Poor Parenting: Exhibit 3,458

Our little suburb was featured on Channel 8's 10PM Newscast last night.

Apparently, it's big-time news when a town of 70,000 people's police force has decided to crack down on underage drinking in our community. Yep. They're going to be on neighborhood patrol looking for lots of cars parked on both sides of the street with kids in the back yard standing around a "party pool" holding red Solo cups pumping a keg. Such is the nature of high crime in my community.

Now, I'm not knocking this. They say it's to stop drunk driving before it starts and such. Fine. I'll take them at their word on that, and public safety and/or drunk driving are not laughing matters. I can assure you I'd be glad for both me and any keg-pumping Solo-cup holding kid if the cops kept that kid from slamming into a parked car in my driveway...or the myriad of possibilities that are worse.

That's not what I'm focusing on here. Read the article...or watch the video.

Check out this quote:

The Flower Mound police will even take the unusual step of getting a judge to issue a search warrant, so officers can enter the home.

It may be extreme but a needed step, officers argue, because often kids and sometimes even their parents will resist cooperating.

"Parents will tell the kids, 'don't open the door, y'all lock the door, don't let the police in there.' So parents are hindering our job to make the kids safe," said Lt. Clay Pierce.

Parents, if your kid wants to drink, you're NOT...

...let me repeat myself...

...NOT...

...doing them any favors by lowering the bar of expectation by saying, "We know you're going to drink, so when you drink, drink here." And, parents, as an aside, you most likely are unaware of the tremendous legal exposure you're placing on yourself.

And, ummm, you might want to think about the message you're sending kids when you tell them to ignore police directives. I'll remind you when they ignore your directives that they learned to subvert authority at your feet.

For about the millionth time, parents, please stop trying to be your kid's friend or the cool parent or whatever. Do your job. Be a parent, for crying out loud.

Yes. It can be difficult at times.
No. If you do it right, you won't win popularity contests very often.

But be the parent, okay? It ain't about a happy teenager in 2009. It's about an adult that uses wisdom in say, 2018. But you get that from lessons you taught them in 2009 while they were under your roof at your feet.