I can certainly understand most of the perspectives in this post. I work with teenagers every day, and have a degree in education. One of the classes we took was human development. My professor was a cutting-edge researcher doing studies on brain growth and development. It takes the brain until about the age of 24 to mature entirely. The last parts to mature are the parts that are involved in forward-planning and risk taking, and right up through the late teens, certain glands are working overtime producing hormones that contribute to the "invincible" feeling that we can all likely remember from the teen years.
I've said my piece to David in the past. He knows how I feel. Others are concerned about the welfare of his animals. I can understand this.
What concerns me the most about teens acrueing large collections of animals (or anything else that can "weigh them down," including an expensive car) is that it limits their future life experience. I also know that it's easy as a teen to scoff at us "old folks" and say "I have a plan," "I know I am going to college in state and local," because when you are 14...15...16...17.... you know EVERYTHING. All the adults around you are morons who not only know nothing, but cannot understand at all how you feel.
Yup.
We are up to 40 snakes now. I don't see vacations being a possibility in the near future. We'd need to hire a pet sitter to watch our crew, and that would be pricey. I don't trust anyone in my family to do it, even my sister who loves snakes... and even if I did, it's really not right to dump my hobby on her and go have fun. Having a lot of animals involves a tremendous amount of sacrifice on the part of the person involved. It is easy to decide that the sacrifice is worth it when you're acquiring new specimens, and they are pretty to look at and fun to hold... but it's harder when you start to have to pass on things because of your hobby.
Like the idea of spending a semester abroad in Australia??
Too many pets for that. Someone will need to care for them...
Want to take that partial scholarship to the out of state school that provides exactly the major you want?
Sorry... you have to live on campus as a freshman, and no pets are allowed.
Not to mention the fact that an acquired collection can make it impossible for you to move around.
You could have the very best job offer ever, post-graduation, and not be able to take it because the state it is in bans one or more of your pets. So then you are stuck having to choose... do I take the job of my dreams, or keep this animal I have grown to love?
These are difficult decisions that are not easy to make. Even now I sometimes wonder about the decisions I have made... but at least I am settled in a home and a very stable job, without any great desires to travel much farther than the in-laws farm in Virginia. I accept the consequences of my actions.
But seeing as how it is in the nature of a teenager to push the envelope constantly, and to take risks and do things without thought for the future... it is their parents responsibility to "know when to say when," and to look out for what is in their best interests one... two... or five years from now. It is not our job, nor the job of society as a whole, to parent other peoples children.
The decisions that the young people on here make are the responsibilities of themselves and their parents.
No one else.
