What are the major mistakes in bringing up children?
The major mistakes in bringing up children are many, but I will talk only about the most important. First: the idea that they belong to you. They come through you; you have been a passage, but they don't belong to you. They are not your possessions. Out of this idea of possessiveness many mistakes arise. Once you start thinking that they are your possessions, you have reduced them into things, because only things can be possessed, not human beings. It is the ugliest act you can do. And those poor children are so helpless, so dependent on you, they cannot rebel. They accept whatever your idea is. And to protect your possessiveness you make them Christians the moment they are born. You make them Hindus, you make them Mohammedans, you make them Buddhists, you make them Jews -- you can't wait! And can't you see the absolute absurdity of it? In politics, the person will be adult and capable of voting when he is twenty-one. Is religion something of lesser quality than politics? B