Role Models, Stars and Toenails

It is football season! Well, not quite, but close. Training camp is under way and the next Super Bowl Champs, the Philadelphia Eagles (I can dream can't I?) are beginning their two workouts a days in the intense heat of the Lehigh Valley. And what would training camp be without the darling story of the sports media, the star player holdout? Enter the franchise player Brian Westbrook. A few years ago the media circus that was Terrell Owens captivated the headlines for weeks before the Eagles dumped him. In his own words T.O. (as he is called) needed more money so that he could feed his family. A gazillion dollars was not enough. He needed a bazillion dollars. Now we are at it again. Westbrook needs to feed his family and thus renegotiate his multi-million dollar contract.

Miley Cyrus (aka Hannah Montana) and her loving (he loves money) dad are at it again. Somehow or another, Miley became the latest in a star studded cavalcade of entertainers to bite the dust of failed role models. She now wants to bust out and show more skin. As one blog puts it, "She has a very bad habit of behaving inappropriately in front of cameras, leading to embarrassing photos splashed across the Internet. According to Fox News, some British parents have had enough of the pop star's provocative posing and are boycotting her merchandise. Moms interviewed at a London Disney store say they 'feel she is now of an unsuitable nature for a 15-year-old megastar.'"

When rock stars, movie stars, sports stars, and TV stars cut their toe nails it is front page news. Every time I go online I am invited to eavesdrop on some star's private life, to see them half naked, without make up, with makeup, in love, out of love, pregnant, post-pregnant, dancing, clubbing, getting in and out of a car, with a boyfriend, without a girl friend, in court fighting for custody, in jail, DUI, AWOL, and a plethora of other life situations. Have you noticed how many TV programs are now actually taking us into the bathroom so that we can watch actors urinate? Give me a bucket!!

When will it stop? Never, as long as parents are not their kids' role models. Miley Cyrus is role model to seven year olds. Seven!!!! They want to dress like her, look like her, dance like her, sing like her, and actually BE her. This is sheer idiocy. I cannot wait to see how many kids in the near future are going to be named Miley or Hannah Montana. How many seven year olds can recite the lyrics to Miley's latest song but cannot name the four Gospels? Better yet. How many twelve year old little girls are learning to dress like their thirty-five-year-old moms with low cut blouses and skin tight jeans with some message strewn across the derriere? What message (or messages) does that send? Ok, so in some of your personal dictionaries my thinking on this fits the definition of old fashioned and prude. So be it. I stand on my record. I raised three gentlemen and one lady. When you send your little girl out of the house with more skin showing than not, you may be proud of your little girl and her half naked body. You may have the "if you got it flaunt it" mindset. You have come a long way baby in that you are setting the foundation for transforming your little girl into a future sex object.

So now that I have your attention and you're arguing, "But what am I supposed to do? This is our culture. I want my child to fit in!" Have I got good news for you. I am in the midst of a ten part series of sermons titled "Teaching Them Young - Principles You Must Teach Your Kids Before They Reach the Age of Twelve". Click here to view or listen to all of the sermons in this series. You can also watch us live at 11:00 AM Sunday mornings by clicking here. Even if you don't have children or have already raised yours, you need or will need this material someday.

So what do you think? Agree, disagree, dead right, dead wrong?

In His Grip,
PB