Note to baby boomers
The generation now nearing retirement can look back on a legacy of poor parenting, now coming home to roost, but what followed may be worse
Iread an article some days ago regarding the contributions my generation has made toward the advancement of science, humanity, general knowledge and progress. The author went to great lengths to explore the “deeds” of baby boomers and recognize our efforts which have contributed to our quality of life. I’ve since given a good deal of thought as to some of our more “questionable,” if not downright shameful, “contributions.”
It was our generation that “discovered” that if we’d sit our young children in front of a television, they’d remain quiet and mesmerized for hours. We called it the “electric babysitter,” substituting, of course, for parental care, contact and personal communication.
It was also our generation that began the practice of creating latchkey kids. Our children locked themselves in their homes after school, a period void of interpersonal contact.
As our children grew older, we began sending them to their rooms to “study” and then ignored them as long as they kept the volume down on their television sets and stereos.
Thereafter, it was all about the shopping mall. We began dropping our young people at the local mall, passing off our parental responsibilities to mall security. We justified that practice by “buying in” to their excuse that all the other parents allowed their children to hang out there, too. If you really “cared about them,” we reasoned, “you gave them money to chunk into arcade games.” It was no big deal. If it got them out of the house, after all.
With the advent of the internet, I feel truly justified in passing the “Torch of Shame” to the next generation of parents.
On the occasion that the 9-year old and the 6-year old are not deeply and emotionally involved with their own “electronic internet devices” and sense some genuine need to consult with a parent, they could talk with their Daddy but they hesitate to bother him. He’s on the deck with his iPad, involved with his email. They could go to their Mommy but she’s in the den, deep into Facebook and they don’t want to bother her.
All the foregoing being said — and you know it’s the blessed truth — we find ourselves wondering what’s happening around us. There are nonsensical murders of people unknown to the perpetrators, unprovoked violence among strangers, words “inflicted” among each other without any concern for each other’s feelings and a broad lack of empathy as though we were throwing hurtful insults against a wall instead of a fellow human being with feelings.
What have we become?
With the advent of the internet, I feel truly justified in passing the “Torch of Shame” to the next generation of parents.