Today's Disrespectful Teenagers

The other day, as I sat having a triple espresso, minding my own business but not really, I heard a statement from a man that is repeated all too often: "Kids today have no respect," he said in a rather irritated fashion. The man looked like he was in his late thirties to early forties. He wore a gray suit with a crimson and black striped tie. The top of his head was adorned with salt and pepper hair and a set of spectacles, which looked more like a pair of cheap reading glasses that one can obtain at any pharmacy, were perched just below the bridge of his nose.

"They certainly don't," his companion replied. Neither of these blokes seemed to be aware that I was eavesdropping on their conversation as the former chap went into a dissertation on how some teenager that sported multiple tattoos and had several pieces of jewelry hanging from every orifice on his face had told him to basically "get bent" after almost knocking this poor man on his can end that morning. I was glad that they didn't notice that I was listening in. Eavesdropping is, after all, disrespectful. Disrespectful as it may be, it at least gave me something to write about, which is why I was doing it in the first place. Hopefully, these guys will forgive my general nosiness.

The sad truth is they're right. Every generation seems to get more and more disrespectful than the last. Even at the age of twenty-eight, I can see the blatant disregard that teenagers today have for adults. I was raised to respect my elders. I would have never even thought about telling an adult to get bent when I was a teenager. Well, maybe I thought about it, but definitely knew better than to let such an evil utterance escape my lips, even if I was in the right. Had I done so, invariably, someone who knew either my parents or my grandparents would have been there and reported the breech of etiquette to them. The butt whooping that would have ensued would have been legendary.

Let me say now that my parents never abused me. They may have whooped me into shape, but I never showed up at school with black eyes and various other bruises, nor did I ever get any more than I had coming to me. The whoopings that I did take were good for me. The fear of them kept me in line most of the time.

And if those two men had reason to complain about today's kids, maybe it's because our country is taking away from us parents the ability to discipline our kids. There is such a fine line on whether spanking a child is abuse that people are afraid to do so. Non parents aren't much help either.

There was one time when my five-year-old son decided that he didn't need to hold my hand or look for traffic in the Giant Eagle Supermarket's parking lot. He tried to dart out in front of a car that was moving way too fast for a parking lot. I was able to catch his shirt from the back of its neck and yank him back onto the sidewalk before he could be creamed. Some young woman who witnessed the incident, and who obviously had no children, came up beside me and said, "You shouldn't yank your son around like that." I whirled around and asked her if she would have preferred that I let him get run over instead. I then asked her to mind her own business, while forgetting to mind my manners, as I said this in such a way that her eyes watered. After all, I was only protecting my son from himself.

I even heard once that yelling at your children can be considered abuse. Of all the stupid, idiotic, and all around #$%^*%$ up ideas I have ever heard. I can't spank my child, nor can I save him from imminent danger anymore. Now I'm being told that I can't even yell at him. Wait! I have an idea! Why don't I discuss the thing he does wrong over a bowl of chocolate ice cream? That's the ticket! I'll just dip out something that he loves-Lord knows, I don't want to ever upset the kid-and tell him why he can't do this or that. Oh that's right, he'll only misbehave more, because misbehaving will reap ice cream, chocolate no less.

I'm all for positive reinforcement. I try to catch my son behaving so I can give him praise. I do think that's important. But using positive reinforcement for negative behavior? Does anyone else find anything wrong with that?

That takes care of the punishment issue. There's another reason that kids are disrespectful. When I a teenager and gallivanting around with my friends, the prospect of someone who knew my parents seeing me doing something wrong and then reporting it to my parents kept me from doing anything too terrible. My parents were able to trust that when they weren't around I wasn't doing anything illegal. I may have picked up the habit of smoking, which got me grounded quite a few times, but never shoplifted, or joined a gang, or even take drugs.

Today, not even schools will tell a parent when things are wrong with their child. I have a friend whose child was flunking a subject and had no idea until the principal called her in for a conference. When asked why she wasn't told about this sooner-it was close to the end of the semester-the principal couldn't give her a satisfactory answer.

People are reluctant to tell a parent about what their child does wrong because it's not any of their business, but are quick to put their noses into punishment issues, where they don't belong. It's a small wonder that kids today are disrespectful.