Help Kids to Select Worthy Heroes – Revisited due to Mike Vick

Michael Vick - Role Model?

In light of the recent case involving Mike Vick, it seems pertinent to revisit the article that I published in this column last year about helping children to select worthy heroes.

In Mike’s public address that he issued following his conviction of a felony he apologized to any children who might have looked up to him as a role model. That is a nice thought, but for parents I would just ask, “How would a parent allow their child to select Mike as a role model in the first place? What had he done to be selected? Would it be because he is famous? Was it because he was gifted with great talent as an athlete? Was it because he seemed defiant of most rules and authority? Why pick Mike Vick?”

Get Involved in the Process of Choosing Heroes with Your Kids!

I would again like to caution parents to guide children to set extremely high standards for selecting heroes. Be careful of allowing your children to fall into the trap of selecting heroes and role models based upon fame or talent. Teach your children to select role models based upon sound values, morals, ethics and standards that you have discussed openly and honestly with your children. If you discussthe standards for selecting their heroes with them, that they will learn as much or more from the process of choosing their heroes as they will from the heroes themselves!

Selecting Heroes

In today's society like in the past, kids have heroes. This is a good thing if they choose carefully! However, in modern society it seems the process of selecting heroes has become rather muddled or confused. Fame should not necessarily make a person a hero. We, in our family, have experienced this from both sides: first as parents of two sons who chose heroes while growing up, and now with two sons who have distinguished themselves as outstanding athletes, who are often the object of hero worship.

Please hang in here with me on this one so there is no misinterpretation of what I am attempting to say. We do believe that both our sons are worthy heroes. Both are moral, ethical, kind, honest, and admirable people with a strong sense of family. Both are civic minded and both give back to their respective communities.

What is alarming is to see how so many young people have selected them as heroes who know nothing about them. Many children have been taught to, or at least allowed to, select their heroes/role models based upon nothing more than skill at a game or fame. Few of these kids have been challenged to know much about their heroes beyond some perceived skill or fame. If children had been taught some criteria or standards for selecting role models, it would be different; and Michael Vick would not be needing to apologize to any children.

Diligence, Honesty, Loyalty, Integrity

Allow me to illustrate with a personal example. Barbara's Father, Dick Matthews, died suddenly a few years ago. His five grandchildren delivered the eulogy at the funeral. It was obvious to all in attendance that "Grandpa Dick" was a hero to all five. As they spoke of him through their tears, they all mentioned his hero status in their eyes and used words like loyal, dedicated to his wife, hard-working, honest, a man whose word was his bond, as well as describing a fun Grandpa who always had a smile a mile wide.

Dick Matthews was quite a fellow. Nobody could outwork him outside his home. He built houses for a living but he also ran a 120-acre farm and did odd jobs on the side as was needed for extra money for the family. If necessary, I'm certain he would have taken a night job to provide for his family and he did all of his work cheerfully, and with a bounce of purpose in his step.

Inside their home it was a different story. In his house, Dick was the "king" and Maxine, his loving wife of 56 years, waited upon him and hand foot. It was not a "modern" romance but rather one from a previous generation and it worked beautifully for them. Dick earned a living and Maxine kept up the home.

Then, ten years before Dick's death, tragedy struck that loving couple and Maxine was stricken by a severe stroke. Overnight she became in need of around-the-clock care rather than being the caregiver. Without the slightest blink, Dick became the 24-hour, 7 days a week caregiver; and on top of that, he began to do all of the housework! He did all of the laundry, cooking, cleaning, shopping and everything else Maxine had done for all the years of their partnership of love. He even did her hair and put on her makeup!

A Real Hero Worthy of Imitation - A True Role Model

During Dick's last year of life, they came to visit with us up at our home in Montana. While out to breakfast alone with Dick one morning, I was struck by the enormity of the change he had made on behalf of his loving wife, Maxine, and I asked him how he made such an amazing change so suddenly and so cheerfully. His answer really affected me that day and it will always be in my memory. He looked back at me, got tears in his eyes, and then quietly said, "One day 56 years ago, I said 'I do'..."

Man, I think that everyone deserves to be loved like that just once!

At his funeral each of his grandkids said that one thing they had learned from Grandpa Dick was to honor commitments! They each got the message. He was not famous but; he was a hero to all.

Help Children to Pick Heroes; Carefully and Precisely

We, as parents and as adults, need to hold people like Dick Matthews up as heroes to our children! We all know people in our families and in our neighborhoods that are so worthy of being heroes to our kids. We must not be so careless as to think that kids will seek out these remarkable but often quiet people; we need to teach them what a real hero is and point out some in their immediate surroundings.

Sure an athlete makes a flashy hero and many are worthy of the status. Some musicians, actors, and public figures are worthy also, but let's be careful to teach our kids what makes a person worthy of “Hero” or “Role Model” status. (More on our website: Teaching Values to Children )

What are the criteria for picking your heroes in your family? Make tomorrow "Hero Day" in your family and talk about what makes a real hero! talk about it daily. Pick some heroes for your whole family. then challenge your children to pick some people who are worthy of being their onw role models. The process of choosing will work well to teach some pretty valuable lessons.

