Recently, Chris Brown was arrested for beating up his girlfriend Rhianna. Chris Brown is nominated for Nickelodeon's Kids Choice Awards in a few categories. Nickelodeon has refused to pull Chris Brown off the ballot. Austin and I were voting on them the other night and he wanted to vote for Chris Brown in the song category, or something like that. I explained to him that I didn't think it was a good idea because of what he had recently done. Austin then asked what I meant and I explained the pre-Grammy incident to him. His response? "Well, that's not that bad." Excuse me? Why would he think that was okay? We had a lengthy talk about how men should treat women. I couldn't believe I had to explain this to me 7-year-old son!
We then got to the "Favorite Male Athlete" category. Austin wanted to vote for Michael Phelps. I again had to explain his recent actions of smoking pot at a party. I then had to have a lengthy discussion with him about drugs and why they are illegal and what they do to your body. He asked why an athlete would do something that was so bad for them. I had no answer!
My point is this why on earth do we allow celebrities to influence our lives so much? What the heck do they know? I understand that most of them didn't ask to be role models, but guess what? You are. Deal with it! That's the price you pay for money and glamour and the type of lifestyle you lead! So, man up! Do the right thing even if it is hard. And I also understand that people make mistakes. Chris Brown eventually apologized. (Although I am not sure why it took him 9 days!!) Michael Phelps also apologized. But, what is done is done. You can't change the past. What message are we sending to our kids? It's okay to hit your girlfriend? It's okay to let your boyfriend hit you? It's okay to smoke pot...it's not that bad? It's hard to escape all the garbage! I try really hard to not pay any attention to celebrity "news" but it's everywhere!
My hope is to teach my boys about real heroes. People who are worth looking up to.
Stepping off my soapbox. For now....
2 comments:
Just a side note...I just found out that Chris Brown withdrew his own name from the Kids Choice Awards. I commend him for that!
Wow. You make such a good point. It is up to us as parents to show our kids who to really look up.
I am glad Chric Brown withdrew his own name.
Post a Comment