Differentiate but don’t discriminate
Serve equity to their needs fairly
Say your children need shoes. You take them to the shoe showroom. There, you get all your children similarly priced shoes but different sizes to fit their individual feet. This is differentiation. You know that all your kids can’t wear the same size shoes. Hence, you buy the right size that fits their needs. Say, instead of that approach, you buy some of your kids, really expensive shoes, and the others some mediocre shoes. Maybe some of your children get none at all. Now, that is favoritism or discrimination.
In each of these situations, let’s explore how the children feel.
When you differentiated based on their needs, even if the children didn’t understand, there’s a scope for an honest conversation: A conversation that the kids will understand and buy into — even if some conversations take time to sink in. This situation is a win-win one — the child’s emotional bucket is filled as the child is not feeling discriminated. And you score a win as the relationship is intact — in fact, it is strengthened.
When you exhibit favoritism, you are still able to provide an explanation but this explanation doesn’t hold much water. Your personal bias has impacted your decision and it shows. The children who were not shown favoritism are visibly or silently resentful. What is this situation’s combination? Ironically, it is lose-lose-lose.
- For the favored child, the pressure of maintaining their favorite status eventually gets to them. It’s stressful for them, though we might think the opposite.
- The child who doesn’t get favor is definitely developing resentment and might even become revengeful. Their emotional bucket becomes empty. The empty bucket leads to bad behavior, which in turn could make them fall down more in the favoritism hierarchy.
- You lose too. Of course, you have to deal with bad behavior of the unfavored children but you have weakened relationships with all your children.
While all that introduction has set the stage, what do we actually do? There are quite a few steps we can take.
- Identify your own personal biases.
- Identify your triggers. Children can possibly trigger us. If we identify and work on our triggers, then we will be able to remain relatively neutral.
- Identify the children’s emotional needs. Every child is different and hence every child’s needs are different. The same rule applies to their emotional needs as well.
- Develop strategies based on the child’s age and development stage.
- Be aware of how children understand love. Different children have different love languages. (Reference: Dr. Gary Chapman)
- Ensure that the family rules exhibit fairness to all.
- Regular family discussions/meetings help strengthen family bonds (Reference: Dr. Jane Nelsen)
- Allow for open communication. Everyone should have a voice that’s heard and listened to without judgment (Reference: Listen to understand, not listen to respond)
- Provide some 1–1 time for all children. This special time strengthens the bond with each child and also provides them the private time with you to share. (Reference: Dr. Laura Markham)
- Instead of being defensive over criticism from children, strive to understand, apologize and correct the mistake. An apology is a very powerful tool. It teaches the kids that mistakes happen; we should correct them and move on. Apology also strengthens the relationship between the parent and the child, for it removes any myths or perceptions of superiority in the family. Finally, it teaches the kid what is expected of them when they do mistakes.
Dr. Julie Gottman rightly said that
world peace starts at home
If we differentiate and don’t discriminate, our children will grow up as strong, kind individuals. They will contribute to the positivity and peace of the world.
Finally, here’s food for thought:
Equality, Equity (Differentiation) & Discrimination are three totally different terms.
Equality is giving the same thing to everyone regardless of their needs
Equity a.k.a Differentiation is giving similar things to everyone based on their needs
Discrimination is giving different things (or not) to everyone
