Herbert W Armstrong

   Twelve rules for rearing a juvenile delinquent, guaranteed to work. You can put it in effect in your own home. All you gotta do is follow the rules. Are you ready? Listen carefully.

   One, begin with infancy to give your child everything he wants, everything you can possibly provide him. And if you can't provide him enough in the way of materialism of material goods and things, then certainly by all means give him everything he wants when it has to do with his own way. Don't ever take anything away from him, don't ever thwart him, don't ever tell him no. Or her. You know, it could be a girl, just give the child everything it wants. In this way, he can grow up to believe that there are no stigmas out there. There are no stop signs, there are no don't smoke, keep off the grass signs, there are no rules, no orders, no laws. Furthermore, he will know that the world owes him a living. He will know that the world is only out to get him because every time the world says no, because mommy and daddy never did, he will know the world has it in for him. And he will feel horribly defensive.

   Two, while he's real little and he first comes up with some of those bad words, laugh at him. In that way, he will chuckle and he will think he's cute, and he will be very proud of himself for having gotten all that attention and the power of shock of saying a cute little four-letter word that just absolutely drives his mother out of her skull, that stands his father's hair on end, and that sends the ladies' bridge club out screaming. You know, like the Dennis the Menace strip, that type of thing. He'll think that's real cute. And then a little later on, when he really gets some choice words, why, you won't be shocked. Just drive it right at the walls. You know about the new Los Angeles garage. You heard about that one, didn't you? They got a unique way of parking cars down there. New Los Angeles garage. What they did is just hook up a record of Tiny Tim to the loudspeaker and it drives the cars right up the walls.

   Then number three, never give this kid any spiritual training whatsoever. Never talk to him about morals, about any kind of a spirit being. Don't talk to him about God. Don't give him any religious training. Don't give him any moral or spiritual training. What you do is wait until he's 21 and then let him decide for himself. The only trouble with that third rule is that a lot of times they beat you to it at about age 15. They've already decided for themselves by then or age 16. And by that time, you can't even handle them anymore. And you will find out by age 21 they're not about to change their opinions that they've already made by age 13 or 15. But if you refrain from giving them any spiritual training—and you might as well because you probably are incapable of doing so anyhow, because you might not have had the proper kind of spiritual training. And if you did, you never looked into it to prove it, or you would have found it probably was shot through with all kinds of tradition and errors. And those who gave you the spiritual training were only perpetuating what they themselves had been taught. And that's kind of like Granny Goose, or Gross rather—well, it could be Gross. I don't know, depending on what language you're using—and Mother West Wind tales, Jack the Giant Killer, that type of thing. And the tales that you were told about religion that you grew up, the kind of spiritual training a lot of people got was not necessarily all that accurate, you know. So, if you avoid or neglect giving your child any kind of consciousness that there is a higher power and let him wait until he's 14, 15, 17, or 21 to decide for himself, in this way, you will leave him without a moral guide. He won't ever think that there is somebody else watching him other than human eyes, some greater power that has a face over his eternity or his eventual destiny. And therefore, there won't be any old type of stigma inside his mind which would make him conform to any particular moral pattern or another. There would be no consciousness of a God or a higher being which would stand him in good stead if mom and dad aren't there to watch. There wouldn't be any restraints if you neglect giving him any spiritual teaching.

   Now, the second part of that third rule for rearing a delinquent child, better than that—even better than not giving him any spiritual teaching—if you want to really drive your kid up the wall, what you do is to give him spiritual teaching and then let him see that you are not living by what you are telling him. That works even better. What you do is drag him off to church and he falls asleep, you know, for the first few years. And then finally, when you get him interested in a youth group or a Sunday school or something—maybe they can get some kind of an athletic program or something that interest the kid, tea party, one thing or the other. But finally, as he's a bigger teenager and he listens to all these words, like the one kid said we interviewed in the World Tomorrow program not long ago about the drugs thing on television. He said, "You know, that was a real cool sermon. I heard these things in church and, man, that's not a good, you know." And then we came home and everybody congratulated everybody that shook hands at the door and a few minutes later, why, everything was just like it was. It was like McDonald's, the way it always was. In other words, what the sermon said, while it might have been a fine sermon, it might have told a few straight-from-the-shoulder points about Christian living, about how to live, but it didn't seem to have all that much effect by the time they've been back in their own home for a few minutes. So, the second part to the third rule for rearing a delinquent child, which is never giving any spiritual training, better yet, give spiritual training, but give him a weak, insipid, ritualistic type and then show him by your example that you don't believe in it anyway because you're not living what you believe.

