Talking Politics

Today Rusty and I had our first "political" conversation with Meg and Ben. We were driving from Salt Lake to Provo (we're here on Spring Break) and Meg wanted to know all about the first woman who is running for President, the first black man who is running for President, and what is means to be a Republican and Democrat.

It really hit us that we could (for lack of better word) "influence" our kids. I know that a lot of people outside the Church have accused Mormons of doing just that with their kids, but we as parents (and the leaders of the Church) encourage our kids to "find out" through study and prayer for themselves what they believe as far as the Church is concerned. But this whole political thing was a little different.

Meg kept asking, "Who are we voting for?" "Are we Republican or Democrat?" "Do we like the woman who is running for President?" I realized that we could totally tell her what to think. It was weird. I haven't been able to do this with clothes, music, movies, etc. but I seriously saw how at this point and time in her life I could do it with politics. We decided to take the highroad and tell her the facts (the best that we knew). We presented her with a lot of information on her level and she kind of made a few conclusions on her own.

Ben was very interested in the conversation as well, but kept wanting to compare the candidates to the founding fathers (he has read a few biographies on Ben Franklin and George Washington; we also just went to Philadelphia last fall). I want to ingrain in my kids a trait I am grateful that I learned, the ability to study the facts and think for yourself.