Old enough to know better...

"...old enough to know better." 

Now there's a phrase I have a problem with. If all parents raised their children in exactly the same fashion and under the same conditions we might be able to say we all agree on a level of maturity such as "old enough to know better". But we don't. And levels of maturity vary greatly at all grade levels. (I can confirm this from experience watching k thru 5th grade children interact at recess) --- in fact there are too many children these days who don't get enough supervision or the opportunity at home to witness how to compassionately treat other people. Too many children witness adult frustration and anger, and sometimes terrifying examples of resignation, addiction and violence. In this way socialization skills and the quality of our overall togetherness is increasingly challenged today.

A child by the law may be expected to know better by say 16 or 18 but if they were given no firm guidelines nor given a proper social perspective, they will likely often cross behavioral boundaries, inflict damage upon others and property and in the course of events upon themselves as well; and this because of a fundamental lack of decent parental nurturing in the formative years of early childhood. 

This lack of a parent or decent supervision is not necessarily the fault solely of the parent. I believe for many it's the financial conditions that create a rift between the parent and child. This same rift is what becomes the prison pipeline later in life. It is a path towards self destruction that is not determined by teachers, school administrators or government who find themselves looking for solutions afterwards for what is more a symptom of what is wrong with our system which itself neglects to sustain a healthy workforce and their families. Too many families have become "externalities", and the institutional entities which purport to be educational and social services merely propagate and exacerbate the neglected students' circumstances by isolating them and thus perhaps sealing their "anti-social" fate. Finally, we may fairly say we are witnessing the birth a nihilistic generation... and a new dark age of feudalism...