   Number four, the fourth rule for guaranteed rearing of a delinquent child: always avoid the use of the word wrong or bad or don't. Always avoid the meaning of the word punishment. Adopt the notion that the words wrong, bad, don't, evil, sin, punishment, taboo, etc., all should appear in the dictionaries only in the obsolete word section where you can go to peruse the words that a society still believing in the old puritanical dos and don'ts once used to thwart young people because all those parents and all that society were trying so diligently to keep all those young kids under their thumbs. Now, if you avoid the use of these words, you will then, according to this theory, avoid giving him a guilt complex. And since there is no act that he may perpetrate that you might make him feel guilty over because you would never say no, you wouldn't say that's wrong, you would never say don't, and you certainly would never think of punishing him, then this will condition his mind so that later on, you see, when he's arrested for smoking pot or if he's arrested for stealing a car or for vandalizing somebody's property or for assaulting a police officer, he will automatically know that society is against him and just trying to thwart him, that everybody's out to get him. The police exist for the primary purpose of trying to make his life miserable because the cop reacted to his assault and he is not guilty, not wrong, has not done anything which was a no-no. And he's only being persecuted, he's being picked on. So, if you carefully avoid any thwarting, carefully avoid the use of the word no, don't, that's wrong, that's bad, don't do that, and you can make sure that your child later on when he's arrested will feel that society is against him and he's being persecuted.

   Number five, in the 12 rules for rearing a delinquent child: be sure to pick up everything he leaves around as a little tiny baby. If he throws the oatmeal on the floor, just make a delightful little chirp and smile at him. Don't upset him because he might get the idea that he's guilty and then just pick it up and then give him another bowl of oatmeal. If he throws his silver on the floor in a restaurant, ignore him. The waitress can't and probably the rest of the personnel there won't and the people sitting next to you won't, but maybe you can. That's what the child psychology books tell you to do. Just ignore him, that's all right, and pick up after him. If you can reach the fork with your foot without looking like you're really making a spectacle out of the thing, just surreptitiously kind of toe it over on the table and then maybe get it later as you're about to leave. At home, pick up everything he leaves around: books, shoes, clothes, old records, tapes, switchblade knives, cudgels, baseball bats, a couple of kilos of hash—something. Pick it up when he leaves it lying around so that he will know no matter where he is, whether in school, in his locker—he wouldn't be in the locker, but maybe his clothes and books would be. Well, maybe he would be too, depending on where he's hiding out when the bell rings. But he would know that society is pretty messy and that nobody is going to cuss him out for being messy and that it's the way to be because everybody else is. And he will also know that it's somebody else's responsibility. He casually tosses it aside, he knows somebody else is going to pick it up. So if he's driving along in the automobile, he throws the beer can out the window, throws the garbage along by the side of the road, tosses the cigarette butt out in a dry grassy area where it can start a forest fire. Because as a little tiny child, he learned by your example, picking up everything he leaves around, that it's somebody else's responsibility to pick up after him.

   Number six, and most of you are doing this anyhow, let him read any printed matter he can get his little hands on. Anything, doesn't matter. And in that regard, since he's your child and he's only 8, 10, 11, or 13, his mail and his pockets and his desk and his drawer are utterly private and you have no business intercepting his notes, looking in his notebook, or reading his mail. Because at age 8 or 10 or 11 or 13, any printed matter that passes through his hands is entirely his own business. Because after all, isn't this kid about to make up his mind whether God exists? Haven't you left him free to make that choice? Haven't you avoided all these years telling him no, don't, that's bad, that's wrong? Well, certainly. Well then, this is just in the context of the rest of these rules if you want to rear a delinquent child, a criminal as a matter of fact. So let him read any printed matter he can get his hands on and look at any pictures that come into his hands and don't interfere. And furthermore, let him look at any kind of television he would like and go to any motion pictures he would like. In short, let him choose his own forms of recreation and entertainment and do not interfere. Oh, be careful the silverware is clean when he eats. Make sure that you've carefully sterilized the glasses, ask him to wash before dinner, that's okay, he'll probably understand that. Make sure you keep all the poisons out of his food, the medicine chest high enough or locked when he's a little tiny one so that he won't get a hold of those pills you're using and end up dead. Keep all the highly volatile toxic poisons out from underneath the cupboards when he's real young because after all, it's impossible for you if you're going to follow these rules to tell him no, and he would not have any normal fear of just gulping down a good healthy swig of detergent. Yet, many little babies have and it will probably kill him if he does. So what you've got to do, because you don't want him to end up that way and since you're not going to tell him no, and you wouldn't punish him if he did reach for that drawer, which is taboo, and you wouldn't teach him that he shouldn't reach for it, well what you've got to do is keep that stuff out of sight and carefully protect him in a clean environment while he's too young to make those decisions for himself. Be awfully careful then that his physical body is clean, but don't care one whit about what happens to his mind. Let him soil and dirty up his mind with whatever printed material, whatever spoken word, whatever picture books he can get his hands on.

