Do We Really Care?

What I'm noticing these days are the sayings on T-shirts in Bluenotes and West 49. As a parent of a teenager and a pre-teen, I'm shocked at the sexually explicit comments on the Ts. I'm not shocked that sexuality is a topic in teenage culture but I am shocked at the blatant statements and teens bearing these statements. I know that High Schools and middle Schools do ban students from wearing them. As a parent, I'm glad that they've taken this position.

In my effort to understand why, I notice that apathy is at the source of this. The apathy in particular I'm speaking of is that of parents themselves. There is an underlying tone in some parents that teenagers will be involved in stuff that's bad. The words I hear to describe this are, "they're experimenting - they'll get over it." But I see teenagers who repeatedly get caught into the slippery slope of deeper into drugs and deeper into sexual promiscuity. I'm wondering if they are doing this to catch our attention, except that our apathy is preventing them from catching our attention.

I say this because I think what's behind the explicit statements on Ts is an 'in your face' attitude by manufacturers and designers in taunting adults in their apathy. Students have caught on to this and I believe use it to see how far they can go without parents noticing. If this is true, then I think teenagers view adults as morons. [yes I know its strong but I think its true] I think they view adults as stupid and don't care. My question is, do we really not care about the condition of our teenagers? I also see parents that are concerned and involved in their teenagers life. My worry is that there is not enough of us concerned to turn the tide of youth problems in our culture.

At some point, as parents and adults, we need to step up and take responsibility for our teenagers. They will be our next leaders, shapers of culture, protectors of the common good. We are losing many of them to drugs, alcohol and sexually transmitted diseases. By not caring enough, we are forcing them into a state of insecurity that breeds the abuses. I dare say that if we truly start caring enough, we can provide an atmosphere where our teenagers feel secure about who they are, are supported in their hopes and dreams and are given healthy boundaries where they can party without hurting themselves and others and flexible enough so that it doesn't stifle their enthusiasm and energy.

If we are going to have an impact on helping our teenagers, we need to prioritize our lives so that we can give time to building relationships with our teens and supporting them in their learning activities and life goals. We need to provide the resources as well but time is what they're looking for. They're calling out to us - want us to notice them - and I fear we are continuing to ignore them and placing other things as priorities. For me, every teenager is important to our community and we can't afford to have them waste their lives and we can't continue ignoring them!!!