What is Happening to the World?

[Sukerkin]

I know that news stories tend to 'clump' together and so you get hit with a number of reports all on the same area ...

... but this further glaring example of how the humanity and decency of the new generations is degrading towards a deep low still astonished me:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/wales/8598136.stm

 

[Xue Sheng]

I have no idea what is happening to the world but whatever it is it is not good and being a father of young kids it scares the hell out of me.

A few months back I was seriously considering relocating to another country but where they whole damn place seems to be going a bit nuts lately

 

[OnlyAnEgg]

I'm of the mind that nothing new is happening in the world. This kind of thing has been going on as long as there has been people.

What we do have now, though, is near-instantaneous communication and a media machine that loves to sensationalize, capitalize and spread horror.

All we can do is our best with our children. Tend to them and watch out for them. Teach them well.

 

[Sukerkin]

I used to think along similar lines, Egg i.e. that things were always going to hell in a handcart, it's that we heard about it more these days.

Now, having seen a few decades with my own eyes, it is worse. Of course that just might be middle-age kicking in. I can't dismantle my own 'filters' of how I view events, so when I perceive that the rules of the game that I grew up with have been tossed aside, that seems to me to be an abandonment of decency and the sense of honour that I had inculcated into me.

 

[Xue Sheng]

All we can do is our best with our children. Tend to them and watch out for them. Teach them well.

That and get them trained in Sanda, Krav Maga and Kick Boxing.

 

[OnlyAnEgg]

That and get them trained in Sanda, Krav Maga and Kick Boxing.

'No groin? No krav maga!'

 

[Hawke]

I never thought I would ever consider home schooling if I had kids.

After all the terrible news, I am considering it.

 

[Brian King]

I know that rhythms are found in all things, so it should be no surprise that violence also rises and falls as society ages and changes. It has always been so I suppose.

My sympathies go to the poor girls abused and to their families.

I see a few trends happening here in the United States and assume that they are perhaps also happening in other countries to one degree or another, and think that they contribute to these kind of children on children sexual violent crimes. These trends are damaging to society in my opinion but many others see no harm or see benefits to them so the trends will unfortunately continue.

The first trend is the rush to grow up. We, as society rush our children thru childhood into preteen & teen years far before they are ready physically or mentally for the changes. We take little girls, put earrings and makeup on them and call it ‘cute’. People take their little ones and dress them like adults with all kinds of revealing and suggestive clothing and get angry if schools try to keep some standards and norms. We are now teaching sex education in kindergarten. For those driven to succeed the pressures on our young ones are very intense. The pre-school is considered and marketed in relation to what college might be attended 15 years down the road. Kids are now getting credit cards even if they are not working. Look at the ads on television and radio that evolve children and how they attempt to show the children making wise and grown up decisions. I do not have TV but I imagine that some of the sitcoms still have episodes where the parents are idiots but the children are all-wise and responsible. We as a society allow children at younger and younger agers to see in video games and movies all kinds of sexual situations and violence and do not consider what this does to young ones that are trying to learn what it is to be an adult and what adult relationships are about.

This rush to force children to grow up, to face sexual issues while still so very young is destructive to the young ones I believe. The trend for adults to see children as little adults robs both of building healthy relationships and the trend to exploit little children (especially young girls) in marketing by putting them in suggestive clothing, sexual situations or poses is very harmful yet continues.

Young people are always in rush to grow up as a toddler how old they are and they often round up the number of fingers held up, all children know that thirteen year olds have it sooo much better than 12 year olds and 16 year olds can drive and work etc. As adults the responsible thing is to slow them down until they are ready and to model good citizenship and healthy relationships, but I do not see that happening.

Another trend I see that goes hand in hand with society pushing children towards preteen and teen years is the trend to keep them there and not allow them to grow into adult hood. Reading the recent health care bills I was amused to read that you are now allowed to stay on your parents insurance as a child until age 26. Not sure how that works if you are 24 and have children of your own but assume that the policy wonks took the time to figure that all out. So the government now considers someone 26 years old a child. Read any crime reports in the news? Ever notice how it might say something like “four local youths were arrested at 3 am breaking into local homes….” Then later it often names them Joe Stupid age 17, Janice Dumb 15, Jill Huh 23, Roger Dumber 27…. Youths now means people under 30. There are now constraints and road blocks designed it seems to keep people from accepting their roles and responsibilities as adults. This trend is also in my opinion destructive to our societies. It is one reason people are not ready to become parents and raise children of their own; it is tough raising children when you still think of yourself as a child.

So we rush children to grow up or at least act grown up in dress and sexual knowledge when they have no idea of what they are doing and have no responsibility to the actions while at the same time keep late teens from taking steps to grow up and assume responsibility. It is no wonder that much of what once was considered normal and decent by most of society is now considered old fashioned and restraining by a very large percentage of our populations that flees from responsibilities and boundaries.