   Number seven, always try to make sure your quarrels are frequent and vocal and public in front of your children. And even if you don't quarrel frequently in the presence of your children, let them see your long, mad, angry, gray, hate-filled glances at each other in the aftermath of your latest quarrel. You see, in this way, they won't be too shocked when the home breaks up later and they'll be prepared for the court suit over custody of the kids. And it won't be all that much of a horrible shock when they wonder which parent they're going to choose to go live with or tell them both to forget it. And if you quarrel frequently in the presence of your children, it helps overlap on number three, the third rule there about spiritual training, and it helps to accomplish the firmly believed and accepted doctrine which most kids have learned to believe now, that most parents tell them, "Don't do as I do, do as I say do." It will firmly entrench in their mind that all parents and everybody, the whole establishment, are hypocrites because they say one thing and they do another. Furthermore, it will undermine any attempt you had at that number three, whether you gave spiritual training or the lack of it. Because if you did, they will know that a great deal of spiritual training has to do with kindness and meekness and peace and joy and all those fine attributes of Christianity. And that there's a great deal in there that they probably heard in some of those sermons, those dry, dead, boring, dull sermons they went to listen to about father and mother and husband and wife and about family responsibilities, you know. And they heard all of this and they'll know now that you're not living by it. So, they won't know what a horrible liar, cheat, hypocrite, and virtual criminal you are because you don't live by anything that the pastor tells you. But you have every right to be profoundly disturbed when your child doesn't live by anything you tell him. And then, since you probably rebelled against your parents and probably don't follow the moral principles you know you should, and probably didn't pay all that much attention to spiritual training as you came along, then you can be utterly shocked. And you can tell your friends over the cocktail party, "I can't understand this stupid kid of mine. He just seems to want to rebel against me. Can you understand it? All he ever does, if I tell him do this, I know he's gonna do the opposite. So, I desperately try this opposite psychology. I try to tell him don't do it, you know, when he figures me out even then. I try to get the opposite response and little snot is so sharp that he knows in advance what I'm going to do. He's got me figured out and I can't understand why it is that he just seems to want to rebel against me. I don't dare say a word about his incredibly long and filthy hair because if I did, you know what he'd do? He'd just let it grow longer or maybe invite some friends in and sit around and let me stare at it and I can't understand this." You can't understand it? Why not? If you spent half your teenage in rebelling against your parents, there's nobody more qualified to understand rebellion against parents but a former kid who rebelled against parents. So, quarrel frequently in the presence of your children, argue, be loud, be obnoxious. Dads, make your kids think that you're a giant know-it-all with an empty peanut shell for a brain and a mouth as big as all outdoors. Anytime any subject comes along, tell them that you know all there is to know about it, that there isn't anybody who knows anything more than you do, whether the subject is Hondas or automobiles, it doesn't matter, you know. And if the kid tries to argue and tell you something he learned at school and he says, "Well, Dad, frankly, that's not quite right. Here's the way it is," what you do real quickly before he gets the whole statement out is just shut him up. In that way, he'll know what an open mind you have, how willing to admit you're wrong that you are, and how truly objective you are. And mothers, be sure to fight the feminist battle and be sure to show your kids that you're able to rule over Dad by any hook or crook method you possibly can. And if that fails, in many cases, you could use brute force, which is likely in some households. You could see, you know, Maisie the Riveter has gone the way of all flesh now after World War II. We're in the day of the new modern fem. This gal that comes home in overalls after she's been searching boxcars all day for a living with her flashlight in her hip pocket walks in and says, "How did, George?" You know, throws a hammerlock on him, leads him over there and says, "I thought I told you to get the stupid dishes cleaned." This type of thing. And if you're fighting that battle at home, the kids will kind of be looking back and forth, maybe help you ring the bell and tell you it's time to come out of your corner. But they won't really know which one is doing the shaving and which one is wearing the trousers because maybe both will look sort of unidentifiably alike. It's like the two hippies that looked exactly alike that walked into the doctor's office, an obstetrician he happened to be, and it was announced to the doctor by the nurse that these two hippies—or one of them at least—was pregnant. But they both wore the same clothes. They didn't have shoes on. They had baggy pants and a shape was kind of a shirt and long hair and kind of an ugly long nose. How many of these kids get all these long noses or does long hair just make it look longer? Anyhow, the steel-rimmed spectacles and a rope for a belt and no shoes, and they sat there fingering their love beads. And the doctor was embarrassed. He looked and he couldn't figure out which one was the girl. And he says, "Uh, how do I put this? He says, uh, which one of you, uh, has the, well, you know, the, uh, which one of you has the, the monthly cycle?" And she elbowed the guy and she said, "Well, it must be him because I drive a Yamaha or a Honda, whichever one it was." She wasn't quite sure. Well, look, you can have kids like that if you just continue to show them the examples that I'm talking about and use these 12 rules. But you've got to abide by the rules. Now, if you're not willing to abide by the rules, you may escape having a juvenile delinquent for a kid or a criminal grow up and tell you what he thinks of you. So, quarrel frequently in the presence of your children, fight the battle of the sexes, argue, bicker, nag, scream, fight. Every now and then just haul off and give one another a good roundhouse. And you can be sure that your children won't be too shocked when you break up the home and that they will learn to fight and they'll learn about the hypocrites all around them in society and so on.

