Keep It Pithy by Bill O'Reilly Read Free Book Online Page A

pictures of perfect family life, and the kids glued to this mental bubble gum began having unreasonable expectations of their own human, unscripted parents. Most parents want to do what’s best for their kids, though it’s not always easy to know what that is. With TV images and ad temptations millions of American parents came under siege. TV, according toone writer, “fed a sense of generational superiority” in the kids who watched it. I know exactly what he means, and so do you.… Satisfying the desires of children can be an overwhelming task. Worse, it can distract parents from paying attention to the really important parental duties: teaching discipline, morality, and the truth about how the world works.
    Or, in the same vein:
Seven in ten [high school students] admit to cheating on tests, and 92 percent say they lie. And most of those kids don’t feel much guilt at all.… What caused this deplorable state of affairs? Number one, “cowardly parenting.” Number two, “corrupt national leadership.” As the tree is bent, so will it grow. And today kids can look all around at so many bent adults that they can hardly guess what it means to be straight. People basking in the spotlight—and I don’t mean just politicians—are forever presenting terrible examples to the children of America.

And if we so-called adults can be tricked senseless by the clever shills of Madison Avenue, pity our poor children. The ads are designed to make them think that they are the most deprived creatures alive because they don’t own expensive designer clothing or high-tech toys and games.…
Money doesn’t buy love or happiness. We have to helpour children understand that the proof of affection is not an overpriced gift. Otherwise, we are helping the advertisers set them up for a frustrating life of trying to cope with their problems by racking up credit card bills at the mall.

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    The late Steve Allen talked about the dangers of TV to children on my program some years ago .
    I think it’s a conversation worth remembering:
            O ’ REILLY : Do you think that watching these programs will make kids want to have sex?
            ALLEN : No. Mother Nature makes them want to have sex. The argument is that when sexual material is dealt with on television and nobody has to worry about birth control or sexual disease, then the implication is, “Hey, it’s all kind of cute and hip and let’s do it even though I’ve never met you before.”
            O ’ REILLY : So you believe kids are impressionable enough to pick up a message like “They’re having fun at Beverly Hills High. I should have fun at my school”?
            ALLEN : Yeah, I believe that. There’s a lot of documentation. This is not just some theory of mine. I am by no means a saint. But the sleaze and vulgarity on TV disgust even an old roué like me. It’s part of the whole dumbing down, the coarsening. The question is, what kinds of parents are the kids today going to make? I think the answer is, not too good.
            O ’ REILLY : Why?
            ALLEN : Well, imagine an ideal father. Would you like it if he came home with a couple of broads on each arm? You see that image on TV.
            O ’ REILLY : Are you referring to President Clinton?
            ALLEN : That’s another matter. But really, if people don’t know we have a problem here, then we are in worse shape than I thought.

    But neither Steve Allen nor I would ignore the challenges that parents face today. No guilt trips here for working parents who must sometimes, for economic reasons, put their children in the care of others .
Look at today’s reality in America. Families have to deal with a tough dance card. The cost of housing and modernconveniences is significant, and taxes are gutting the take-home pay of the working class. By necessity, most Americans have to work longer and harder than they might like. If you have more