In a world where everyone strives for progress and peace, it’s easy to overlook one of the most powerful forces that shape humanity that is parenting.
We all believe that home is the first school, and parents are a child’s first teachers. The values that instilled to a child during childhood have a profound impact not only on the individual but on society at large. So, good parenting becomes a necessity not a luxury.
It is the foundation of emotional stability, moral reasoning, social behavior, and mental resilience. When done right, it creates individuals who can lead, heal, and build. When done wrong, it can give rise to scars that are too emotional, behavioral issues, and even crime.
Children do not only need food, clothing, and shelter. They need presence. A father and a mother who are present provide emotional security, discipline, guidance, and most importantly, they provide love. These are not optional. They are vitamins for a child’s emotional and psychological development.
Child psychology clearly shows that early bonds between a child and their guardians shape how their brain grows and how they relate to the world. Criminology supports this by showing that strong family ties can help prevent children from getting involved in crime, while broken or harmful family environments often lead to trouble.
Fathers and mothers provide structure, confidence, emotional compass of the home, offer warmth and protection. A study by the US Department of Justice found that 85 % of youth in prisons grew up in fatherless homes. Similarly, the absence of maternal care in early childhood has been found linked to antisocial behavior and attachment disorders.
Sociologist Emile Durkheim also believed that the family plays a key role in teaching children the basic values and social rules they need to live in society. When families fail in this function, individuals become alienated, which can lead to deviance or even at the worst case; criminality.
Together, these fields paint a compelling picture. If we fail to nurture the moral, emotional, and intellectual life of a child, we risk producing not only unhappy individuals but an unhealthy society. When both parents are available, both emotionally and physically children are less likely to suffer from depression, aggression, or detachment and are more likely to finish school, have stable careers, and form healthy relationships.
When parenting fails
Statistics are really sobering. The connection between a poor parenting and criminal behavior is no longer just limited to theories, it’s become a documented reality. According to a longitudinal study published in The Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, neglectful or abusive parenting significantly increases the risk of a child engaging in criminal activity by age 18.
Similarly, In a report published by National Institute of justice provided a report that children who are abused or neglected are 59% more likely to be arrested as juveniles. Various research papers and articles also have concluded that many of the young offenders came from broken or dysfunctional homes.
Neglect behavior, lack of discipline, absence of affection are the breeding grounds for low self-esteem, rebellion, and in extreme cases, criminal behavior.
Let’s consider these three scenarios:
- Scenario A: A 15-year-old child growing up in a violent home with an absent father has a high risk of becoming a gang member, seeking the structure and belonging he never found at home. He is likely to normalize violence in his life.
- Scenario B: Similarly, a teenage girl, emotionally neglected by her parents who are career-obsessed, is likely to fall into a cycle of toxic relationships and self-harm, believing that love must be earned through pain. It’s because she never really received the attention and presence easily.
- Scenario C: A child raised in a nurturing, communicative household grows up can be linked to become grown as a community leader, advocating for mental health and education in underprivileged areas.
The difference here? Parenting
We spend years learning how to drive, operate machines, or manage finances. But what about learning how to raise a human soul that brings true civilization? I guess it’s a high time to professionalize parenting, not by making it rigid or bureaucratic, but by giving parents the tools, knowledge, and support they need desperately.
We could propose the launch of a nationwide Parenting for Progress initiative, a training and mentorship program designed to educate parents about emotional intelligence and child psychology, about positive discipline and conflict resolution, effective communication with children, handling trauma, bullying, and social media influence, about gender-sensitive and inclusive parenting, about building resilience, empathy, and responsibility.
This initiative can involve school’s engagement, community centers, religious institutions, and even workplaces. Workshops, support groups, and even online modules can be tailored to suit various socioeconomic and cultural backgrounds.
Every great civilization begins at home. Good parenting creates good people. Good people build good societies. It’s that simple, and that powerful. If we want a world with less crime, less mental illness, and more compassion, it begins not in courtrooms, hospitals, or prisons but in living rooms, at dinner tables, and bedtime stories.
It’s a time that we just not wait for the system to fix broken adults, let’s equip parents to raise whole children.
