There have been a rash of shootings in Augusta over the last year, and it is alarming how young many of the perpetrators are. In my mind, it was just a matter of time before the gun violence spilled over and into the schools.
And now it has.
I like to tease that I am ancient. At 51, I am really not that old; however, the world has changed dramatically during my short time on the planet.
It wasn’t that long ago that I walked through the school parking lot and saw gun racks in the back window of pick-up trucks. Those rifles didn’t belong to the school resource officer; they belonged to students.
In those days, our idea of a gang was the neighborhood kids we ran around with in the forests on Saturdays or, maybe, the Little Rascals on television.
Comparatively speaking, life was tough for us kids of the 1970s and 1980s. On a hot summer day, my mother would literally lock us out of the house so that she could have a little peace and quiet, and our only refreshment was the water spigot outside. When the streetlights came on, we knew it was time to hop on the bikes and head home.
Even though video games existed, they were nothing like Grand Theft Auto and, generally, Frogger and Donkey Kong were rainy day fun and not a constant activity.
Back then, only rich people had microwaves, so dinner was whatever mom cooked, and there was no nuking a mac and cheese in a pinch. We either ate what was on the table or we went to bed hungry.
Growing up, my house had rules. The bed was to be made before breakfast was served. Shoes were not allowed to be worn in the house. Getting a spanking at school meant getting one at home as well.
When MTV came along, my parents had it blocked, and that was during the time that music videos were tame compared to the demonic imagery and absolutely lurid sexual fantasies found in the lyrics of today. Back then, MTV played Pat Benatar, and no one would have ever dared to produce a show like “16 and Pregnant,” but my parents still wanted nothing to do with the channel.
I was allowed to listen to rock music and record albums, but only after my father read the lyrics first.
It was a tough childhood, I’ll tell ya.
My father, on his deathbed, told my mother she needed to find a good Christian man to marry after he was gone. Dad understood the importance of two parents raising children.
We now live in a world of magnets and miracles, according to Pink Floyd, and while modern conveniences would blow our great-grandparents’ minds, society has evolved to a point where the most important thing in all kids’ lives is fast eroding away: parenting.
I grew up in a household where the words, “You just wait until your father gets home,” struck fear in the heart.
According to the U.S. Census Bureau, 23%, or almost a quarter, of all children under 18 live in a single parent household.
After the discovery that the United States had the highest percentage of single-parent households in the world, what did the Census Bureau do? They designated March 21 as National Single Parent Day…of course!
We might as well have National Smoke a Pack Day, National Running With Scissors Day and National Eat Tide Pods Day.
Richmond County School Board Trustee Venus Cain and I have had many hours worth of conversations about how some of today’s “parents” expect the schools to do their job for them.
“Some of them intentionally put down wrong numbers for the school files so that they aren’t bothered when their kids act up,” Cain has told me multiple times.
I actually had it good growing up and some of my upbringing filtered down to my own fatherhood.
When my daughter was around seven or so, I noticed that she would randomly notice something about the checkout clerk, our restaurant server or a stranger in line with us and give them a compliment.
“That’s a beautiful ring! Is that your engagement ring?” Emerson would say to a complete stranger.
It later dawned on me that Emerson got that from watching me. Rather than standing around like an automaton in silence, in the South it is considered good manners and communication to strike up conversations with people sharing an elevator.
I learned that from my mother, who could make a new best friend in the canned goods aisle at Piggly Wiggly, and I passed that on to my kid, kind of unknowingly. According to my mother, she got that gift of gab from her mother, Vivian Reed.
“Mama always broke the ice with a compliment, and she meant it. She could make friends instantly,” my mama told me about my grandmother.
These days, kids learn a twisted version of morality on social media with the parents blissfully unaware.
Shortly after the Aug. 16 shooting at Josey High School, Mayor Garnett Johnson released a statement lamenting the earlier recent deaths of two 15-year-olds to gun violence and the fact that the violence has made it into the schools.
Johnson, in his statement, called for more programs aimed at keeping youth off the street.
“We need to create safe havens for our children, including expanding after school and summer programming offered by our recreation centers. We need an awareness campaign to inform parents about the options available to their children,” the statement reads.
While I know his heart is in the right place, I must respectfully disagree with the mayor that more programs are the answer. There are already programs everywhere catering to every possible activity a kid or teenager could want, from boxing to chess clubs. Scores of non-profit organizations exist that provide after school programs and summer activities.
The Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency prevention annually spends $143.7 million on mentoring programs and delinquency prevention; meanwhile, the same agency spends only $110.4 million on the justice system and drug courts.
District Attorney Jared Williams has been quoted repeatedly as saying that he wants to keep kids in the classroom and out of the jail. While that may be a noble quest, it is still jousting with windmills, in my opinion.
Once a cat is feral, it can rarely be trained to live indoors. Children who grow up with no supervision or moral compass must be shaken into reality that criminal activity has consequences. An after-school program cannot convey that message, only a jail cell can.
Scott Hudson is the Senior Investigative Reporter and Editorial Page Editor for The Augusta Press. Reach him at scott@theaugustapress.com
