February 10, 2009, - 11:30 pm
The End of Parenting: The Complete Morons Who Take Their Kids to “Friday the 13th”
By Debbie Schlussel
Tonight, I concluded that the decline of America is increasing with rapidity and escalation far worse than I’ve earlier diagnosed.
I just returned from a special critics and promotional screening of the latest installment of the “Friday The 13th” movie franchise. This latest one bears the same name as the 1980 original–simply, “Friday the 13th.” And I watched parents voluntarily subject their very young children to graphic, bloody violence, from which many parents in the Third World only wish they could shield their kids.
Al-Qaeda murdered 3,000 Americans on 9/11. That was an outrage. But thousands more American parents–who are merely sperm, egg, and womb donors–are doing to this country what Al-Qaeda could never do. These American parents have voluntarily turned their kids’ minds to mush–kids who will still be around, who will “grow up,” and who will continue to add to America’s decline.
In the past, I’ve complained on this site about selfish parents who take their babies to the movies, so we hear them crying instead of the movie. And I’ve lamented that irresponsible parents take their very young kids to violent, graphic, sex-laden, R-rated movies like this one. This latest “Friday the 13th,” should have been rated NC-17 and, a few years ago, it would have been. But Hollywood is desperate to keep teens coming to these flicks and manages to get the ratings standards relaxed.
But while I blame Hollywood for creating ever trashier garbage, I blame these pseudo-parents far more.
Tonight, I saw ever more extreme examples of this–of the morons who are “raising” America’s next generation.
“Friday The 13th” is what you’d expect–except that it’s more graphic, bloody, and violent than ever. Posters and passes to the free screening of this movie say, “FROM THE PRODUCERS OF THE TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE.” (There are more graphic beheadings in this movie than a dozen Al-Qaeda videos.) It also is more replete with topless, heavily-implanted women, sexual language and content, and a prolonged, very explicit sex scene.
It’s NOT for kids. But fewer and fewer parents in America seem to care anymore.
Tonight, I saw–or rather, heard–at least two crying babies at the “Friday the 13th” showing. And I saw at least two parents with VERY young, impressionable kids. It was one of those times I wish I had a video camera with me. I spoke with each of these parents I saw.
First, the babies. I understand that it’s “Friday The 13th.” It’s no masterpiece. More like the anti-masterpiece. I expected lots of laughter at supposedly scary points in the movie and lots of talking back to the screen.
But I didn’t expect surround-sound baby. Two single parents–a baby mama and a baby daddy–brought their babies to the movie. They didn’t think: Hmmm . . . I don’t wanna or can’t afford to spring for a baby sitter. So, the right thing to do would be to be a good parent and a good citizen and stay home with my kid.
Nope, they thought: I wanna see a free movie, and damn it if I have this inconvenient product of my slutty single sex life get in the way. I’m gonna go see that movie, not matter what. And I don’t give a crap if the rest of the people in the theater can’t enjoy the movie when my baby predictably cries or makes noises.
That was selfish enough. But, then, as you’d predict, their babies repeatedly cried, cooed, and screamed during the entire movie. Not once did they get up and leave the theater. No, that would ruin their movie-viewing experience. Who gives a crap about the rest of the people in the theater?
I asked both of the parents of these babies why they brought their crying babies to the movies. Both happened to be Black, but don’t you worry that this is a race thing, because I’ll get to the two moronic single White mothers who brought their young kids later on in this column.
First, there was a single Black mother with her baby. I shouted to her, “Why did you bring a baby to “Friday the 13th?” “Shut up, bitch,” was the response. To another film critic’s questions, she and her friends said, “Mind ya own damn bid’ness.” Um, well, we would, if we wouldn’t have to hear the result of your bid’ness throughout the movie, sister.
Then, there was the single Black father and his aging mother with a baby. I’d bet money his mother is raising this grandkid. They were parked next to me, and after the movie, I asked, “Why was it necessary for you to bring your baby to ‘Friday the 13th’? Don’t you think that’s rude and irresponsible?”
His response: “He say he wanna get scared.”
Me: “Huh? How old is this kid? Can he even talk?”
Baby Daddy: “He one-year-old.”
Me: “A one-year-old can understand what’s going on in ‘Friday the 13th’? Come on . . . .”
Baby Daddy: “You’d be surprised.”
Me, getting into my car: “Well, that’s very irresponsible parenting and very rude to the rest of us who heard his crying.”
Then, there are the two White, single mothers with their kids, who looked to be between the ages of 8 and 11.
White Single Mother #1 took two young daughters to see this disgustingly violent, explicitly sexual movie. I asked her youngest daughter how old she was. She looked at me and her mother like even she knew she wasn’t old enough to be there.
White Single Mother (WSM) #1: “She’s eleven.”
Me: “Why would you take an eleven-year-old girl to see this movie?”
