Am all African no doubt. My skin is a good
shade of chocolate (I think) and as far back as I can trace my lineage; my
family is all made of authentic Africans. You know what being African has meant
to all children born before the 90s? You’re supposed to keep your emotions and
feelings to yourself, obey the rules of the land and keep moving on no matter
what happens. People only knew that feelings matter after watching western
family drama clips where children were given time out for doing wrong. As far
as I know, breaking something meant a back hand slap across your face that
would send you sprawling on the floor followed by continuous death threats in
case of any future discrepancies…
So what’s with the new generation of African children
who wants to talk about feelings and emotions all the time? talking about ‘my
parents are not there for me so that’s why I rebel, drink and start having sex
at a young age’. When I was small my parents were not there for me either
because they had to work and feed us. At least parents nowadays give their children
phones and money to keep them busy while they are at work.
When I was small, my parents used to lock the
house when they left and left us to play outside until they got back from work
so we wouldn’t mess it up. Lucky kids nowadays can call their parents and ask
them when they are coming home. During my childhood, the position of the sun
told you mum was about to get home….let along the days when she was late and we
all thought she wasn’t coming home but had no option than to sit at the
doorstep and wait for her.
Kids nowadays are way too spoilt, have no
respect for anyone and are too ill mannered. Have you seen the tantrums that children
as old as 13 throw in the supermarket when they want something? My mum had a
death glare…just before you touched something in that isle; you look up to her
to see if she was watching you and she gave you that death glare…. No need to
say what it meant!
I think children nowadays have not been taught
what being content and grateful is all about. When I was a child I had one doll
at any one time. This doll got into so many accidents…it lost an arm and a leg
and I still played with it. The day I convinced by mum it was finally dead…its
head fell off. All this time I wouldn’t dare ask for another doll….maybe borrow
my sister’s every once in a while, but I kept my doll until I actually deserved
a new one.
The only way to deal with the menace that is
the children of today is to restore the morbid fear that children used to have
of their parents. Children should be whopped to put their arses back in their
place. It was no mistake that it was even written in the Bible, ‘spare the rod
and spoil the child’. It makes no sense grounding a kid or sending them to
their room where there is a phone, a computer and a speedy internet connection
among other electronics. These kids
should be beaten till they can taste the blood in their mouth when they go
misbehaving… the old fashioned way.
Now I know this issue raises a lot of controversy
since some parents torture their children in the name of discipline. That’s plain
wrong in any decade I have lived in. but if beating is not the answer then let
me see you come up with anothe way to get these kids back in line!