What’s Bad For Kids, Is Bad For Adults

Seems incredible. All over Africa criminal warlords have, over the last decade, forced children to become ruthless killers. With a combination of black magic--whereupon warlords manipulate young boys into believing they have supernatural powers—drugs and unimaginable cruelty (forced execution of family and friends) have they created these young soldiers.

According to the UN and Human Rights Watch the nearly 300,000 kid killers, as young as 8, are not only trained to kill without a second’s hesitation, they are also abused as sex slaves, spies and human shields. [Full CNN story:
http://www.cnn.com/2007/WORLD/africa/02/12/child.soldiers/index.html].

The real problem, apart from the utter…well there just aren’t words to express how repulsive this is, like trying to describe the unimaginable horror of the holocaust…of this utter abomination is that journalists write and we read about it as if the outrageous part is simply the young age of the soldiers and the forcing of such young children to kill when in reality the brutality which we find so revolting when done by children does not become less so as the age of the perpetrator goes up.

In other words, if it’s bad for kids to do, it is likewise bad for adults.

This truth applies to many activities which society deems acceptable above a certain age. “Adult movies?” Same thing. If it’s not appropriate for kids, while legal and permissible they probably aren’t good for adults. Alcohol? One need only see the toll of abuse to agree with my premise. Sex? Wel-l-l-l, again, one can see that irresponsible sex at any age—and there is probably much more of this by those over 18 than under—can be troublesome.

Obviously, while this is most certainly a call for the curtailment of war and the aggressive use of soldiers at any age, especially in the cause of false pre-emption, this is not a call for abstention from racy movies, fine wine or carnal knowledge. Rather it is a guide for the ideal. If it’s bad for kids, it probably is not so good for adults.
Whew, I’m ready for a beer!