WSM #1: “Well, if I would have known it would be like this . . . .”
Me: “If you would have known?! Lady, it’s ‘Friday the 13th.'”
And it’s R-rated. WSM #1 threw her hands up and smiled because she knew quite well what the content of “Friday the 13th.” It’s not like there haven’t been a gazillion sequels to and incarnations of this movie over the last three decades (the first was in 1980).
Me: “Great parenting. You’re a moron.”
White Single Mother #2 had a teeny, tiny, young boy with her. I asked the boy how old he is. He, too, had the same look of guilt as White Single Mother #1’s daughter. He knew he shouldn’t be at this movie.
White Single Mother (WSM) #2: “He’s ten.”
Me: “Why are you taking a ten-year-old to see such a graphic, violent movie?”
WSM #2: “It’s only a movie. And, yeah, I know it’s violent and stuff, but he knows right from wrong. And ya know, it’s only a movie and stuff.”
Me: “Huh? That’s Bullsh-t. He’s only ten and you’re taking him to a movie where people are hacked to death, burned alive, and otherwise killed in morbid, grisly ways?”
WSM #2: “I can’t believe you just cussed in front of my son.”
Me: “Why does that suddenly bother you, since you just dragged your ten-year-old son to a movie at eleven o-clock at night, in which they’re swearing throughout the entire movie? [Every other word is sh-t, f-ck, the p-word, etc.] You’re completely irresponsible.”
WSM #2: “Well, that’s not real. Mind your own business.”
You know what? I wish Americans could mind their own business. I wish that we didn’t have so many morons, so many irresponsible people raising kids in America. But that is my business, and it’s yours, too. Because how they raise–or rather, don’t raise–their kids is going to affect us and future generations of this country. “Deep Throat” is “just a movie,” too. I wonder why this woman isn’t also showing that to her 10-year-old. Or maybe she is.
Trust me–this isn’t the first time White Single Mothers #1 and #2 are subjecting their kids to these kinds of movies, violence, and sex, because they, themselves, can’t pass up a free movie ticket. If they have no problem with this, odds are that they have no problem with a lot of other objectionable things that come up in raising their kids. And the same goes for Black Single Mom and Father. They’ll do the same. These so-called parents have no sense, no basic standard of what it means to be responsible, to raise your child with the tools to be good people and use common sense. It’s, frankly, indecent. And sickeningly selfish.
And this is one of the reasons I’m not optimistic about America’s future.
When I was a kid, my parents investigated the movies I saw BEFORE I saw them. They didn’t let me see the movies I was too young to see. They didn’t view parenting as a passive, go-through-the-motions avocation. It was their very serious vocation. (And they taught me to be a polite citizen–not to consider a movie theater my own personal living room, in which I can answer my cell phone, bring a crying baby, provide John Madden-style endless play-by-play color commentary of the obvious regarding what’s happening on-screen, or otherwise disturb everyone else repeatedly.)
At first, my father wouldn’t let me see “Star Wars,” because he heard there were monsters and scary-looking people in it. I was seven or eight at the time and begged him to see it. He saw it on his own first to check it out and loved it, realizing that his concerns were not borne out. He couldn’t wait to take us. But I’m glad–and lucky–that I had a parent who cared enough to be concerned in the first place.
When I was in high school, my dad wouldn’t let me see “Risky Business” because it glorified prostitution and pimping (as a way to get into the college of your choice). But compared to the new “Friday the 13th,” “Risky Business” is nothing.
Sorry, but parents who take their ten-year-olds to see “Friday the 13th” shouldn’t have kids. It’s child abuse of a more insidious kind.
These were just four irresponsible parents–all single parents, too. But I’ve seen other parents take their young kids to violent, risque movies. And there are, sadly, tens of thousands–probably hundreds of thousands and even millions–of American parents just like them who just don’t give a damn.
They don’t give a damn about the rest of the people in the theater. And, even worse, they don’t care a whit about their own children.
And when people don’t care enough about their own kids, who and what will they care about?
Certainly not the rest of their country. The stuff to which you subject your children is the stuff that they will be.
Garbage in, garbage out. And sadly, we have a lot of trash to take out in America.
Let’s take out the trash before it takes us out.
Ugh, I have no stomach for gory films. I’m very squeamish, and rarely see stuff that’s rated R. Kinda wimpy for a 44 year-old, but that’s how I am!
Dad’s a southern Baptist minister and his flavor of religion forbids all movies (the Devil’s work, along with secular music, card games and booze).
Mom, however, is Salvation Army and we sneaked out to the odd Disney matinee when I was a kid. That being said, she always VERY CAREFULLY vetted movies and music before we went shopping. She even screened a BTO album for my aunt before giving it to her son for his birthday. Two songs later it went back to my aunt to be returned.
And mom would have had my scalp if I ever behaved like that in a theater!
mplumb on February 11, 2009 at 1:48 am