No Wonder Some of The Kids Behaved Atrociously!!!

[susiestar]

I was stunned by this.

300+ kids broke into the second home of a former NFL linebacker and had a party. They TRASHED the place, doing over $20,000 in damage. Not just spills and broken furniture, they broke windows and spray painted the house!!!

How do they know how many kids were there? The kids live-tweeted and tweeted and posted videos all over the web!!!

The linebacker started a site and put the videos and tweets on the website to get info for the cops and to hopefully start a discussion to teach the kids WHY this is wrong. He seems to want to be able to hear their side and discuss the things they did and the ramifications of the damage.

Instead of supporting this, the teen's parents are furious. Because he put up the website. they are blaming the homeowner for gathering the things their teens plastered on the internet as tehy bragged about what they were doing. These kids were still bragging about it after the party ended. In fact, the homeowner found out about the damage partly by his college age child recognizing the house in photos/videos posted online!!

Parents are worried their kids might have their college plans altered or future careers changed because the homeowner put the videos on one website. What is WRONG with these parents?????? WHY are they not urging their kids to step up and take the consequences of their actions, INCLUDING putting the evidence on the internet where it cannot really be removed???? It isn't like the homeowner took the photos himself and released them. The kids released them and put their names on them and BRAGGED about breaking multiple laws. HOW is that the homeowner's fault?

I would have blamed the kids because it is their own actions that got them into trouble until I saw the behavior of the parents. It is no wonder that these kids think it is fine to break into a home, cause major damage to the home, party and plaster it all over the internet. Of course they think that is acceptable behavior if you have parents who threaten to hurt someone because you made stupid choices and bragged about them to the world.

What do all of you think about this?

 

[donna723]

I saw that. I was appalled by the behavior of both the kids and the parents ... but not surprised. And that's sad. How far we have come in just a few generations! I can't help thinking what OUR generation's parents would have done if we had ever tried something like that, but then we would have never had the nerve! We KNEW we would never get away with it and we KNEW there would be serious consequences. Apparently not anymore ...

 

[DammitJanet]

I saw that and was dumbfounded. When Cory did anything wrong we immediately acted and asked the people to call the cops on him and have him charged. He never did anything like that but he did break into a few peoples homes to watch cable and have a sandwich when he skipped school!

 

[ThreeShadows]

Shocked and appalled in this home. I don't understand any of those teens OR their parents. Seems to be "each man for himself" in this society. I want to cry.

 

[BusynMember]

Ditto, ditto, ditto although I came from a rich neighborhood and none of THEIR kids did anything wrong either. Many fathers were lawyers, doctors, CEOs, and even politicians and when their kids shoplifted (and they did it all the time, sometimes with $300 in their pockets) or bullied or stole from classmates or took drugs or, yes, broke into houses, they got off the hook. It isn't just today that this happens. I think it has more to do with the values of the particular community. Where I lived, the kids were protected even in the 1960s/1970s.

My dad got me out of a traffic ticket that was my fault (an accident) by making a deal with a friend who was a judge. This was in 1972. So it happened back in the day.

 

[susiestar]

I think it has always happened to some degree, but the scale is getting much, much bigger and more common. Partly, I think, because we hear more about everything with the instant information we have. I also think some of it is the whole social media thing. Kids and even young adults seem to see absolutely nothing wrong with posting outrageous and even blatantly illegal information online yet they are all upset if anyone uses it against them. I cannot tell you how many conversations I have overheard where even the college kids are saying how unfair it is for cops, employers, even parents of people they are dating to look up and hold against them photos and comments that they have posted online. Some truly think that they should not be held accountable for photos and tweets and posts where they are doing illegal/immoral things. I find it mystifying how they honestly expect to post these things and believe that these should have no impact on their lives, criminal records, and future employment.

in my opinion it is getting way out of control. It is one thing to shelter your child but another to try to give them a pass for illegal behavior that they advertise to the entire planet. My kids ALL know that there is no way that anything good will come documenting bad behavior, esp if you are so stupid as to post it online or hang out with people who think it is great to post that type of thing online. I actually don't like them to post any photos of themselves online. I flat out refused to let husband do it when they were little and he wanted to make a family webpage. in my opinion it is like putting your kid in a catalog for pedophiles and once explained that way, husband agreed with me.

