Parents must set limits
CHRISTINE CAMPLAIN Rusk

To anyone involved in raising a child(ren):

Where are all the parental guidance providers? And if you are there, what are you teaching your pupils? Are you paying attention to what they are saying or doing? I know after working all day, rushing home to cook dinner for my children,( that rarely ever say, "thanks, mom"), harassing them into doing their chores, reminding them of their homework, baths, teeth brushing and finally bedtime, it seems like an extra job to check and see what they have been and are up to.

Recently one of my daughters received a nasty e-mail from another little girl in, the same grade, that my daughter will never read. I deleted it from our computer, not because I was trying to hide it from her or the fact that there is ugliness in this world, but because it was sent to deliberately hurt her. Now that makes me wonder, is she being taught to be mean or is no one paying attention?

We live in a "society" that pushes hate, hurt, distrust, even to the point of criminal behavior, down our throats as a means of acceptable behavior. It comes in the form of music, games, television and our children's favorite, cartoons.

Our children see it as acceptable behavior if no one is saying that it isn't. After filling their ever-consuming minds with all of that stuff they are sent to school to live out what they have learned, where eventually one or more of the unfortunate recipients of this presumed acceptable behavior has had enough. At that time it becomes either an inward attack or an outward attack meaning either suicide or an open firing range in the middle of a school that leaves so much tragedy with their own unseen pain, and all because the parents of this society were too busy to pay attention to what their child(ren) were doing.

If you are not telling your children that it is not acceptable then your silence is telling them that it is.