No Thank You, Mom and Dad
Tag(s): Convention on the Rights of the Child • CRC • parental rights
Part II of an In-depth Look at Article 13 of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child
In an age where information is becoming easier to access every day, children face new and uncharted risks. Our American heritage has long honored the right of parents to direct their child’s access to information, recognizing that in the vast majority of circumstances, parents are best situated to monitor their child’s activities and to provide necessary guidance during the transition from childhood to adulthood. Unfortunately, this vital role is being undermined by the rising tide of international thought, far removed from our own tradition and championed by international agreements like the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC).
Last week, we began our discussion of Article 13 of the UNCRC by looking at its impact on what children are taught. This week, we return to Article 13 to examine the right of the child “to seek information,” and the impact this guarantee has on the relationship between children, their parents, and the state.
Article 13 is divided into two sections. The first states that “The child shall have the right to freedom of expression; this right shall include freedom to seek, receive and impart information and ideas of all kinds, regardless of frontiers, either orally, in writing or in print, in the form of art, or through any other media of the child’s choice.” The remainder of the article clarifies that this right be restricted, but these restrictions must be provided by law and necessary to “respect the rights or reputations of others” or for “the protection of national security or of public order, or of public health or morals.”
This article focuses on the implications of a child’s “right to information.” Although our Constitution does not expressly grant such a right, there is a growing trend – both within our boarders and abroad – to grant children such rights.
Setting Children Free
Article 13 begins by guaranteeing to all children the right to seek, receive and impart all kinds of information and ideas. Although some proponents of the Convention allege that article 13 is particularly important for children who are seeking to discover more of their identities after spending years of their lives in the care of the state, there is nothing in the text which limits this provision to such a narrow meaning.
According to advocates of the CRC, such as Marian Koren, international author for the UN at the Hague, a more acceptable interpretation of article 13 would require the government to establish and support a whole host of government programs aimed at educating children, such as “advice and information services for children, free access to libraries and loans, workshops for children on topics of their interest,” and so on. According to law professor Bruce Hafen, such a “right” is a broad departure from current US law, and not only poses difficulties for parents, but also for schools, teachers, and educational administrators who have to make difficult decisions about what they teach the children entrusted to their care.
No Thank You, Mom and Dad
While article 13 allows the right of information to be restrained in order to “respect the rights or reputations of others,” this respect does not extend to the decisions of parents. As Koren writes, whenever the state feels that parents are “failing” to protect their child’s rights, “it is the duty of the state to control parents to take their responsibilities and to fulfill their tasks towards their children.” (emphasis added)
American law has long recognized the importance of parents in guiding their children to make good decisions. In 1979, for example, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in Parham v. J.R. that “most children, even in adolescence, simply are not able to make sound judgments concerning many decisions, including their need for medical care or treatment. Parents can and must make those judgments.”
The UNCRC shifts this recognized balance in favor of increased autonomy for the child. According to Barbara Nauck, writing in the Cleveland State Law Review, “the more assertive language of Article 13 presumably means that Article 13 would prevail where there is a conflict between the child’s desire to freely express herself and the parent’s interest in curbing that expression.” Given the arguments advanced by many of today’s child advocates, “the interpretation of the Convention that will be argued in the courts is that the parent may act as counselor, suggesting the pros and cons and possible consequences, but the final choice would be in the hands of the child.” (emphasis added)
Our Children in Harm’s Way
It does not take a parent long to imagine the Pandora’s box that would be unleashed if the final choice is placed in the hands of the child. With television and the internet opening up an almost infinite number of avenues for children to seek information, it is more important than ever for parents to have the freedom to guide their children through the journey to adulthood. Article 13, and the autonomous ideology that it perpetuates, undermines these vital efforts.
Please forward this message onto your friends and urge them to sign the Petition to Protect Parental Rights.
Sources
UN Convention on the Rights of the Child
Marian Koren, “The Right to Information: Too Vague to Be True?” in Monitoring Children’s Rights, Eugeen Verhellen, ed. (The Hague, 1996): 675.