 

[SuZir]

I partly believe that parents reactions are due the longevity and seriousness of consequences nowadays.

I have read quite a few biographies of people who had achieved a lot. Many have been in trouble or two, when young. When caught, there has been consequences, often harsh, often corporal punishment. But when it has been over, it has been over. No permanent records that have haunted and caused obstacles to them five or ten or 25 years from the deed. There has been clean slate and forgetting the misdeeds. Even when asked recommendations, it has been in consideration of person giving the recommendation, if and how to mention the misdeed.

Now with our digital world, there is not forgetting, not getting over it. There are records following us till eternity. And more and more our life is determined with those records, and those records go father back. We have some American friends and not that long ago we talked about their kids and school. How their future college and level of it can be decided by the math course they took when they are twelve. And how colleges want disciplinary records from earlier and earlier on. For me it is easy to see, that parents would like to shelter their kids future being decided by mistakes they make, when they haven't even hit the puberty yet. And when parents take those actions and safe their kid from consequences, kids of course learn a very wrong lesson.

We tend to have much stricter publicity laws and more protection for personal information than you in North America. And much less negative records anyway (heck, we don't even get criminal record if not sentenced to prison sentence. And if we get ourselves sentenced to prison, depending the length of the sentence, we only have to stay out of trouble five or ten years to criminal record to be erased. Only first degree murder and treason lead to permanent criminal record.) So we have more leeway to let our kids have their consequences without having to fear so much it will haunt them when they grow up. That leads to much less need to interfere.

But of course digital world and internet has changed the game to us too. Google doesn't forget. For examjple my son's situation. He did something wrong. Had his consequences, quite severe in many ways, but has no official record of any wrongdoing. In old times, people involved would have remembered what he did and it would had been up to my son to make it right with them and in the end, whole incident would had likely be almost forgotten after enough years. But nowadays, because it is on the internet, it will be there for ever. People, who have actually nothing to do with the whole thing, don't know my son or any of the other persons involved, know about it, are reminded about it because message boards etc. And it stays there forever. difficult child can pack other stuff on it and hide it deeper and deeper in those Google searches, but it will never go away from the eyes of people not in anyway involved.

 

[DDD]

truthfully ??? (Yes, I know that I am an old person now.) I fear that this age of instant communication and actual disconnect between generations is leading to a society that I would not choose to join. It is sad. DDD

 

[BusynMember]

I'm old too and think instant communication makes things worse. But I'm not immune to the fact that even MY generation, and everyone before that, lamented that, "Oh, these kids are so out of control!!!" I grew up during the hippie era and you heard this all the time from parents and grandparents. "We were so good!" But their parents likely thought the same thing.

Our grown kids need to learn that if they end up on the internet, they will get a footprint there forever. If my kid screws up and ends up on YouTube, it is my adult child's fault. I may wish the whole thing could be erased by my being able to wipe it from everyone's screen, but we have no control over YouTube, Facebook, etc. Our kids need to learn the consequences of doing things that put them "out there." I know that in the US, an employer-to-be will Google a possible new employee into the search engine to see if there is anything about that person that they would prefer not to hire. It is legal to do that here.

Your life is no longer your own.

I do not approve of those parents, regadless of their motives for not teaching their kids hard lessons, and never gave my kids free passes...no rescues, no anger at the police, nothing. I expect my kids to obey the law and when one of them did not, she had to pay the consequences. I don't understand parents who think it is better to "rescue" a grown kid from a crime they've committed. Unless it is seriously mild, like getting caught smoking a joint one time, my husband and I let them see what being an adult criminal is like. in my opinion it is the best way to teach them not to keep doing it.

 

[witzend]

Google "Willow Palin Party House".

Blaming the victim is the officially sanctioned Ruse de Guerre of the elite. I'm sure that in this case just as in Wasilla AK there will be a not-so-well-to-do kid that will pay the price. That's how it works now.