What rights do parent have over their children? To their minds and their bodies or even their lives?
It starts with religion. Religious people can be very zealous in the belief that their religion is right, yet the overwhelming majority of people are the same religion as their parents. How many of those people have actually investigated, and understood, even the major religions of the world (let alone the different versions that exist in some of them – Islam and Christianity are dominated by two major branches each but have many smaller variations).
School religious education in my day was pretty much a joke. Either more focused on what is now called PSHE, or just whatever the Deputy Head wanted to talk about. Many children have their lives severely affected by religion when they are young – look at the Jesuits, give me a child to the age of 7 and I will have them for life. It is not just religious organisations and leaders that the abusers of children, but they have a terrible track record and an even worse one of trying to cover up these abuses.
Why do parents have the right to indoctrinate children with a particular world view? There should be a far more comprehensive program of religious education at primary school that values religions equally and that no parent can opt their child out of.
The issues with bodies are just as bad. The worst example of this is Female Genital Mutilation where girls are physically damaged for the rest of their lives, often in unsanitary and unsafe conditions, that lead to long term or permanent health problems. At the heart of this is the issue of whether issues of right and wrong trump cultural heritage. Fortunately we are past that with FGM and it is clear that it is not allowable, but sadly it still happens, even in the UK.
Now it is accepted that it is wrong. Now it isn’t the same degree of terrible but why are parents allowed to circumcise a male child? In a small number of cases there are medical reasons, but as a general thing? Cultural and religious reasons are cited but I think the rights of a child should be paramount. There are groups of men that are angry that it has been done to them without their consent.
Ian Dunt’s book How To Be A Liberal has a whole chapter on how it is so difficult to square the rights of oppressive culture with the rights of the individual. https://smile.amazon.co.uk/How-Be-Liberal-Thinking-Yourself/dp/B07Y4LNBDF/ref=sr_1_1?crid=2V9R8T9UMC3VA&dchild=1&keywords=how+to+be+a+liberal+by+ian+dunt&qid=1607325968&sprefix=how+to+be+a+liberal%2Caps%2C148&sr=8-1
This would apply to tattooing or piercing where it is done. No decision should be made about a child’s body without their consent. A parent’s beliefs will not necessarily be the child’s – if they are happy to do it then it can be done at the age of majority.
This is the Love Affair’s most famous song, but they appear to be overlooked apart from this.
Everlasting Love
Five Miles Out 