stop wasting your time on this bozo! its obvious he's just trying to get a riseo out of us. unfortunatley, many of you are playing into it. stop wasting your words!

angelofcloud9- OMG!!! that thing about the boy's teeth is NASTY!!! THAT IS WRONG!!!

And yes... kids need help to learn what's right or wrong... but not people to DO everything that the kids need to do!!!

Kids are the future of our country. They are the ones that will later have to make some decision to help others. If we help kids hopefully they'll return the favor.

I totally agree with what others have said about kids needing help. No matter how old a person is they will always need help. Actually, as human beings in general we need mental help. Even though when we reach a mature age we could differentiate what is right and what is wrong we still need help. What I think is right could be wrong for someone else. Now if mature individuals need help, children need serious help. Children cannot be independent because they need some source that will help them learn how to behave in the real world. Children who are left alone are more likely to commit acts that harm other individuals. If the child grows and all that child does is watch tv, what will come about that child when they're on their own. There's a lot of violence in tv's, which will influence the child, therefore they will want to do what they see because they haven't received help.

I disagree with that statement, it doesn't matter how old you are, or what you may be going through no matter what there will always be a point in your life when your going to need help... especially young children, if they didn't need any help, then honestly i don't think they would be called young children....

Ya know young children can't defend themselves and they need people to stand up for them sometimes you can't say that a child that has been abused or sexually abused can defend themselves against an adult and you can't say that giving them counseling after something like that doesn't help them. In some cases children can be suicidal after that and getting them help is crucial. I have little nephew and I would want him to have all the help he can get if he ever needed it so, I am completely outraged that you would be so ignorant as to say something like that.

You're talking out if your @$$. Shut up.

ok i am 14 years old. you have no idea what we need!!! you sre utterly stupid and should shut up before someone else does. i have been hurting myself since 7th grade and i am a freshman in highschool now. everyday i think about suicde and wonder if my mom helped me more, yelled less, never once hit me how would i be now. so never never say that kids need to learn for themselves. i was left to learn for myself and look how i turned out. what kids need is a good balance between friend who lets us make our own mistakes, and parent who help us fix those mistakes and doesn't anger easily, and is non judgemental, and someone who doesn't try to control our lives unless we do something really awful such as getting arrested or pregnet.

You have got to be kidding me, is this a joke? How could you possibly say that they need to learn from theirselves?. Kids need to learn from parents, freinds and everyone and anyone. I don't think you could say that if a kid dies becase he got beat up or harrased or shot, or something like that, because it's happend before to plenty of kids. Why do you think kids comit suicide? Some times the reason is because kids are afraid of other people, and they think the only answer to their problems is to kill themselves. Helping kids can make them better people now, and when they grow up. It makes them stronger, and braver. I know everything I just said probably meens nothing to you, but it's true.

-Madison

Children all over the world need our help. It is not their fault if they were abandoned or orphaned by a serious diease like AIDS. If the child is starving there is nothing that they can do. Children need our help. That way they can become stronger through us and still know how to defend themself.

well yes, kids do need to make their own decisions, but if noone helps them, it may push them to thinking that noone cares about them! kids need help, even if its a pat on the back or saying good job. it boosts their confidence so they feel better and thinks that someone cares about them.

I thought that everyone here at Youthnoise was going to be a person who wants to make a positive impact on the world and is a caring person, but obviously I was wrong. Some of you are saying that kids will become sissies or weak if they are mentored. That's ridiculous. Mentoring means helping a kid learn, not doing their work for them. These kids don't know any better when they do something bad, or if they do know better, it may be their only option. I watched a show on PBS about needy children in my area, and the kids' situations broke my heart. An elementary school principal told about discovering young children--as young as 7 or 8--drinking beer on the playground. If these kids had someone to love them and to tell them that beer isn't good for you and makes you lose control, they might be drinking water (or juice, if they can afford it, which is doubtful). Does it make a kid a sissy if their parents or their mentor tells them how alcohol makes you lose control and isn't good for young bodies, which hopefully will make the kids decide that drinking alcohol isn't right for them, at least at this time in their life. These kids have nobody who cares about them, or who cares enough to swallow their pride and ask for help; the same principal told us how one day, a kindergarten teacher came into his office with tears in her eyes, and asked him to come with her to her classroom. When they got there, the principal saw a boy rocking back and forth, crying a little, with his hands on his cheeks. The teacher gently asked the boy to open his mouth, and to the principal's shock, the boy's mouth was filled with black, decaying teeth. His mouth hurt so badly that he couldn't even eat well. His mom would put cigarettes on his teeth because the nicotine dulled the pain. Can you imagine? His parents use their money to support their nicotine addiction instead of buying their kids a toothbrush and toothpaste. If their parents and family don't care for them or give them the information they need to have to get ahead in life, how WILL they get ahead and become good, upstanding mothers and fathers and friends and citizens? These kids need guidance on how they can make it out of their drug-ridden, gang-filled neighborhoods; they need someone to believe in them, to encourage their desire to be a doctor or an actress or whatnot; to care about them so they don't feel that they are worthless. How can you say that kids who are mentored become sissies? Mentors don't go and beat the bullies up for the kids or anything; mentors help the kids decide what they can do to stop the bully from hurting them or others. So shut up until you consider how society is going to fall apart with people like you not caring about other people, or being so worried that a kid will become a "sissy" that you don't help them at all. These same "sissies", without the mentoring that supposedly makes them sissies, could be the gang member whose bullet catches your best friend in its crossfire; it could be the burglar who robs your house; it could be the rapist who rapes you or your little sister or girlfriend; it could be the murderer who kills for fun. If that happens, you'll be thinking, "What if I had tried to make a difference in their lives? My best friend wouldn't be dead right now," or whatever tragedy has been caused by people like you being indifferent. Think about it.

this guy is a genious where does this guy come from hes so funny

I was reading another article on YouthNOISE about a 12 year old girl who instead of having a huge celebration for her Bat Mitzvah, decided to build a playground with her friends and family. I wasn't clever enough to do something to help others instead of myself for my own Bat Mitzvah, but there were two boys in my school who did. One of my friends, instead of receiving gifts the morning of his service in synagogue, asked(on his invitation) for a donation in canned foods to his synagogue's food pantry, for those less fortunate. Also, for another guy's celebration, he chose to get his friends together and paint 5 murals for a library uptown for underpriveleged children. I went to this celebration. It was really fun, and it made everyone there feel good, knowing they were giving back to the community.

Always,
Sydney

I have one thing to say to that: What the **** is wrong with you?! The reason kids today are screwed up is because parents WON'T help them, not because they SHOULDN'T!!!!!!!!!! You need to get some ****ing help. You don't deserve to have children!

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children need to be taught the right way...and they need to be taught by people who are more experienced then them...peers or otherwise.

the human mind at birth is just as powerful as it is when you are an "adult".

the only thing different is experience and mentorship.

we all need to make sure that kids understand what is out there so they dont screw themselves up figuring it out for themselves.

if u help a child too much they will be kinda "siisyish"

Im so sorry to burst your bubble stu but you have absolutelyNo Ideayou are just another one of those stuck up jocks that kids have to put up with. The adolesence is a very trialing time for all and without a little guidence from parents, friends or teachers teens will be lead astray and YOU ARE A PERFECT EXAPMLE!! Next time maybe you should ask for help when you want to post something so idiotic on the message boards. Its people like you that need more help than the rest of us.

I THINK KIDS NEED THEIR RECESS IT GIVES THEM TIME WITH THERE FRIENDS AND IT TAKES THEIR MINDS AWAY FROM ALL THE STRESS THEY HAVE TO GO TO.