Timeless Wisdom: Ultimate Issues Hour - What Do Children Need?

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Welcome to Timeless Wisdom with Dennis Prager. Hear thousands of hours of Dennis's lectures, courses, and classic radio programs. And to purchase Dennis Prager's Rational Bibles, go to DennisPrager.com.

Hi everybody, it's Tuesday, and when possible, I have the Ultimate Issues Hour because If you get the ultimate issues right, you'll have a much better life. You will lead a better life and you will make a better society. It's a pretty good combination. So I'd like to talk to you today about what is it that children really need and Here is my thesis, which explains much of what has caused a deterioration, massive deterioration in our society over the last century, and particularly half a century. So let me put it in this way. What do you think children need more? Expressions of love or security? Expressions of love or guardrails? Meaning you can't do this and you must do that. You can't do this and you must do that. Which do you think will produce a happier and finer human being? I don't know exactly why it happened. I will admit that. And maybe some people do know why. I would love to learn why. But I, well, I have one theory because I can date it. The World War II generation decided that what their children most need is love, expressions of love. I love you, I love you, I love you. Have I told you how much I love you? And that's fine if it's accompanied by security and guardrails. Guardrails is You'll fall off unless you follow the following rules of life. There are no guardrails in a home without discipline, as a best way of, I guess, explaining what guardrails means. And so after the love preoccupation came unconditional love preoccupation. Not only should you tell your child how much you love him or her, but that it is unconditional, that no matter how your child behaves, your child will just receive effusive love, effusive expressions of love. You can tell I'm not a big believer in this. I love my children. They know I love them. But my primary concentration was on guardrails and security. Here's how to lead a better life. This is what you need to do to be kind and to be good. You have to pursue truth. All these values, values. And I tried to be a model. Obviously— not obviously, I also tried to be a model. That's a very big deal in the raising of children. When did this whole love preoccupation begin is a, is a very interesting question, and we'll get into that. Dennis Prager, 776. Hi everybody, Ultimate Issues Hour on raising children. Do you agree, disagree, partially agree, partially disagree? We've overdone it on the expressions of love to the detriment of moral instruction. Which includes discipline. So we went from parents primarily teaching their kids values to then primarily expressing how much they love them, to then announcing to the world how important not just love but unconditional love The message of which is, no matter how you behave, we, your mom and dad, will love you. No matter how you behave. I'm curious, does anybody, does any rational individual think you will get good behavior from people who are told you're being loved, you will be loved no matter how you behave? That's why, by the way, I, I'm not a fan. This is a theological discussion for another time. I've had it with you on the Ultimate Issues Hour. I'm not a fan of saying God unconditionally loves, and I don't even know what the biblical basis is. I know the biblical basis of God's love for humanity, but unconditionally? I don't know where the basis is, whether it's behavior or faith. You got to do something. You just— you can't go on the way you were before and still be loved. Or maybe you're loved, but you're not saved, at least in Christian terms. So it changed the way children were raised. That is the root of the civilizational decline. The spoiled brats at Harvard, these nothings, these narcissistic, arrogant, immoral nothings. Not all Harvard students. My dear Julie, whom I have a podcast with, went to Harvard. I know some terrific people who went to Harvard. My brother went to Harvard. But by and large, I'm using Harvard as an example because it's the most prestigious university. And they have a particularly high percentage of a-holes for students. And faculty, one might add. Those faculty were raised the way I'm describing. Even the oldest faculty is still post-World War II. The, the praise that I hear parents give to their children is, is beyond belief. Everything is awesome. I mean, the word awesome deserves its own Ultimate Issues Hour. You give an order to a waiter or waitress. Yeah, I'll have a side of coleslaw. Awesome. I'm thinking, why is a side of coleslaw awesome? Would a side of fries be awesome too? Yeah, I suspect so. But a side of broccoli? Awesome. How about, eh, I won't have a side? Awesome. So no side or any side is awesome. Awesome, it was reserved historically in the English language for that which inspires Aww, you know, running the 4-minute mile, climbing Everest, saving a kid's life who fell into an icy pond. That's, uh, those, those things are awesome. But the praise, the praise that is offered to kids, the unconditional love. So it produces these people who expect life to present them with constant love and attention and praise. A lap. It's known as lap. Yes, so in fact, sit on my lap. It comes from love, attention, praise. That is where the word lap comes from. Look it up, Sean. Yep, that's right. Sit on my love, attention— what was the P for again? Praise.

