Filial piety
In China, “filial piety” has long been a Chinese traditional virtue recognized by the public, and I also show respect for this word all the time. My understanding of this word is more of children showing heartfelt gratitude to everything that their parents have done for them. Of course, what I respect is the heartfelt gratitude and what I agree with is children’s repaying their parents’ love. However, nowadays, “filial piety” is misinterpreted by many people and turned to burdens enforced on children. Moreover, some parents may even force their children to do something in the name of filial piety; some parents may compel their children to totally comply with their will to achieve their expectations in the name of the debt of raising children up. To this regard, I do not agree with the so-called traditional virtue of “filial piety”.
All the parents should be responsible for taking a new life to this world. They should not use sayings like “I gave birth to you” to force their children to do what their children are unwilling to do. In that case, it is a brutal act and a kind of moral kidnapping. It is not necessarily a good thing for children that they were brought to this world. They are exposed to this colorful and wonderful world, but in the meantime, they also have to suffer all kinds of pains in this world. Besides, we can not view things from a unilateral perspective. When parents bring children to this world, children also bring about happiness, pleasure, sense of pride and even sense of achievement to their parents.
In my opinion, every child is his or her parents’ “work” and he or she may have something similar to parents or becomes someone that the parents expect him or her to be. But it does not mean that I am in favor of some parents’ behaviors, such as going against children’s will and asking them to do something they don’t want to do. Certainly, at first, children know little about this world, so parents should impart knowledge, correct values, view of thought and world view to children as well as tell them some living skills. Then it is inevitable that during the process, some problems and conflicts may occur, which proves the existence of children’s natural instincts. You may have a doubt—why do so many fierce conflicts take place between parents and children from time to time? It is not contradictory. When children were little, some parents did not help children form correct values, or we can lower our standard, some parents did not impart their own values to their children. What’s worse, when children were in their childhood, the communication between children and parent was very little, so it is nothing strange that children’s thoughts are different from parents’. Now children have grown up and their thoughts run counter to parents’ will, parents cried out that their children no longer follow their directions. Why? Why should children obey their parents who fail to well educate them? Do those parents ever reflect on themselves? At this time, parents will usually give sayings such as “I am your parent”, which seemingly makes sense, but I think those sayings are feeble and futile, and I feel lamentable for them.
Let’s get back to the word of “filial piety”, which is a pseudo-proposition at first. Every life is independent. Children did nothing, so why should they support their parents for dozens of years? Some parents may say: “Why? I raise my child up for twenty years!” Children owe parents nothing. Parents bring children to this world and raise the children of their own accord. No one pushes them to do this. “Then how about us? Can our children really leave us alone?” It depends on parents. If parents provide superior and comfortable growing environment and the warmth of a family to their children, as well as support children to grow up happily and healthily, I am sure that the children will be kind to their parents, which is true dependency and affections. Children love their parents, so they genuinely want to repay their parents. If their parents do not live a good life, they will feel uncomfortable, which is human’s instinct, but not the so-called kinship or patriarchal clan ties. Using kinship or clan ties to bind people is really unreasonable. Therefore, I show no compassion for the poor elderly who use legal provisions to force their children to fulfill the obligation of support. An effect presupposes a cause. All the results come from seeds planted by those parents at the very beginning.
In addition, nowadays, many parents regard children as everything in their own life. In my opinion, that is why the saying of bringing up sons to support parents in their old age exists. In parents’ eyes, they devote themselves to raising their children up, so it is for sure that their children should treat them in the same way when they are old. If their children leave them alone, what I want to tell them is, “You deserve it. You yourselves ask for it. No one ever pushes you. You certainly live your own life. You make every decision on your own.” Therefore, I beg to differ with those sayings like “My whole life is occupied by my child.”
I won’t interfere in others’ life. But if I am a parent, my child will only be a part of my life, but not my whole life. If conditions permit (I refer to economic condition), on the premise of fulfilling my obligation of raising my child, I will still continue what I like to do, such as traveling, reading and to be together with people I love. There are too many novel and wonderful things to be done in this world. Therefore, in my mind, those empty-nest elderly are really very poor. They reply on others, but once others leave them, they have nothing. The same is true when it comes to the relation between lovers.
Moreover, if children do not contact their parents, there are nothing but following reasons: the children do not miss their parents at all, which show that the parent-child emotion is not deep. So is it true that the parents have nothing to do with such a situation? Or maybe the children live happily. Shouldn’t parents feel happy in this case? If it is not above two reasons, maybe the children encounter some difficulties, but they don’t want to discuss with their parents. Isn’t this their parents’ problem? Or there are someone who can provide suggestions to the children, so shouldn’t their parents feel happy? If their parents are not happy, that means their parents are selfish.
Life should be mastered by everyone. Children have their own life. Parents bind their children by using ethical traditions and give them the sense of guilt. Then such parents are still very selfish. Everyone may live a life for about several decades. In the first over twenty years, children cannot totally make their own decisions on their own. If the rest of their life should still be controlled by parents, that is too pathetic. It would be best that if children can persuade their parents, but if they cannot, forget about it and follow their hearts. People should be grateful, but should not make concessions without bottom line.
From my perspective, modern society should no longer advocate so-called “filial piety”, especially blind filial piety. Parenting should not be a debt of gratitude, while filial piety is not an obligation. Instead, “filial piety” in traditional sense can be replaced by love. We have no obligation to be filial, but we can show love for our families.