For and Against Essay Example: Should People Be Judged by the Actions of Their Contemporaries?

People are doing many different things throughout their entire lives. Many good things and even though we try hard not to, we still do make a few poor choices in our lives. But more importantly it is what we teach our contemporaries that make us either great or not. Our lives can and should be judged by what we teach these future generations. If we are doing the right thing for example, following and obeying laws more frequently than not younger people will follow in our footsteps and make similar choices to us. We may not think so but close to all kids look up to close adults for an example. They copy what we do the good and the bad.

As we grow up, we are learning new things most of the time. We don't pick these things out of thin air, often these skills are actions that we saw other people do. “Young children are paying attention to the world around them every waking moment. They watch how their parents and caregivers talk, eat, react to situations and interact with others. You are your child’s very first teacher!” (Shrier) Even though we may not think that anyone is watching children usually are. This makes our future contemporaries the best way to judge us they are picking up skills that we may not even now we are teaching them. We need to teach future generations to make an impact in the world for good. An old but good quote that is posted in many place is, “Be the change you want to see in the world”- Gandhi if we are changing for the better others will see our example and may follow, not everyone will but if a few people here and there follow, it will be like a pyramid that flows downward. 

Another reason we can be judged by our contemporaries is because they are so much like us. Just like we are like our parents and our parents are similar to their parents, it is a chain that goes both ways our children are going to act similar to how we act. We see how they act and we see our parents as role models we strive to be like them we act, impersonate, and copy there actions. . “We are obligated to future generations much like past generations were obligated to us” (Nolt) we are responsible for the future people that are going to inherit this world after we pass. Our predecessors made sure we were responsible they made sure we were informed, smart people.

Many people may argue against judging people by their future generations they may say that it is not an adequate representation of us. A person could have lived a terrible life for example they hardly followed rules and didn’t do things that they were supposed to do, and yet their contemporaries could be amazing citizens. And vise versa. Hardly do those cases ever happen most of the time children will follow in their adult leaders’ footsteps

People can be adequately judged by looking at their posterity to see how they lived their life. If we act as we should, and we follow and obey laws future generations will see us doing the right thing and continue the streak. But if we do not it teaches our contemporaries that they don’t need to either we need to set the example. If we do not set good examples, we cannot expect future people too either it would be hypocritic of us to do so. We cannot be great by teaching the wrong thing we must act in such a way that we would be proud to see others mimic us.

Works Cited

Nolt, John. "Arguments for and against Obligations to Future Generations." Why Care about Future Generations. N.p., n.d. Web.

Shrier, Carrie. "Young Children Learn by Copying You!" MSU Extension. N.p., 20 Sept. 2018. Web.