Stripper Poles and Sexual Assault: Who Cares if My Kids Are Unsocialized?
I don’t watch Reality TVso it doesn’t surprise me that I haven’t heard of E!’s new show Keeping Up with the Kardashians. Another thing that did not shock me? The 9 year old girl working the stripper pole like a pro. Is it sad that I’ve become accustomed to little girls dressing and acting like hookers? It seems to be the American way: sexualize them young before they have a chance to know what hit them. Sure dad came in and carried her off the pole and stated that it was inappropriate. But the pole is in his room to begin with. And I doubt she bought those sexy high heels she was wearing with her own credit card.
It reminds me of a post that Lee from Absolutelee wrote a while back. How To Turn Your Daughter Into A Whore In Two Easy Steps. The first step is “Enroll your daughter in public school.” While I doubt the girls in this show are enrolled in a public school, the fact is they have been more than assaulted by the over sexualization of girls and women in our culture. When a school teacher can fondle a 5th grader’s breast (does she have breasts at that age???) and keep his job for 40 more years the sexualization of America’s girls is certainly floating around in the mainstream of our schools as much as it is in Hollywood.
When Regular Mom talked about her occasional worrying over her kids socialization it hit the nail on the head. There are countless people who are “just fine”, yet spill story after story of things no child, and yes a teenager is still a child in some senses, should endure. I can nod from my own experiences. Drugs, drinking, sex. All of those things are common, a lot more so than most parents would like to admit. The parents sitting next to the smiling perfect girl on Sunday morning praising themselves for their good parenting skills are either clueless or pretending not to know about what their “angel” was doing Saturday night. Sure to some homeschooling means removing their kids from all the socialization, but really there are just some parts of it I’d rather they miss out on until they are much older. Pardon me for being prude, but I don’t want my 9 year old sons playing with little girls who know more than I probably do in the adult areas. I certainly don’t want them thinking this is OK because “everyone else does it”.
What everyone else is doing has a huge impact. No matter how well you think you have taught your children, when they are standing on the outside looking in that is a very tough place to be. And not all kids are strong enough to resist. Many, many more than you might want to admit do fall into peer pressure. And many parents do not see it, or at least not all of it. And no, homeschooling is not a guarantee that your kids won’t be falling into the traps of negative peer pressure. But for me it means I’ll be there a lot more often for my kids, be able to steer them in a better direction should something happen, and know a lot more about what is going on. And hey, if they skip school to go hang out and smoke weed at a buddies house I’ll certainly know about it sooner than the school could call and tell me.
socialization, homeschooling, Keeping Up with the Kardashians, sexualization of girls
October 22nd, 2007 at 8:20 am
I saw a news article about this yesterday! I was completely disgusted!! The report didn’t include private school teachers because the teachers are not required to have a teaching license. Here is the link to the story that I saw yesterday http://news.aol.com/story/_a/sexual-misconduct-plagues-schools/20071020124309990001 .
October 22nd, 2007 at 10:50 am
[...] I’m referring to is a topic broached on a site called Mom is Teaching. Whether or not you believe in homeschooling or public school systems, this quote in particular [...]
October 22nd, 2007 at 12:07 pm
Yeah, when you think about it, putting our kids in the hands of strangers is a crazy thing to do…. yet that’s exactly what we do when we send them to school. Why is it so easy to fall into thinking it’s ok simply because everyone else is doing it?
I’m with you. I don’t want to shield my kids from real life. I just want the opportunity to be their tour guide.
October 22nd, 2007 at 2:13 pm
FYI Kim Kardashian…the “star” of the show…went to a private all girls Catholic High School. Her sister probably goes to the same school…maybe not…
http://www.mhs-la.org/
I blame the nuns…
October 22nd, 2007 at 2:54 pm
[...] more parenting tips and information, check out Mom is Teacher’s interesting post about the dangers of sexual socialization at too young of an age. Did You Enjoy this Post? [...]
October 22nd, 2007 at 5:34 pm
I’d never heard of that particular reality show. It’s just another reason why I don’t watch reality TV. Ugh.
For so long, we’ve all been telling ourselves that the problems in schools were “isolated incidents” and really “few and far-between” and it just felt like the abuse was ubiquitous even though it really wasn’t.
But I’m not sure we can really tell ourselves that anymore. (sigh)
October 22nd, 2007 at 7:33 pm
First, thanks for the link. Unfortunately, there are SO many examples of this type of behavior, it isn’t hard to find something outrageous. If my children will end up “antisocial” because I homeschool them, I’m all for it. “Social” is scary nowadays.
October 23rd, 2007 at 12:32 pm
Summer! Thanks for the link. What I find interesting is the idea of “antisocial” behavior. Apparently, we’ve come to the point where “antisocial” means things like being able to talk intelligently with adults, not necessarily dressing like all the other fifteen year olds, not having had sex before you’re thirteen, not necessarily really knowing what sex is until your sixteen or so, not listening to the same crapp (sorry! I meant rapp
) as all the other kids, believing in your country, believing in God, not walking around in a pair of too short shorts that say “bite me” on your derriere, being able to read, knowing your multiplication tables, actually planning on doing something with the life God has given you other than smoking dope. If that’s antisocial, then that’s what I want for my children.
Homeschooled children are not antisocial at all. As a matter of fact, the ones I know (several) are to the person much more at ease with themselves socially than their public school counterparts.
Keep up the good work, Summer!
November 7th, 2007 at 1:37 pm
[...] about parenting (and especially about sexual safety for kids), check out Teacher Smackdown, Mom is Teaching, and Parenting our Children. Did You Enjoy this Post? Subscribe to Between the Sheets. It’s Free! [...]
December 22nd, 2007 at 4:56 am
[...] you’re new here, you may want to subscribe to our RSS feed. Thanks for visiting!Summer’s post over at Mom is Teaching (a few months back), regarding sexual assault in schools, reminded me of a [...]