It looks like the coward brigade known as "terrorists" are focusing a lot of their attention lately on London. At first I thought all of Europe was in for a long battle with these cowards, but it looks like the focus will be London. Why? As Americans, we tend to forget that there are radical cowards all over the world and not just here. Religious tension between opposing groups has been a problem in France for decades that is now, of course, getting worse. So is the world losing its mind? It sure looks that way. But maybe the answer to these problems is as close as your own mirror.
I think that the world is actually losing touch with each successive younger generation. My wife and I were at the park today with our grandkids and I noticed a lot of things. Being from an older generation, we were out on the playground with our little ones watching them like hawks. Parents younger than us had their noses in their phones. No other parents were out on the playground with their children. Not one.
I would walk around with my boys and caught the eyes of several of the young children who wanted me to watch what they could do, or just to tell me what they were going to try. One kid wanted to climb up the slippery part of the slide, which we all have done. But he seemed a little too young, so I told him that it may not be a good idea. He smiled, got off the slide, and went to the swings. Meanwhile, all of the parents were either too busy talking to each other or the younger parents had their noses in their phones while not watching their kids at all.
Then there was an incident on the playground where a two-year-old pushed another two-year-old in the back and the victim fell to the ground crying loudly. My wife and I responded quickly, not one of the other parents moved. Not one. We helped the little victim to get off the ground and he went off to find his parents, who he did find. In the meantime, the offender got a few choice (but perfectly acceptable to say to a two-year-old) words from me, but his parents never even looked up from their phones. No one did. If parents can ignore a wailing child at a small town playground, then what else are they missing?
So what am I saying? I am saying that this kind of absentee parenting goes on all over the world. The bad kids get away with murder, parents blame victims, and kids grow up feeling entitled. It has been going on for at least two generations now, and it is getting worse. The disconnect between parents and their kids all over the world is breeding kids who just don't care about anything, and feel they are entitled to do whatever they want. If you look at the perpetrators of these last few events, you will notice that most of them are very young and most of them are not from the Middle East.
Is the world going crazy? I guess you could call it that. I prefer to call it just a simple case of generations of bad parenting. Yes, my four-year-old likes to play his video games and both of my kids like their Kindles. But they get disciplined when they do something wrong, they are learning wrong from right, they know Nana and Bapa love them, and they are watched closely when they interact in social situations. Are we perfect parents/grandparents? No. Far from it. I actually consider us to only be doing what used to be considered the very basics of parenting when we were growing up. Doing these things now is considered excessive.
Maybe I am wrong about all of this, and I can accept that. I complain about the younger generations a lot, but that is because I see young faces burning down cities, killing innocent people, and having children they don't want to take care of.
Is every member of the younger generations like this? Of course not. That would be ridiculous to say. But when you grow up being given a trophy just for showing up and mommy and daddy would rather text their friends than watch as you push a child to the ground, then you get out what you put in.
And now London is feeling the brunt of younger generations that are easily turned to murder by older generations with old ideas. These kids do not think of these things on their own. They are taken in by evil people who will actually listen to them and these evil people make these kids feel like they matter. You know, the stuff parents should have done years earlier. Then these evil people turn children into murderers, and the innocent suffer.
Can all of this be stopped? Two generations of bad parenting cannot be overcome in one night. The first, and most difficult, step is to convince new parents that sticking their noses into their phones while their young children assault other young children is bad parenting. To them, it is none of your business. Even if your child is the one being assaulted. And if it was your child being assaulted then, as far as the new generations of parents are concerned, your child is to blame...not theirs.
Now the results of generations of bad parenting are becoming everyone's business, and it is going to get worse. For those of you who think that Islam is to blame for this, you are sorely misguided. If you were or are the kind of parent who never noticed that your child sought attention from a stranger on a playground because you were too absorbed in what you were doing, then you are to blame.
Hang in there, London. All I can say is, hang in there.
George N Root III is a Lockport resident and concerned grandfather to two wonderful little boys. Follow him on Twitter @georgenroot3, or send him a message at georgenroot3@gmail.com.
