Are kids being too protected from life? (generation, Baby Boomers, legal)
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I'm a bit dumbfounded to discover just how protected many teens are from life, especially those who are brought up in religious families. When I was growing up, I had a rifle at age ten, a two mile paper route as a teenager, a drivers license at age sixteen, was able to easily get a drink at age seventeen (legally at eighteen), was primarily living on my own by age eighteen and fully self-supporting soon after.
By eighth grade we had been taught both local and national history, had math and English training that was better than 90% of graduating seniors in today's schools, and phys-ed was less of a challenge than the normal chore duties of the week.
We knew how to separate fantasy from reality, we knew exactly where milk and meat came from, we worked in gardens enough to know the basics of growing food, we helped in canning and preserving, and if push came to shove, just about any of my high-school classmates could have made it on their own by 10th grade at the latest.
I'm now seeing kids of seventeen and older that have had less life experience and exposure to different facets of life than I had at age nine. I know of kids in the south that freak-out if they get a glimpse of the "Rocky Horror Picture Show" movie. I know of kids that cannot determine if a book is fiction or non-fiction. In Florida, I ran across hundreds of kids who couldn't even fill out a job application. Conversely, the work that the educated kids are being guided into is often highly specialized and requiring extensive specialized education that has no "carry-over" to other occupations and will likely be past technology by the time they are in their thirties.
I can't help but think that we are setting up kids for failure.
"The moral to the story is this: Don't you dare tell me that our problems center around the youth and what they don't get. Most of these kids have more experience than 95% of the posters here. They have more life experience then you can handle."
The moral of the story is that you are in a high pressure situation and seeing the effects of life on certain kids, and using that experience to make an absolutist statement that what you see is all there is. What you fail to take into account is that I wrote from the position of personal experience as well. I know better than to think that every kid has that experience, and I was asking for comments. What part of "how protected many teens are from life, especially those who are brought up in religious families." didn't you understand??? Do you understand the idea of different groups, or do you just get lost in your own world?
If you want to discuss, fine. If you want to point out that a great number of teens aren't in the situation I described, great. If you want to work yourself into a lather, I can deal with that too. However, if you can't do better than a "don't you dare" and " They have more life experience then you can handle." BS then you'll be talking to yourself. How DARE you presume out of self-righteous ignorance to know what MY life experience has been!
I do appreciate your points and point of view other than your inflammatory and unthinking reaction.
I'm a bit dumbfounded to discover just how protected many teens are from life, especially those who are brought up in religious families. When I was growing up, I had a rifle at age ten, a two mile paper route as a teenager, a drivers license at age sixteen, was able to easily get a drink at age seventeen (legally at eighteen), was primarily living on my own by age eighteen and fully self-supporting soon after.
By eighth grade we had been taught both local and national history, had math and English training that was better than 90% of graduating seniors in today's schools, and phys-ed was less of a challenge than the normal chore duties of the week.
We knew how to separate fantasy from reality, we knew exactly where milk and meat came from, we worked in gardens enough to know the basics of growing food, we helped in canning and preserving, and if push came to shove, just about any of my high-school classmates could have made it on their own by 10th grade at the latest.
I'm now seeing kids of seventeen and older that have had less life experience and exposure to different facets of life than I had at age nine. I know of kids in the south that freak-out if they get a glimpse of the "Rocky Horror Picture Show" movie. I know of kids that cannot determine if a book is fiction or non-fiction. In Florida, I ran across hundreds of kids who couldn't even fill out a job application. Conversely, the work that the educated kids are being guided into is often highly specialized and requiring extensive specialized education that has no "carry-over" to other occupations and will likely be past technology by the time they are in their thirties.
I can't help but think that we are setting up kids for failure.
Comments?
I don't believe for one second that the kids today are more ignorant due to being overly sheltered. You don't learn local and national history or how to fill out a job application by watching the Rocky Horror Picture Show, drinking, or shooting a rifle!!!!
Not ALL kids are ignorant of basic things, and due to the web ect many are probably much more aware of the world that they live in than you were at their age.
Uninvolved and irresponsible parenting and failure of educators to compensate (not that they should even be in that position) is the cause of what you described. Children need guidance and structure...sadly many don't recieve it and THEY are the children who are being set up to fail.
