First Friends, Best Friends

A friend of mine just wrote a blog post that got me thinking. He presents a conventional, age-old idea in parenting: that one should not be his kids' best friend. Many parents agree with this. You guessed it: I don't. The catch is that you need to really understand what it means to be your kids' best friend. See, it is a little different than being your best friend's best friend, but maybe not all that much, in a few ways.

I have seen forty-something moms in the mall dressed like their daughters and attempting to blend-in with a group of teenagers. I have seen fathers cursing and making lewd comments about women to their teenaged sons. I have seen parents who think it is okay to drink with their high school aged kids. I have also seen parents who are afraid to discipline their children -- who think their kids won't like them if they "lay down the law." These people are all fools. These people act more like buddies than parents and I trust this is the kind of thing my friend is objecting to in his post. I object to them, too.

What Would "What Would You Do?" Do?

You've probably heard of the show "What Would You Do?" On the show, produced by ABC, they set up scenarios and wait to see, well  . . . what people will do in morally questionable situations. When all is said and done (or not done), John Quinones steps in for an interview.

I've only seen it a few times but, for instance, last Friday, they got actors to portray construction workers who were saying inappropriate things to a pretty girl (also an actress) in front of a New York City lunch truck. Bystanders reacted in various ways, from ignoring the whole thing to offering to do some Picasso-inspired renovations on the construction workers' faces.