Childhood Lost

When I was a child, I’m talking prehistory here folks, kids were kids. We rode our bikes wherever we went, we had hoola hoops until we began senior high, we obeyed our parent’s and we weren’t rushed to grow up—at least not to the extent the children of the new millennium have been. We respected our elders and police officers were our friends.

The pill changed attitudes. Sex education got its toe in the door of most schools and we children learned where babies came from. (Here’s something to think about: When my mother was born, it was illegal to share birth control information or even explain where babies came from) I remember sitting in our guidance class, boys snickering on one side of the room, girls solemnly on the other, while a blushing middle-aged woman gave us the goods on pregnancy, gonorrhea and syphilis. Talk about an eye opener. And, all using stick figures and grainy film… LOL

To be honest, we didn’t learn much because the poor woman teaching was way too embarrassed to answer questions and she spoke in a whisper. The boys hooted, the girls blushed.

Today, we’ve got AIDS and some diseases we’d never dreamed about in our liberated ‘Free Love’ 70’s culture. Today we have girls 12 years old waxing their legs, and more. There are beauty pageants for babies, youngsters and pre-teens. Pre-teens made up to look like much, much older girls, stuffed into dresses that an eighteen year old would love. Yet, let a boy or man look at these harlequins of maturity and he’s called a pervert. Mothers berate the girls for not doing well in these pageants while plastering more make up on them. Read about a 12 year old who's already a veteran of this insanity.

Oh and let's not forget body image. It used to be married women who dieted to 'get their figure back' after childbirth. When I was a teenager, I don't remember anyone dieting. Now, it's not uncommon for a ten year old to be counting calories. Anorexia was unheard of in my younger years. Today, it's rampant among all ages, even the very young.

Sex sells! Yes, it does, but along with sex comes responsibility. What on Earth inspired a pageant that encouraged young girls to act much older? What parent thought bringing little Sally up as some pretty doll would make her happy, or make the world a better place?

The AIDs scare has made sex a roulette game. Do it and you could die. But, the advertisements and encouragements from ‘responsible’ adults has dragged these kids forward at an outrageous speed. They no longer have time to be kids.

Add the internet, with its free porn and sexually explicit sites, and you’ve got the makings of one hell of a wasted generation. Parent who would like to raise their children properly, discipline them, monitor what the view or who they see, etc., have been handcuffed by idiotic laws that won’t allow them to do it. Touch your child and you could be charged with abuse. Spank little Johnny and find yourself in jail, and Johnny in foster care, which could truly destroy him.

The pendulum has swung too far, one more time. We’ve gone from ‘you can’t explain what causes babies’ to creating miniature sex objects in our children. Explicit sex if fine, but along with it, you need education and maturity. I was a firm believer in giving a child as much knowledge as they asked for. If my daughter, at age three, asked me where she came from, I didn’t go into a long spiel about biology; I told her the hospital in town. If that wasn’t good enough, she’d let me know. It’s up to the parents to take back the control they were meant to have and to use it wisely. If that means we need classes for people, then let’s have them.

I pray that the next generation will find some middle, sane ground and let their children have their childhood, as well as the education they need. What say you all?