To suggest that religous generally families fail to educate their children seems unfounded.
I think you're being too hard on kids. Sure I had a gun and learned to shoot at ten too, worked in the garden, helped can, rode my bike all over the county alone, and went out on my own at 18. That's not to say I wasn't overprotected because I surely was. If my dad had his way all of us kids would have lived on a big family compound till we died.
Actually I'm shocked at what kids are exposed to today. The personal violence, the exposure to the lowest elements of culture as being pushed as mainstream... We weren't even allowed to read comic books. Life was much simpler then, maybe a lot of work, but not as complicated. It has to be a real challenge these days to bring up kids properly. So much input and lots of it not good.
I can't say I knew how to fill out a job application when I left home. Did you? I would probably freak out today if I had to watch "The Rocky Mountain Picture Show" - I don't think that's a bad trait.
One thing I think kids today have going for them is they realize that things are constantly changing. That was a big shocker to me.
I don't believe for a minute that kids in this day and age have it any easier or any harder than they did, say, fifty years ago. I think the elements have changed. Certain societal factors we once would have faced in the 50's or 60's are gone only to be replaced by other things. I don't know if there's a way you can measure the various inputs and outputs of that socio-feedback system but I would be willing to bet the overall sum posits little to no overall change. The difference seems to be the typical response most people have once they hit a certain age of adulthood and reflect back on their childhood. Typically, this starts with "Back in my day..."
The funny thing is that I can remember my grandfather and father saying that stuff about me when I was growing up in the 80's and 90's. "Back in my day..." usually ended with a lamentation of how the Sony Walkman wasn't available or why Air Jordans cost over $70. Surely, there were bigger and better things to be worried about as a parent. Does anybody remember the crack cocaine public service announcements in the 80's? "This is your brain. This is your brain on drugs."
But, even so, to look back on kids in the late 50's or early 60's there were numerous things children encountered. The difference was that people never heard about it because we didn't have mass media like we do now. There were plenty of child molestors, abusive alcoholic fathers who killed their kids in a drunken rage, as well as a much higher than thought of murder rate. Heroin in the 50's was quite the popular drug and many a child was introduced to various assortments of liquor and drugs at the same age. Lest we also not forget books like The Outsiders which remind us of nothing other than street gangs.
We should also not forget the so-called morally ineptitude society the 60's brought forth! Oh my! Peace, love, and hope for all. Weren't many baby boomers and their parents in harsh disagreement over what these movements might bring? Was there not sufficient panic in the 60's for parents to worry about their children given everything that went on?
Both John and Robert Kennedy were shot, the Russians were going to nuke us, the race marches and riots, rampant drug use galore, etc... etc...
Yet, in today's world, I can readily assure you there isn't a boy between the ages of 11-14 who hasn't seen a breast or a vagina on the internet. I wouldn't be surprised if they've been on other sites which show the gruesome deaths of people getting their heads hacked off or being hung at the gallows. The sites exist and are extreme. Meanwhile, CNN and FoxNews are consistently reporting in such a fashion to declare the sky is falling and the world is ending.
Our are kids really too protected? I say, absolutely not. If anything, they have more immersion into the "adult world" than any generation before us. Just because they are no longer immersed in the same things that once interested us fails to provide sufficient grounds of evidence of being overly protected. BB Guns and rifles might be out. But, maybe that's not such a bad thing if it's replaced with a "first person shooter" video game?
We in America have embraced violence in the 20th century (and late 19th century) as almost something of a fetish. Frank and Jessie James were even popular idols back in their day because of their daring robberies. The same goes for Bonnie and Clyde. Al Capone was something of a star celebrity. Heck, even John Gotti garnered more news attention as an acute public figure than one would ever expect. The hit on Paul Castellano outside Sparks' Steakhouse in NYC was something almost admired by people for being so daring.
Our children may be exposed to different elements, different variants, and different influences than we grew up with. What I think scares most adults about that is we have learned our life lessons and we'd like to be able to tell our children from personal experience why something is or isn't a good idea. When we as adults fail to connect with our children because of a new fad, I think it makes us feel somewhat powerless to protect our kids because we just don't know how to interpret what it is we're facing.