   And by the way, if you want to write for a booklet on the kind of woman that none of the Femmes would want to be and the kind of woman most of you women would never want to be, then write in for this booklet, True Womanhood: Is It a Lost Cause? This is a booklet that talks about true womanhood and it dares to talk about the state wherein woman finds her true fulfillment and happiness. It doesn't apologize for some of the source material that is used, including places like Ephesians and the Book of Colossians and even the Book of Proverbs and so on. Oh, there are some beauties in the Book of Proverbs. You ever read some of those Proverbs, those wise statements of kings that used to live a long time ago? A lot of people think those were all Solomon's. No, some of them were written by a lot of other people. Even, uh, King Lemuel's mother had a lot to say. Matter of fact, she's got a section in there about women. It's pretty interesting in reading. She had a lot to say about women, but it talks about, you know, the dripping on a tin roof. It's kind of like the mouth of a nagging woman all day long, this type of thing. There are some real interesting statements in there. If you like this, uh, booklet, I think it's pretty much up to date right now, what with the feminist movement and all the wives going on strike. And a lot of them marched into the offices to take a kid and throw it in the lap of the boss and say, "Here, you watch the little one so I can." So, you are right for this one on True Womanhood: Is It a Lost Cause? Or is it a worthwhile cause? True womanhood.

   Now, the women are really beginning to get into this revolutionary act. Everybody wants to revolt and it does get very revolting when you look around. There are a lot of revolting people in the world. But now going back to the lesson on these 12 perfect rules for creating a juvenile delinquent in your own home. After you've quarreled frequently in the presence of your children, the continual type of thing.

   Then the eighth point is: be sure to give your child all the spending money you possibly can. Make sure that he's never lacking money and don't teach him the value of money and don't teach him what kind of work produces that money. In this way, he will think that he should never have things as tough as you've had them. He will never feel that he has to earn his own. He'll never have any sense of responsibility where it comes to money. Furthermore, when you catch him stealing out of the cookie jar—or even better yet, if you find out that what he did was eat the cookie and then come in and ask you, "Mom, can I have a cookie?"—don't tell him that was subterfuge. Don't use any evil words like, "Well, you little, uh, uh, cheat, don't you realize that's tantamount to lying?" and whip him. Because if you do that, you're liable to straighten him out and he's liable to get a pretty good object lesson and he's liable to defeat your purpose if you want to have a juvenile delinquent for a kid. So, give him as much money as you can possibly afford, never make him earn his own. Why should he have things as tough as you had them? Don't teach them the value of it or honesty or integrity or things like taxation and financial responsibility. Just let him find out that later on the world is out there waiting for him to get his hands on whatever money comes into his hands by whatever method he hopes to obtain the money. And maybe when he's, uh, in jail for having held up a dairy or a grocery store or something, why maybe he can learn the lesson later.

