The culture war at home: How modern trends leave kids vulnerable

By John DiGirolamo | Guest Commentary, Rocky Mountain Voice

Modern culture directly affects our society. This is not your parent’s Yoplait yogurt. The current culture’s influence is stronger than ever and is constantly evolving. Ask a typical high school student what they want to be when they grow up, and you won’t hear answers of doctor, lawyer or accountant. They dream of being an influencer. But they’ve already been influenced themselves.

The Influence of Modern Culture

The culture and its sphere of influence include several facets. Changing societal norms benefit predators. Vulnerable kids and teens correlate with an increased risk of manipulation and exploitation. Specific examples are summarized below:

1. Unstable home life: Unsupervised children have a higher tendency to spend time online and may seek a parental type of relationship from a stranger. A strong parent-child bond is a good start but doesn’t guarantee your child won’t be tricked by an online predator. Single parenting and broken families have always been difficult for teens, but in today’s modern world they may seek refuge from chatbots, AI relationships or worse, active Internet predators.
2. Drug Use: Whether it’s the parent or teenager, drug and alcohol abuse will only increase the child’s vulnerability and potential for exploitation. An adult cannot effectively be a parent if he\she is addicted, and an intoxicated teen will not make smart decisions, putting their safety in jeopardy. 
3. Technology: The Internet allows anyone to contact a child, thus making it easier to find victims. Many teens correlate their self-esteem with the number of friends\followers they have on social media. Thus, teens routinely accept a new online connection without knowing who the other person is. A typical suburban teen will have thousands of people in their social network. Not all friends are friendly.
4. Pornography: The average age of viewing explicit images is now about 10 years old. This significantly influences a young person’s brain and normalizes the viewing and creating of such content. It also negatively affects their outlook on relationships and marriage and feeds a hookup culture that diminishes genuine love and intimacy. 
5. Sexualization: Whether it’s viewing pornography at an early age, or a celebrity-obsessed society, kids and teens are bombarded with sexual messages. Age-appropriate clothing is difficult to find, especially for girls, and many schools are flooded with a sex education curriculum that pushes sexual exploration and normalizes sexual experimentation. A child’s time of innocence is becoming shorter than ever. 
6. Traditional Values: Modern society, politicians and celebrities regularly mock Christian, patriotic and nuclear family values. When values can be self-defined, nothing is right or wrong, thus making children and teens more vulnerable to exploitation.
7. Pandemic: When kids were sent home during the COVID-19 pandemic, it only increased their time spent online. Social interaction with real people was replaced with online relationships, which benefited the predators. 
8. Erosion of Church Participation: When fewer people go to church or believe in God, we see a rise of occultism and new age “religions” that put people at the center, rather than God. Many forms of Christianity are watered down and focus more on self-love instead of biblical values and traditions. God and religion have been taken out of the public square, Hollywood and our schools. God, traditional values and moral principles have been canceled by society. When kids (and adults) don’t have a moral foundation, it only follows that negative consequences will occur. Wherever God is removed, something nefarious will take its place.

John DiGirolamo is a speaker and critically acclaimed Christian author of four books, featuring stories of police officers, spiritual warfare, human trafficking advocates and survivors and a pro-life doctor. His third book, It’s Not About the Predator: A Parent’s Guide to Internet & Social Media Safety, is a practical 65-page booklet to help parents keep their kids safe online. The book details the predator’s playbook, grooming tactics, and specific proactive actions for parents. John is the Board President of Bringing our Valley Hope, whose objective is to end human trafficking in central Colorado through education and survivor support. He’s also on the parent’s council of Defend Young Minds, a nonprofit that equips parents to defend their children from the harm of pornography. John is a member of the Chaffee County Patriots, and his books sell on Amazon. More information can be found: https://itisnotabout.com/

Editor’s note: Opinions expressed in commentary pieces are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of the management of the Rocky Mountain Voice, but even so we support the constitutional right of the author to express those opinions.