I was driving around with a few friends on President’s Day, and we were talking about strange boxing idioms. I asked them to explain the boxing slang “glass jaw.” I knew what it meant, but seeked confirmation and possibly etymological enlightenment. “It basically means your jaw is fragile.”

Of course, I started thinking about the kids of today, you know: the I-Generation. I am against hitting a child, but I see nothing wrong with taking disciplinary measures (ie. grounding, privileges revoked, community service, stern lectures, schoolday breakfast tomato juice without vodka). A great part of what forms our sense of morality begins in our childhood experiences and how we were dealt with at home. We are taught that improper acts result in consequences: when we break the rules, we are accountable. The I-Generation, being brought up and ruled with a velvet fist, will probably need to text message KGB about what “patience” means. They wouldn’t even understand the concept of “working for something.” It’s love on demand, Ugg Boots on demand, justice on demand.

Unfortunately, the I-Generation is being raised by granola-munching, feel-good, the child-is-the-customer-is-always-right, Radiohead-listening babyboomer moms and pops who handle their kids with kid-gloves, and put their children’s friends’s tweeting about their cool parents as the No.1 priority in successful parenting. Snow on the ground? “stay inside, you may catch H1n1. Besides you won’t be able to text-message if you get frost-bite on your finger-tips.” There’s no way you can even time-out a kid in the corner of the room anymore. It’ll lead to “separation anxiety and guilty complex depression.” If the young ones throw a tantrum and go on a bender wrecking the house? “We’ll have to see about signing Bobby up with therapy and look into the possibility of the presence of Bipolar, Obsessive Compulsive, Attention Deficit Hyperactive Disorder and getting meds for him.” The comedian Dennis Leary once reminisced about his childhood, “therapy meant a smack in the head followed by “now go mow the friggin’ lawn.”

I once overheard this at a music instrument store: “Now, Jimmy, this is the very last Marshall Stack Mommy buys you for this month.” The kid was 11.

It makes me wonder what I-Generation kids will grow up to be. Glass Adults probably. At the slightest deviation of a daily routine….perhaps they accidentally got out of bed on the wrong side or the local Starbucks ran out of Venti Mocca Latte Frappucino, they’d be rushed in to therapy, followed by a cat-scan, MRI with ECG and a valium-cialis cocktail. A satellite going down, resulting in a dead 3G connection for 3 minutes is a guaranteed panic jihad.

Just browse the articles of your online news sites. Headlines like Children’s Fitness Levels Continue to Decline; Today’s Kids are Weak and Unfit, Many U.S. kids have chronic health problems: study are not uncommon.

Is it any wonder that each successive, over-pampered generation is getting weaker, while the health care industry is booming?

Needless to say, healthcare professionals recommend treatment. I vote for a healthy kick in the butt to knock them into queer street.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, February 16th, 2010 at 3:55 pm and is filed under Society. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.