Bigger problems than a Gaga

Even before Stefani Joanne Angelina Germanotta decided to embrace the demon Judas, we already had bigger problems in the Philippines than kids becoming “gago” because of Lady Gaga. This weekend and up to today, two major topics will almost certainly compete for every front page, every headline and sound byte. The media will force feed us nothing but news about the testimony of Chief Justice Renato Corona and the controversial concert of Lady Gaga.

Unfortunately, little or nothing at all will ever be repeated or mentioned about the saddest news coming out of Manila last week which was about how 4 teenagers coming home from a late night out slammed into an electric posts instantly killing all four and almost tearing their car in half.

According to reports the “kids” were between the ages of 14 and 16 and all belonging to well to do families presumably living in the exclusive Ayala Alabang Village where the accident happened. Sad to say, the accident was merely a repeat of an “annual” event that happens with such frightening regularity in the Philippines. Not only is it an annual occurrence, the victims almost always happen to be from middle or upper class families, who fall asleep at the wheel or who lose control of their car and die as a result of a joy ride.

So in reality, the Impeachment of Chief Justice Renato Corona has no direct bearing on the lives of our teenage kids. Lady Gaga won’t really cause the physical death of our children in the same manner that Marilyn Monroe and Madonna only titillated us but did not cause our demise. We have real problems and the lives of our teenage kids are at risk but it has nothing to do with artists and politicians. It has to do with parenting, driver training, alcohol restrictions, and safety consciousness.

This is “why” I have repeatedly told my 11- year-old daughter that I will do everything in my power to make sure that she becomes a very good driver, that she will have at least one very reliable car of her own and that she should, whenever possible, be the driver and not a rider or passenger. I even told her to learn to live with the fact that I will do my best to hover above her as a parent and that I would rather she resent me for being over protective, than live the rest of my life with a dead or damaged daughter because I wanted to be cool or liberal.

In my 56 years, I have learned enough to know that being a passenger puts you at the mercy and the driving skills of the person behind the wheel. I have heard enough horror stories of women being threatened, molested or abandoned on the highway by the guy behind the wheel and I personally know of several incidents where a joy ride turned into a deadly disaster or a near death experience for passengers.

I can tell you with complete authority that after kids get hurt, get killed or get molested because of joy rides and lack of supervision, the only thing that’s left are parents who spend a life time in mourning, parents and families who blame and hate each other, damaged individuals cursed to live a life of regret and trauma. For them there is no real healing. They can go to court, they can collect or pay out damages, they can do a lot of things, but they can never bring back the dead or fix a damaged soul.

But for the rest of us, we have a duty and a responsibility to make sure our children don’t become the annual sacrifice on the altar of “joy rides” and parties or dates gone wrong. We are “parents”, the “adults” who have the moral and especially the “legal” responsibility to protect our teenagers.

What is unbelievable in all of this is that many rich parents who are able to build or run financial empires somehow don’t have enough judgment when it comes to putting a teenager behind the wheel, no active management and control or supervision of teenage drivers regarding destination, alcohol consumption and curfews. Somehow, buying a car and letting the teenager go, is viewed as being cool and less of a hassle than to instill discipline and accountability on a young adult.

Why is it that we as managers, leaders or bosses expect and demand greater accountability from our employees than teenagers that we place behind a vehicle worth several hundred thousand pesos that could be used in a crime or could cause bodily injury amounting to millions or the death of one to twenty people in an accident?

Why are we more concerned about the political and professional lives of controversial people than the issue of drivers’ education, committed parenting and the lives of our own flesh and blood?  Treating kids like adults also means taking into consideration that they can commit the same stupid and deadly mistakes that adults make.