A few days
back, I saw an online video highlighting some of the problems the millennial generation
has and unfortunately the video failed to highlight the deadliest problem,
HIV/AIDS.
If the HIV
prevalence among teenagers’ statistics is anything to go by, Kenya has a
looming disaster that MUST be dealt with as soon as yesterday. A few months
back there was talk about introducing sex education to schools, but as expected
education stakeholders couldn’t agree on the best implementation strategy.
Reason being, most Kenyans tend to go into panic-mode when faced with any
situation that could either change the status quo, contradict our ‘culture and traditions’
or basically if they have no idea how to address the problem. In the African
culture, it has for years been termed as taboo to address or talk about sex
issues near children. The problem though is, the ‘children’ in this case have
long ‘grown up’ and know things most of us were clueless about at their age.
Over the
past couple of months the media has highlighted several stories of teenagers
booking hotel rooms, hiring buses and organizing private parties, to engage in activities
they have no business engaging in, including orgies and drugs. Data from
various counties especially Bungoma and several other counties have indicated a
drastic increase in teenage pregnancies.
If you marry
the HIV prevalence statistics, frequency of teenagers being found in
compromising situations and teenage pregnancies prevalence; it’s obvious the
problem is way deeper than a bunch or rebelling teenagers.
What baffles
me most is the fact that parents, religious leaders, politicians and education
stakeholders don’t realize there are deeper issues in this country than who is
heading IEBC or who will be president next year. We have a completely clueless,
confused, misinformed and misguided generation. What’s worse is the fact that
the generation the teenagers should be looking up to, the 25-40 year olds are more
lost than the teenagers themselves.
The question
is; what is the real problem and what’s the solution? I honestly don’t have a
clear answer to that question, reason being; only the teenagers themselves can
answer it. All I have is what I think contributes to the problems teenagers are
facing.
First and
foremost, who and where are the parents to these teenagers? A dysfunctional
family unit coupled up with a drastic increase in the cost of living and
individuals’ desire to live a better life have led to parents spending most of
their time away from home, hence the teenagers being left under the guidance
and parenting of the caretakers/house managers, the internet and fellow peers
in the same situation. Is this however enough reason for parents not to be
actively involved in their children’s day-to-day activities? Most parents nowadays
tend to equate providing their children with material items to good parenting.
This could not be further from the truth though. Taking a child to the best
schools, buying them the best gadgets, buying them cars at 18 years and living
in the best estates has nothing to do with good parenting. In fact, this might
be a major contributor to their problem. I would rather have a mentally healthy
and hard-working child living a middle-class life, than a self-entitled ‘rich’ brat.
Now, don’t get me wrong, I’m not an
advocate of mediocrity. In fact, I believe we should all be able to work hard
towards achieving the best and highest attainable quality of life. Striking the
balance between work and family seem to be a huge challenge to most of us.
Research done
in the recent past showed that most teenagers had their first sexual encounter
before their 15th birthday! Shocking right? This would be considered
‘normal’ in the western culture, but not in the African context, but we do know
by now that it indeed is the ugly reality.
A further
analysis of the situation according to age groups further indicates the depth
of the problem. Gone are the days when 5 year olds played with Barbie dolls, car
toys and mud. In the current generation;
5-18 year
olds who should be studying hard, discovering their talent, playing
age-appropriate games among other activities; are now playing aggressive video
games and watching pornography videos and images online.
18-24 year
olds who should ideally be attending campus in order to shape careers, going
out for friendly coffee dates and/or walks in the park, and discovering who
they really are as individuals; are instead busy having pre-marital affairs,
dating and having unplanned pregnancies and children with men and/or women in
the 25-35 year category who are just as lost and misguided as their younger
counterparts and worse still dating older married men and/or women (sponsors)
for easy money, instead of building careers and implementing God-given talents.
Well, with socialites and near-naked musicians for role models, I’m not
surprised.
I have seen
18-24 year olds getting married and starting families and it baffles me because
any psychologist will tell you that infatuation is very often mistaken for love
in that age group. I however do understand why that particular scenario exists.
A teenager who is exposed to pornographic material, near-nude/explicit music
videos at as young as 13 years or younger are more likely than not to engage in
what they see on TV or internet. This means teenagers having sex way before
their 18th birthday and having kids, while still kids.
Unfortunately
sex and drugs are in the modern society taken as part of ‘societal norm’, and
as teenagers engage in all the escapades mentioned above, there are so many
avenues of contracting HIV.
So, if
teenagers are engaging in sex while as young as 13 years isn’t it time we dealt
with the issue head-on and actually introduced not only sex education in theory
but also contraceptive education and demonstrations on contraceptive use in
schools? Secondly to the ‘morality cops’ and religious groups, isn’t it time to
re-strategize? Clearly, the old ‘waiting till marriage’ slogan isn’t working any
more, at least not on the majority of teenagers and youth.
Having said
that, what’s the best way forward? I think the ONLY persons with that answer
are the teenagers themselves, because unless we fully understand their side of
the story, we can’t draw a clear way forward.
The immune system’s role is to protect against disease and
fight disease. The system accomplishes this
by generating internal inflammation to get rid of any infection and prevent
onset of disease. The immune system can however
go haywire, mistakenly attacking the joints with uncontrolled inflammation,
potentially causing erosion and damage to internal organs, eyes and other parts
of the body. The body’s attack on itself is referred to as autoimmunity.