Mike Vick, Dog-Fighting, and Parenting Part 2

An Excerpt from "Parenting with Dignity" Book

Here is an excerpt from my book "Parenting with Dignity" that kind of puts in a nutshell how effective parenting skills can arm children against making the kind of terrible decisions that Mike has allegedly made.

Respect for Authority

"Do it because it's the law." Teach your children that a civilized world will always have rules and laws. Teach them that these are not an annoyance; they are an aid to us all. Rules and laws protect our rights, privileges, property, and safety. Explain to them that chaos would result from a society without stop signs, property laws, and rights to privacy, opportunity, expression, and freedom from injury. (Note that it is almost impossible to teach respect for laws and rules if your children see you violate those same rules and laws. You can't speed and then demand that your children drive the speed limit!)

This education about rules and laws can start at a very early age. It really works to point out to kids as young as four or five that a busy intersection simply would not be negotiable without traffic lights. I watch our son teach his kids the meaning of red, yellow, and green lights and how they protect all of us, and it's easy to see why, at three and four, they're able to negotiate intersections by looking at the lights and knowing how to decide when to stop and when to go.

As I work in juvenile prisons (and adult prisons, for that matter), it never ceases to amaze me how almost every kid who is in trouble with the law has little or no knowledge of the very law that they have violated! A child who has a knowledge of laws and an ability to use that knowledge to make decisions is far better equipped for successful living than a child who doesn't!

Check back for the next article as I will highlight some other portions of Parenting with Dignity and how it will help arm your children to make great decisions for themselves.

Mike Vick, Dog-Fighting, and Parenting

Finger of Blame

It is amazing to me to read the bulk of the writing and commentary that is coming about as a result of the whole legal issue of Mike Vick, his indictment for involvement in dog fighting, and the role of the law and the NFL in controlling his behavior. “Why is it amazing?” you ask. Well to me it is amazing simply because it seems to me that few seem to grasp the whole big picture. Everyone seems to be wanting to point a finger of blame at someone.

The Issue Is Parenting

To me this is really not about Mike Vick and dog fighting. To me this is an issue of great cultural significance because this seems to be evidence of a failure of our older generation in teaching the next generation the way that our democracy works in America.

The Issue Is Teaching Children to Respect Rules and Laws

We are a society of rules and laws! Freedom does not mean fewer laws. Freedom does not mean ignoring laws. Freedom does not mean living outside of the laws. Recently someone gave me a bumper sticker as a joke... but to me it was not a joke. It reads, "It's not guns, stupid; it is a lack of parenting!"

The problem in America is not one of more cops and stiffer penalties; it is clearly a problem of doing a better job of teaching our young people about our way of life. Democracy all starts with respect for the rules and laws we create. It simply does not work if we do not show respect for the rules and laws. Our children need to know that!

What freedom means is more laws! The more laws that you can live within the bounds of, the more freedom you have.

American Parents Have Shirked Their Duty

Our older generation (commonly called the “Baby Boomers”) taught the next generation, by their actions, that if there was something that we felt was wrong with our societies laws; all we had to do was to disobey the law! That is not how it works. That is not Democracy; that is Anarchy!

What a disservice we have done to our younger generation.

The problem with Mike Vick is a lack of parenting! Someone failed to teach him to live within the law. My issue is not specifically with Mike Vick's parents... it is with American parents in general. As a society, we Americans need to do a better job of teaching our children to obey rules and laws!

The Point of This Article

Now, like I said, the purpose of this article is not to point the finger of blame at Mike Vick’s parents. The point of this article is to say to every parent, "we need to pay attention to what we teach our younger generation!"

We Americans need to teach respect for rules and laws!

We need to teach respect for our process of making laws in our great nation. We need to teach our children to respect our way of government and to respect our leaders. We need to teach our young people that if we do not like our leaders and the way that they are leading our country, we need to vote them out of office and replace them with leaders who take us in a direction we want to go.

American Democracy Is Built To Allow Change

We need to teach the next generation of Americans that if there is something that they do not like about our structure of laws they must get involved on our system of representative government and work to change that part of the law that they disagree with.

Our forefathers set up a government with a built-in process for change and improvement. Few young Americans understand how that process even works.

Mike Vick, if he indeed was raising, training, and putting dogs in fights, needed some instruction about how our system works. If it is illegal to do something… don’t do it. If you feel that the law is wrong, work to change it but do not just ignore the law.

Missing the Point

It seems that most of the people writing about this unfortunate event seem to be saying that we need stiffer penalties for violators. They say that the problem is lax penalties and weak leaders in the NFL. They say that the problem is that athletes are paid too much. I say "NO!" to all of that… I say that what we need is better parental guidance.

In my book Parenting with Dignity and in our 9-week Parenting with Dignity course we teach parents how to teach their children respect for rules and laws. What America needs is more parents teaching their children respect for rules and laws! It is that simple.