Helping Kids Through Anger: Coping Skills

We all have coping skills because we all have to cope with things we don't like.  The real question is whether our coping skills are constructive or destructive.  If I start throwing punches at someone when I'm frustrated with them, then I'm using a destructive coping skill.  That's exactly the kind of coping skill that comes most naturally.  When X is frustrating, we can cope by lashing out at X.  The next step is to recognize when lashing out at X will backfire.  So when I'm frustrated with the 6'8" body builder at the end of the bar, I might choose to lash out at the drunk pipsqueak nearby instead.  Most of us have caught on to the idea that this kind of coping is frowned upon and might get us thrown in the clink even if we win the fight.  We either learn to do it in a sneaky way ("I'll show that guy, I'll key his car when no one is looking!") or we find some other outlet for our frustrated energy.  The latter is where you're going to find the constructive coping skills (as well as plenty of other destructive ones).

One of the first steps to helping kids work through anger is to help them identify and rely on constructive coping skills.  Help them to find things they like or things that relax them.  For example, maybe a child who enjoys snuggling with something soft and warm could benefit from having a stuffed animal (stuffy? doll? plush toy?  Different families call them different things...)  Either way, the first trick to helping kids work through their anger is to support them in the development of good coping skills.  Lots of people use food for coping - that's why we talk about comfort food - but, while better than punching someone in the face, it's probably not the healthiest way of defusing anger.  The same goes for any kind of approach that can harm oneself.  The fact is that different people will get help from different things.  One person needs to talk it through while another needs to cool off alone.  One person will want to rearrange furniture and another will want to listen to music.  As parents, our role is to help our children figure out what works for them and then let them do it.

This may be easier said than done.  Sometimes a 5 year old isn't going to be able to walk away from the source of their anger to go color a picture.  Parents and teachers often frown on letting children walk away when they are the source of the child's anger.  I know my daughter gets plenty mad at me sometimes when I correct her homework, but that doesn't mean she gets to just go outside and ride her bike instead of trying those math problems again.  That's why you'll want to find a variety of coping skills that can be used in a variety of situations.

Another thing you'll want to be aware of is that when children (or anyone, for that matter) is learning a new skill, they'll need more reminders and support than usual, but that eventually (after a good long while and a lot of supported practice) they'll get to the point where they can calm themselves just by knowing that their coloring book, or stuffed animal, or sandwich hug from mommy and daddy will be there later.

So what are some coping skills that work for you and your family?

Pat Buchanan, Censorship, & the Culture Wars

A fair bit has been made about MSNBC firing Pat Buchanan after his most recent book was published.  The book included chapters titled: "The End of White America" and "The Death of Christian America".  Apparently, both chapters lamented the increasing percentage of non-white, non-Christian citizens and attempted to link these demographic shifts to an overall national decline.  The book's title questions whether America will even last another 15 years under burdens such as these.

Some conservative commentators have jumped on Buchanan's firing as an example of "political correctness" gone haywire - to the detriment of the free expression of ideas.  But this isn't just a conservative knee jerk reaction to the sacking of a member of their own ranks.  Even some Democrats and liberal commentators have decried Buchanan's fate.  Former New Mexico governor and Democratic presidential candidate Bill Richardson says Buchanan deserved better.  Peter Fenn, a Democratic media consultant states, "The point is not that Pat hasn't made statements that are insensitive or controversial, we all have.  But should his voice be silenced?  Should it be banned?"

Frankly, I'm baffled.  The conflation of the lack of a regular gig on television news with the silencing and banning of a voice is absurd!  I don't have a recurring role on TV, but I have a blog, and my wife will attest to the fact that I'll hold forth on most any topic out there - free of charge!  Pat Buchanan himself wrote on The Conservative American blog that "after 10 enjoyable years, I am departing, after an incessant clamor from the left that to permit me continued access to the microphones of MSNBC would be an outrage against decency, and dangerous."  The fact that his response to his dismissal from the network was put on a highly trafficked blog and then picked up by national media exposes statements about silenced voices as demagoguery.  

In all likelihood, MSNBC has a good enough read on its audience to be aware that it leans left and that it might either tune out if Buchanan's platform was preserved or tune in more consistently if it imagined that the network was taking a principled stand against a loathsome ideology.

I don't watch MSNBC, so on some level I don't have a horse in this race, but my first reaction was to view it as encouraging that, regardless of the reason, a tiny battle has been won to shift the conversation in our country to more rational ideas.  Until I thought about it a bit more.  Why the hell am I writing this?  Because he got fired.  In all honesty, I didn't even know he had a book out before this happened and I bet a lot of conservatives didn't either - but they do now.  Similarly, MSNBC is an even more appealing information source for liberal audiences now that they've taken a principled stand against a racist screed-slinger.  In the end, this just amounts to another draw in the culture wars - both sides feel righteous indignation and everyone goes home happy and proud of themselves for being right. As a reward for giving us this feeling, Buchanan sells more books and MSNBC can charge more for ads.

This works out great if your goal is to feel good about your side, but what about if your goal is to report the news or improve the lives of your fellow Americans?  Maybe not so much.  

