Mama Said Knock You Out: Are You Teaching Your Child to Fight?

May 1st, 2012 - By Kendra Koger

telegraph.co.uk

 

When my sisters and I were young girls my mother would always tells us (among other things) that when a fight breaks out, don’t run toward it to watch it, run in the opposite direction.  Her rationale was in case someone in the fight pulled out a weapon, or the crowd gets too hype and starts pushing, you could get hurt if you were trying to see what was going on.  But like any bad-butt child, I would rebel and when the fists would fly on the playground, I would run my short little self on over to the melee to see it first hand.  But after a while, after a couple of my family members were murdered by going to fights I realized that my mother did indeed know what she was talking about, and wasn’t so much of a wet blanket.

So, imagine my surprise when years later, I’m working at an afterschool program and one of the students tells me about a fight she had that day.  Customary to school policy, she had to talk to her mother on the phone and during this phone call her mother told her to not fight the girl again… until the last day of school. Then bring soup cans in her bookbag and if the girl starts with  her, to… “bust her upside her head.”  Fear and alarm would be an understatement to describe my feelings (and  a little bit of paranoia, honestly.  How was I supposed to know that one of these kids didn’t have a soup can surprise for me at the end of the year?!).  But as the children listened to the fourth grader retell her fight, more began to chime in with stories of advice that their parents given them.

I’m not going to lie, my father taught my sisters and I about the “element of surprise” when it came to fighting, but it was only supposed to be used as self-defense.  Not as a way to possibly murder another child.  But as reality television gets more prevalent you hear people saying how these “stars” are bad influences on children (which by the way, why are you letting your children watch reality television anyway?) and they should be more mindful of the viewing audience, but it seems like a large problem of it starts in the home.

In preparation for this article I googled the phrase “parents encouraging their kids to fight” and came up with over 62 million results.  There were the normal You Tube videos of a father who encouraged his son while fighting another teenager to “punch his eyes out… slam his head on the ground” or a woman who was in the midst of high schoolers cheering her daughter on. Parents can be seen barking at their child to win the fight, and either enjoying the adrenaline rush of the fight, or sometimes even intervening when their child is fighting, so their child can get an upper hand on his/her opponent.  The news articles seemed to come one after another of parents being arrested for openly praising their children for fighting, but the most disturbing  article came from the UK’s Mail online website about a group of parents who had their little boys participating in child cage fighting matches.  (REALLY?!)  There are pictures of one little boy’s face that’s blurred out, but apparently the little boy was crying.  The article described a video that was released that showed the adults cheering, clapping, and barking for the fight to continue while a medic came to see if he could continue the fight.

Being a relatively new mother, I can’t wrap my mind around setting my child up for failure in this manner.  Leading her down a road of letting her know that it’s okay to be a trouble maker, or result to fisticuffs just because you’re frustrated at the other person.  I’m not saying this to point fingers or judge anyone, but it hurts me when I see these women and men who don’t learn from their own mistakes, and keep teaching the same pointers to their children to perpetuate these personality flaws throughout generations.

Then you do watch reality television and you see mothers and fathers either encouraging their daughters to fight and start drama, or you see the parents engaging in the juvenile behavior themselves.  Now, I’m not advocating being a punk, but I am trying to say to think before you act, and think about what you’re teaching your children.  Because I personally know two mothers who could tell you that if they had the opportunity they would turn back time to convince their children to think before preparing to knuckle down.

Please know that your life is worth more than bragging rights, and so are your offsprings’!  Follow Kendra Koger @kkoger

 

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  • Miss_Understood

    “Be peaceful, be courteous, obey the law, respect everyone; but if someone puts his hand on you, send him to the cemetery.”

     -Malcolm X

    • http://twitter.com/prfectisshe myprfectimprfections

      i live by these words.

  • Amija James

    I’ve never had a fight in my life.  I have a coworker who drove her daughter to someplace to fight another girl and I was flabbergasted!  That’s the only word I could think of to describe how shocked I was.  As a parent,  I think I would’ve handled it in a different way.  Going through the school I think is the best way.  Ghetto people think they can just beat somebody up and it’s okay, but you touch my child and you’re going to jail or at least catching a case. 

