When we educate our children, it is often appreciated that the child obeys. But Obedience, far from being a value, I think it's the opposite, an extremely dangerous reaction for the child and for his future. And to illustrate, I'm going to talk about milgram experiment, just as we have used other famous psychological experiments to invite you to reflection.
Of course, there is a logical and healthy aspect of obedience: the confidence of our children in us to alert them in dangerous situations. But this immediate obedience should not be based on the idea that adults are always right and should follow our instructions (or those of another adult with authority) without question, but must be born of, as I was saying, the confidence that, if We send something, it's for your safety. As a value to instill, obedience is dangerous.
Obedience is dangerous for children
Obedience, as a value, is really dangerous for the children First, by the methods with which it is achieved. To get a child to be obedient, punishment (of whatever type) or threat (physical or emotional) or blackmail is used ("if you don't do what I tell you, you don't love me or you are bad"). It seeks to achieve blind obedience.
Rather, we should always be open to dialogue, negotiation, rectification and the right of the child to receive explanations appropriate to his age. Only if the child trusts that we act justly can we expect him to totally trust situations of risk.
Conversely, demand the child to obey Without complaining to the adult with authority and to do so without explanation or right to refuse, it is enormously dangerous even for your own safety. The acceptance of unjust norms, of orders from anyone to whom the society of authority, oppression and submission are consequences of instilling obedience.
Even the silence of many children in the face of abuse has, as one of its causes, that demand for adult obedience and unquestionable acceptance of authority.
Obedience is dangerous for free society
But, beyond the immediate consequences for the child, obedience as a value is, as I said, dangerous for free society. Obedient people are directed towards an objective: they must assume that the authority has the right to mark their actions and should not question it or stand up against it if it is unfair. Nothing occurs to me, besides the "black pedagogy", more dangerous to educate free people, with their own criteria and able to reveal themselves to injustice.
Fear creeps to the bone, even more, the refusal to obey an unfair rule or order is the first barrier that must be overcome to achieve it. If we want to educate our children to fight for justice we should not put obedience among the priority values that we instill or expect from them. The upbringing and education of our children will influence their future as free people in society.
The Milgram Experiment
To illustrate what I am telling you, I am going to invite you to know and reflect on the famous Milgram experiment. If you do not know him, surely you stay, as I did, absolutely speechless. It seems a lie, it seems incredible, but it is true. Obedience to authority remains so encumbered in our minds that we are capable of committing the greatest monstrosities.
One issue we are going to start from is war crimes caused by obedience and the supposed right that any soldier must have to disobey a criminal order. But is that always possible?
Milgram showed that no, that human beings have (or, in my opinion, those educated with black pedagogy in obedience) tend to obey authority by the simple fact of being, delegating in it their criteria, their autonomy, their Judgment and your freedom. If the authority sends something the responsibility is already of that authority and not of ourselves, being able to do things that no decent person would do. Let's go with Milgram.
Stanley Milgram was a psychologist at Yale University and devised this experience thinking of precisely assessing crimes committed during Nazism.
The legal and philosophical aspects of obedience are of enormous importance, but they say very little about how most people behave in concrete situations. I set up a simple experiment at Yale University to test how much pain an ordinary citizen would inflict on another person simply because they were asking for a scientific experiment. The strong authority was imposed on the strong moral imperatives of the subjects (participants) to hurt others and, with the cries of the victims ringing in the ears of the subjects (participants), the authority subjugated more frequently. The extreme willingness of adults to accept almost any requirement ordered by the authority is the main discovery of the study.
The subjects thought that the experiment would analyze another parameter, but in reality, what they were looking for was determine to what extent they were able to obey authority contrary to their morality. Participants thought they were applying electric shocks to a subject and would increase the intensity at the command of the authority figure. Most agreed to continue causing harm even when they heard cries of agony.
In the different experiments, the results, with little significant variations, indicated that people were, mostly, capable of consciously causing damage whenever it was the manifest authority who ordered them.
Perhaps the most exciting thing about milgram experiment It is the letter of one of the participants, who understood the object of the work, and, faced with what was lived, decided to become a conscientious objector when he was called as a soldier to the Vietnam War. But most would not react in this way. Authority was too firm a value in their minds to question it.
He milgram experiment It is essential, in my opinion, to understand how the value of obedience can be harmful. Definitely, obedience can be very dangerous. Do you want your children to apply electric shocks if the authority sends it?