Bruce & Jonathan Hafen, “Abandoning Children to Their Autonomy: The United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child,” Harvard International Law Review (1996): 468
Parham v. J.R., 442 U.S. 584 (1979): 603.
Barbara J. Nauck, “Implications of the United States Ratification of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child: Civil Rights, the Constitution and the Family,” Cleveland State Law Review (1994): 693.
Richard G. Wilkins, “Why the United States Should not Ratify the Convention on the Rights of the Child,” Saint Louis University Law Review (2003): 420-421.
[…] unknown wrote an interesting post today onHere’s a quick excerptNo Thank You, Mom and Dad While article 13 allows the right of information to be restrained in order to “respect the rights or reputations of others,” this respect does not extend to the decisions of parents. … […]
Apr 25 at 5:13 pm
As a parent of 4 children under the age of 8, I get this panicky feeling when I hear about things like this. In my small world of school, housework, friends, family, neighbors, etc, I am not exposed to this sort of thought (like that offered by Marian Koren) and am shocked that it is popular in the Eastern Hemisphere. I am reminded of the importance to pray for our leaders…and to pray for and lead our children in the right direction.
Apr 25 at 11:19 pm
It seems to me that a child gets a set of two parents here. One who will give them what they want and another who will give them what they need.
Apr 26 at 9:19 am
This is some scarey stuff!First a child is supposedly given a right,then the right is restricted,..Is that then a right at all,having restrictions?Next some faceless entity,is supposed to decide whether the right infringes on moral, respect, national security etc.So who is to make these calls and based on what criteria,such as protection of national security,public order,public health or morals,..according to whom?and how will that be determined? Who will determine it? Then we have parents restricting the child’s right to this information,but if the nameless entity has a right to determine what is morally and nationally exceptable,then this article basically deems all parents to be idiots unable to determine what is morally and nationally acceptable, even though we the people are suppose to be the government.
After the FLDS raid,parents being guilty until proven innocent,it seems clear to me that we the people,actually aren’t at all!And that our government looks more and more like a military junta
Apr 26 at 9:38 am
why do you think we call them children??? c’mon we need to guide them from their mistakes…plesae stop messing around with the children
Apr 26 at 12:04 pm
-Just a quick comment on the whole “American Heritage” thing mentioned in the article… While I totally agree with the line of thought that it should remain a parent’s right to teach and help guide our children (hence why I homeschool), and that our American heritage has (past) honored this right, much of our “American Heritage”, however, has fallen short of actually conducting ourselves honorably toward our families and the in the rearing of our children. Further, I’m not so sure that all of this can be blamed on the “Eastern Hemisphere” as noted in another comment. This may be what sit-com propaganda will show. However, as a successor of four generations born and raised in America, I am actually disappointed in what “heritage” has shown -especially as we’ve clearly assumed our self as a model for the rest of the world. When I consider what we’ve done to innocent children and families to acquire this land, how we abandoned and harmed children and hard working families in order to build economy and industry, and how we currently allow our children to be put into electronic trances by all of this information technology to further build knowledge and relationship with industry, I don’t really believe that we can pass the buck on the “rise of tide” of “international thought”. Perhaps the character of this nation was a little challegened from the onset. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying it’s bad to be an American as I think we’ve also done some great things. I am just simply saying that we have this habit of casting shadow on other nations, or better yet, demonizing other nations as if our heritage is angelic in sort. As a fellow American, I can love my country, but I refuse to be in denial of the things our nation has done and continues to do -on its own to undermine the wholeness of families and the rearing of our children. The reality is that we shouldn’t blame, rather we should take responsibility for own own actions or inactions as a nation that has brought us to this point. Finally, please please understand the power of corporate media and the tool of propaganda. It will almost always turn the lens off us and on to someone else. We’ve long told other countries what to do, and now that we’re experiencing our dose of “international thought”, we feel imposed upon. My advice is for you to put down the magazines and go talk with people from other countries. They’re not trying to pollute America, in fact many of them are just as disgruntled about how when they arrive, they discover just how polluted we already are. Again, let’s take responsibility and clean our own dirt from this house that we elected to occupy.