Yeah.

'Let me give you more love, attention, and praise.' Then people get these spoiled narcissists and wonder, 'I don't understand. I so loved them, so loved him, so loved her.' Believe it or not, most children, that's not what they most need. The opposite of love— hate, abuse, etc.— is evil. That goes without saying. But oodles of love, I don't, I don't know. It's, it's not necessarily bad because if it's accompanied by guardrails, discipline, etc., it could be fine. But I don't, I don't know how important it is. The other thing, I don't have an answer to this, but how often if you tell your child how much you love them, at what point, and maybe there is no point, I have no answer to this, but at what point does it begin to lack meaning? Maybe never. Okay, I'm totally okay with that. I don't have an answer to it.

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Now back to more of Dennis Prager's Timeless Wisdom.

Okay, let's see here. Yep, Dave in Atlanta, Georgia. Hello.

Yes, sir. Just wanted to say I agree with what you're saying. Um, and really true love includes discipline. It's just that, um, sorry, it's raining here pretty hard, but the reason God disciplines us is because he loves us. So a parent-child relationship's no different. We discipline our kids because we love them. We want them to be good people, um, and not just tell them yes all the time. Because you tell them yes all the time and that's where the entitlement comes from. No respect for our authority or for our elders. I grew up respecting my elders and that's what's going on nowadays, it seems like. And if you tell them no, it's considered emotional abuse.

I agree with you, that's correct. The interesting, I would be very curious to have some, I don't know if it's doable, but I would be curious in the extreme to juxtapose children raised in religious Jewish and Christian homes and children raised in secular homes. I'm not even asking now for the result, although that would be obviously important, and interesting, but the methodology. You know, I've told you that as far as unconditional love is concerned, there is a metric in Google— it's an astonishing thing that it exists— which tells you how often a phrase, or I think even a word, is used, was used starting in the early 20th century. Starting in 1900. And if you look up unconditional love, it's virtually at zero until the 1950s, and then it skyrockets like a ski slope in the 1960s. So interestingly, this notion did not come from the religious community. It came from the '60s anti-religious value system. So when Christians, or it's usually Christians in this case more than Jews, when religious Christians as opposed to religious Jews, secular Jews might say the same, speak of unconditional love, they don't know they've been influenced by secular society. Back in a moment. What a show lap. I like that one. Love, attention, praise. I got a question for you. I'm talking about the bombardment of expressions of love on children and how it's not worked out. Things they need more. Here's an interesting one. I just thought about this. So think about your childhood. What would you have preferred your parent— between the two things, they're telling you how much they love you or telling you how much they admire you? I, I don't have an answer. I, I— but it was— it just occurred to me to ask the question. Yeah, anyway, I think that the expressions of love— I think love has been sort of cheapened in, in the last, uh, what is it, well, not 100 years, but since the post-World War II era. We're approaching on 100 years. Okay, let's see here what you folks have to say. William in Rye, New York. Hello.

Oh, good day to you, Dennis.

Thank you.

Uh, but coleslaw is much better than broccoli. Neither is awesome, but I go with coleslaw anyway.

No, no, it's a fair point, although broccoli properly flavored with salt and seasoning could be delicious. But go ahead.

Right. Yeah, neither is awesome though. Um, so when my younger brother and I were teenagers, my father caught my younger brother smoking pot, and he sat us both down with his mother, with my mother standing next to him, uh, and he said to my brother, uh, you're not going to do this again. If I catch you doing anything like it, I'm going to do to you what the boxers in China did to addicts during the Opium War. Do you know what that is? And of course, my brother didn't. Nobody told him that the box blew— literally blew the brains out of the opium addicts. And, uh, my brother started to well up a bit, and he was a tough kid. And then my father just looked at him and said, listen, I have to do this because I'm your father. He says, I love you, and that's why I do this. Now get out of here, you know. And that was it. And, uh, my brother never did it again.

