This past weekend, I had the opportunity to stay in a Condo on North Miami Beach with my family.  Nice spot, well to the north of the "South Beach Scene," pretty much all family-oriented, and lacking the pressing crowds.  On Sunday, we were down at the pool when it started to rain, so we got caught in a small throng of people waiting for the one elevator available to take us back up to our rooms.  When our turn came, we dutifully crammed-into the elevator like sardines.  In front of me was a chubby boy of about thirteen years.  After all the buttons were pressed, he piped-up, out of the blue, announcing to all in the elevator, "You know, all you people who are on the first six or seven floors should all really be taking the stairs instead of the elevator, because it uses-up energy  and fuel, and is bad for the environment.."  There were two or three short but audible grunts and laughs.  I of course was not so subtle, quite audibly saying "Sure, right" with a mildly sarcastic tone.  At which point, our thirteen-year-old dictator-to-be said "Well screw-you, if you don't care about the environment!" 

My wife later told me she hadn't heard this last part clearly, but she knew he had said something, and she knows me, so she immediately shot me one of those looks out of the corner of her eye, you know the look, the one that says "I know you're about to do something really stupid."  The apparent father of the kid clearly sensed trouble to, as he casually moved himself between the kid and the rest of the elevator.  I have to say, their impulses weren't wrong.  Had it been just me and the impudent little urchin, I might just have slapped him.  As it was, I diverted my impulse, by saying, louder this time, "Oh really?  and turned to my daughter and nephew and said, "See?  This is what you get from watching the Disney Channel!"  At that point, the elevator opened on the seventh-floor, and our little environmental-fascist, now revealed also to be a hypocrite too, debarked, with his father trying to shush him.

 So this is what we have come to, a world where 13-year-olds feel empowered to dictate how the rest of us ought to behave.  Obviously arguing with a 13-year-old is a waste of time, and certainly teenagers in general don't need Global Warming as an excuse to behave obnoxiously.  But I think the more important point in this particular case is the substance of the claim, that there was a justifiable self-righteousness to the idea that we should be "forced" in some way to submit to certain behavior, or we were going to "ruin the planet" for everyone else.  My daughter and her like-aged cousin both watch a great deal of Disney Channel programming.  And I have to say, some of their programming is really very good.  In fact, I like Phineas and Ferb so much, I've adopted Dr. Doofenshmirtz' jingle as my ring-tone.  But their whole Friends for Change program makes me nauseous, especially when I hear my daughter parroting any part of it.  The whole thing is reminiscent of the Hitler Youth and Young Pioneer programs, designed to inculcate young children with vigilance against wrong-thinking behavior.

I'm not just picking on Disney Channel here, although they are very close to being blocked in my household.  Global Warming and radical environmentalism are routinely pushed on children in an alarming number of venues, including school.  As parents it can be exasperating trying to keep-up with all the attempts to inundate your children with this message, and by wrapping it up in popular culture, it is even more attractive to them.  Parents who are concerned about this have little choice but to be ever watchful.

Permalink | Comment on this post