I don’t think that bad behavior is inherited or has something to do with genes, it’s learned. Who we turn out to be as adults will always be due to the direct influence of our background. Not just our parents, but our neighborhood, our school, schoolmates, places of worship… everything and everyone we come into contact with will shape our minds over and over again. Affecting our decision-making skills and levels of discernment. And that’s how we grow up into independent adults, a product of our upbringing that encompasses every factor possible.
As I said, our parents are only a part of our upbringing, because so many factors are involved. That’s why it’s always important as a parent, the kind of environment you choose for your kids to live in, because many times, the environment will have more sway than you in the affairs of the kids. You won’t always be there to watch and monitor them, and the environment will have to look out for them.
Another thing we need to remember is that kids learn. Not just from you, but from everything around them. They watch your actions, and they know if you’re a liar or if you lead by example. If you keep telling a child not to play with fire because they’ll get burned, yet they see you playing every day with the same fire without getting burned. They’re only gonna see you as a liar! And once your kid starts losing their trust in the things you say, it only gets worse from there. Because then, they’d begin to question every other thing that you’ve ever told them. It’s crazy!
So no, good behavior, bad behavior, none of them are innate. Even those who are said to be the black sheep of the family also have the same thing. You can have a family of good people that everyone around looks up to, but there will be one member who will keep constituting a nuisance for the rest of them. There are people who, due to how troublesome their siblings are, you’d wonder how it’s even possible they’re related. And most of the time, they don’t even cause the quiet kind of trouble, they make the loud ones that bring the most embarrassment and shame.
The pastor’s child, who got caught at the nightclub smoking something illegal, and the rich man’s son, who was caught with a crew of armed robbers. Even the one that stole the proverbial candy from the baby… lol! The thing is, such things don’t only affect the perpetrators, they affect those around them as well. The parents of such people will be forced to pay them more attention, depriving the other kids of having a good time with their parents. There will always be apprehension every time a stranger knocks on the door, you’d wonder if they’re there to beat up the problem child yet again!
And this will only lead to unhealthy relationships between the siblings. Imagine making academic feats as a child, but that gets overshadowed because of your brother’s criminal tendencies or your sister’s scandals. When people should have been praising you, they instead couldn’t stop talking about your siblings and what they did. People refuse to acknowledge what you did, but instead tag you as the sibling to that person who did that crazy thing! If this doesn’t bring bad blood, what will?
So yeah, bad behavior isn’t inherited, it’s learned. And because of that, it can also be unlearned. We just have to be willing to do what it takes. If not, those of us who are around them will keep suffering for the consequences of their actions. Enough is enough.
