Dennis Prager Show - Happiness Hour: Parenting
Aired: 2021-06-05
Duration: 07:04


=== Why Parents Matter (06:35) ===

[00:00:00]  I resolved to be happy.
[00:00:03]  I was about a junior in high school.
[00:00:06]  It's very easy to be unhappy and don't take the easy way out.
[00:00:11]  I combined the two.
[00:00:14]  It was a good moment.
[00:00:17]  It takes no effort to be unhappy.
[00:00:20]  That's the default position for many people.
[00:00:29]  Life is work.
[00:00:33]  When you know that, you're halfway there.
[00:00:38]  Whatever it is you want, you've got to work out, including happiness.
[00:00:41]  That's why I have a happiness hour.
[00:00:44]  Today's subject is a biggie.
[00:00:47]  Most of them are biggies.
[00:00:49]  I never said I had a smallie for a topic.
[00:00:55]  That is, why are so many young people unhappy?
[00:01:00]  Now, I've addressed this in passing, but now I'm going to devote an hour to it.
[00:01:09]  There are micro and macro answers to the question of why are there so many unhappy young people.
[00:01:15]  I mean, college age in particular.
[00:01:19]  Everybody knows a moody teenager.
[00:01:22]  Moody teenagers are a dime a dozen.
[00:01:26]  But why, even getting into college, why are there so many unhappy?
[00:01:34]  I'm going to offer you some responses, and then I want to hear you both react to mine and give me yours.
[00:01:42]  But here's something that I have been thinking about for, I don't know why, but I've been thinking about...
[00:01:49]  In the recent past, that I do believe has been a contributor.
[00:01:54]  And it's not the number one, even though it's the first one I'm mentioning.
[00:01:58]  It's only because it's in the micro, and I want to start with the micro reason.
[00:02:05]  I think a lot of parents made a big mistake in not wanting to be their children's parents, but their pals.
[00:02:18]  And I don't think that that contributes to a child's happiness.
[00:02:25]  A child wants a parent because parents, as opposed to pals, give security.
[00:02:33]  And they give you something to aim for.
[00:02:40]  A parent as a model is a very powerful force in a child's life.
[00:02:47]  Where else are they going to get these models?
[00:02:50]  I mean, they do.
[00:02:51]  They can get them on TV. They can get them anywhere, theoretically.
[00:02:56]  But the most logical area to find a model is in a parent.
[00:03:03]  But this notion of, I want to be my child's friend when they're eight.
[00:03:13]  If you want to be your child's friend when the child is 40, that's a separate issue.
[00:03:19]  But when the child is 8, they can have a lot of pals, but they only get one crack at parents, or two cracks at parents.
[00:03:33]  And I think that that does, in fact, add to a child's happiness over the long term.
[00:03:42]  Having parents who have played a parental role in their lives.
[00:03:49]  The power of parents in people's lives is really staggering when you think about it.
[00:03:57]  You know, Bernie Madoff just died a couple of weeks ago.
[00:04:03]  One of his adult children committed suicide.
[00:04:10]  And it is not uncommon among disgraced parents that a child will become profoundly depressed and even commit suicide.
[00:04:24]  You don't want your parents to be shameful.
[00:04:35]  It's bad if your child...
[00:04:38]  Does bad things, but it doesn't have the same devastating effect as a parent doing bad things.
[00:04:49]  The foundations of your life are not rocked by a bad child as they are by a bad parent.
[00:04:59]  The power of parents is really, it's almost unfair, because you're very lucky.
[00:05:07]  Nobody gets perfect parents, by the way.
[00:05:09]  That's why I find a lot of complaining about parents to be immature.
[00:05:15]  We'll see how you do as a parent.
[00:05:19]  By the way, it's one of the reasons I'm convinced parents love when their kids have kids.
[00:05:25]  They're far more accepting of the parents.
[00:05:30]  One of the most common sentiments that a new parent has is...
[00:05:35]  My parents did all this for me?
[00:05:39]  After you get up, you know, 3 a.m.
[00:05:41]  for three months for a crying child and change a diaper at 4 a.m.
[00:05:48]  Yeah, wow, my parents must have done that for me.
[00:05:51]  I remember when I was a parent thinking one day, wow, I really should be grateful for my parents that I have all my limbs.
[00:06:02]  Just for that!
[00:06:04]  Somehow, they were able to protect me from permanent injury.
[00:06:16]  So, the role of the parent is a huge one.

=== Lives Emptied (00:44) ===

[00:06:24]  Here's another factor, I believe, in the unhappiness of many children.
[00:06:31]  They have nothing to live for.
[00:06:34]  Nothing.
[00:06:37]  Nothing fills their lives with meaning.
[00:06:41]  The poisonous, destructive, nihilistic left has ensured that their lives have been emptied of all that is good and meaningful.
[00:06:53]  Religion, love of country, marriage, family.
[00:07:02]  Happiness Hour, Dennis Prager Show.