Twelve year old Kate flips on the television, unaware that the channel is set on MTV. The show seems innocent enough at first. Two teens seemingly in some sort of relationship and young enough to be in eighth grade are pictured goggle eyed as they share an awkward hand-holding session by the locker. Then, without warning, the screen switches to a steamy scene where the two graphically engage in a sexual interaction. Twelve year old Kate has witnessed and possibly taken in what America’s media ethics have come to: a careless, disgusting and rated R endeavor to “capture the eyes of America’s youth.”
This is obviously a fabricated story, but it’s happening in living rooms all across the nation. There is rated R content, content that is not made for little eyes and the exact type of content that requires a person to be 17 years or older to even watch it is being shown where it shouldn’t be: right in the safety of our own homes. From Degrassi to The Secret Life of the American Teenager to the recently cancelled show, Skins, America has let its morals of what should go on television get out of hand. Skins exposed teenagers as young as 15 in racy sex scenes, doing drugs and handling alcohol. The Secret Life of the American Teenager started off pretty safe. A teenage girl got pregnant and left the audience wondering what she might learn from it and what she might do with the experience. Instead, the show took a down turn and began displaying teenagers having more sex instead of less of it and the show Degrassi is the exact same way.
Sure, it happens. There are eighth and ninth graders that do drugs and get pregnant but that does not mean we need to expose it or that we need to promote it. It’s almost like America said “okay, we’re losing, so let’s just give up the whole game.” America has given up on its teenagers’ well-being and sense of self-respect. America has given up on morality in general.
It’s especially terrible for the children. Many young girls or boys can easily turn on the television and see this explicit content and think to themselves that it’s okay. It’s okay to give themselves away to every girl or guy they meet. It’s okay to see themselves as a mobile baby machine. It’s okay for them to think that this is all they can have in life. Everything they hear, everything they see, everything they touch, they take in. These things will definitely make a dent in who they are in the future. It’s ridiculous to think that the television shows America is allowing is showing America’s children that all they can grow up to be is merely a party animal that lives their life doing drugs and downing gallons of alcohol every night. None of these shows promotes any ounce of hard work, dedication, passion, knowledge, intelligence or bettering oneself.
If America were as strong as it has proven itself to be in all other areas military and political alike, the least it could do is be strong for the well-being of its children, its future holders. The least it could do is instill a thirst for knowledge, passion, and dedication into them rather than a mere acceptance of a life full of drugs, alcohol and sex. What America’s children need most of all is a role model to stand up and protect their sense of self-respect.