My friends and I grew up rather well. We conformed to society and, for the most part, we did so in spite of being "protected" from guns, ammunition, and booze. In fact, one could probably argue we replaced those things with MTV, Nintendo, and heavy metal which were things inherently argued against in the 80's and as some would put it "detrimental to society."
they have a lot of information and knowledge but very few life skills.
Yes. This is not necessarily their fault, but it's true.
I agree with GCSTroop that the elements have changed.
Today's youth live in a fast-paced environment and a consumerist society.
I don't think their time and money management skills are always as good as we read about in the media, but they are indeed used to multi-tasking.
Are all children of all income levels having the same bringing up?
No, they never have, but Johnny in Trust Fund, Connecticut, despite his apparent material advantages, does not necessarily have a more nurturing family life than his counterpart in inner-city Miami, nor as bright a future.
I do think more kids are now pointed toward higher education.
Everyone should have the same opportunity, but I am reminded of what Huckleberry says above. Life skills involve personal responsibility.
I had chores and a part-time job, and so did my kids.
If you mess up, you 'fess up, and pay the consequences.
Today we have so many entertaining distractions.
The way to get past these is to grow up with a sense of purpose.
I'm a bit dumbfounded to discover just how protected many teens are from life, especially those who are brought up in religious families. When I was growing up, I had a rifle at age ten, a two mile paper route as a teenager, a drivers license at age sixteen, was able to easily get a drink at age seventeen (legally at eighteen), was primarily living on my own by age eighteen and fully self-supporting soon after.
By eighth grade we had been taught both local and national history, had math and English training that was better than 90% of graduating seniors in today's schools, and phys-ed was less of a challenge than the normal chore duties of the week.
We knew how to separate fantasy from reality, we knew exactly where milk and meat came from, we worked in gardens enough to know the basics of growing food, we helped in canning and preserving, and if push came to shove, just about any of my high-school classmates could have made it on their own by 10th grade at the latest.
I'm now seeing kids of seventeen and older that have had less life experience and exposure to different facets of life than I had at age nine. I know of kids in the south that freak-out if they get a glimpse of the "Rocky Horror Picture Show" movie. I know of kids that cannot determine if a book is fiction or non-fiction. In Florida, I ran across hundreds of kids who couldn't even fill out a job application. Conversely, the work that the educated kids are being guided into is often highly specialized and requiring extensive specialized education that has no "carry-over" to other occupations and will likely be past technology by the time they are in their thirties.
I can't help but think that we are setting up kids for failure.
Comments?
I partially agree.
However, I disagree on the education portion. If you have kids, or know kids, then you'll know that children are learning by far more at an earlier age then we ever did.
My son, and everyone on his football team, knows how to read, write, and basic addition and subtraction, and none of them have gone into kindergarten yet. Hell, I didn't even know my alphabet when I went into kindergarten.
Also, my niece, who is in 5th grade, is taking geometry, and things I didn't take until I got to high school.
I'm all for kids learning at a faster pace, but saying that they are dumber than we were, is just flat wrong.
I do agree though, kids need to work. I had a gun at an early age as well, and I've already exposed my son to guns at age 5. (he has a BB gun, and uses it with me) I let my son watch most PG-13 shows. I'm not concerned with language, he will learn that if I shelter him or not.
The moral of the story is that you are in a high pressure situation and seeing the effects of life on certain kids, and using that experience to make an absolutist statement that what you see is all there is. What you fail to take into account is that I wrote from the position of personal experience as well. I know better than to think that every kid has that experience, and I was asking for comments. What part of "how protected many teens are from life, especially those who are brought up in religious families." didn't you understand??? Do you understand the idea of different groups, or do you just get lost in your own world?
Lost in my own world. I just got off work. Its not that I don't see the different groups, I do. I said from the get go that I was biased.
Your right. I didn't think it was inflammatory when I wrote it. But it is.
they have a lot of information and knowledge but very few life skills.
If I wasn't so verbose, I'd say this is a good summary of where I was heading with the OP. Then again, maybe life skills have changed since I grew up.
Loved the "Rocky Mountain Picture Show" Maybe it starred John Denver?
I still think a lot of kids are too sheltered and unprepared, even more so since it is being pointed out that other kids are being forced into to being much more savvy and street-smart.
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