I agree with what you say but I don’t think it’s do-able for a lot of parents. The community is not the same as when our parents were growing up. It’s hard to trust other kid’s parents even IF you get to know them a little. ANd it’s hard to really get to know anybody these days. When I was a pre-teen my mother talked to my girlfriend’s mothers about my coming over and told them they didn’t allow me to watch R-rated movies or ride in cars of anyone they didn’t know. Guess what we did at their house a lot of the times? Watch rated R teen flicks. Those parents did not care. At 12 years old my friend had a sleepover and on her porch there we were at midnight catching porn on the pay channel. My best friend’s parents cared so much about me that they forbid their daughter to play with me at one point because I was “boy crazy.” Never once thinking to call and tell my folks that there was a 24 year old guy 2 houses down from them that was enticing me to hang out with him and I did because one of my friends from the faster crowd hung out there too. As a parent you cannot trust anyone else to care about your kids and not let them be exposed to junk.
I understand what you are saying. I experienced similar situations growing up, too. It almost ruined my life.
There are parents who can be trusted. It takes time to seek them out and find them.
You’re right about many parents not caring what their kids do. That is the problem today. Many parents are just too darn lazy and self-absorbed. That’s when their kids come to my house only. I don’t want my kids going to theirs so they can see mom’s drunk boyfriend smoking dope in the house. Their boy used to come play at our house all the time to get away from that misery. His mom bought him Grand Theft Auto, which he wasn’t allowed to bring to our house, and we discussed why.
And for those touchy situations, my kids were taught right from wrong. They know not to watch a bad movie or play a nasty video game. They despise the whorish Hollywood stars and popular “music” artists. Yeah they get caught in situations sometimes, real world, but they turn away from it, flee from it, and then tell me about it.