I had recently seen a movie in which a man commits crimes because of a traumatic experience he had in his childhood and it got me thinking. Nowadays, people often say that people should raise better sons instead of instilling their daughters with fear. Parents should teach them to respect women. We also say that hatred breeds more hatred, therefore kids that grow up in racist or sexist households will probably grow up to be sexist or racist, as well. We say that the parents instilled this belief in their children.

Now, we know that everyone has a moral compass and everyone has a say in how they behave, but these values and morals come from what our parents teach us. Some young people still believe that being homosexual is wrong because their families have deeply instilled that in their mind, and it will be difficult to change that. But what about the kids who grow up in violent households thinking that it is normal or the kids who see their parents do something awful and their parents say it is okay? They grow up believing that it is okay to hurt people or even kill them.

We automatically label these people as evil or criminals, just like we label others sexists or homophobic, but rarely do I ever hear that their parents should have raised them better or they are partly to blame.

Don't get me wrong, I understand that what they did was wrong, they made the choice to do it and they might not be good people, but I think we need to see that if they too were raised differently, maybe they would've been better. I just feel that people easily assign blame to the parents in some situations and not others and I think it is hypocritical because you can't say that the home environment bred one thing and had little to do with the other.