So, well, I have a lot of anecdotes about that, some of which I think some listeners will recall, but it's worth it. I did an hour on the, on the show many, really many years ago. If you didn't take drugs in high school or didn't use drugs in high school, why didn't you? I had no idea what answers I would get. I was curious what prevented people who didn't use them from using them. And it was fascinating. Caller after caller said, 'Cause I, uh, my mother would kill me.' You wouldn't have that today. 'My mother would kill me.' Anybody who said that and it was overheard by Child Protective Services the parent might lose custody of their child. I have another great one. A friend of my younger son, one that does the podcast AP Unfiltered— Aaron Prager Unfiltered, it's one word— and, uh, he, uh, he was addicted for a number of years. He's been sober for 7 And he's really has— is leading a wonderful, productive life. So I have met some of his closest friends, also recovering addicts, and one of them said to me, you know, I owe my father my life. I said, really? How so? Because one day he said to me, get the F out of my house and come— don't come back until you're sober. So now I know many of you will say, well, that was a loving thing to do. Okay, I agree with you, and it was a loving thing to do, but he didn't say I love you. It was get the F out of my house and don't come back till you're sober. He didn't tell him how much he loved him. All right, let's see what else you folks have to say on this. Oh, okay, okay. Don in Jolton, Tennessee. Hi there.

Hi, Dad.

Hi, Dennis.

How you doing?

Good, thank you.

So I believe that this, uh, this unconditional love has come as a misrepresentation of what my theology is, which is a Reformed theology whereby my salvation was paid in full at the cross by Christ, but before my salvation and after my salvation is meritorious. In other words, the sins I've committed before I was saved, I would pay the just penalty for those sins. Now, as one of his elect, that is, he chose me before the foundation of the world. By the way, this is the same for Jews, where in Romans 11 it says not all Israel are of Israel. And he said, Jacob I loved, Esau I hated. This is all meted out in Romans 9. Whereby God has determined my eternal destiny at the cross, but before and after is a meritocracy. I'm going to receive a reward at the end of my life, and it's going to be based on what I did after I was saved at the cross.

That— what is the name of that theology? That's fascinating.

Yeah, it's called Reformed theology, and I—

so then it's a theology where works in addition to belief save you?

Yes, works after you say gives evidence that I have been saved.

I think that's great. I wish, I wish that were the universal teaching. If you don't behave properly, it, it means that you're You're not saved. You're not saved alone by works alone. That's obviously basic Christianity. But you're not saved without works. That's an important message.

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Now back to more of Dennis Prager's timeless wisdom.

Yes, we have overdone it with expressions of love for children. I'm sorry, I know it sounds cruel. It's not. It's actually quite loving. A staggering number of entitled young people are ruining this country, and they have since the baby boomers, since my generation. After all, who taught these kids to loathe everything beautiful, including beauty? It was the baby boomer generation, but they, they also got it from somebody. All right, let's see here. Patrick, Mammoth Springs, Arkansas.

Hello.

Hello, Mr. Prager. I love your show and I love how you bring clarity to these issues.

Thank you so much.

First of all, let me say I agree completely with what the conclusion you've come to.

I, I deal—

I'm a what's called an evangelical. I'm sure you know what that is, but I'm also a Reformed evangelical, which helps me and helps— maybe helps you understand that I could see unconditional love very, very narrowly, and not as though God loves everybody equally. Um, the Reformed theology, as your previous caller said, qualifies that faith without works is dead, as it says in James 2:17. And if a Christian doesn't recognize that the vast majority of people who claim to know Christ are not living according to what the New Testament says they should be, then they're severely blinded.

Good. You wanted to call up about the Hebrew word hesed?

Yes, I studied out the origins of how this could have happened in evangelical circles, that unconditional love was bandied about as it was. and I came up with, uh, in the Old Testament, uh, translated goodness, mercy, numerous other— loving kindness, uh, the word chesed. And if you look at, um, if you're trying to find how the apostles in the first century came up with this idea which we now call unconditional love, I think you can find it in the 247 times that chesed is used.

