When authority fails to be role model

The lonely hours of unemployment, short of the commitment to work out, housework, dinner preparation and spurts of self-improvement on various hobbies, can lead one to rely on daytime television on occasions.

No, I don't indulge in Dr. Phil, soaps, Lifetime movies. I haven't sunk that low.

Rather, my sense of adventure led me to Bravo's "Party Party." I think it is their version of Sweet Sixteen, the little glimpse of which left me to deduce that it's an exploration of spoilt, rich brats squandering their parents' money on their graduation party? Like I said, it was a glimpse.

I watched only one episode of it the other day. It showcased two families whose daughters were graduating from high school, and how they planned to throw the most fabulous party, like, ever.

What prompted me to write this blog is my ever increasing amazement at the parents, as observed in this show, and various youth-oriented networks.

This one mother encouraged her underage child to drink secretly, and protected her and her friends when the police showed up. In her drunkeness, she slapped her young son across his face because he didn't resign to his room as told, and later carried on an argument with her husband before the children. All the while whining that he wasn't "on her side."

I'm not a parent yet. But I like to think that I'm putting serious thought in child-rearing before I have my own. I don't believe in making your child your friend. I believe strongly in not sparing the rod. I believe in spanking, but not in anger. I believe in being able to dictate what my child wears to school and in picking out the clothes. I don't think the child should hold on to gift money, when it should be deposited in a savings account.

I fear the day when I flip on the television and see my offsprings prostituting themselves in some R-rated Cancun expose. I hate to think that they would resort to reality TV as the means to a livelihood, like those oversexed, constantly drunk twentysomethings Real Worlders and Road Rulers.

I understand that these perceptions are shaped by what the entertainment industry provided. But something has gone wrong somewhere in their upbringing. And I wonder what.