THE LEFT ALONE GENERATION...

If you wake up every morning to have breakfast with your parents and have the opportunity to talk about life’s important issues, your fears and your aspirations and in turn allow them give you their godly counsel, then you have so much to be grateful for because not every child has such opportunity…for their parents have long left home!

Where are all the parents gone? They are out in “ Broad Street ”, caught up in the rat race of trying to make ends meet. Daddy’s pay check is no longer enough, so mummy has to leave her full-time-stay-at-home duty for one that gives monetary reward to support the family. Now we are left to blame the poor economy system!

Unlike in the past, in most homes today both parents work full time- from dawn to dusk, thus, creating a yawning vacuum in parent-child relationship. It is difficult to build an intimate relationship with parents whom one barely knows and vice-versa, so parents become money-making-strangers to their children with no idea of how much is happening in the lives of these little ones God has placed in their care. House-helps have taken over the role of mothers and in cases where the parents cannot afford such luxury, an older relation such as Aunt or Uncle is entrusted with the responsibility of taking care of the children- a type of care that eventually leads to the child molestation and other acts of abuse!

In a city like Lagos , most parents are literarily forced to leave home as early as 5:30am to beat the traffic jam and they do not return home until about 9.00pm to 10.pm due to road congestion. Thus, their children wake-up and go to bed without seeing their parents or an opportunity to have a decent conversation with them. Think for a few minutes what this means to these children, their growing up and for us.

It means more babies going to school (day care: a school where students- babies don’t wear uniform). It also means children growing up without consistent support of parents, leaving them to become independent at a too-early age. It means children becoming distrustful and resentful of the system or country that is allowing their parents burn out so much energy to make a living which in turn deny them of proper parental care. It means more children turning to their peers for counsel about issues parents would have been in a better position to give a right answer. It means more children growing up into youths with angry behaviour and its likes which breed rebels and juvenile delinquents.

The family is the bedrock of every Nation. The decline of strong family-ties will sure have a negative impact in a Nation’s development. This article is neither pointed towards judging parents for shirking their responsibilities nor is it written to console the children who find themselves left alone unintentionally by their working parents. However, it is written to question the dysfunctional nature of parental responsibility that is prevalence in today’s society and largely contributing to the decadence of family values.

It is an undisputed fact that this generation is becoming the most left alone generation in all aspect. But should we accept this with reasoned impartiality as something we must get use to?