Moral Decadence in Children and the Blame Game (2)

Moral Decadence in Children and the Blame Game (2)

Tuesday, October 13, 2015 3:26 pm


Grace Essen: “Although we often link the level of moral decadence among children and youths to lack of proper upbringing and home training, after all the best service any parent can give to the nation is to invest adequate time and attention in their children, we should also keep in mind that training the young is the collective responsibility of all members of the society.”

Grace Essen:
“Although we often link the level of moral decadence among children and youths to lack of proper upbringing and home training, after all the best service any parent can give to the nation is to invest adequate time and attention in their children, we should also keep in mind that training the young is the collective responsibility of all members of the society.”

Grace Essen.

Should we come down too hard on parents for ‘abandoning’ their roles? Not really, you and I are not left out, are we? The truth is that the ever rising cost of living hasn’t helped matters at all. The cost of education in Nigeria alone can keep you chasing after money day in day out. If your child is not in a private school it’s almost like s/he is not getting quality education, and no one wants that for his/her child. But seriously, should that be enough reason to ‘abandon’ our children? I don’t think so. It’s like making money and putting it in a sack full of holes. I only wish I had a better way to put it.

The role of the media in society as we all know is to inform, educate, entertain and serve as the watch-dog of the society. Do they do that still? Yes. But the question now is what is the content? The entertainment industry for instance through music videos, movies and other publications have continuously polluted the young minds and have promoted indecent dressing, substance abuse, violence and get-rich-quick mentality. It’s about what ‘sells’ and morals don’t, unfortunately. New media is taking the world by storm; exciting, fast-paced, available on demand…exactly what young people want. When we watch movies on TV, we are warned about the content (violence, sex, etc), and what age is appropriate to view it. In new media, there is no form of regulation for contents published, scary isn’t it?

Most parents totally underestimate their children. We have no idea what our children are exposed to, and are capable of. Some children act and behave like ‘saints’ at home and become ‘demons’ the moment they step out of their homes or soon after their parents say, “Good bye!” But no matter how good they are at acting or covering up their tracks, a parent who is present and vigilant can at least see signs which will prompt further probe or action. A stitch in time, they say, saves nine.

Agreed, there are myriads of contents in the media – traditional and new, which are ill motivated, there are also those meant to inform and educate children to follow the path of hard work, honesty and good behaviour. We need to teach our children that they should take responsibility for what they take in and who they keep as friends both online and offline – maybe we need to do more in this regard. Also young ones who have gone astray need more than condemnation, reorientation, and that should be wrapped with compassion, empathy, respect, and understanding. That way, we are able to win them back.

The wife of the immediate past governor of Lagos State, Mrs.Abimbola Fashola, in her address at a programme organised for children by Solution Media and InfoTech Limited in Lagos sometime ago had this to say: “Parents should lay a good foundation of character, integrity, honesty and discipline for their children right from their childhood. And this can only be done by investing time in their upbringing and not by being absentee parents who outsource responsibilities to house maids and nannies. The effect of parents not being there for their children is that these children are easily influenced by peer pressure while those nannies and house maids who are often uneducated fail to impact the right values in them which ultimately affect the nation negatively.”

Although we often link the level of moral decadence among children and youths to lack of proper upbringing and home training, after all the best service any parent can give to the nation is to invest adequate time and attention in their children, we should also keep in mind that training the young is the collective responsibility of all members of the society. And so, we all without a doubt share in the blame, if we leave the task to parents alone, what will become of children who have none? If you train your children alone, mine which are not properly trained could be friends, go to same school, mosque or church, or play and even socialize with yours and ‘corrupt’ your well-trained children. The time for blame game is over, now is the time for every one of us to rise up to this challenge, which like corruption we have to kill before it kills us.

Connect with Grace Essen on twitter @GraceEssen, email:[email protected] and follow her [email protected]


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