issue求拍--130

不知道有没有跑题， 可能某些重要的地方没有点出来，用的时间很长，又查资料，又查字典才弄出来的，恳求大家狠拍，多谢啦

我是第一次发文，有什么程序不对的，还望前辈们指出。

事先没有提纲：大致想法是：

反对：1 社会化很重要，但不是唯一因素

           2 我们已经取得了不错的成绩， 在raise children方面

Issue 130

The speaker’s statement actually contains two claims: (1) the destiny of society is determined by socialization of children, which I paraphrase as: the higher degree of socialization of children is, the better a society would become; (2) we have not yet learned how to raise children who can help bring about a better society. As far as I am concerned, I disagree with both of them.

To begin with, I concede that socialization does have a crucial impact on both individuals and society.  On the one hand, the process of socialization, which starts from the day one is born and continues through the whole life, prepares an individual to recognize the acceptable and unacceptable behaviors of a society when interacting with others from a particular role he or she plays.  Influenced by family, school, peers, mass media and the like, children gradually learn to modify his or her behaviors so as to conform to social norms.  On the other hand, it is by socialization that “social and cultural continuity are attained”, according to Clausen, a renowned sociologist.  To illustrate this point, one needs to look no further than national characteristics of different peoples, such as English people’s gentle and reserved manners and Chinese people’s modesty, which are passed down from one generation to another by no other means but means of socialization.  To the contrary, failure in socialization can lead to anti-social behaviors or shyness, which may be not for the benefit of society or individuals.

However, socialization is not the only factor that destines the future of society.  First of all, factors like knowledge, physical health, natural resources, etc can also influence whether or how a society develops.  With low level of knowledge--for instance, in prehistoric society or tribes—however socialized children may be, the fact that the overall speed of development is slow will not change a lot.  Similarly, fatal diseases or limited amount of resources are bottlenecks of a nation’s development.  Second, considering socialization emphasizes on conformity to social norms, what kind of social norms or standards is like has a lot to with the destiny of society.  If social traditions advocate a healthy environment manifested by critical thinking, liberty and equality, then the speaker’ claim may have some merits.  However, for a totally opposite matter, there may be some likelihood that individuality and creativity will fall prey to conformity to authorities, which surely we wouldn’t want to see.

With respect to the second claim, the speaker seems to overlook the painstaking efforts that parents, education system and the whole society have made in order to create a healthy environment for the development of children.  There are indeed some controversies such as government versus home schooling, student- or teacher-oriented teaching methods debating the best way to raise children.  There are also some problems such as juvenile delinquency, high dropout rate in high schools and suicide etc arousing more and more people’s concerns.   Yet, can’t these issues demonstrate the fact that more attention has been allocated to our kids?  And we are continuing to make progress.  Lots of merits that are neglected before such as creativity, individuality and cooperation, are now widely accepted by parents, teachers and the whole society as factors that contribute to the future success of children and a better society.  Parents are reading more books in order to understand the way how their kids think and behave.  Violence and pornography on the Internet has been blamed as poison to young people’s minds.  High pressure in studying has been identified as a major threat to mental health of students.  Despite the fact that we can’t figure out the best way of teaching younger generation—whether there is such a way is still open to doubt—we are improving.

To sum up, socialization constitutes one important element for development of individuals and therefore, closely relates to the future of society.  Nevertheless, the destiny of a society is influenced by many other factors as well.  Moreover, in my observation, progress has been made in how to raise children in a healthy way, physically as well as mentally.