william jackson
Prom Is Not for Booty
Calls or Sexual Conquests
The facts cannot be denied or ignored about the importance
of parents talking to their children before the Prom.
As Proms dates come closer concern is taken in
clothing to shoes, hairstyle to perfume or cologne.
What type of transportation will be available?
If car rental agencies are checked now most would already
be booked well in advance of each schools respective
Prom date.
Proms traditionally are a high school event or rite of passage
from high school student to transitioning graduate. The
pressures of social marketability, notoriety, popularity
and economic visibility have created an atmosphere where
even juniors in high school, middle school students,
elementary school students and private/home school
students plan Proms.
The logistics alone border on levels of military planning
and execution. Parents plan months if not a year in advance
for hair appointments, makeup consultations, pre-evening,
evening and after Prom attire.
The list of chores and duties grows the closer the main event
gets to execution. Several items that many parents do not
address either out of fear, denial, ignorance or forgetting is
the discussion of sexual encounters during and after Prom.
When all the pageantry, partying and pimping/primping are
over what may transpire afterwards are Booty Calls, Drunkin
Parties and possible Sexual Encounters.
This may sound vulgar, contrite and harsh to some that read this,
but many parents spend several minutes or seconds warning,
joking or playfully dancing around the issues of sex after the Prom.
Parents must make sure their child(ren) and the others they are
traveling with, escorting and meeting with later understand the
ramifications of potential pregnancy, STD’s and other dangers
associated with unprotected and multi-partner sexual exchanges.
We live in a society where teens have sex, as Nikki Gionvanni
stated on her recent visit to EWC, “teens have sex, that’s what
they do. Parents have to wake up and be honest with the reality.”
Proms are ongoing now and parents should be talking to,
planning with and discussing potential drinking and driving,
sexual encounters and other potential dangers.
Parents should remember THEIR Proms and the events and
activities they took part in or were witnessed too and even some
travesties either loss of life, loss of limbs or undesired, unwanted
and unexpected pregnancies that stopped college entrance,
military service or travel plans and scholarships to higher education.
It takes more than parents saying, “they know better,” “if they do
it and I catch them they know I’ll be disappointed,” “they would
never do that.” Truer words have been spoken, but the results have
been devastating.
Parents remember your responsibility to teach, train and raise your
child or children, but also understand the dangers of peer pressure,
societal influences of alcohol, drug use and pressures to have sex.
This Prom season talk to your children and their friends before
Prom is knocking at your door. Before your child either male or
female is ready to step out the door is not the time to try and
have “the talk” or try to place condoms or other types of
protection in their hands or strategies in their heads. Conversations
should be honest, respectful, open and share a high level of expectation
for safety and maturity.
Senior Prom only comes once in a young person’s life, parents should
make sure all the memories are pleasant, happy and fun. No one should
have a devastating Prom that leaves them with lasting consequences
of frustration, pain, sorrow or unpleasant memories of their last year
in high school.
