Kids?

I believe that the kids of the next generation are doomed. I have noticed the problems in the last decade concerning kid’s behaviors in this country and I’m scared. Kids are taking part in activities that are dangerous to others and themselves and are providing each other with bad examples leading to making bad decisions. This concerns me because these kids are going to be our next generation and will determine what our world becomes.

In early years, children are exposed to many of life’s uncensored misfortunes. A grandfather dies or a brother is in rehab. Avoiding this is pointless. The world is not always a friendly place, but this is where the problem begins. In order to learn and grow we have to also make mistakes and accept failure, but I feel that kids these days are not getting the right kind of exposure to this idea and that exposure to trivial issues is setting an unrealistic way of life. There are two things that I believe have a very important role in this issue; family life and education.

Thankfully, the law requires that kids must attend school until they are at least sixteen years of age. Unfortunately, not everyone has the luxury of living in an area with the most respected school systems. Some of the institutions in which these kids are learning in are full of illegal activities that are not being addressed due to lack of involvement and/or support. I can not point blame on anyone for this, although since these institutions are where our kids are learning to become who they want to become, I think more involvement needs to be mandatory. Putting more officers in the schools, with stricter punishments and suspensions could be one way to start. Another is providing with more of a support system for these children and teenagers. School is a place for students to round themselves academically, although since these students spend so much time in schools, it is also a huge part in what shapes them. These institutions need to be more concerned with the overall health of these individuals rather than focusing just on academics.

Families and the family life play a huge role in the shaping of a child. As time has gone on, expectations for families have changed. Now, almost half of marriages end in divorce where as even in my own generation, this was not as accepted. This has made the meaning of marriage, well, less meaningful. These children are learning from their parents as their role models and are getting wrong impressions about how their lives could be. Drugs have been on the rise lately as well. I hear of teenagers stealing hard drugs from their parents or family members and distributing them to their friends. I would not have even known what cocaine looked like when I was as young as some of these teens are. Also, the over-prescription of medications such as Adderal, kept in the house, is being used to sell to other students for money. This lack of supervision or knowledge by these teens’ parents is only implying that what they are doing is okay or not as serious as it really is.

I asked my roommate the other day if he wanted to have children. He said he didn’t think so, that he was afraid he would raise them badly. Understandably I agreed with him in saying that right now I wouldn’t be able to raise children very well either. Although, I warned him that if he still felt in the future that he shouldn’t have kids. Some people have kids because they feel they are expected to, but the truth is that kids are not for everyone. There are plenty of people in the world that are happy without kids and can take better care of themselves because they don’t have any. Hopefully in the future, things will change and people will start thinking more maturely about having children and changes will be made in their lives so that our next generation won’t be so doomed.