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A tolerant approach will help strengthen the family, as well as wider society
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People’s Daily yesterday carried a signed commentary commending traditional Chinese family values. Its simple title was: “Family is a good thing.”
It began by citing President Xi Jinping. Before Chinese New Year Eve he said: “We should pay attention to family, family education, and family mores, however our times and lifestyles may change.”
It concluded by quoting Deng Xiaoping from around 30 years ago: “Family is a good thing.”
In between it quoted a few Confucian sayings about the importance of cultivating individual and family morals to create a well-functioning society.
The article singled out two things for elaboration. One is the massive demographic shift that has come with fast economic growth. The other is corruption involving couples or wider family groups.
In the first case, many people feel stressed out and stretched by the demands of our ever-faster pace of life. But a good family allows them to come home to rest and also take care of their parents.
“Taking care of one’s parents does not mean just feeding them with food,” the article reasoned. “Children must respect their parents from the bottom of their hearts.” Here it quoted Confucius as saying that dogs and horses also take care of their own parents, but what distinguishes humans from animals in taking care of their parents is that humans should respect the elderly. “It takes more than a day or night to cultivate one’s mind to respect one’s parents,” said the article. “It requires time-tested family education.”
In the second case, a good family watches family members pursuing lofty ideas and interests, cautioning each other against improper behavior, and jointly building family harmony.
A dysfunctional family, by contrast, may witness collaboration between an avaricious husband and wife, or between an indulgent parent and arrogant child. Family graft, noted the article, has been a recurrent feature of many high-level corruption cases exposed in the past few years.
Rethinking happiness
The article could not have come out at more opportune time. For Chinese are rethinking what happiness means, after a few decades of fast economic growth and wealth accumulation. The worship of money has in many ways replaced mutual respect.
Newly-coined terms such as tuhao (nouveau riche with low taste) and you qian ren xing (money makes one arrogant) reveal the loss of our traditional values, especially respect for each other.
Is this a problem of the family or society? Some colleagues and I had a heated debate across the dining table in our work canteen yesterday.
Some said that the worship of money is of course a social problem, to which everyone agreed.
But I added: “The point is: Where do we start, if we want to solve the problem? I would say family is a reasonable starting point.” My justification: “If we don’t learn to respect our husband or wife, father or mother, sister or brother, how can we respect others?” This is how Confucianism differs from certain other isms which propose universal love for all, whether or not they are kin.
Spreading love
Wang Yangming (1472-1529), perhaps the greatest Confucian military strategist of all time, explains that love and respect must originate from within one’s family and then spread to others.
In other words, Confucian scholars endorse the idea of universal love, but within a practical context; they say there must be a place of origin, and family is that very place.
Many people today are quick to blame things like juvenile crime on a so-called declining morality in society. But on second thoughts, aren’t such things family scandals in the first place? Delinquents seldom come from caring and harmonious families.
True, our society as a whole needs to improve. Commercials and advertisements to boost a mentality of conspicuous consumption should be limited and low-taste actors and actresses should not be given prime slots.
But, these public policies are not enough. We — as husband and wife, son and daughter, father and mother — should learn to practice love and respect in our daily family life as well. Through doing so we will become more tolerant.
Tolerance does not mean acceptance of anything as it is; it means that we can understand others better. And understanding begets understanding, making it easier to move things ahead in the right direction.
At home one evening this week, I asked my wife why she was washing cups in one sink not the other. Irritated, she raised her voice and said, “I always wash the cups in this sink, don’t you know?”
In the past, I would have raised my voice even higher in response. But on this occasion I was speechless for a few seconds, then broke into a wide smile. “Although I don’t like you raising your voice, I see that you’re right, so I accept it.”
Letting go of my ego is difficult. Listening to others is also difficult for me. That night, I did it, at my home.
Yesterday, when I discussed family-society relationships with my colleagues over the dining table, I listened.
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