IT'S THE PARENTS, NOT THEIR CHILDREN, WHO ARE OUT OF CONTROL

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MIKE MALES IN NY TIMES - A spate of news reports have breathlessly
announced that science can explain why adults have such trouble dealing
with teenagers: adolescents possess "immature," "undeveloped" brains
that drive them to risky, obnoxious, parent-vexing behaviors. The latest
example is a study out of Temple University that found that the
"temporal gap between puberty, which impels adolescents toward thrill
seeking, and the slow maturation of the cognitive-control system, which
regulates these impulses, makes adolescence a time of heightened
vulnerability for risky behavior."

We know the rest of the script: Commentators brand teenagers as stupid,
crazy, reckless, immature, irrational and even alien, then advocate
tough curbs on youthful freedoms. . .

Why do many pundits and policy makers rush to denigrate adolescents as
brainless? One troubling possibility: youths are being maligned to draw
attention from the reality that it's actually middle-aged adults - the
parents -whose behavior has worsened.

Our most reliable measures show Americans ages 35 to 54 are suffering
ballooning crises:

- 18,249 deaths from overdoses of illicit drugs in 2004, up 550 percent
per capita since 1975, according to data from the National Center for
Health Statistics.

- 46,925 fatal accidents and suicides in 2004, leaving today's
middle-agers 30 percent more at risk for such deaths than people aged 15
to 19, according to the national center.

- More than four million arrests in 2005, including one million for
violent crimes, 500,000 for drugs and 650,000 for drinking-related
offenses, according to the F.B.I. All told, this represented a 200
percent leap per capita in major index felonies since 1975.

- 630,000 middle-agers in prison in 2005, up 600 percent since 1977,
according to the Bureau of Justice Statistics.

- 21 million binge drinkers (those downing five or more drinks on one
occasion in the previous month), double the number among teenagers and
college students combined, according to the government's National
Household Survey on Drug Use and Health.

- 370,000 people treated in hospital emergency rooms for abusing illegal
drugs in 2005, with overdose rates for heroin, cocaine, pharmaceuticals
and drugs mixed with alcohol far higher than among teenagers.

- More than half of all new H.I.V./AIDS diagnoses in 2005 were given to
middle-aged Americans, up from less than one-third a decade ago,
according to the Centers for Disease Control. . .

It's true that 30 years ago, the riskiest age group for violent death
was 15 to 24. But those same boomers continue to suffer high rates of
addiction and other ills throughout middle age, while later generations
of teenagers are better behaved. Today, the age group most at risk for
violent death is 40 to 49, including illegal-drug death rates five times
higher than for teenagers.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/09/17/opinion/17males.html?ei=5090&en=
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