Influenceable

While we were still in Texas our Pastor at the time used one of the younger cuties to get his point across about the influenceity of children. The catch phrase that to this day I remember was when she said in a childlike voice "influence me". Even then I didn't understand how influenceable a child's mind was. Some friends of ours had a daughter slightly older than Ainsley and she looked up to in just about every way. Even being away from Texas for over two years we still hear about the dog that Brooke played in Annie or about the particular toy that Brooke had that Ainsley loved. Since getting "older" Ainsley has wanted her hair cut short to both of our dismay. But since we want our hard lines to have meaning and in my opinion as long as she still looked like a little girl, we allowed it to be cut. So mom loaded her up in the car and after a hard hour she returned home to my surprise with a haircut just like Brooke! Does Ainsley even remember what Brooke's hair really looks like? I don't think she does conscientiously, however back in her brain somewhere she was influenced.
A book called "A Class Divided" goes into such deep detail of our at a young age a child can be taught to hate or to love. A teacher takes her third grade class and divides them according to eye color. On the first day all Blue eyed children are the best at everything and deserve special privileges. Immense hatred arises among life long friends. Students become violent and start to call the others names like "you brown eye". On the next day she switches it and immediately the attitudes change. Where before the downtrodden brown eyes felt inadequate, now they are superior and horde it over the poor blue eyes. Even grades change depending on who is being told is the better.
We in America tend to think that we are strong and uninfluenceable. It has been proven over and over that at the very least children are. I believe strongly that labels have truly influenced our society to the point that we can't advance past hatred and bitterness. Catch phrases like African American, Asian America and Hispanic American only lead to more segregation because regardless of side you are taught that you are different. My mom brought up a point recently that while she was growing up those who were Spanish were... white. Yeah shocking isn't it! We allowed a divide somewhere to come up, to the point that heritage really has nothing to do with it. Starting at a young age we should stop telling people they are any different and start showing them the things they really need to know. Around the world they have figured it out, yet the melting pot has became a salad of things that can be picked out and tossed aside. Recently you see racism at is finest with people like Obama as a presidential candidate. HE and no one else brings race into the mix. HE claims that the McCain group will bring it up and HE proves my point over and over and over again because suddenly there is a divide that can't be crossed created by HIM.
To influence our children to do right we need to start while they are yet young and continue it through their education then in their adult life the issues we face won't be the problems they have.