Who Is To Blame?

  It is generally expected of parents to guide their children in the right path, but reverse has become the case. In our society today, we see parents who aid their kids in accomplishing very unsavoury acts. We see parents that don’t frown at drugs, smoking and all forms of illicit habits, just as we see parents who infuse good morals and conducts in their kids. There’s a boy I used to know, he was 14 years old and still in junior secondary school. He always looked so ‘responsible’ but beyond the facade was another character. I was inside my apartment one quiet afternoon when I heard a loud noise coming from people outside my house; a boy had been caught stealing. When I came out to see who the thief was, I was so surprised to discover that it was no other person than this boy I knew. There and then, he was apprehended for stealing.  Before that incident, I once heard his father asking the boy to borrow him a sum of 2,000 Naira. For God’s sake, where on earth did the father expect the boy to get such amount of money what he wasn’t working yet?  Obviously, the father was instigating his son towards those negative acts, as he kept on encouraging the boy.            Back to the incident, though the father couldn’t say anything concerning the issue, a condition was given to them which they had to comply with. They took to heaping all the blame on the devil by saying: “It’s the devil’s  work”.              Do we have to always blame the devil for every mistake we make or for every negative actions we take? Who is to blame, really?

The boy was still in J.S.S 3 in a private school then but after his Junior WAEC, he switched schools. He frequently went to school on mufti, but suddenly he stopped attending school altogether, and at last he never came home again. What do we call that? Who do we blame? What is the root of issues like this? Can we say it’s lack of money? No, I don’t think so. Or could it be the decision of the boy himself? What role do you think the father played or could have played in the life of the boy?. What role do you think the boy could have played in crafting out a better future and life for himself?

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We really don’t have to blame society for everything that has gone wrong, because if truly society controls you, then society should tell you when to sleep, eat, bathe and all. We are the architects of our destinies. The decisions lie in our palms, let’s plan our lives in ways that know will suit us positively not just now, but in years to come. Failure to do so will eventually reveal that we are to blame. After all, WE are constituents of the society.

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