T. GAMBLE: Kids today … are like any other day

I’m not sure exactly what is happening to the youth of America, but I’m pretty sure it ain’t good. Of course, with a sentence like that, one could say it wasn’t all that sporty back when I was growing up.

You see, folks have worried about how kids were turning out since Adam and Eve. What do you think Adam had to say after Cain slew Able? I’ll bet you Eve complained that Adam let Cain stay out too late and did not teach him to make his bed. And, that’s all it takes to turn a kid from a productive citizen into a brother-slaying delinquent.

I’m not sure why but every mother, since Eve, has at least blamed part of her children’s misbehavior on the failure to make one’s bed. I’ll bet $10,000 Charles Manson never once made his bed. His mother was probably racked with guilt knowing she did not force him to make his bed.

Well, I don’t know if kids are making their beds, but they aren’t making many wise decisions these days. I understand they are eating Tide Pods, which should be used to wash clothes and dishes. You can’t force a kid to eat a turnip green, but they will wait until their parents are not home and sneak around to eat a plastic bag of detergent.

I heard a comedian say parents use to punish kids by washing their mouths out with soap, but now they are eating soap for free. When I was young, I did stuff like drinking Early Times liquor straight out of the bottle to rebel. Come to think of it, a tide pod might actually taste better. In my defense, I at least hoped to get some type of effect from the Early Times, and I did achieve this goal. I threw up.

I guess Tide Pod eating and drinking Early Times have more in common than I thought. Maybe I better pick a better example.

‘Cause now I see where young adults, and I use this term “adult” very loosely, are seeing who can put their forearms on a hot stove burner for the longest period of time. One of my first lessons as a 2-year-old child was the strict warning not to touch the hot burner of a stove. My mother instilled this lesson in me. It worked. I haven’t touched a hot stove burner since I was 2. Never. I won’t even turn the stove on. If I had my way, we wouldn’t even have a stove.

But what exactly do these folks hope will happen when they win the contest for longest time with their arm on the stove burner? Maybe, they can win the longest time spent at the Augusta burn unit prize. Or, years later, they can impress their girlfriend with their disfigured arm.

“Oh baby, what happened? Were you in a bad car wreck or house fire?” “No, sweetie, I won the longest-arm-on-the-stove-burner contest and spent a summer in Augusta as a reward. Let’s go eat some Tide Pods and have strangulation sex.” That’s another fad I hear about now where during sex you choke your partner until they pass out. I think Ted Bundy tried this out 30 years ago and it didn’t work out too well.

Aristotle and Socrates both complained the youth of their day were headed nowhere, and yet human kind survived. I guess we will survive this, too, with clean breath and disfigured arms. But we will survive.

Contact columnist T. Gamble at [email protected].