SETTING THE BOUNDARIES GOES WITH JOB

For weeks now, I've been watching this television commercial that speaks
wise words in support of an important cause. And trying to understand why
it annoys me. The spot features a bunch of young people, voices
criss-crossing one another as they address their parents in that tone of
wounded petulance and righteous scorn so peculiar to adolescents: "Mom?
Dad? You were miserable parents. I snuck out, you caught me. I lied, you
knew. I pushed and you pushed back. You invaded my privacy. ... Why
couldn't you leave me alone? ... I thought you were the worst parents in
the world." And then, the kicker: "Thanks."

The commercial is one of the latest productions of the Partnership for a
Drug-Free America, a non-profit coalition that, for the past 15 years, has
crusaded to change the nation's attitudes about illicit drug use. Good
group, great cause. And yet, a commercial that bothers me. You know why?
Because of the very fact that it's necessary. What does it tell you about
the times we're living in, that we need a media campaign to encourage
parents to be, well ... parents? That's essentially what the commercial
does, after all. It reminds mothers and fathers that their job description
includes snooping upon, policing and interrogating kids. Maybe it was
different in your house but ... I don't remember MY mom requiring anybody's
permission to do that stuff. The absurdity of it is not lost on Tom
Hedrick, vice chairman of the partnership. He says that many parents
mistakenly believe that peers and pop cultural heroes have more sway with a
kid than mom or dad. Kids whose parents talk to them about drugs are, he
says, about half as likely to try the stuff as kids whose parents don't.
Because ultimately, many teenagers most fear disappointing mom and dad. So
how is it mom and dad don't seem to know this?

The answer, I think, is that something happened to parenting as the job
shifted from the World War II generation to its children, the baby boomers.
That something is encapsulated in a story Hedrick tells. "I grew up," he
says, "with an incredibly overbearing father and mother. I'll never forget
saying to myself when I went to bed at night - particularly after a pitched
two-hour battle - that I was never going to treat my kids the same way." So
he "went overboard in the other direction." Where our folks were
restrictive, we were permissive. Where they judged, we were
"non-judgmental." Where they gave orders, we negotiated. Our mothers and
fathers had been parents. We became, in essence, co-equals. Playmates. And
we're beginning to see the fruit of that approach. Some good kids, yes. But
many, too, who seem disconnected, disaffected, materialistic, filled with a
misplaced sense of entitlement. Which is why media are suddenly running
public service spots reminding us that it's OK to make rules and lay down
law, OK to "invade privacy" and demand answers, OK to be parents.

The men and women of the war generation were not perfect parents. But they
were also not as bad as their children sometimes claim. It occurs to me
that, if they earned our scorn, our impatience, our criticism, maybe we
should admit that they also earned one thing we never truly gave. Our gratitude.