Mummy’s boy
First up an apology if this entry is a bit rambling and all over the place. I have about a million ideas rushing around my head and don’t really want to censor them too much by worrying about little things like grammar and structure….I wonder how long before some of my students use that one on me! 
I was all set to publish an entry about Australia’s current Resources Super Profit Tax and then my mum stepped in and changed it all. To clarify, she didn’t edit the blog entry, she just gave me something else to write about instead. My mum is an amazing person, with one of the most unique minds I have ever encountered. I hold her accountable for the way my mind works…and works…and works…and never seems to bloody stop, even when I want it to! No, seriously, she is very much responsible for my outlook on life and the way I think about things. But she also bugs the hell out of me sometimes (sorry Rose! :-(……:-) ). You see she has this little habit of sending me books and extracts to read or web-sites to look at. And they are invariably somewhat alternative.
Now this doesn’t always sit well with me a bit because, although she has imparted a particular outlook on life to me, I still have a very strong logical / scientific part to my thinking which has trouble accepting a lot of idea’s she shares with me. And then yesterday it hit me…for some reason the concept of the Ladder of Inference (which basically explain the process by which we makes assumptions) was floating through my mind and I realised that I was as guilty as anyone else for making un-substantiated assumptions about the value of the stuff she was sharing with me. It also occurred to me that I don’t need to agree with it to get value from it. The secret is to put assumptions behind you and open up your mind.
For example, she gave me a book called The Chalice And The Blade, which is about whether war and dominance have always been a part of our culture and whether we can have a culture without them. To me it seemed to be written from a very feminist perspective and, in typical guy fashion, I was wondering how they hoped to ever convince our male-dominated society that we could all live as equals. The strong will always seek to dominate the weak. And then I came across this little gem…
‘The larger, stronger adult mother is clearly, in heirarchic terms, superior to the smaller, weaker child. But this does not mean that we normally think of the child as inferior or less valued.’
…and in one fell swoop my whole perception of the issue was changed!
The other big mistake I make is to assume that if I’m not interested, or can’t see the value, in something she has given me then no-one I know will….again an assumption not based on any evidence. The Summer Solstice Council of the International Council of 13 Indigenous Grandmothers is a great example…on this occasion it’s not something I’m not interested in, in fact I love the idea of it, I’m just struggling to see where it fits….any thoughts would be greatly appreciated.
I guess what I am trying to saying in a meandering kind of way is that we can find useful things in all kind of places…if we open our minds up to seeing things from other peoples perspectives. And I think to address a lot of the issues the world is facing we are going to have to be willing to look in places we might not have thought were useful. My mum sensemakes the world differently to how I do but by understanding each others views we get a better picture of reality. This is kind of the central premise of both distributed leadership and adaptive leadership…doh!!! Hey, I get there in the end!:-)
June 17th, 2010 at 06:38 pm
It interesting to note that while there is a lot of literature on the relationship of Mothers and their children, there may not be enough awareness on the impact of Fathers on children as far as the Ladder of Inference goes.
In 2008, a child psychiatrist in Singapore and his team researched the impact of uneducated fathers on their male children and discovered that these male children have higher incidents of learning difficulties and delinquent/aggressive behaviour.
What happens if the mothers of these families are slightly more educated or more active in the upbringing of their male children – will this mitigate the effect of the father’s lack of education? According to a social worker, the answer is mainly no because 1) men usually marry down - women who are less or not educated and 2) these male children have no positive role model and hence don’t stand a chance in society.
On some occasions, there will be a very resilient child who will overcome the odds but such cases are still a minority. This research shows (in Singapore at least) that there is still much to learn about the impact of Fathers and current assumptions of their role.
June 18th, 2010 at 09:08 am
I think it is amazing how often I come across instances of ‘collective consciousness’!:-) My brother works for a group that recognises this issue and works specifically with men, helping them to develop their relationships with both their sons and their daughters. They focus on both the boys and the girls because research has suggested that the old idea that fathers raise boys and mothers raise daughters is not a complete enough model. And I know he would agree with you…there is still much to learn about the impact of fathers and current assumptions about their role!
Could you possibly give me link to the 2008 study if you can find one…my brother would be interested to have a look at it. Thanks very much,