Growing Pains

I have had dreams. Dreams of the Children's Dystopia.
This isn't a society in which things are really sad for children, mind you.
As it stands now I would say that children have things going pretty well for them.
And that will only exacerbate itself.
No way I'm using that word properly. Exacerbate? Anyone know what that means?
Where's our dictionary guy? Did we hire one of those yet?
Anyway.
I'm talking about a society in which children rule everything.
There have certainly been science fiction books and films on this very topic, but I don't know any of their titles.
Besides, fiction is all well and good, but it'll seem much more real when 14-year-old cops are shaking you down for chocolate bars and loose change.
It's going to happen, man.
Kids are fucking running this place.
And, of course, there can only be one reason why this is the case:
We're letting them.
There are no parents. Everyone's trying to be their child's friend.
I've hinted at this several times, but it's gone too far. Hinting is a waste of time.
I have to get the message out.
Kids have already fucked the education system.
That's a branch of government. They've overthrown it and now control it.
If you will, a demonstration:

Little Asshole Tina: [throwing her bookbag where she pleases] I hate Mr. Person!
He expects us to write down our homework and then do it!
Asshole Tina Senior: Well, you have to put up with Mr. Person because he has tenure.
Little Asshole Tina: Isn't there any way to get a new teacher?
Asshole Tina Senior: No my little angel, I'm afraid not. Unless, of course, he sexually harassed you.
Little Asshole Tina: [brightening] Well, he rubs my back funny when he shows me math stuff.
He also runs his hand along my thigh sometimes.
Asshole Tina Senior: Oh yeah? We'll see about that!

A year later, Mr. Person has a job shoveling up dead seagulls at the dump.
They don't even do homework any more.
Homework has been taken out of schools because (wait for it) the kids won't do it.
In a school system where kids run everything, what do you suppose their first rule would be?
"No More Homework."
Check.
Sure, if the kids ran everything, they'd have sodas in the vending machines instead of bamboo shoots, but they'll rememedy that when they have tenure.
This is all coming about because of this asshole kid I saw on Sunday.
He was this little heffer who sort of reminded me of that fat kid in all the movies.
Fewer freckles, but that same sort of confidence, y'know?
This fat kid confidence that you can't figure out, so you just take it as being endearing.
As I'm walking by, I (make a point to) hold eye contact with this kid.
He holds my stare without a flinch.
I look away for a second and look back, and his gaze is waiting for me.
Undaunted.
I can drive. I can buy beer. I had been doing drugs recently.
I'm an adult (as far as he can tell, anyway).
None of this phases him.
I look away, and once more I look back, over my shoulder this time.
He's looking me dead in the pupil, and he lazily licks an ice cream he's holding while he does it.
It was fucking weird. It was legitimately unsettling.
Kids have no respect for adults now, which means they have no fear, which means we have no control.
Why don't they respect us?
Well, I would think, and I'm actually quoting Ferris Beuller here, that it's because "you can't respect someone who's kissing your ass."
In Stalinist Russia, children ratted out adult neighbors for crimes uncommitted, and those adults were sent to the gulags.
That's a labour camp.
Worked to death. Literally.
All on the whim of someone who doesn't realize that you should never take a radio into a swimming pool.
Stalin's kids sent adults to death because someone allowed them to.
You think Ice Cream cone would have any trouble sending one of us to the slaughter?
I don't think so.
I've had dreams, y'know.
I say we put them all on harnesses and keep them there til they learn to say 'please'. 

edit: I don't have enough battery to proof-read this right now.