March 17, 2013

  • Too much beer, too little oversight....

    Rites of passage.

    For teenagers, that often means partying with their friends, consuming alcohol and, sometimes things get out of hand.

    In Steubenville, Ohio, just such a party took a tragic turn when several boys took advantage of a drunken girl, filmed her in a compromising position and bragged about it on social media.

    In today's world, social media, means the whole world can find out.

    After days of testimony, the judge found both boys guilty and sentenced them to a juvenile facility for a year.  The young girl just wants her life back.  I'm pretty sure those boys would like to have that night back as well.

    So what happened here?

    Teenagers have always opportunities to party.  Spaces seem to always open up for parties.  Adults find a way to get the alcohol to the kids.  It almost seems inevitable.  So too, do the tragedies which follow.

    We all know that alcohol is a depressant-not so much of mood, but of inhibition.  Have a certain amount of it, and anyone can lose their sense of what is right or wrong, good and decent.

    Hindsight is 20/20.  Parents have been quoted in this instance as saying, "Be their parent, not their friend."

    Indeed.  Being the parent means setting guidelines and rules.  That's not always fun and, during the teenage years, can mean that, as a parent, the battle lines are drawn.

    But being an adolescent means that the brain is not mature enough to make good decisions and to see the potential for trouble down the road.

    Somebody needs to be the adult in families.  And it's not the kids.  We adults need to step up not step away from our responsibilities.