By
Adam Pugh
Arizona Daily Wildcat
Kids today are either way too curious - or, as some would have you believe, too stupid - to recognize that by participating in certain activities, they can be seriously injured. Whether setting yourself on fire, or trying to jump over a car going 40 mph, kids should know better.
But 15-year-old Jose Serrano and his friends obviously did not when they decided to tie a grease-soaked rag around his pant leg and then set it on fire. Instead of quickly going out, the fire spread to his pants and severely burned Serrano.
Then there was 12-year-old Jason Lind who participated in a stunt with the same outcome - his friend purposefully set him on fire.
And what, you might ask, was the point of this? Well I can't think of a good reason, so let's see what Lind's lawyer, Michael Magistrali, had to say.
"The short answer is, he's (Lind) not old enough to know better," Magistrali said.
He also alluded to scientific studies that, he said, have found young teens often lack the ability to make informed decisions.
Wait, did he just say this boy was not old enough to know better? Give me a break! And to reference a study that says teens lack the ability to make informed decisions is a slap in the face to every kid in America. People should be angry that this kid's lawyer is essentially saying he is a complete moron because he is not the right age.
So when is a child old enough to know better? When parents teach them to.
I don't know about you, but if by the time you reach 12 - and especially 15 - you don't know that fire is dangerous and destructive, then someone obviously did not give you correct information. Don't blame television; the guys in "Jackass" were doing this stuff before it was picked up by MTV. Kids are going to do crazy stuff whether it is on television or not.
Last week, another group of young men decided to submit a tape to the show in which one boy would jump over a moving car. You can guess what happened - or you could tune into any news program, which have replayed the incident repeatedly during their broadcasts. The boy was severely injured, and the kids driving the car were arrested. Of course the blame went to none other than "Jackass."
This incident, with the same result of injury, is no different from the others. The boys - instead of imitating a stunt - wanted to do something original to submit to the show. But if the boys were such big fans of the show, I don't know how they could have missed the warnings and notices that MTV will not even open submissions sent to them.
Since the first incident, MTV responded by moving "Jackass" to a later slot and released a statement of regret for the incidents.
"Obviously we feel horrible when a young person does something to hurt themselves. Like other programmers, we take great care to air our shows responsibly. 'Jackass' airs with a TV-MA rating, with written and verbal warnings throughout the show, clearly stating that the stunts should not be imitated," a spokesperson from MTV said.
In each occurrence, the friends helping to perform the stunts were arrested for reckless endangerment or a similar charge. So, we punish the kids that are involved in the stunt, but not the kids that also participate and are hurt. That is something that I just cannot understand.
If viewers continually tune in to shows of this nature, which replay their warnings after each commercial break - and if adults and kids don't listen to the warnings and hurt themselves - it becomes harder to distinguish who truly is the jackass.
