Beiber is Not News
I heard, like most of you, that Justin Bieber got arrested. I didn’t much care and thought surely there was some real news going on that the giggling-in-the-field reporters and giggling-in-the-studio anchors should be laying on us.
Am I being anti-social and pretty much alone in not believing that the antics of this teeny-bopper has any real meaning in my life or in the lives of those I’m surrounded by? It could be that I watch too much coverage of the news . Well, let me quickly correct that statement. Maybe I watch too much of what should be coverage of the important things occurring that impact our lives.
CNN reported interviews with parents and the impact his arrest would have on their kids and then their staff people went on to raise the issue of how parents should explain this to their kids.
What?
Just in case you are smart enough to have avoided this story and are even extra-smart and don’t even know who Justin Bieber is, I’ll spend a quick few lines here, to spell him out.
He is the 19-year-old pop star idolized by millions, who Miami, Florida, police arrested Thursday on charges of drunken driving, resisting arrest and driving without a valid license after police saw him street racing early Thursday morning.
Back to the so-called intelligent and educated folks – TV personalities – asking what should parents tell their kids; who said there are no dumb questions?
Beiber’s arrest is not, in my opinion, anything like the kid’s grandfather having skipped town with the 30-something housekeeper or like the family dog having been run over by the trash truck while the kids were at school.
Those are sensitive family issues that do, indeed, require time to determine the best sensitive approach to deliver the news in a manner the family’s young people can digest and learn how best to live with.
How did we tell our kids that Michael Jackson was dead? It didn’t take pondering and wondering in my case – it was my kid who told me the King of Pop was no longer with us.
I was the bewildered one and thought for sure she was talking about Michael Jackson the radio talk show host.
But once I got over the initial shock and made it to the television screen where she had gotten the news, together we learned the first details being reported.
And so, there’s the answer for the dumbest question I’ve heard. Parents don’t need to tell the kids anything about Bieber’s arrest; they can turn on the boob-tube and watch the gigglers, but I suspect their compadres will have instantly texted them the info and parents will be on the late train trying to introduce the topic.
