There I was , casually crossing the road, toddler on hip when from the depths of his ten year old lungs came the screams of “Jou ma sa @$&*”
I turned my head fast enough to get whip lash, crossed the road and gave our little hero a mothering mouthful of note!
So disgusted in how our youth address each other , I got home and furiously typed a note to the head master of Mr heroes school. ( yes he was intelligent enough to conduct himself like this in public in his school uniform …proud parents take a bow )
As I hit send , ranted to a friend and sat back to enjoy my coffee I realised we’ve lost the village !
Every generation talks about it’s teens as a lost cause. Rebellious, disrespectful and corrupt but we as a generation of millennial parents have also lost our tween and kiddies.
Look at the behaviour in our primary schools from rape, murder, attacks on teachers and suicide. A younger generation of children who are force fed the need to “grow up” and be adults long before their time.
We allow privileges to children to young to grasp the consequences of their behaviour or to comprehend the implications of where those privileges lead.
If I’d spoken to adults the way a lot of today’s children speak I’d have received the hiding of my life….and so I chose to be respectful to my elders.
Where have we as parents gone so wrong?
I remember when my oldest sons were 7 and 8 , we lived in the small town , of Aberdeen in the Eastern Cape. The town is prodominently made up of elderly people and they are very much still the village within a parenting community.
The boys took a walk and pulled all the divisions out between the lei water sloots, flooding my friends vegetable garden.
Long story short, the boys were called back , made to apologise, dig the holes and replace the divisions ….then brought home after learning a valuable lesson.
They were not scared for life, I took no offence and they never did that again.
We , as a parenting generation, have become an absent village.
We no longer look out for one another children and the welfare of our youth.
Too afraid to intervien and too eager to like a social media post about kids needing direction.
You are the village. ….
Remember that when next the child you see needs guidance or perhaps a little mothering mouthful.😉
