Why I’m AGAINST forcing kids to do chores.

OK, before I start please notice that I am against FORCING children to do chores, I am not against children helping around the house because they are asked to and willingly do or because they volunteer to. I realize that in this issue I am in the minority but sometimes the majority is wrong. I would kindly ask you to bare with me.

When I was a child in the 80’s and a teenager in the 90’s I was never required by my parents to do household chores. Neither did I ever know in person anybody my age who did have chores. For me the whole concept was unknown and actually the last few years I got to hear about it mainly from Facebook Memes. Yes, I knew that some kids helped around the house mainly from US sitcoms but I did not realize that they were forced to do so.

Please don’t get me wrong as kids the correct thing to do was to put our toys away after playing, put our jacket in the cupboard and not just throw it anywhere or even help set the table especially on holidays but I never saw these things as chores, they were simply good manners. Neither was I handicapped from learning things like watching my mother make a cake and even help her doing it or try out a recipe myself - actually I had a phase I enjoyed cooking stuff - but I did these things because I wanted to not because I was required to. Believe it or not there were times I took out the garbage or did other stuff without being asked or we did get sent to the shop to buy things at times with a shopping list given by mom but these were not forced chores. There are other things too that I could point out but belong to a different essay and would take up a lot of space.

Not being forced to do chores did not handicap me - I reassure you that I can do anything you can if I want to. It did not make me ungrateful. It did not take my dignity away, actually offering to help on my own or doing well at school, etc gave me more dignity than being made to scrub the toilet ever would.

I have read all the arguments in favour of chores and they make me on the one hand laugh because I know from my own experience that they aren’t so and cry because of the lies being served to people by a Capitalist Society that really aims at creating working machines but that’s another story.

1. For me the most important argument against chores is that the job of a child should be to be a child and its a sin to steal childhood away from kids. Children are children but once. As one mother said, “... the reason I have never given you chores is that, from where I sit, your job as a child is to BE a child. To enjoy the simple things. To play. To laugh. To have fun. To enjoy this carefree state for as long as you can. To focus on school and extracurriculars. To find a hobby you love. To encourage your passions in life. To own the responsibility the world will throw at you even from a young age. But not to throw more at you by creating mundane lists of things you need to “do” at home.”...” [Why my kids don’t have chores]. Kids should be having fun. Running in fields, making messes, playing with cardboard boxes. THAT's childhood. Real life will come in time. As another mother wrote, “I still think that before long my son will be an adult and he’ll have years of chores ahead of him, of responsibility and jobs and paying taxes and keeping a house clean and his clothes laundered. But he will only have had one chance at childhood. Like drinking, dating, voting and driving a car, there are some things you only take up in adulthood but you get really good at really fast.” [Why I don’t make my son do chores].

2. A second reason is because children have already plenty of work to do. They have school [6 hours a day], homework for school [at least 1- 3 hours, according to grade], extra activities that might also require homework [like music lessons, foreign languages, etc]. People seem not to realize it but school aged children have really a lot of work to do. As a student wrote, “We have sports, school, work, homework, and other extracurricular activities. We have so much stress as it is and then you want us to come home and work more just to do more work after that? I go from sports to school to work to my house so I can do chores and homework and then I go to sports again. I don't have the endurance to keep the good grades you parents want and keep our extra curricular activities good for college resumes too.. It's a lot to deal with. Especially during finals week...” [Should kids be required to do chores around the house?].

3. A third reason is that chores around the house aren’t the same as going to work and should not be seen that way. The child’s job is education either in regular school or home-school. Getting paid for doing household chores is wrong and gives the wrong signal. If the child can and wants to help that gives the correct lesson. You may say “If I don’t force my kids to do chores the will never help”. Really? If that’s true its because of you not them! How do you face doing things around the house? By example they learn and believe me especially little ones want to help mommy and daddy and if encouraged, praised for their accomplishments and not forced they will learn to be helpers, true helpers offering help when they can and not bittered people forced to work.

4. A fourth reason is that life was not meant to be only work like Capitalism has taught us. Working from the minute we start walking until the day we die might be good for Capitalism’s economy but bad for us as human beings. Adult life is full of stress etc and I believe that God gave us so many years of childhood in order to have something to rest upon later in life. Children are not adults.

There are many more reasons but I don’t want to bore or tire you. The links I included in this article mention some of them.

Friends, children are not adults. Children need education, play, rest. Little ones need 10 hours of sleep and older ones at least 8 hours. The Bible mentions that its the parents job to take care of the children and not the other way around.

I was reading an article earlier stating that child labour would be a good thing because it would boost the economy, etc . You will say child labour is another subject... granted... but the seed of forcing kids to work is there.

If you love your child you won’t want to steal his or her childhood away, you won’t want to exhaust him or her by adding more work over the overload they already have from school, you won’t want to stress your child out and have a sick child in the long run and you won’t be so interested in what others think but about what is best for the human being God entrusted you to care for...

Again I grew up with no forced chores. I don't personally know in real life anybody who has. I grew up fine and I can do everything people can do. As a child I helped when I could and from my heart. I do not agree with forcing kids to do chores, I do not agree with treating kids as adults. I know MANY kids who have so much homework and other forced activities they cannot literally breath. I find it disgusting how people think they have the right to steal the joy out of childhood.

Enough from me...

PS: I read somewhere that kids voluntarily do chores to help and are not punished if they don’t. This is an straight-faced lie. I know MANY cases that children are FORCED to do chores and if they don’t or if they don’t do them well or even if they do them but in a “bad” attitude they get punished [spanked, grounded, etc]. That is forcing people to work and is a form of slavery. Another stupid argument I read is that kids should be required to do chores as a way of paying “rent” since chores are not legally considered “labour”. Rubbish! If a parent dares let him not provide a home for the child and he will get into trouble in no time. Providing for the child is the parents RESPONSIBILITY, paying “rent” back is NOT the child’s responsibility!