Families should teach values

More and more people lament that parents do not take enough responsibility for raising their own children these days, for instilling moral values and good behavior in them. Many cite this trend to justify paternalistic big government. Some seem to think a mountain of new laws backed by police power is needed to protect decent folks from neglected youths running rampant.\nHas no one considered that there may be a causal relationship working backwards here? It could be that the more government fashions itself as a moral guide and disciplinarian, the less parents feel obligated to fill that role.\nThe Children's Protection from Violent Programming Act is a product of a "Nanny State" mentality that costs Americans far too much in both lost freedoms and tax dollars. A Bloomington Herald-Times editorial Feb. 27 reaffirmed that "hands-on parenting" impacts teens' behavior much more than "teachers, government leaders or coaches." Censorship cannot accomplish what caring parental supervision can, but its prevalence can teach kids that government interference permeates every corner of American life.\nHow far will politicians go before they get to a point they consider beyond regulatory control? Taxpayers should not be forced to fund the convoluted, counterproductive regulatory processes that employ armies of bureaucrats who produce bad law after unnecessary bad law. Yet our new president has officially declared it the responsibility of government-run schools to "teach right and wrong." The First Amendment and your freedom to determine your family's values and teach them by your chosen method are more endangered than ever. \nAt least we can applaud the American Bar Association for recently announcing it opposes zero tolerance policies in schools that they say "redefine students as criminals." Civil libertarians agree that zero tolerance policies in schools are misguided, too often applied with such paranoia that kids are kicked out of school for brandishing candy, rubber bands and fingers. \nFor example: \n• A 9-year-old was suspended and forced to undergo psychiatric counseling for threatening to shoot a classmate with a rubber band. \n• A 10-year-old's mother put a small knife in her lunchbox so she could cut her apple. The girl realized the knife could violate the school's anti-weapons policy. She turned it in to a teacher and was promptly expelled. \n• Two kindergarten students were suspended for playing "cops and robbers" on a school playground, pointing fingers at each other and shouting "bang, bang." \n• When a 6-year-old shared a lemon drop with a friend at school, the friend was rushed off in an ambulance and the generous kid was suspended for violating the anti-drug policy. \n• A 9-year old was suspended for simply drawing a picture of a gun on paper. \nThese policies compromise educational effectiveness. They force school officials to pay attention to such trivial transgressions that they are distracted, and students may actually be less safe. Kids certainly get an impression of their status as "guilty until proven innocent." \nCurfew laws like the ones under consideration in Indiana's State House also contribute to criminalization of our youth and usurp the parents' role. In July, the U.S. District Court in Indianapolis struck down Indiana's old curfew law as "in violation of the First Amendment."\nA few years ago, in San Diego, the U.S. Court of Appeals ruled its curfew law unconstitutional. That court's decision stated, "The curfew is, quite simply, an exercise of sweeping state control irrespective of parents wishes… (I)t violates the fundamental right to rear children without undue interference…The statist notion that governmental power should supercede parental authority in all cases because some parents abuse and neglect children is repugnant to the American tradition."\nI urge all citizens to ask Indiana legislators to vote "no" on any bill reviving a curfew in Indiana and on other efforts to legislate behavioral learning in children. Let us support fair justice, freedom of expression and strong families. Let us teach children that individuals have rights and responsibilities, preparing them to be intelligent self-governors when they grow up. Please resist buying into the false security promised by compulsory courtesy, censorship, zero tolerance and curfews.