73 SHEETS

I have five children, I watched her video, it brought tears to my eyes and lump in my throat. The last two sheets read, “I have nobody, I need someone”. “My name is Amanda Todd”. 73 sheets in all. A story told. A life lost. 15 years old and gone. That video could be anyone’s daughter. It could have been mine. It could just as well be anyone’s son it could have been anyone of my 4 sons. Where have we gone wrong? How have we let our children become so lost, so hurt, so alone, so confused? How have we let our children become so desperate? Does anyone really believe that we are not collectively responsible for this girl, for what we have allowed to become of our youth? Of course were not responsible. We never are. It’s someone else’s problem, right? Not yours or mine. Amanda is not your child, just another sad story, another statistic. If you believe that, your wrong, were all wrong. She is our child, she is your child, she could be anyone of our children. The idea that we can dismiss her or more importantly the problems she faced is a pure copout.


73 sheets of paper is the sum of a Childs life. Of Amada Todd’s life. Everyday we get further and further from our children and their reality. We run around justifying how we raise or don’t raise our children. We have no idea who they are anymore because we are to worried about who, we are. In many parents mind raising children is a burden not a gift. It is a job not a privilege. We should all be ashamed of ourselves. I am ashamed of myself. I have often failed as a perfect parenting model. In essence no one is perfect, no parent is perfect, it is hard, most of the time we struggle and fail in the most basic areas of child raising. Most of us, most parents, legitimately try. There are however far too many parents who just don’t care or won’t care. Those parents lives are filled with challenges, “They” have to face, no time to focus on the children. No time to understand the society they are living in, the reality they live with everyday. No time to deal with their needs, we are to busy looking after our own wants, needs and desires to bother with them. We need two cars, a couple of vacations every year down south, big houses, careers. We need things. Who has time for the children? They’ll do just fine! Check your e-mail, there not doing ok! Do you need someone to send you a text message to get that!

The technology that surrounds us and consumes us also privileges our children to an environment most of us could never have imagined or dreamed of. We love our PC’s and our tablets and our smart phones. We can’t put them down, or step away from them to see what is actually going on. We can’t survive without Facebook, Twitter, instant messaging, texting. We have hypnotized ourselves into believing that they are all good for us. More importantly they are all good for our children. We are impotent to help our children live through the reality of the technology and the impact it can have and is having on their lives. We don’t know how to help them face the ugly side of it because we can’t even see it ourselves. 73 sheets because Amanda flashed someone during some fun with friends on a Web cam. It turned into her legacy, her life and ultimately her death. As a parent can you get your head wrapped around that reality. Probably not! Because back In 1980, or 85 or 90 when you were Amanda’s age if you flashed some friends it was probably in a kid’s basement sitting around in a circle with an empty coke bottle. No cameras, no smart phone, no instant upload to Facebook or Twitter. No texting in real time the events to everyone you knew. No it was just the few friends who saw it and went on to deal with it. Oh yes there was the talk in school about the girl who during “spin the bottle” flashed her boobs, but it stopped there, it didn’t become the Childs legacy. It didn’t become a tool for poorly brought up children or even adults to torment her with it, to drive her to 73 sheets. It was what it was, children growing, experimenting and learning. Not 73 sheets.

73 sheets later, the authorities will investigate, the talking heads in government and the media will speak up about the travesty of it all, about the need to improve the system, to fix it. The even more impotent school administrators will tell us how the system is working and how they are doing such a great job. Everyone will take notice for 15 minutes and then go back to doing what we all do best, NOTHING! You see my friends, one girl is not going to change our self centered quest for continued improvement of our own lives. No sir. We’ll continue to drop off the kids at day care, let them consume indigestible amounts of violence in movies and on TV, will park them in front of the video games where they can blow each other to pieces just so we can take care of that, Oh so, “important issue”, whatever it might be. Because you see our kids are not what is important anymore, they are simply an extension of us, they are a reflection of us. We as adults are no more empowered then our own parents were to understand the challenges of growing up. In a modern society where we boast of our advancements and successes we have forgot to ask the children how to help them fix the challenges they face. We have become dilusional about our ability to fix everything. We fix very little, we simply pass over it. Einstein once said, '' one day I fear our technology will surpass our humanity''. Well guess what; we are getting mighty close. Understand this though, its not the technology that is the problem its our blindness to manage it in the daily lives of our children.

Our children have become what we are. Pieces of paper, with very little written on them. Amanda Todd’s 73 sheets say more about us as Parents then we could ever write on our own 73 sheets. That my parent friends is sad, very sad. Amanda I am sorry we failed you.

Rob