OK. Had to jump in here. You guys are hitting close to home with a
particular pet peeve of mine....
Parents and their kids. A lot of my friends had really good relationships
with their parents along with some who didn't (but that's par for the
course), and most of the time, most parents took an active role in raising
my friends and their siblings, if any.
Which meant keeping an eye or two on what actually went on in their kids'
lives. Who they hung with, how their grades were, after class activities,
etc. etc.
Now, I consider myself somewhat normal. I don't do drugs (other than social
drinking), I have fired a shotgun (hunting gophers on the farm, (they can do
really bad damage to a tractor if you drive over their underground palaces.)
.....
However, and this is not to excuse kids/adults hating each other, or trying
to kill each other and others,... or to say, oh poor Erika, I'm just trying
to make a point about how some kids get away with some of the stuff that
that they do, like making bombs and owning weapons or selling drugs or being
viloent in general, etc.
My mother went through 3 husbands while I was a kid. Family life wasn't a
phrase I really knew. When I went to high school, you were allowed to be
absent 30 times in the course of a school year before they flunked you.
Every year I was absent 29 times and only about 5 of those were days my
parents knew about (I actually was sick). The rest of them, I would leave
the house like normal, only I would walk around the block, wait for my
parents to leave and then go back to the house and hang in the attic all
day. I had my own little world up there, someplace my mom never ventured.
(In spite of the absences, I was still a straight A student, so notices from
the school were non-existant. I was just bored with school.)
I had friends that smoked pot, did cocaine, drank...the usual bad stuff. I
never gave into any of their peer pressure and they never tortured me for
it, but my mother never knew. She was often not home herself until 8-9:00 pm
at night.
I had probably the best opportunity to become one of these kids that
practiced making bombs, experimented with drugs, could hold a grudge, grow
up, hate the world, whatever.....
But I didn't. I think that if I hadn't had some good moral examples from a
family I would live with in the summers on the farm since I was 9, and
eventually all year round, I might have. Or maybe I wouldn't. Who knows.
Not every kid gets that chance.
There was a lot of talk that one the Columbine kids had a normal childhood.
What is normal? What about parents that really do turn a blind eye to what
their kids do? And just because people can have kids doesn't automatically
turn them into parents. That same person that abuses animals can also have
kids and abuse them too. Just because we were born with the ability to
reproduce, doesn't mean we all should. Some parents should never be parents.
How do we know who they are? You can't!
An excerpt from an article I read on the Columbine kids......"That their
parents never noticed the boys’ grim fascination with guns, violent video
games, bomb-making and Hitler leads me to believe that like many children,
their parents were so busy with their own lives that they didn’t even know
their own kids." .... this happens every day! Much is made about families
where both parents work and the task of raising their kids is turned over to
babysitters, nannies and in some cases, the kids themselves.
This thread can go on and on and on and on, and none of us, right now, right
here, will ever be able to correct society as a whole. It's going to happen
and it's going to continue to happen. All we can do is make sure, without
suffocating, that our lives and our children's lives are enriched and
fulfilling and that we teach good manners and show them the brightness in
the little things, and show them how to make a difference in others' lives
by volunteering, being a mentor etc. And still, we will never know if
somewhere down the line something is going to go wrong. It is not within our
immediate control.
Now that I've rambled and probably made no sense whatsoever, I'm going to
crawl back into my little hole here and shut up for the rest of the day.
Maybe. Unless Gel entices me out with a fresh baked muffin.
**** Now I'm depressed. Will have to go play the Shoot-em sheep Flash game.
Hmmmm...there must be something significant there..... *****
Erika
(with a *K*)
"Blessed are they who can laugh at themselves, for they shall never cease to
be amused."
-----Original Message-----
From: Nick McClure [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]
Sent: Monday, May 07, 2001 10:50 AM
To: CF-Community
Subject: RE: Violent education
Yea I guess when I was in high school 4 years ago things were different.
At 10:37 AM 5/7/2001 -0400, you wrote:
> > My Parents wouldn't let me have firecrackers let alone Automatic
> > weapons or
> > propane tanks. How you can let this go by in your own home without being
> > the least bid scared for your own life is beyond me.
>
>That's your first problem, Nick. You assume that parents feel responsible
>for their children's protection. Don't you get it - that's why we have TV
>and the vChip. Lord forbid someone turn off the TV if they don't like what
>their kids are watching.
>
>p.s. Ok, so I'm being a bit over the top here. Most parents _do_ take care
>of their kids. Again, I'm referring to those who feel it's someone else's
>problem/fault/etc.
>
>Ray
>
>
>
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