I have noticed recently that most children's shows center around relationships. Not brother/sister relationships, not parent/child relationships....but boy/girl relationships. Today I watched 2 hours of Disney Channel/Nickelodeon television. Not by choice I was babysitting: (although Disney Channel honestly is often my choice...). I just find it appalling that my nine-year-old charges are watching shows that focus solely on boy/girl relationships. Granted, they are teaching them appropriate ways to handle relationships, but isn't there SOMETHING ELSE to make a children's show about? Granted, they were the live-action semi-highschool/junior high shows with people who are obviously older than they appear in the show which makes real-life people think they should be that old when really they're aspiring to a non-reality. But honestly, Madison said to me today she doesn't want to get married, and doesn't want to have kids. I'm sure that will change, but that means she is interested in more than the cute boy down the row in homeroom.
Of course, crushes are a reality in high school/junior high (I even had my first boyfriend in 7th grade) and of course now I am a little jaded and realize how ridiculous high school relationships are (well most of them) and how much more important it is to spend time with your friends and develop your own personal sense of who you are than to chase after boys. But even in saying that, we learn from everything in our lives, and I have learned just as much from those silly relationships than I have from other parts of my life. And who am I to expect high schoolers to be any different than my own 16 year old self? Without those experiences I wouldn't be who I am today...and without their own experiences they will not be who they are supposed to be. (profound, I know. but makes you think right?)
Lesson: not to watch too much TV. and make fossils.
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