Well, that's interesting. I, I had never heard that. And of course, I, I know biblical Hebrew, uh, well, and I've never heard it as unconditional. The most famous use of it might be the, this, the what they call in Judaism the 13 attributes of God. Let me see. So it's, let's see, okay, this is always a challenge. So God is El Rachum, a God of mercy, the Chanun, and kindness, or however Chanun would be translated. Rav Chesed, filled with Chesed, your term, and truth. So, and then there's more about God. So this is essential, but it's nowhere does it imply unconditional. So that's what I was aiming for and trying to review the verse. Oh, all right. Anyway, I thank you. I do. I do thank you for your call. Yep, Chicago and Rose. Hello, Rose.

Hi, Dennis. Um, I was just going to say I believe there has to be a balance, that a child who has many rules and boundaries and does not feel that they are loved by their parents, it breeds insecurity and rebellion. I believe love is extremely important, that, that they know that that their mom and dad is going to love them no matter what. And I do believe the Bible teaches— I do agree with the Reformed theology. I believe that my Savior loves me unconditionally. My assurance is not in how good I am, but in the sacrifice that my Savior bore for me to take my sin upon himself. Also, I was going to say God didn't give up on me. I went through a time of rebellion in my teen years, and in college I was ashamed when a Christian came up to me and started talking to me about Jesus, and I was embarrassed. And in spite of all that, Jesus led me to himself and became my Lord, the Lord of my life and my Savior. And My life changed that day.

What happened?

My faith in him. And I believe I had way more love after I became a Christian than a love that centered on pleasing me, making me happy.

Right, so I have a question. Hold on, I'll pose a question when you return. So I have a question. Is Our Lady still here? Rose in Chicago, thank you. Good. Did you have children, or do you have children?

Yes, I had 4 children.

They're grown now, I would assume.

So here, I was just— this is a curiosity question, so let me see. I wrote it down during the break. Did you convey the message to your children, no matter what they did, no matter how awful they would ever be toward others, you would still love them?

I never said it in those words, but I do believe my children knew that I would love them no matter what. I would tell them sometimes when I had to discipline them, and I was pretty strict, um, that I love you too much to let you get away with this. And, um, I don't think they ever doubted my love.

So it isn't—

it is—

it's a tough question, and I'm not arguing with you at all. And, you know, I don't hesitate to argue if I have to, but I'm not arguing with you. So it's a very interesting moral question as well as anything else religious or pedagogic. I mean, what if one's— not yours or any more mine, just in general— what if one's child commits a heinous act of rape and murder? Do we want them— do we want them to think— I'm not asking would we still love them because parental love might be immutable, but do we want to convey to our children, I just want you to know— I mean, would we say it, it doesn't matter what evil you commit, I will still love you? You would not have said that to your child, right?

I don't think I would have said that, but I think by my actions that I would never give up on them, um, repenting from a horrible wickedness, um, that I would never stop praying for them or loving them, even though my heart would grieve.

Right. And I know that. Yes. Okay, thank you. By the way, it's important to note that she said she was strict So I think the combination of love and strictness is really, really terrific. But we, we now have generations of Americans raised with effusive love and minimal strictness, and the results are quite awful. And if there's an imbalance towards strictness over expressions of love, I think you will still produce a better human being than if there is an imbalance and there is far more expressions of love than strictness. But it is interesting that I don't know any parent, even believers in unconditional love, who would say to their child, I just want you to know it doesn't matter what you do to hurt any other person. I will still love you. No parent would say that. But why not? If in fact unconditional love is an ideal, why, why wouldn't we say that? That's what it means, right? Unconditional means there is no condition under which I would withdraw it. But you wouldn't say that to your child. Why not? And I, I don't know if God has said that to us. But anyway, this is not primarily about unconditional love. It is about the imbalance that generations now have had, and the results can be seen at Harvard Yard of spoiled brats. I'll bet vast numbers of them were told by their parents how terrific they are and how much they love them a lot. That's, that's my suspicion.

This episode of Timeless Wisdom will continue right after this.

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Now back to more of Dennis Prager's timeless wisdom.

All right, let's see here. Des Plaines, Illinois, and Ross.

Hello, Ross.

Hello, Dennis. Can you hear me?

I hear you. It's a slight reverberation, but I hear you fine.

Oh, I'm sorry. Here, I can just get off the Bluetooth thing.