   Number nine, satisfy his every sensual desire. Make sure he gets plenty of food and drink and comfort because, you see, if you deny anything—like, for instance, he wants the ice cream but not the spinach—that may lead to some horrible frustration. And according to some of the child psychology books, it could warp his personality, it could make him straight. And you see, you're trying to get a juvenile delinquent now for the purpose of this particular series of 12 lessons. We're talking about how to rear a juvenile delinquent. And if he gets denied anything, if he finds out that unless you perform according to a certain standard, there aren't any rewards, and if you perform according to a wrong standard that there are punishments, if he's a kid that is allowed to grow up in an environment where there is a system of punishments and rewards, he's liable to end up straight. And so, what you do is to satisfy every physical craving and need and pleasure. Let him go to bed when he's good and dog-tired, let him get up when he's dopey with too much sleep, let him eat whatever he likes. Let him have a good roaring case of pimples or acne, don't pay any attention to his diet. And that way he'll learn how to be a seeker of self-gratification. And now every sensual desire ought to be satisfied. This is one or two things that might get a little technical and intricate here, so I'll try to be careful the way I state this. Some of the books do advise that in some of those areas of personal gratification that it should not be done, at least in public. That's in a book I have, which is a big thick red book that is written by more than 25 doctors. And that's the best they can come up with about trying to thwart some of these kids' desires about satisfying the physical senses.

   Then number ten, always take his part whenever he gets in any altercation with neighbors, with neighbors' children, with teachers especially, and more especially with the policeman. Always take his part. Tell the neighbors' kids that they'd better get home and quit crying and quit picking on your kid. When the irate or angry neighbor comes over, raise your voice and lie about it a little bit. Let your kid hear you. It's a good example if you want him to be a juvenile delinquent. Or be a cringing coward and simply draw the shades and refuse to answer the door. He'll see that example. It would be beautiful. Help him become a juvenile delinquent. Or simply argue that it was the other kid's fault when you know better and the kid knows better too, and he'll listen to that argument and he will have a real good chance for becoming a juvenile delinquent. So, take his part against the neighbors and the neighbors' kids, take his part against the teachers when the teacher shows you an abysmally sloppy report which was only three weeks late and says, "I had to give the kid an F." Just cuss the teacher first, call the teacher all kinds of names: "You frustrated old maid," so on, you know. And be sure to do it in the presence of your child and take his part against the teacher. And in this way, the kid will learn that all the teachers are trying to do is to get him, all they're out for is to give him bad grades. And they lie awake at night trying to figure out how to get this particular kid. Always look over your shoulder and when you see a traffic policeman, slack off on the accelerator. Hedge a little bit on the red lights and the yellow lights, park in no-parking zones when possible. And if you ever do get a ticket, make it the topic of conversation around your TV dinners for at least five nights in a row about that dirty so-and-so cop that was lying in wait to get you and you didn't really have it coming. In this way, he'll learn that neighbors and teachers and policemen and people in authority are just a bunch of idiots out there that don't know any better, that are only out there to get innocent citizens. And he will be able to mimic your example.

   Now the eleventh point, when he gets into real trouble, then apologize for yourself by saying, "Well, it's not my fault. I never could do a thing with him. I don't know, I gave him everything I possibly could and I don't know how to do anything with him."

   And twelfth, get ready for a miserable life because if you apply those preceding eleven, you are going to have it.

   Now, on the other hand, if you want to have some information about how to combat all those twelve rules and the rules about how not to have a juvenile delinquent for a child, then you ought to write for these booklets on The Plain Truth about Child Rearing. And our booklet on Crime Can Be Stopped, which contains these twelve rules I've just gone over for rearing a delinquent but also how not to. And the book with The Plain Truth about Child Rearing shows you some of these unbelievable quotations from child psychology and how you ought to rear your children.

   Now, be sure to write for the booklets I've mentioned in this program and also request the Plain Truth magazine. Your free copy is reserved for you, read by millions around the world, more than two million circulation but absolutely free of cost to you. There is no charge whatsoever. It's called the Plain Truth, and all you need to do is to request it by sending a letter to Box 345, Sydney, New South Wales. Be sure to tell us the call letters of your station. We'd like to have you do that. That's all we need. There is no cost but tell us the name of the radio station which you've been listening, the call letters, and then send your letter to Box 345, Sydney, New South Wales.

   And so, until next time, this is Garner Ted Armstrong saying goodbye, friends.

   You have been listening to The World Tomorrow. If you would like more information, write to Ambassador College, Box 345, GPO, Sydney, New South Wales. That's Ambassador College, Box 345, GPO, Sydney, New South Wales.