Who should read this chapter? All parents.
Summary: While it is obvious to adults that all our actions have consequences, this is not obvious to children and teens. Without our help, children and teens will learn about consequences by personally experiencing some tragic and catastrophic consequences themselves. Many consequences are too dangerous to experience personally (fire, injury, disease, etc.). We must teach our children about consequences to help them make better decisions in life.
All our actions have consequences. As obvious as this is to us, children do not appreciate this. As with anything else, they must be taught this. Children learn about life on TV -- at least some aspects. While they should ideally be learning about life from their parents at home, exposure to TV is still substantial. Everyday family life is safe and boring. This is how it should be. How do children learn about shoplifting, robbing banks and gang violence? Everyday family life does not routinely expose them to these things. TV provides the only opportunity for children to witness the events surrounding these activities. Unfortunately, TV provides a very distorted view of reality. TV programs and movies are designed to entertain audiences, not necessarily to present an educational session on reality.
For example, a good movie about a bank robbery will typically start with a scene of a highly sophisticated bank robbery being planned using fancy electronic gadgets (very appealing to children). The next scenario is the robbery itself which is exciting and stimulating (very appealing to children). The robbery is successful (since an unsuccessful robbery would make a very boring movie) and the robbers get away with $50 million (very appealing to children). The robbers travel around the world by train, airliners and cruise ships, spending their money while the FBI attempts to track them down (very exciting and appealing to children). After an exhaustive hunt for the bank robbers, FBI agents arrest the robbers and place them in handcuffs with the press madly shooting pictures and video. While the arrest and handcuffs may not be appealing to children, the press coverage is. At this point, the movie ends. Notice that the jail sentence and scenes of the prisoners in jail (the consequences of the crime) are not shown in the movie. Children only see the appealing parts of the crime. They do not see the consequences. To them, robbing banks seems exciting and glamorous. Time spent in jail is too boring to be included in the movie.
It's no wonder that many children have never considered the consequences of their actions. For them to do so, they have to be able to think ahead to foresee what consequences will result from their actions. Small children are simply not able to do this unless they have gone through such an experience themselves. Teens are capable of foreseeing consequences, but they often don't think about it until it is too late. Since we do not necessarily want our children personally experiencing terrible consequences, we must teach them about these consequences so that they are avoided in the future. We cannot rely on TV to educate our children. We must do it ourselves.
Children play with matches because small flames are fascinating. The consequences of this are obvious to adults, but children do not understand how fire spreads. They do not know of the consequence of playing with fire unless they already experienced such a catastrophe or someone has taken the time to explain these consequences to them. We do not want our children experiencing a fire out of control, therefore, they must learn about this consequence from their parents. We must teach them about matches, lighters and fire. If we don't, they will experience the consequences first hand. While learning something first hand is highly effective, many things are too dangerous to learn first hand. This is like learning things the easy way or the hard way. Children must learn the difference. They can learn the easy way by listening to parents or they can learn the hard way by personally experiencing painful and often catastrophic consequences. If we don't teach them about the consequences, they may have to learn the hard way. Unfortunately, there is no generic way to teach them about consequences in general. Each action has unique consequences that must be learned individually.
Teenage driving is an experience that parents dread and also look forward to. Teens now have a new freedom to travel on their own while parents have less responsibility to transport them around and have more time for themselves. Do teens understand the potential consequences of driving a car? When I began to drive, I never understood the potential damage that a car could do. To a teen, a car represents freedom, power and status. As usual, they understand the appealing and exciting aspects, while often failing to understand the potential negative consequences. A car crash might result in car and property damage, but far worse, it can cause human damage. The consequence of human injury or death is underappreciated by most teens. Next time you pass a car accident on the roadside, ask your children about the consequences of the accident. They will probably tell you that they will have to get a new car or get the car repaired, but they might not be able to tell you that someone may have been seriously injured. They need to actually be told about the seriousness of human injury. Injury can result in loss of function, loss of life or prolonged or chronic pain. Do they understand how serious this is? Sometimes an explanation about liability and law suits may help them quantify the seriousness of human injury in dollar terms where law suits for $50 million are common.
When I was a teen driver, I remember my friends teasing others who followed the speed limit in residential zones. Most of my friends would drive no slower than 35 mph in residential zones. It was more important to drive fast than to minimize the risk of a crash. In arcade car race games, you are allowed to crash several times before the game is over. Even when the game ends (after several high speed crashes), you can put in another quarter and start all over again. The consequences of crashing are conveniently left out of the game.
