by Dave Kemp

Created on: April 25, 2008

I am very tired of the problems that arise from the "cool parent" and what they do that makes all teenagers want to spend all of their time at their house. What problems do I mean?

Let's start with the possibility that these "cool parents" are of the belief system that you have to trust your kids so they will trust you. Sorry - a teenager's lack of maturity gets in the way here. They are not capable of making this leap. They will tend to do what they think is best for them and will take advantage of your trust in pursuit of this opportunity.

Why am I so negative? Lots of experience plays into this for me. I'll give one story as an example. A woman I know once told me that the first time she really got felt up good was when she was at a coed halloween party when she was 15. The hostess was the "Cool Mom" and was letting all the kids pair up and share a blanket while they watched movies in her den. She was checking in occasionally to make sure everyone was doing okay. What she was not doing was checking to see what was going on under the blankets. Several of the young couples had their pants down/skirts up and as long as they were not horizontal and their heads weren't under the blanket, the "Cool Mom" figured all was okay.

Now frankly, some would say getting felt up is no big deal, and in some cases I would agree. The problem is that I know for a fact that in the case I am talking about, it was just a start. Once she had crossed the threshold at that tender age, the curiousity got the best of her and she kept on going farther and farther sexually until she crossed the line between having a healthy interest in sex and flirting with disaster at almost every opportunity.

Sorry, but I am not a fan of 17 year olds and younger getting this kind of trust and freedom to explore. Yes, they may do it anyway, but why make it easy for them? I have two college-aged daughters that both thought we were much too restrictive as parents. As of now, neither of them is pregnant or has any babies yet, both understand the responsibility they will have if that does happen, and both have a lot of respect for us as parents because we made it clear that we were tough because of how much we loved them and cared about what happened to them.

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