(May 31, 2001) -- A twelve-year-old girl wearing heels twice the size of the ones I have at home. Throw in a pair of skin-tight jeans, shiny tube top, tube of blood-red lipstick and you have yourself a recipe for disaster.

It’s interesting how we have these “poor confused” parents who are worried about the ever-increasing rate of teenage pregnancies and abortions, and  yet we speak of the problems as though they fell out of a clear blue sky. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not suggesting that these problems are in any way related to the twelve-year-old in the tube top. I wouldn’t dare be that politically incorrect. All I care to say at this point is that maybe, just maybe, there is a connection.

I would love to find some research that traced this problem to the media, because being the society we are, we would try to “change” things and “make them better.” But let’s take a look at our most recent and dearly loved pop stars who seem to be increasing in popularity yet decreasing in size. First we have Lil’ Bow Wow, fourteen years old and singing about puppy love.

Then there’s 3LW, going on and on about ballers and shot callers. What are you doing thinking about boys at that age? Go grab a book and study something! It’s sad to think that kids these days could be modeling their behavior after the songs of little pop stars – written by bald men in their forties, mind you. But if you really look into it, it’s not too hard to imagine.

I hate saying that the media influences what we say and do these days, because that makes it seem like we don’t have a head of our own to think. We can all see that kids these days are forced to grow up much quicker than our generation was. If we were living back in the Middle Ages with the black plague, growing up fast would be understandable since they only had twenty years to live.

But sadly, that’s the case with some of these teenagers. I guess that’s where the roles of parents come in. But then again that suggests that all parents know how to do their job. If only every parent could get a copy of “Parenting for Dummies.”