See, Eric has had the great fortune of having about ten people play parent to his two older kids, there are aunts, uncles, grandparents, and four parents all keeping an eye on them and showering them with love and affection, this is the positive side of divorce that few people acknowledge. So his kids have benefitted greatly from an unfortunate event and in return, he thinks the hands-off, eyes-closed, stay-out-of-their-nutsack approach is the path to success, plus he is so worn down by the job of parenting at this point it's lost its appeal.
Fortunately, I am mean and vigilant enough to play both roles, my kids can call me mean and bossy all they want, but it's my way or it's the highway.
In the 80's parents didn't worry too much about their kids doing drugs, drinking, getting pregnant or becoming victims of crime. Parents were too worried about being incinerated by a nuclear bomb, high interest rates and poorly made sitcoms.
Ahhh, but then came the 24-hour news phenomena and with it a media bombardment - not to mention the internet. If there is something bad happening in the world, we will know about it quickly and in great detail. Nothing like bad news to fuel the paranoid mom's and dad's imagination with visions of terror. So in turn, we don't let our kids out of our sites, they sit on the internet, play video games, watch tv, eat chips and soda and are subsequently obese.
So, the greatest generation won't be a bunch of drunken, drugged out sex fiends, but rather a bunch of slovenly, slothlike fatasses.
That's much better isn't it?
I am not buying these numbers to be honest, I think teenagers are just better liars than we were and how found ways to be sneakier about what they do. Call me cynical, but I find most of them to be a bunch of knuckleheads without one braincell to rub together.
Oh, heaven help my two little angels when they reach puberty, I know every lie, every trick, every smell, every which way but loose, and they aren't getting away with ANYTHING.
ANYTHING I TELL YOU, now go run two more laps around the track and don't roll your eyes at me!!
Article comments
1 - Eric Olsen
good story, a bit of an overgeneralization about me, though - duh