In a residential zone with cars parked along the side of the road, kids crossing the streets, kids riding their bicycles, multiple intersections, stop signs and driveways, the potential for a car to strike a person is highest. It is this very area where drivers should be most cautious. Yet this is where teens are most likely to disregard the speed limit. Are they aware of the consequences of striking a child with their car? Most teens are not aware because they never think it can happen to them. Most teens think that they are perfect drivers who will never get in a crash. More experienced adults know that a crash can occur due a brief moment of carelessness or due to factors beyond a driver's control such as a child darting out in front of you, a car crossing the center line coming in the opposite direction, a child falling off his bicycle in front of you or a car (parked on the side of the road) door opening suddenly in front of you. None of these crashes occur intentionally, but when someone is hurt in a car crash, it cannot be undone except for healing and medical treatment. Many injuries result in death or serious and often irreversible disability and/or chronic pain. These are far more serious and irreversible. Even if the driver is not at fault, it is likely that if the driver was driving more slowly, the crash may have been preventable. The driver will feel very badly if someone was hurt. Do teen drivers understand how they would feel if they hurt someone? Many have not thought of this. We need to explain this to them so they will take their driving responsibility seriously.
An earlier chapter discussed good versus bad and right versus wrong. Similarly, all our decisions and actions can be categorized as a good idea or a bad idea based on the anticipated consequences. Why is it bad to speed? Why is it bad to drive while intoxicated? Because you might crash your car. But car damage substantially underestimates the severity of the consequences occurring from a car crash. How would they feel if they became injured, disabled or paralyzed? Try to imagine this. How would they feel if they injured someone else leaving them dead, injured, disabled or in chronic pain? Try to imagine this. How could they apologize to this victim? How could they apologize to this victim's family? Try to imagine this. When your children can appreciate the pain of this, they now better understand the consequences.
Shoplifting is exciting and fun as long as you don't get caught. What are the consequences here? The merchant loses profits and they may need to raise prices or lay off workers or close down. How would you like it if this was your family's store? How would you feel about shoplifters? When I was in high school, several students would brag about what they successfully shoplifted. I also knew of several others who were caught shoplifting. I noticed that these students (the ones who got caught) never bragged about shoplifting. I guess they understood the consequences better than others. It is poor judgment to risk a criminal record just to shoplift some small item like a CD or a watch. This is obviously a bad idea once the consequences are fully understood. When peers encourage another student to shoplift, they tell the would be perpetrator that it will be fun, exciting and they won't be caught. Peers won't tell the would be perpetrator about the consequences of hurting the store's owners, employees and future customers or that the consequence of being caught is inaccurately dismissed. To make a good decision, all the consequences must be known, but this doesn't come automatically, because all the consequences are not that easy to anticipate. We must explain these consequences to our children.
Young children should be taught the consequences of fire, electricity, stoves, ovens, hot water, knives, household chemicals, medications, sharp objects (pencils, scissors, tools, etc.), pools and deep water, crossing the street, bicycles, cars on the road, strangers, wandering away from parents, etc.
Older children should be taught the consequences of smoking, drugs, gangs, violence, revenge, human injury, crime, bicycles, cars on the road, thin ice, water currents and waves, etc.
Teens should be taught the consequences of driving, sex, alcohol, drugs, risk taking, etc.
Instant gratification while ignoring consequences often involves teen risk taking behavior. For example, the instant pleasure of shoplifting an item while ignoring the consequence of jail. The instant high from drugs while ignoring the consequence of addiction and disease. The instant pleasure of making love while ignoring the possibility of pregnancy (lifelong responsibility) and sexually transmitted disease. The instant thrill of speeding down the highway while ignoring the risk of a car crash and human injury. The instant thrill of our gang taking over territory from another gang while ignoring the consequence of human injury, property damage and retaliation. The instant thrill of graffiti while ignoring the consequence of property damage.
Consequences of teen sex are the most difficult for parents to discuss with their teens. As parents, we know what the consequences are. Be proactive. Teach them these consequences. Just do it.
Communication time spent with your children is vital to teaching them about consequences. ALL our actions have consequences. It is our job as parents to teach them these consequences.