Children have always picked on other children but in the past they did so as children, making rhymes up about the other kids, or calling them sophisticated names like poo poo pants. If they fought it was often pushing matches or rolling around ‘wrestling’ action. Now they are modeling what they see on TV, on video games and unfortunately what they see in their homes. Adults seeing this behavior often do not have the tools to step in and intervene as they have not had their own boundaries set and have very limited models of someone saying no and expecting good behavior.

These trends in my opinion will continue until things get much worse then there will be a back lash and things will go in the other direction…and after awhile they will go too far and there will be another back lash and back and forth the standards will go towards one extreme or another.

What can parents do today? Protect your child’s innocence tooth and nail. Let them be children and enjoy that time…it doesn’t last. If you have a little boy and you are the father you need to model what it means to be a man, as a father if you have a daughter you need to model the kind of man you want your daughter to grow up and marry. As a mother, little boys need to see how a strong woman interacts with a man, meaning not being a punching bag or door mat, while at the same time showing compassion understanding and the many other unique strengths that a woman brings to relationships. Daughters also need to see how strong women interact with strong men in healthy relationships. Parents need to set boundaries for the kids, they are kids and the parents are adults and should set and enforce the rules. As the kids get older the boundaries are adjusted they assume more and more responsibility.

Around children that are not your own. Try to always remember that their eyes are on you and you are modeling what it means to be an adult while at the same time having behavioral boundaries set and be willing to enforce those boundaries.

Meh, anyway there are some of my initial thoughts
Regards
Brian King

 

[Andy Moynihan]

Brian nailed it.

 

[grydth]

I don't think the human species, per se, is becoming more evil.... read a detailed account of what happened in a Jewish village in Russia in 1941 when the Nazi Einsatzgruppen arrived.... what real pirates did on ships they captured.... what joys both sides visited upon each other in the Crusades era.... and you will see that brute savagery and depravity are nothing new.

I once got hold of an olde book on criminal cases in the USA from 1790 to about 1840. Just the same level of violent predation...

So why's it feel different, like there's more of it?

The media plays a part. Ever since the Wild West and then the Depression era, the media has tended to publicize and even glorify criminals. Sociopathic killers like many Western gunfighters, or Bonnie + Clyde became almost folk heroes.

Now, these days there are so many more media sources - and one can get just as much exposure for fame as for infamy......lessee, now - I probably cannot break an Olympic record, but with some snappy shooting and luck, I could exceed the Columbine kill total.... and I'll get more TV time for the mass killing than I'd get for a silver medal from years of training.

Is it any surprise that the loser Virginia Tech gunman paused in his kiling to mail a package to NBC? NBC then, obligingly, gave the monster all the publicity he ever could have wished for. Is it any surprise that another loser gunman, on the way to a mall massacre, told somebody," I'm going to be f'ing famous!!" And he was...

What if the minimum coverage, and in a condemnatory sense, was all they'd get?

Then there's the change in us.... the criminals are as bad as ever, its just that we have lost the will to defend ourselves. The child molesting pirate of 1810 was hung at dockside or sent to jail for 85 years, a hard 85. Now, its parole and probation time, as if some constitutional right existed to go on rampages not once, but many times over. Yes, the criminals rights are established and exalted - but you never hear their second sentence. You hear," I got rights!!!!!!!!".......but what you don't hear is"....and the rest of you sheeple have none, none at all"

 

[Bruno@MT]

Then there's the change in us.... the criminals are as bad as ever, its just that we have lost the will to defend ourselves. The child molesting pirate of 1810 was hung at dockside or sent to jail for 85 years, a hard 85. Now, its parole and probation time, as if some constitutional right existed to go on rampages not once, but many times over. Yes, the criminals rights are established and exalted - but you never hear their second sentence. You hear," I got rights!!!!!!!!".......but what you don't hear is"....and the rest of you sheeple have none, none at all"

I would also like to point out that anyone -accused- of child molesting had a good chance of being lynched. How many people have been lynched, just because they were convenient suspects? We've done away with that as well. And those were also innocent people with rights. They were victims as well.

 

[terryl965]

I never thought I would ever consider home schooling if I had kids.

After all the terrible news, I am considering it.

I do homeschool mine, the great thing is what is called vitual school. It is alot better and they have actual teachers on line to help and explain everything.

 

[terryl965]

I have no idea what is happening to the world but whatever it is it is not good and being a father of young kids it scares the hell out of me.

A few months back I was seriously considering relocating to another country but where they whole damn place seems to be going a bit nuts lately

I have been in that same boat, if you ever find the perfect place let me know.

 

[grydth]

I would also like to point out that anyone -accused- of child molesting had a good chance of being lynched. How many people have been lynched, just because they were convenient suspects? We've done away with that as well. And those were also innocent people with rights. They were victims as well.

I fail to see why my quote was used with this post.

Indeed, I see no cause - effect relationship, or even a correlation, between the stricter justice system and incidents of lynching.

Indeed, one could contend that lynching/vigilantism is more likely with a dysfunctional justice system which allows criminals to skip free. I can recall at least one modern case where a mother of an abused child put several bullets into the head of a serial molester.