Osama, who? Ask clueless teenagers - Hindustan Times

Osama, who? Ask clueless teenagers - Hindustan Times

My daughter was four years old when 9/11 happened. She kind of remembers me watching TV for hours trying to make sense of it all. She kind of remembers seeing a big plane crashing into tall buildings in New York. But while she may remember those things and we have talked about them over the years, I do not think that something that we talked about who was who was responsible for doing it. It does not surprise me these facts:

According to Yahoo!, 40% of searches on Sunday for 'who killed Osama bin laden' were from people aged 13-20.

But teenagers aged 13-17 made up 66% of searches for the question 'who is Osama bin Laden?'

Why would't this be the truth. We teach our children all sorts of things, but then do not teach them about others. And then call them clueless when they do not know about something? I can understand the questions they asked desperately, flooding internet, confused and clueless as they were about the man who ran the world's largest terrorist network and whose manhunt of 10 years had finally culminated in his killing in a Pakistani city, the Daily Mail reported.

Scores more turned to Twitter to pose the question and get the answer, before they were quickly embarrassed by other users for their lack of knowledge.

One youngster wrote: 'Who is Osama Bin Laden and why should I care?'. Another asked: 'Is he famous?'

A young Twitter user wrote: 'Who is Osama? And why is it so good he died?'. Another poster referred to the terrorist leader as 'Ben' Laden.

What bothers me is that they did not ask their parents. We as a culture have grown cold to what our kids need and let them surf the web for answers. And then we wonder why they are messed up.

When I get time to visit with my kids tonight, I think I have to ask them if they understand exactly what happened Sunday night, and why they should care.