Wednesday, July 14, 2010

How soon is too soon?

Is it me or does anyone else notice that children's behaviorism's are getting maturer quicker than ever,  and is it all due to pop culture?  Let me define first what I mean by children, I'm talking about anyone under the age of 16 for my point of reference at this time. I know most people refer to the age of 18 years, but I'm sticking to the age group I am consistently around and am more familiar with their behaviors.  My 12 year old and her friends are into coffee drinks!  Coffee drinks of all things!  I remember being her age and tasting some coffee my mom made and no amount of sugar could make that horrible stuff pleasing to my palette (but maybe it was my mom's coffee brewing technique), I also remember my mom stating "coffee will stunt your growth".  Maybe that's why I am one of the shortest in my family.  I wonder if Starbucks has anything to do with the surge of teen coffee consumers, hmm... it's a good possibility as even now McDonald's sell's their version of the Frappuccino.  This same 12 year old came to me a couple of months ago asking if she could have a Facebook account as "everyone" she  knows has either a Facebook or Myspace account.  I of course said no without hesitation.  I explained to her that she's too young for that, and I'm sure not everyone has those accounts, and if you get everything now, what do you have to look forward to in high school or even college.  Of course I'm seen as the over strict and lame parent.  I cannot fathom what good is allowing my child to have something that can jeopardize her safety and security as well as she really doesn't have that many friends to worry about keeping up with blogs and so forth.  Now let's skip down to my six year old whom happened to utter the word "ass" the other day as she was telling the dog to "sit your ass down"!  Great!  I calmly said, um you, come here, that word "ass" is a bad word that we do not use, and where did you learn that from?  She tells me it's on TV, and I'm like, "I don't think so".  Wouldn't you know it, an ad for "Dance your ass off" the TV show comes on and my daughter points to the TV and says see!  I never even noticed that stupid show or it's ad's and this was during afternoon television on a local channel!  I guess censorship has changed in the last few years as that would've never happened just 5 or 10 years ago.  My mom use to tell me stories about how her grandparents (she was raised by her grandparents when her mother died leaving 12 children) they were disturbed when they would do the current dances, such as the Twist, locomotion and so forth as they believed people should not be gyrating like that and especially in public.  I wonder what my mom would think of seeing kids as young as 3 on YouTube or like I do at the elementary school playground singing "If you like you should a put a ring on it" by Beyonce?  My mom passed away seven years ago, but I know she would be scandalized by that!  I wonder if those parents whom taped their very young children singing that song, really know what Beyonce was talking about "liking"?  I guess what my point really is that I have a 12 year old going on 25 and a 6 year old going on 20, and I feel like even I can't slow down their accelerated progression to what I consider "Mature Consumer" products.

1 comment:

  1. Honey, they are repeating and responding to the culture they are growing up in. TV unfortunately is a big part, and it is full of garbage we didn't see or hear. Anyone agree with me there?

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