A Parental Vacuum
The Roanoke Times reports of a girl, 14, being shot by her 28 year-old boyfriend:
I have posted before how well I know that parenting is incredibly difficult (see "A Kiss Before Dying"). There are times you do things and you wonder what you were thinking. There are certainly times I have felt I must be the lousiest parent in the world. Though moments of failure hurt deeply, there is a huge difference, in my opinion, in moments of failure as a parent and simply failing to parent. When you let your child into this type of situation, you are, frankly, not fit to parent.
This is not to say that the parents are necessarily bad people (I have no idea what type of people they are), but simply the observation that we are dealing with an area (that of raising children) where failure is not an option. No, there are no perfect parents, but please, when there is such a deficiency of common sense on the part of those charged with raising and protecting a child, we're talking about a parental vacuum.
I hope and pray this girl recovers quickly and as soon as she does, I hope she is placed in a situation where she will be protected from this kind of parental negligence.
Police have arrested a 28-year-old man they say shot his 14-year-old girlfriend Wednesday evening in Blacksburg...It seems like everyday unbelievably tragic stories like this are coming out in the news involving children. A couple of days ago, I commented on the disabled girl who was basically gang-raped in the school auditorium in Columbus, Ohio while "dozens" of students watched (See "Disabled Girl Abused at School"). Now, this story of a fourteen year-old girl, shot by her twenty-eight year-old boyfriend. A twenty-eight year old boyfriend?! What the heck is going on here? What are parents doing letting a fourteen year-old girl have a boyfriend twice her age? Has it really gotten so bad that parents have just completely given up on the whole idea of actually parenting?
[Blacksburg Police Lt. Bruce Bradbery] said that at around 9:30 p.m. Wednesday, [Michael Paul] Collins arrived at the girl's home and fired several shots at her mother and another family member before wounding the girl. The victim, whose identity has not been released, was airlifted to Roanoke Memorial Hospital where she is listed in stable condition. (complete story)
I have posted before how well I know that parenting is incredibly difficult (see "A Kiss Before Dying"). There are times you do things and you wonder what you were thinking. There are certainly times I have felt I must be the lousiest parent in the world. Though moments of failure hurt deeply, there is a huge difference, in my opinion, in moments of failure as a parent and simply failing to parent. When you let your child into this type of situation, you are, frankly, not fit to parent.
This is not to say that the parents are necessarily bad people (I have no idea what type of people they are), but simply the observation that we are dealing with an area (that of raising children) where failure is not an option. No, there are no perfect parents, but please, when there is such a deficiency of common sense on the part of those charged with raising and protecting a child, we're talking about a parental vacuum.
I hope and pray this girl recovers quickly and as soon as she does, I hope she is placed in a situation where she will be protected from this kind of parental negligence.
Labels: David C. Price
posted by DAVID C. PRICE at 4/15/2005 12:00:00 AM
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1 Comments:
Good post. Though the analogy is imperfect, I am hopeful for little people like this because of the story of Joseph sold into Egypt.
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