morrigirl | New Flash: Generation X Doesn't Trust Mass Media.

Apparently, the original episodes of Sesame Street are not appropriate for today's pre-schoolers.

This article rammed home a very disappointing reality for me: that the ridiculously over-protective parents whose stupidity I so often marvel at are fellow members of Generation X.

While it shames me to call such idiots my peers, their behavior isn't all that surprising if you've read any sociological studies on Gen Xers. Back in the early to mid ninties when the Boomers first began railing about what apathetic losers we were and how scared they were of seeing us inherit the country, surveys and studies showed that, as a whole, Gen Xers were more conservative and more family oriented then their parents. Researchers theorized that was because ours was the first generation to come of age during a time when divorce was socially acceptable, both (middle-class) parents were required to work outside of the home, and hands-off parenting was favored. As a result, the latchkey kids of Gen X grew up feeling lonely, abandoned, unloved, and unprotected. They turned into adults determined to see that their children never felt the same way.

It makes perfect sense, but it continues to boggle my mind. I can't see the natural progression of the flannel and Converse wearing, Nirvana-listening, stringy-haired slacker into the over-protective mother who won't tell her kids not to talk to strangers for fear of scaring them, and then sues MySpace when her kid gets molested by a man she met off the site. I can't beleive it is my peers who have come to the completely incorrect conclusion that the best way to care for a child is to shelter them from everything. The generation that embraced grunge music because it expressed the angst ridden reality of being young in a way that the glossy hair metal of the 80's did not, have now chosen to reject reality all together, convinced that even the slightest ounce will poison their children and destroy their youth.

I grew up in the nineties, I know it sucked. Coming from a broken home and having parents more concerned with their own comfort then that of their children sucked. Being picked on at school sucked. Falling into depression sucked. But, simple knowledge of these things isn't what made growing up suck. It was living with them that did. Gen X parents don't seem to make that distinction. They consider knowledge and exposure to be the same thing. They think hearing the word "bitch" has the same effect on a child as directly calling her one. They think sending a child out to play in the dirt is equivilent to smothering him in a smallpox blanket. They fear the worst in every situation. Add to that the fact that parents now have to work longer hours in order to make ends meet financially and you've got a generation of uptight parents who have neither the time or inclination to actually parent. They don't even really know how to "actually" parent since, growing up, they didn't have any good examples on which to model their behavior. They think simply spending time with and protection their children is the extent of parenting, and go to lengths to make sure mass media, local and federal government keep their kids safe because they don't always have the time to.

Bravo Gen X, Bravo. But just you wait, those kids of yours are going to grow up and rebel against your parenting style, oh yes they will. Thanks to your severely distorted hands-on approach, your kids will favor the hands-off approach, mark my words. It's a vicious cycle and you're just a cog in the wheel.

Keep on rolling, Generation X.