supervising our kids

I have noticed recently more and more young kids and young teens hanging around downtown without any supervision. I live in Port Dover and it is alarming the number of kids just hanging out or hanging out with much older teenagers sometimes quite late at night, even through the week when they have school the next day. One young fellow who is about 13 is always hanging out. I have heard he got suspended from school (grade for smoking and has been caught already doing drugs and stealing. I wonder where his parents are when this is going on. I really think that when a kid is on the streets late at night the police should pick him/her up and take them home and fine the parents, maybe a warning the first time then a fine, third time it happens they go to court and have the parent evaluated. I think that this would prevent alot of problems of these young people being exposed to drugs, alcohol far too early. Some parents are simply too selfish to supervise their kids, they would rather be doing their own thing and the kid pays the price. It is just so sad that so many young people are ruining their lives before they even have a chance to really discover what life is all about. They either get in trouble with substance abuse, teenage pregnancy or in trouble with the law, drop out of school or move out of home way too early. This also is a huge burden on the social service sector. I believe some of it is preventable if we make parents and teenagers be accountable for their actions.

By the time the child is 12 and 13 it's too late. You start with the younger child, teaching mutual respect. A lot of these kids can't be handled by the time they're young teens as they've not had the support when they were younger.
By this time, even if the parents want to keep the kid at home they can't, it's too late and they run the risk of alienating them further.

It's sad, but it started when they were very young, and not much can be done to discipline them now.

There may be some response to this observation...but I am goin' for it anyway....

I noted that sometimes in broken families, if the mother (or father) was dating again, and she happened to have a kid from the first relationship...(and God help the boy if he happened to look like his Dad!)....then there was less interest in the kids from the first relationship while Mom was pursuing a new relationship. It works with the Dads too.

I recall one Dad who during interview time said:"I really don't know what I am going to do about ....." He/she is so rude to my girlfriend and has lost interest in school, behavioural stuff, etc. etc.

I said:"I have no real experience with this because when I was a kid, my parents weren't really into the dating scene. I can't really imagine that."

Some kids become real victims when their parents rejoin the dating parade..and they become "burdens" and obstacles to a new relationship at a time when they are most vulnerable and need all the support they can get.

Just from working around kids this age for years and years...and seeing so many homes break apart, the effect on the kids from 11 to 14 is HUGE!

They are just trying to figure out who they are and how they fit in to the male-female world and all hell breaks loose and they lose their footing completely at home. So, yes, they probably go out on the streets to find something warm and supportive to tide them through the pain.

Want to read an excellent Canadian author in this regard? Roughly based on her life...but what a head-spinner:
Lullabies for Little Criminals by Heather O'Neill.

It gets right into the head of these "street kids" and gives you a better understanding of why they hook up with those they do. Spell-binding. They have it at Simcoe Library. But I bought it. Excellent!

Summary of Lullabies for Little Criminals:
A gritty, heart-wrenching novel about bruised innocence on the city's feral streets—the remarkable debut of a stunning literary talent

Heather O'Neill dazzles with a first novel of extraordinary prescience and power, a subtly understated yet searingly effective story of a young life on the streets—and the strength, wits, and luck necessary for survival.

At thirteen, Baby vacillates between childhood comforts and adult temptation: still young enough to drag her dolls around in a vinyl suitcase yet old enough to know more than she should about urban cruelties. Motherless, she lives with her father, Jules, who takes better care of his heroin habit than he does of his daughter. Baby's gift is a genius for spinning stories and for cherishing the small crumbs of happiness that fall into her lap. But her blossoming beauty has captured the attention of a charismatic and dangerous local pimp who runs an army of sad, slavishly devoted girls—a volatile situation even the normally oblivious Jules cannot ignore. And when an escape disguised as betrayal threatens to crush Baby's spirit, she will ultimately realize that the power of salvation rests in her hands alone.