I had to take my two granddaughters to meet up with their father for a doctor’s appointment this morning. The elder, 14, commandeered the radio, but couldn’t decide what she wanted to listen to. Not a big deal. So she decided to play her phone playlist. Big deal.

The first “song” kept repeating a phrase, but I couldn’t make it out. “It’s all about the face?” I asked no. “No,” she replied, “All about that bass” from the song of the same name by Meghan Trainor.

Next was some song I presumed was from the Twilight trilogy.  It had something in it about it not being “your time to die” but the bass, strings and drums overpowered most of the words, except for an intermittent F bomb loud and clear in the chorus. Taylor said it was A Little Piece of Heaven by Avenged Sevenfold. When I looked up those lyrics, the F bomb was the least problematic. And it had nothing to do with the Twilight trilogy.

Next was a song about depression, I think. Again, I couldn’t make out most of it, but after being told it was Last Resort by Papa Roach, I checked out the lyrics. Here’s a sampling “… Cut my life into pieces … I’ve reached my last resort … Suffocation, no breathing … Don’t give a fuck if I cut my arm, bleeding … Do you even care if I die bleeding? … Would it be wrong?, would it be right? … If I took my life tonight …”

This is the playlist of an average 14 year old. It’s scary.

Of course, music isn’t the only problem. Video games are getting more and more graphic with better and better graphics. Cartoons today just aren’t funny … just bizarre Take, for example, Adventure Time, which follows the adventures of Pen, a human boy, and his best friend Jake, a dog with magical powers to change shape and grow and shrink at will; or The Amazing World of Gumball, which revolves around the life of a young cat named Gumball Watterson and his frequent shenanigans in the fictional American city and school in Elmore, accompanied by his adoptive goldfish brother and best friend Darwin and with interaction with his intellectual younger sister Anais and stay-at-home father Richard, both rabbits, and workaholic mother Nicole; or Regular Show, which is anything but regular revolving around the lives of two friends, a blue jay named Mordecai and a raccoon named Rigby  — both employed as groundskeepers at a local park with surreal, extreme and often supernatural misadventures with other characters Benson, Pops, Muscle Man, Hi-Five Ghost, Skips, Thomas, Margaret and Eileen.

Our movie and television heroes are vampires, the walking dead and paranormal activity. Crime drama is a staple, each season pushing the envelope just a little bit more than the last. You can’t find a comedy without sexual innuendo. Entertainment is watching contestants outwit, outplay and outlast each other while scantily clothed in a variety of reality programming or watching other people make fools of themselves.

We were watching American Ninja Warriors the other night {not my choice} and at each obstacle my 11 year old grandson oohed at the competition and announced he could do that.

And we scratch our heads when they try … or live in depression … or act out on fantasies. With helmets and pads, it’s more trouble going out to bike ride or play than it is to watch the mindless drivel. We’re shown the snippets, but not the preparations. We’re guided by the mantra, “Don’t try this at home” yet try it they do.

My generation pushed the envelope at times as well. We had Tom and Jerry and The Three Stooges and Evel Kneivel and even Twilight Zone. Some of our songs were just as strange, like Louie, Louie, (I Can’t Get No) Satisfaction, A Whiter Shade of Pale and a host of dying songs like Tell Laura I Love Her, Dead Man’s Curve, Moody River, Ode to Billy Joe or Laurie (Strange Things Happen). But, I think, we were able to separate real life from art.

Let’s pray for today’s youth.

THOUGHT TO REMEMBER: The best things in life are worth waiting for, fighting for, believing in and just never letting go.