You’ve Got to be Taught…
CONTRIBUTED BY JACK LEVINE
In Rogers and Hammerstein’s South Pacific, we are given this lesson in song…
You’ve got to be taught to hate and fear
You’ve got to be taught from year to year
It’s got to be drummed in your dear little ear
You’ve got to be carefully taught.
You’ve got to be taught to be afraid
Of people whose eyes are oddly made
And people whose skin is a different shade
You’ve got to be carefully taught.
You’ve got to be taught before it’s too late
Before you are six or seven or eight
To hate all the people your relatives hate
You’ve got to be carefully taught
You’ve got to be carefully taught.
Click to listen to the song: You’ve Got to be Taught – South Pacific
Yes, it’s true that babies are not born to be mean, hateful, or violent. These are learned behaviors…that are observed in others and modeled.
Part of our task as parents, grandparents, and caregivers is to realize that from the earliest stages of infancy and early childhood, our little ones are watching and listening. If conflict is perceived as normal, children grow to emulate that behavior with the unconscious assumption that it is the right way to act.
When we model love and caring, gentleness and encouragement, our children behave accordingly. As the writer James Baldwin so prophetically said “ Children occasionally do as we say, but invariably do what we do.”
