What is this site about? It is my personal Soapbox --Mars.
Today's Rant:
What is wrong with people?: A Youth Retrospective
I have conducted a social experiment in behavior and observation of children for approximately 12 years now. In particular, I have studied our own children, along with neighbor, friend and relative's children (not to exclude strangers) I observe when I venture abroad. It is safe to say that I have interacted with a wide variety of youth labelled as: at risk, developmentally challenged, learning disabled (ADHD, ADD, ED and the rest of the alphabet soup of diagnosis), gifted, accelerated and affluent.
Independent of the child's labeling; kids will be kids. They surprise and amaze us, amuse and sometimes even humble us 'adults'. Unfortunately I have noted a general, albeit consistent, decline in their ability to process and retain information and to exercise their imaginations. This does not merely apply to the 'at risk' youth, but across the entire gamut.
Naturally, I speak in general terms. Many children under my observation exhibit brilliance and a savvy my generation sorely lacked, whether then or even now! But, it is both depressing and frustrating when we relay a concept that they seem to understand, and then mere moments later, is lost and forgotten upon them. Social media, perhaps, plays a role as their imaginations are cluttered with Anime, Harry Potter, Angry Birds and countless pop references, not to mention those pearls of wisdom and entertainment offered by insightful programming as American Idol and Jersey Shore. Most disturbing is that they seem to have a difficult time with independent thought, and with processing and formulating information on their own, without some serious guidance or acceptance of others.
Who or what is to blame? I suppose there are several culprits, but I fear our fast-paced, overly-information-processed and aggressive culture we live in is at the heart of the matter. Our youth are saturated with constant info-tainment marketing schemes meant to snare their vulnerable and forming minds. They stand little chance against this juggernaut of pixelated puppetry. The fast pace, in turn, keeps anyone from stopping and 'smelling the roses' (remember that?) so as to avoid independent thought and questioning. My Advice? ALWAYS QUESTION EVERYTHING! Never accept anything at face value, seek your own truths!
Modern day America has become an instant gratification society... where everything is a 'Google' away. This promotes laziness, complacency and rids us of the need to 'wonder' - hence the abortion of imagination. 'We'll take care of that for you' so you don't have to discover it for yourself. There is a subliminal force corrupting the under-belly of our society, and nesting its roots within our children. Media monopolization and 'tailored' control of information further create conditions of human programming, thereby setting the tone for our society. No conspiracy, just an observable fact. Couple this with a general lack of discipline and our inability as parents to raise kids based on our own moral, ethical or religious values and you have a recipe for destruction.
Furthermore, the ever-creeping government laws and restrictions have nullified our parental authority. If you discipline your children, you might go to jail, and if you have children that break the law you are held liable and accountable for their actions. Which means you 'go to jail'! Why be a parent at all? Kids know this too, and will test these boundaries. Seems like a case of we're damned if we do, damned if we don't. So we are, to an extent, bound from managing our own children's lives. So it is no wonder they rely mostly on technology, and having everything handed to them. Unfortunately, they dont learn essential "real world" survival skills. It seems the youth of today has lost its drive to better themselves as human beings, and are just too used to having everything presented to them on a silver platter without much expected in return.
The result? We, generation X'ers, have bred co-dependent 'Latch-key' kids. We have replaced parenting with technology and allowed social pressures and legal restrictions to take over. We allow their minds to be programmed and poisoned by visual inputs on a daily basis, with little oversight or content control. We permit them to be subjected to intelligence-robbing forms of entertainment and process them through our country's pathetically maintained schooling system. But, there are other external stimuli! Let's not forget: Poisons in the air they breathe, poison in the water they drink with continued chemical abuse and fluoridization, poisons in the GMO, synthetically modified foods they eat, poison in the pills they take, thanks to a big PHARMA and poisons in the injections they are given.
We gave this generation enough gorey movies and video games to make the "Clockwork Orange's" brainwashing scene look like a walk in the park. We trained our kids to kill in the privacy of their own rooms without any real world, healthy, sporting experience and parental guidance. It is easier to ignore them than to teach them. Team and competitive sports gave way to bloodlust and gore as favorite past times, thereby allowing no personal or social development skills. It is up to us. We have to ENCOURAGE a child to learn. You do this by involving your child in social environments. Engage with them on any level and guaranteed, the child will try and mimic your actions. It is essential to note, though, you have to treat a child as a dignified human being if you want to be able to socialize with and teach the kid how to do anything. We can't just tell or show them something and expect them to want to learn.
Think about it. I leave you with a classic video that seems to be appropriate. Bill Cosby speaks of the ills and challenges of dealing with child psychology. Enjoy the clip.