Are parents permitted to be involved in their children's development, growth, education, and acculturalization?

The problem seems to originate by the way that children are taught from a young age:

קיצור שלחן ערוך קמ"ג ב: איזהו מורא... ולא יסתור את דבריו, ולא יכריע את דבריו לפניו, אפילו לומר: נראין דברי אבא. עד היכן מוראם? היה הבן לבוש חמודות ויושב בראש הקהל, ובאו אביו או אמו וקרעו את בגדיו והכהו על ראשו וירקו בפניו – לא יכלים אותם ולא יצער בפניהם ולא יכעס כנגדם, אלא ישתוק ויירא מן מלך מלכי המלכים הקב"ה...

קמג יח: אסור להכות את בנו הגדול. ואין גדלות זו תלויה בשנים, אלא הכל לפי טבעו של הבן, כל שיש לחוש שיתריס כנגדו בדבור או במעש, אפילו אינו בר מצוה – אסור להכותו, אלא יוכיחו בדברים. וכל המכה את בנו הגדול, מנדין אותו...

A parent may try to raise children to use their intelligence. From a young age, however, the schools conflict with this training from the parents. They intentionally misinterpret this ruling from the Shulchan Aruch. They teach children that they may not respond to parents. As a result, children simply listen to monologues from their parents, and they are afraid to respond. That clashes with the methods that some good parents would want to use in order to raise their children.

The system teaches children to avoid any serious communication with parents. Communication could lead to a disagreement or a conflict. Parents speak, and children do not respond. Children are very limited in what they can say to their parents. Any serious discussions are held with others – not with parents. In those outside discussions, children are permitted to speak what and how they want. Thus, children share important issues with other children and personages, but not with their parents.

As a result, a father who wants to actively raise his children will rapidly discover that he is fighting the system. חנוך לנער ע"פ דרכו has become the job of the school, since the system believes that חינוך is not the job of the parent. In order for the school to carry out its job, it has the obligation to get involved in the details of a child’s life. The school then makes snap decisions based on its findings.

Since the parent is limited in his ability to raise the child, he gives him everything he wants. There is no reason not to do so. After all, the only reason to withhold something from a child is for חינוך: “I’ll give you a ball if you follow our rule.” However, if this is not the parent’s job, then the parent may as well give the child everything.

This situation also justifies other things:

• There is nothing wrong with sending the child out into the street to grow up there.
• If a child wants something now, then the parent will interrupt anything that he is doing in order to satisfy the child’s immediate need. Indeed, in most families, the parent cannot make a phone call in peace if a child of any age wants something.

In this home, children do not have to earn things they want. That would involve getting into the area of חינוך. A child may demand anything of the parent, in any way. After all, כבוד הורים has a very specific and limited Halachic meaning, such as refraining from sitting in the parent’s seat. It does not mean the same as the English word, "Respect."

This works perfectly for the educational system. A child is sent away to Yeshiva, and he comes home every few weeks or months. During vacations there is a Yeshiva Bein Hazemanim or a camp to keep him away from the parents and under the control of the Yeshiva. Parents are given the excuse that the Yeshiva wants to keep the child off the streets. They give a clear message that the parents are incapable of dealing with their children for several weeks. For some reason, the parents accept this insulting restriction. They agree that the school should control and raise their children. In effect, they agree that they are not capable of doing so.

The parent thus sees the child quite infrequently. During their rare and limited meetings, the parents and children have shallow, unimportant, and light talk, or else they review what the child studied in school. This also reinforces the superior status of the school.

The home offers no חינוך. The Yeshiva raises the child.

This might be compared to a situation in which a person has guests from abroad for a few days. Everybody tolerates with each other’s schtick for that brief time, until the guests go back home. Nobody tries to to educate or to contradict anybody else. Everybody realizes that it is more important to have fond memories of the limited visit than to get involved in any sensitive issues.

ולא יסתור את דבריו does not increase communication or bonding between parent and child. To the contrary. It does the opposite. Children are afraid to initiate any discussion that may ultimately lead to a contradiction. Parents learn to refrain from any controversial discussion, since it will put the children in a position in which they cannot respond. Everybody is very cautious about what they say, since this is what the system supposedly commands us to do.

The school is interested in instilling the concept that it, and not the home, is the focus of the child's life. Of course, the situation becomes absurd when schools call parents after the children face disciplinary problems. Those parents are not going to help the school deal with their children. The school system and the misinterpretation of הלכה have removed the parents' desire or ability to train their children.

The schools teach this misuse of הלכה from a very early age. Children learn to worship the school and the system, while at the same time they show shallow and tacit agreement with parents. They do not get involved with their parents deeply. They accept the fact that no thinking is permitted in the company of their parents, because that could lead to disagreement.

This misdirected use of the concept of יסתור must be removed from the system. I explain that the system requires a Yysterectomy. There may be no other word in the Hebrish language that has a double-Y.

There’s more. חנוך לנער ע"פ דרכו means that the educational philosophy of the school must match that of the child. If there is a mismatch, then the child must be sent to another school that matches his דרך. However, the child must choose from a standard, cookie-cutter דרך.

That means that according to הלכה, the school must offer the "right" derech for the child – whether it is Chassidic, Lithuanian, or National Religious. The child, in turn, must receive the חנוך that the matches that "right" derech. Since the school’s derech matches the child’s derech, the school raises the child to accept that approach as the only “right” דרך. As a result, there is no room for differences or individuality for each child, and no room for accepting any דרך other than the “right” one that corresponds to both the child and the school.

Under these circumstances, it is clear why some Kollel fathers come home so late that they barely see their children who are at home. When the father comes home, the children give him the respect as shown in the interpretation of the שלחן ערוך, and then they go off to sleep. There is no reason for the father to give any serious amount of time to his children, since his job is only to give, not to raise or influence the children.

The educational system removes the parents' ability to raise children. The Yeshiva world goes further, by allowing and encouraging lying or saying the “right” thing. Yes, this is a controversial topic, and many Yeshiva leaders will become very defensive when they read this paragraph. However, the Yeshivas teach this way of life by example. The family cannot correct this situation, since all chinuch and middos are to be taught by the school, and where there is a conflict, the school must win. The Yeshiva world does not place an emphasis on honesty and being straight. They place an emphasis on saying the right things (לא יסתור).

Case study: An elderly person lived in an upper floor of an apartment building. He had a minyan at his home on Friday nights. His children decided to move him to another neighborhood in order to be close to a different relative who could take care of him. He also had the "advantage" of limited stairs to his new home.

The man did not want to move, but the children moved him in the name of כבוד אב. He was lonely in his new location and died shortly afterwards. The children admitted that the move killed him.

He died of כבוד אב.