    • Leelee

       Except in reality that’s not really the case.  Somebody touches your child and chances are nothing will happen, unless you also happen to be a really good lawyer.  It’s been 4 years since I’ve been out of high school, but when I was there they did almost nothing to stop bullying.  The actual rule was that if students were caught fighting, whether it was the kid doing the beating or the one getting beat up, they would be suspended.  I never thought this was fair to the student getting beat up, but it didn’t matter anyway.  They never enforced it.  At best it was detention, which is not a deterrent for any kid willing to engage in fighting.  Most teachers were either too afraid to get in the middle or just didn’t care, and I live in a predominately white town so I don’t think it was because they were scared of the “ghetto” people.  People seem to see bullying as a rite of passage and that kids who are bullied need to just toughen up.  They act as if people just grow out of bullying.  If you were a bully as a kid and there weren’t any consequences chances are  you remained a bully  in adulthood.

      • Amija James

        No offense, but I don’t know where you live.  My nephew had a boy who kept hitting my nephew on his head so one day my nephew went off.  They both got suspended.  My sister and brother-in-law went to the school and raised holy hell.  My nephew was back in school that day.  And this is a predominately white school.  As a parent, there are ways to make things happen instead of just taking no for an answer.  My nephew knows that his mama is a pitbull and if something goes down she will be up at that school in a heartbeat!  

  • Rah Truth

    Children should be taught to defend themselves verbally first, then physically if necessary. BUT….they must be taught very clearly what “necessary” means, and understand that physical defense is a last resort. Most fights could have been avoided with words long before it came to fists.

  • IllyPhilly

     ”Lord knows I loves Harpo, but I’d kill ‘em dead before I let him beat me!”

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  • Miss_Understood

    My family is full of fighters and I grew up the same way. We were taught to “beat the other person almost to death”. I think it was based on the abuse my mother suffered growing up and her need to always be “on guard”…As I became older, I realized that you never really WIN because you either get your butt whooped or constantly watch your back for someone looking to retaliate.

    On my own, I learned to use my intelligence and understand how hard I’ve worked and that I would be a FOOL to jeopardize it all with a silly little fight.

  • http://pulse.yahoo.com/_JAI4SRENU2A5WKRTELXXYJPDSI Kayla

    Only problem I have with this philosophy. esp. in the black community, is that even if you learn to defend yourself, and you win. That person will then bring there cousins, sisters, and friends to retaliate. Long gone are the days where fights were fair, there was no jumping, no weapons. People in general are becoming more and more violent, so I think teaching kids how to fight would not be wise. To defend yourself yes. 

    • Allie1234

      I agree people always tring to jump nothing is a far fight.

  • Ladybug94

    Even though my kids know martial arts, I still teach them about conflict resolution without having to put their hands on someone first.  I have told them there is no harm in walking away especially since they have competing in MA but if a person follows you and won’t let you leave and you have to defend yourself then defend yourself.  Unfortunately, there are some trifling parents who encourage their kids to fight and they even instigate fights, some have even jumped in the fight themselves.  These kids have no respect for authority, their peers or themselves.  It’s very sad.

  • LiiSH

     I don’t encourage fighting, but I will always encourage being able to defend yourself. For that reason, my nieces, nephew, and yet to be conceived children will all be taught how to fight (and when to fight). It is a last resort. (I don’t want any of them to grow up on some Evelyn Lozada mess) I want them to act with tact, dignity, forethought, and wisely pick their battles.

  • Allie1234

    My dad encourage my sister to fight when she was younger. He would be there saying how to hit the other person. I tell my nieces if someone hit you, you betta him them harder. It a tough world and kids are commiting suicide over bullying,  so it is better for them to fight or get eating by the sharks.