Uh, probably. Yeah. Yep, I agree with that.

Is that better?

A little bit. Yeah, thank you.

Okay. Um, hang on a second.

I can't talk now.

Wow, that's sad. I hope it's not bad. Ed in Wheaton, Illinois, hello.

Dennis, it's always a pleasure to talk to you. Um, my 90-plus-year-old mother had a— what we could describe as a near-death experience, I guess, following a surgery. She had this hours-long conversation with God even though she was only under for about 40 minutes.

Um, and one of the things, by the way, just for the record, that's how many of my classes felt. They felt hours long and they were only 40 minutes, so I totally get it.

Well, you know, with, with God, an hour is—

uh, yeah, no, it's very different with God. Okay, go ahead.

Um, there's a family member that had an abortion and Um, she shared a conversation that she had with who she believed to be Jesus or God, and the love that he showed and said that he had for all of his children was something that I thought was pretty profound. I mean, we talked about the love of God, but to think that he can love somebody even though they've whatever, you know, murdered someone and with a gun or with their hands, or in this case, she decided to take this baby's life. So the love that God has— well, the Bible doesn't talk about.

Right. So here is my— here is one of my challenges, and that is no one Not a parent, not a pastor, no religious figure would announce the following: I just want my congregation to know, or I just want you, my child, to know that no matter what you do, how evil it is, I will still love you. No one says that about themselves or about God. So we know that the message would be counterproductive. Ex post facto, 'Well, you committed this act and I still love you,' or 'You committed this act and God still loves you,' is not the same as announcing, 'It doesn't matter what you do, I will still love you.' Pastors don't say that, and parents don't say that. Hi everybody, Dennis Prager here. I just shared some information with Sean about Tiglath-Pileser, and I didn't want to hide that from you, my dear listeners. I know somebody who appreciated that immensely. This is such an important subject. You know, it evolved, not devolved, but evolved into discussions on unconditional love, which is the way it works. There's an organic evolution in many hours of my program. But remember, the point that I open with for this Ultimate Issues Hour is that effusive praise and love is, is dangerous if it'll— certainly if not accompanied by equal amounts of discipline. I mean equal, just for the record. Uh, we have really good ones here. Well, Orlando, Florida. Mike, hello.

Hey Dennis, always a pleasure, sir. Okay, so my dad told me that I had to give him back his keys, uh, to the house. I wasn't welcome there anymore. I didn't live there at the time, but it was because I almost got why out. I was like, why? Because he's like, because you steal from us, you be— we can't trust you, you lie to us all the time, you know, you're not welcome here unsupervised. And so I went out and I'm a low-bottom drunk addict and I hit bottoms. And today, man, they try to eliminate bottoms. Parents try to eliminate bottoms.

That's a great line. That is a great line.

Wow. And also one other thing is the self-esteem thing. It's like people think they can give people self-esteem. You have to earn it. You have to earn it. And I've been sober like 30 years now. In the last 11, 12 years of my dad's life, we had the greatest relationship.

I believe it. I believe it.

I, I—

the point on they don't want us to hit bottom, that's a big reason for so many of those disgusting kids at Harvard Yard. And also a big reason— it is the primary reason, a primary, maybe not the— for the nihilistic leftism ingratitude of a generation. They were raised by parents who didn't want them to ever have any pain.

This has been Timeless Wisdom with Dennis Prager. Visit DennisPrager.com for thousands of hours of Dennis's lectures, courses, and classic radio programs, and to purchase Dennis Prager's Rational Bibles. Your beloved dog and a stranger are both drowning. You can only save one. Who do you save? Every time Dennis Prager asks that question, his audience splits three ways. One-third chooses the dog, one-third chooses the stranger, and one-third aren't sure.

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Because we live in an age where increasingly feelings define right and wrong. But if morality is based on emotion, then murder, rape, and theft are just opinions? And if people feel justified, why is rioting or destruction wrong at all? In his new book, If There Is No God, Dennis Prager explains why civilizations cannot survive without objective morality and why Judeo-Christian values shape the moral foundations of the free world.

If you claim that certain things are good, certain things are evil, independent of how you feel about it, You are in effect affirming God.

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