Apr 26 at 12:36 pm
If this UNCRC is passed, it seems to me that R and X ratings would no longer serve to protect children. Does this also eradicate the age of consent, currently 18 years old?
Apr 26 at 5:09 pm
Parents must be able to bring up their children unto the Lord and when they do desire to do so, it shouldn’t be against the law in any way. Whether it’s with how they school their children if they decide to homeschool or whatever. When parents want to bring them up to glorify God that’s definitely something great because it will be good for the future generation to have faithful children unto the Lord.
Apr 26 at 6:54 pm
Not only are we as a free people not to follow any United Nations directives. We need to quit following some of the Un-Godly and outrageous rules and laws this, our own nation, keeps imposing on us. They want to regulate every aspect of the average Americans personal life and behavior, but do nothing to regulate corporate excesses, or the borders, etc. Get rid of the Federal bureaucracies. They do nothing to help or protect us. The FDA, USDA, and other agencies will rubber stamp anything a major multi-national corporation wants to push on the public, and at the same time, want to tell this citizen where I can smoke a cigarette, but will not tell the tobacco industry to stop putting poisons into tobacco, which, in it’s pure form is not all that dangerous to your health or near as addictive. Parents need to continue to homeschool, and never allow the state, local, federal or other police force to make them do otherwise. Parents need to stick together, band together, and make their voices and intentions heard. You will not malign our children with your public school brainwashing and we will never obey any thing that that United Nations bunch passes. Do not fear the UN. They are an entity with the intent of running a one-world dictatorship. We need to demand that our country pull out of that organization. We need to go back to our roots, and be an isolationist nation with a powerful industrial base, agricultural base, with deep family and religious underpinning. We used to be revered by other countries, and now these modeern day corrupt politicians and bureaucrates are rapidly turning us into a third rate third world country. Our standards in the schools is no accident. This is part of the Big Picture plan to have an ignorant populace who follow state rules and ignore parental authority, God, and anything else that makes people strong.
They want an illiterate and docile population of puppets. Do not let them turn your child into a state mime. Keep them home. Turn off the TV. Do not allow your children to watch anything that you do not monitor yourself. Never allow a child who does not have the maturity to deal with things to get on the internet on those spots such as My Space, and all that junk. There are perverts and predators out there and most homeschool parents know this. Anyway, happy trails and do not give up. Band together. Pray together and let all know that we are not afraid, nor are we docile idiots.
Apr 26 at 10:27 pm
Go, Jerome! He’s right, we need to stick together as parents, and do what the Bible says: “Raise up a child in the way he should go…”. Parents (not the state, national, or global community) have this RESPONSIBILITY, much less, right to bring up the next generation. Want this nation blessed? We’d better start doing it God’s way.
Beth J.
Apr 29 at 2:20 pm
The base assumption which seems to be driving this and other contemporary legal maneuvers is that the State owns our children.
While the argument that the State has a compelling interest in demanding reasonable assimilation of our children into mainstream society for the stability and benefit of our political and social systems, taking this to the socialist extreme (”It Takes A Village” - ring any bells?) in the current atmosphere of political correctness is an easy thing to do.
It’s extremely important to be careful in choosing our language when we address the arbiters of the modern Statist agenda for our children. Invective speech and religious jargon serve only to support State assertions that those in favor of traditional parental rights are “extremists”, “cultists” or “child abusers”.
Those of us who educate our children at home and, indeed, ALL parents need to be observant of programs being implemented in the local public schools as well as the federal funding incentives being handed down from Washington D.C., as these truly are barometers for the State’s agenda for our children.
Apr 29 at 7:21 pm
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