  • fitnessforlife

    My mother encouraged my sister to fight each other, but not other people. People would always try to fight us. I always played it off (they left me alone), but my sister got jumped by a girl her age and her adult relative over some ‘You think you’re cute so we’ve decided to beat you up’ b.s.  Our cousins took martial arts classes an d got black belts, so defending themselves was never an issue. But for some backwards reason we didn’t get to take those, and were taught to cower at people trying to fight us.

    My element of surprise – without my mother knowing, I put some lighter fluid and some matches in my book bag, one time, when I felt really threatened by a group of girls in my neighborhood who kept going on about how much they couldn’t stand me and were going to jump me.

    I can think of several people who ‘would always be fighting’ when we were teens, and they came to be respected. No one messed with them. I knew a number of people who were not trouble makers, but were always fighting someone trying to defend themselves; because we lived a that type of community where, if you were picked out as weak by a certain group, they would not let down until they felt you’ve whipped their behind enough times, won enough fights (with whoever they’ve instigated against you), or until someone got killed (unfortunately).

    But my children will know how to defend themselves; they won’t be taught, however, how to start trouble. But if it comes to it, and they have to knock the bujeezuz out of someone to free themselves or make it clear that they don’t want to be bothered, so be it. Momma will have their back, as long as I see that I taught them well and they actually aren’t sh***t starters!

    • Allie1234

      your mom encourage you to fight each other? sounds like my mom how she starts mess between the siblings.

      • fitnessforlife

        Yes. And I finally figured out ‘why’ as an adult. It’s projected emotions from the sibling rivalry she had with her own sister. Her parents and the rest of her family/relatives really treated her sister better than her when they were growing and, and to this day, and that resentment has been projected onto us. She needed someone to side with her (my sister), or  ‘win’ with her. That’s one of the reasons I would never get into fights because my mother did not have my back on anything. On the other hand, my sister could get into sticky situations and my mother would always have her back. She’s the one that looks the most like my mother and is closer to her to this day. Then there’s the father thing, we don’t have the same one. I am a product of a one night stand – he was never to be seen or heard from again. She’s a product of a long-term relationship and a marriage that ended in divorce.

        That’s why I tried my best to avoid conflict on the outside, if not, people would learn that my mom didn’t have my back and would really come at me (she’d help them, I’m sure).  I tried staying active in school/community, staying in good graces with ‘visible’ people at school and in the community, worked hard to get noticed (awards) at school and in the community, etc…

        • really?

          that makes me sad.i hope you’re doing well and have found some happiness.

  • http://pulse.yahoo.com/_LRACPBXFFVENJ55Z32XUDC6SEI miamac

    Well, I believe in ‘self-defense’ when all else fails. Why should I allow YOUR (ex. parents) rudely child to physically harm my child without encouraging him or her to fight back? So yes, when my kids were young I taught them the rules of engagement:

    1. Tell the teacher or supervising adult …but if nothing is done
    2. FIGHT BACK! And hit them twice as hard as they hit you, to discourage them from ever hitting you again
    3. Tell your parents immediatey what happened so I can defend you and address the school authorities for doing nothing and encouraging negative behavior

    Bullies have existed ‘for ever!’ Little bullies root from big bullies (parents). More should be done to fairly punish bullies in school, suspension and if necessary, fines, to discourage the mental and physical attacks. But I refuse not to teach my child to defend his or her self in such a threatening situation. Why should I let someone hurt my kid mentally (low self esteem) and physically???

  • Kemgem1

    My Mom and dad never encouraged my sister or I to fight but we were told to defend ourselves.. And if that meant picking up a brick then so be it.. I never had to resort to a brick to say the least but I did try the go and tell a teacher or someone and as a child growing up in middle school and high school where fighting is the most prevalent, it was pretty embarrassing as a youngster to be a tattle tell and it usually came back to haunt me, when after school and I’m walking home the same kid I told on is still around and comes up to me to square off now because I told on them..I think everyone should learn to defend themselves that doesn’t necessarily mean going around and picking fights but letting other kids know you can stand up for yourself and you will..