Guest Post by Morbo
With the Terri Schiavo case dominating the news last week, you might have missed an interesting Associated Press dispatch about the state of America’s young people.
It’s important to understand that bashing kids has a long, worldwide pedigree. Even today you can still read screeds delivered by ancient Greeks moaning about the lousy kids they had to put up with.
Carping about the upcoming generation is a time-honored tradition that apparently spans all cultures and possibly other planets.
Conservatives have this down to an art form. From Dr. Laura to Rush Limbaugh, we hear it all of the time: Permissive parenting by liberal hippies enamored of the 1960s has spawned a generation of drug-addled, sex-crazed Xbox monkeys who can’t be bothered to put down their bongs long enough to say hello when you walk in the door. For good measure, the godless public schools are often given a share of the blame as well. And Hollywood. And video games. And rap music. And baggy pants.
A new study challenges these stereotypes. The Foundation for Child Development uses something called the “Child Well-Being Index,” which the AP assures us “tracks 28 separate measures.”
The index, the AP reported, “shows that since 1993 children have been engaging in less risky behavior. And while all is not rosy, the report says the overall well being of children is improving.”
The adolescent and teen birth rate has been almost halved since 1992. Binge drinking among high school seniors has dropped nearly 37 percent. The number of juveniles committing crimes, says the AP, “has fallen dramatically.”
The study, the AP noted, is based on a series of statistical reports, mostly from federal agencies.
Adolescence is a difficult, unsettled time for many youngsters, and obviously we’re never going to completely eradicate anti-social and undesirable behavior among teenagers. But when the evidence shows that many of them are moving in the right direction, we should applaud that and look for ways to keep the trend growing.
We should also acknowledge the work we still must do. The biggest problem facing kids these days is one that seems to be plaguing more and more Americans of all age groups: They’re getting chunky. If you’ve been to the mall lately, you can attest to the national epidemic of expanding waistlines. But it seems unfair to blast kids for this when so many adults can’t seem to lay off the Twinkies either.
Kids today are looking so good that one advocate quoted by the AP, Jeffrey Butts, director of the youth justice program at the Urban Institute, got positively giddy. “Maybe we have the next ‘greatest generation’ coming along here,” he said.
Let’s not get carried away. These pikers still have to clean up their rooms. They could also turn down that music they listen to — if you can call that stuff music. Why, back in my day….