Family values-are they still significant?

A culture is a mirror of society in which we get the glimpse of the language, way of
life, social activities, and history; namely the culture is the thumbnail reflection of the
society. Among various cultures of the world, Indian culture is marked by the highest
degree of syncretism and cultural pluralism based on the family values.

Family values are pragmatic social beliefs that hold the joint and nuclear families to
be the essential ethical and moral units of society. Family ethics are those that
promote the family and its values as an institution. Although the phrase has become
vague because of its shifting meanings, nowadays it is most often associated with
social and religious conservatives.

Amidst all our social institutions, the family is perhaps the only one with which we all
are familiar. As we follow our life’s path, our experiences within the family develops
to some strong bonds. Within the family context even lies some paradoxes, however
most of us hope for love and support within the family. Absence of family values in a
family equates to a haven in a heartless world, i.e. the family can also be a place of
violence and abuse.

In fact a family is what you make it. It is made strong, not by number of heads
counted at the dining table, but by the love, care and respect you show for the other
family members, by the memories you share with each other, by the commitment of
time and by the hopes for the future you have as individuals and as a unit. Each
family member has to understand that ‘Love’ is a continuum with no discernible
starting point.

We Indians have managed to preserve our established traditions, while absorbing

the new ones from invaders and immigrants, and spreading our cultural influence to
other parts of the world. The American singer “Katy Perry”, who recently tied the
knot with comedian “Russell Brand” in India as per the Hindu tradition and the
salutation ‘Namaste’ of the US President “Barack Obama” to all the Indians during
his recent three days official visit to India exemplifies the impact of Indian culture
around the world.

Traditional Indian family values are highly respected, and multi-generational

patriarchal joint families have been the norm, although nuclear and matriarchal
families too are becoming common in urban areas. An overwhelming majority of
Indians have their marriages arranged by their parents and other respected family
members, though with the consent of the bride and the groom.

Every family has a story that narrates itself, that it passes on to the children and
grandchildren. The story grows over the years, mutates, some parts are strictly
focused on, others gets dropped, and there is often debate about what really
transpired and whether it was good or bad for the family. But even with these
different sides of the same story, there is still agreement that this is the story of our
family. And in the absence of other narratives, it becomes the flagpole that the family
hangs its identity from.

On one side the elders are strictly pondering over the issue of diminishing family
values among their clans, blaming the modernisation and urbanization as the root
cause; whereas the progenies of those elders too are bewildered over the same
issue. Finding suffocated amidst the orthodox family values, they want to establish a
different independent world for themselves; but are also willing to not to hurt their
elders, hence agree to keep alive the family values within the restraints of social and
religious assimilation.

Thus in modern times the family gets drifted on to the high sea of bewilderment. In
this voyage the question that runs through every mind is, ‘had the winds always
blown so strongly as now? Had the currents always been so powerful making the
family and independent values so fragile to navigate a separate course?

As long as the spell of love, care, respect, responsibilities and proportional flexibility
lasts, the families will tend to have a strong spiritual base that facilitates everyone to
work together in times of stress.