I've heard of all sorts of weird challenges in the past five years (and witnessed a few of them firsthand): the milk gallon challenge, the cinnamon on a spoon challenge, the Slurpee chug. All fairly stupid but relatively harmless, with the worst side effect being regurgitation.
There's a new one now that I heard about while watching the news this afternoon: the salt and ice challenge. Kids are pouring salt into their hands, pressing ice against it, and enduring the chemical burn as long as possible. Some of them are getting second and third degree burns.
Seriously?!?!?!?!
While I tend to be of the mind that adults can't expect kids not to do stupid things (especially when half the adults I see are paying tobacco companies to kill them slowly in the form of cigarettes), I feel like we have to draw the line somewhere.
Can these kids really think of nothing better to do? What happened to playing outside, reading a book, playing video games? Hobbies?
This more than anything makes me almost desperate to come up with ways to make reading exciting to kids and give them something-- anything-- to do besides causing physical harm to themselves and passing it off as fun. A trip to the hospital for skin grafts masquerading as a good time is fooling no one.
Here's a link to the article:
Salt and Ice Challenge article
This is really odd. It reminds me of something I've been thinking about a lot recently.
ReplyDeleteI think many of the problems our society faces could be addressed by returning to a community-minded culture. It goes back to the old saying, "it takes a village to raise a child." We need to pay more attention to our communities, get to know our neighbors, and build from there. This whole sense of nationalism and globalism must be forgotten.
I hope that my career as a teacher and writer can propel me to a position where I can change some of insanity I see around me.
Bruce and Rebecca,
ReplyDeleteI just posted a response to someone's rant about Obama's health care reform last night, and oddly enough, my response fell among these same topics. The person was blaming immigrants and public welfare for perpetuating poverty. Anyway, my reply was something to the effect that single-bullet theories of reform (like eradicating welfare) will not slow immigration nor fix poverty. We need to fix our values beginning with individuals, continuing in our homes, touching our communities, and so forth--even then utopia will never exist.
As a parent, I watch a lot of children fighting for attention any way they can get it. Computers, cell phones, smart phones, iPads, etc. and all the apps you can get are taking even more time away from children (or parents plug there kids in and walk away). I don't know how many of my friends spend quality time beside their kids on the phone, texting, etc., while the kids are playing on their electronic gadget of choice. I'm not 100-percent innocent of this either--especially when I'm in school, and my kids behavior choices reflect the neglect.
I can't imagine why this would be fun; however, my greater fear is that someone is going to do this as an act of bullying. Simple ingredients readily available, a few friends, and a victim are all you need. It's frightening.
Anyway, thanks for the posts and the conversation.
I read about the Salt and Ice Challenge this morning and wondered how many stupid and dangerous ideas "go viral" due to the new social media. Following up on Bruce's comments, back when your peers were in your community, if Dopey Dan said, "Hey, let's light hair spray cans on fire," you knew it was Dopey Dan and laughed him off. But when Anonymous posts a YouTube video, it seems more reasonable -- I mean, it's on YouTube, right?
ReplyDeleteThis is why I don't usually watch the news: it's always disheartening and threatens to completely destroy my ever-wavering faith in humanity. I think a huge part of the problem is that people are constantly connected-- everywhere I look, people are on their phones, on laptops, attached to those stupid Bluetooths (I still say it makes people look like they're talking to themselves). It does seem as though any time people aren't face to face, it's easier to be rude, think doing something incredibly unintelligent is a brilliant idea, etc. Would a re-vamp of the community-centered culture help, or are we just being nostalgic for a generation we missed out on? I don't even know my neighbors, but if everybody reached out to one another and things weren't so distant, maybe things would be different, better even. It's worth a try, right?
ReplyDeleteI don't think it's nostalgic, I think it's human nature. We are designed to live in community (it's a Biblical thing). I have a feeling that there's going to be a backlash--at least I hope there's one. I just think that rules of etiquette need to be taught somewhere along the line. It's pretty bad when convenience stores, banks, and restaurants need to have signs telling customers that "We'll wait on you when you're finished with your phone call." Really?
ReplyDeleteBy the way, I love my neighbors. We help each other out, have dinner together on occasion, and are genuinely pleasant to one another--granted my one neighbor has a daughter my daughter's age, but the other couple is childless. I don't think I could live in an area or next door to someone and not have a relationship of some sort. It seems odd to me. When we had to take my son to the ER last week, it was my childless neighbors who watched our other three children. I can't imagine the pain in the *&#* it would have been to take all four kids to the hospital--doable, but not pleasant (if trips to the ER can be pleasant). And God forbid if something should happen that I would be dead in my house, I'd like to think that my neighbors would notice long before my corpse rotted and the smell was too much to take (assuming that I lived alone.