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So what does this have to do with Humanism, families, and child rearing?  I've recently joined a discussion group called Parenting Little Heathens on the Atheist Nexus site.  One of the questions posted was titled, "When to start teaching Atheism to your kids?"  (In fact, given the questioner's situation, this was a totally reasonable question.  This response only describes my initial response to the title.)  When I saw the title, my initial reaction was that the question seemed to invest atheism with some of the worst qualities of religion: the goal of being us vs. being them and the focus on conclusions rather than process.  I think the better question is "When to start teaching critical thinking to your kids?"  And the answer is always, "Immediately." 

To focus on teaching atheism, or any other end result of a line of inquiry, is really to allow oneself and one's children to be sucked in to the same attitudes and patterns that have created the ceaseless cycle of culture wars and automatic outrage that demagogues like Buchanan and media conglomerates like MSNBC foster.  This, in turn gives over control of our thoughts and emotions to the best manipulator when we'd rather use reason and logic to keep control of our own thoughts and emotions.

I'm not suggesting that we ought never to join a group.  We're social creatures and joining is what we do best.  Without the drive to pick sides and form a group, we wouldn't last a minute.  But for my kids and myself, I hope that we do so thoughtfully, critically, & carefully.  So my ultimate goal as a parent isn't to teach my kids atheism as a philosophy.  Rather, I want to teach them 1) how to use their reason to identify values that will serve them and their fellow humans well, and 2) how to think critically about the groups that support those values.  Of course, I think that means they'll most likely decide that people who style themselves as having a special communication line with the all-powerful creator of the universe are full of shit, because that's what I've concluded.  But by teaching the process, rather than the ends, I hope to give them the tools to find the answers to questions that range from politics to religion to what to eat to who to associate with all on their own.  If I do a good job of that then they'll learn to dismiss whatever hateful rhetoric their generation's version of Pat Buchanan spews, regardless of whether some news outlet thinks he might make some money for their shareholders.

Lonely Little Atheists

The event that prompted me to start this blog occurred about a week ago.  My daughter attends a private, but not religious, elementary school.  One day last week, when I picked her up from school, her teacher quietly took me aside and said, "Just giving you a heads up: we had a great conversation about evolution and creationism, or religion, so we're just letting parents know in case they want to talk more about it with the kids."

So in the car I asked about it - and was taken aback by my daughter's reaction.  She went from happily telling me about a game at recess to shouting, "I don't know!  I don't want to talk about it!"  I backed off, but later, after she had calmed down a bit, I asked if we could talk about what upset her so much.  She explained that she felt like she was the only one in the class that didn't believe in god and that she was afraid that some of her friends thought she was a bad person because of it.  A bit of background: my daughter is 7 years old, she's very gentle, and she's wanted to be a paleontologist since she was 3.  Knowing about the world is very important to her and it seems to have genuinely thrown her for a loop that someone could think that was a bad thing.

I'll leave for another day a discussion of how my wife and I resolved the issue with our daughter.  Suffice to say that the event got my wife and I thinking about how, as children grow and become more engaged with the world outside of their own family, the ideals and values they learn from their parents will inevitably come into conflict with those of their peers.  For humanists, this problem is magnified by virtue of the malice with which nontheistic people are held in American society.  See articles like this for examples.

I've never fully bought into the New Atheism's disdain for religion.  I tend to see religion more as a tool which, like a hammer, was created by and for humans and can be used to build a house or bash in someone's brains depending upon who wields it.  For example, here in New Hampshire, where I live, the former Episcopalian bishop, Gene Robinson, has been an outspoken advocate for progressive, humanitarian causes.  On the other hand, there's the Spanish Inquisition.  Which, um...Yeah.  Similarly, absence of religious belief doesn't indicate selflessness or selfishness either - there's plenty of stuff written about being good without god.  Being a social worker, I've also found that some people really benefit from religious involvement - even if it's not my cup of tea.

So those are the things that have led me to tread lightly around the subject of religion in spite of the clear evidence that it's factually baseless.  And by "tread lightly" I mean to say that I have tried not to rock the boat.  The experience with my daughter challenged my hesitance to rock the boat because it awakened me to the fact that kids from nontheistic families are really going to need their parents to have respect for their own convictions.  Without that, they may not learn to stand up for their own beliefs - or, worse, they may learn to become ashamed of their beliefs.

I'm still concerned about how to strike the balance between maintaining respect for other people's beliefs and maintaining respect for my own.  The glib answer is that if they don't like it they can fuck off, but we humans are social creatures and the society we live in won't necessarily just change to suit us.  On the other hand, if nontheists and humanists refuse to challenge society, how will it ever change?  Atheists are perceived to be one of the least trustworthy groups in America, yet I hardly imagine that my wife and I are alone as "reputable, professional, family" types who also espouse secular humanist values while remaining quiet about those values in many circles.  And for those of us with children, the last thing we want is to raise lonely little atheists who are too ashamed of being different to carve out a positive set of organizing principles for their own lives.

When it comes down to it, that's what this blog is about.  I'd like to learn from others who have navigated this course and provide a forum for people who'd like to join me.  So, is this an issue you have struggled with?  And how have you resolved it - or have you?