Make your own assessments and form your own opinions

I recently had an interaction with a college-aged friend of mine. I asked him:

What issues do you base your support of your choice of presidential candidate on, and why?

The response I got included a reference to being raised by a like minded partisan parent. The inference being that following a parent's political affiliation is something of a given.

While this was a brief, narrow interaction, the point I would like to make about this response, regardless of the particular subject is, that the virtual inheritance of opinions, viewpoints, and affiliations is something that I find problematic in our worldwide humanity.

As a father, I have tried to provide my opinions to my own son on a wide variety of subjects from politics to religion to economics to the environment, and more. So what is it that I am saying? Am I being hypocritical? No. While I have provided my opinions, as a father what I hope for, rather than my son blindly following my opinions, is that my son thoughtfully forms his own opinions based on as much information as possible, and that includes information from many sources both in line with and opposed to mine.

I do not know the statistics of how closely each successive generation follows the politics, religion, and other important social and personal affiliations of their parents.  But, I do think the more those opinions and affiliations are formed by a thoughtful informed personal analysis the better, whether they end up lined up with the dogma of their parents or not.