I was visiting with Maria Cahoon last week after the article came out about the party at her house and what the kids did to it. She filled us in on details and it was unbelievable to me how those kids acted. I know everyone feels the same way, but I don’t understand why more parents aren’t making their children do restitution than the handful that have. I don’t say this for Maria, because she’s incredibly forgiving and sat there telling us she was just so happy that no one was hurt.

Listening to Maria I was reminded of a book I read by Scott Peck, author of “The Road Less Traveled.” He wrote another one called “People of the Lie” that was a study of what makes a person truly evil. One chapter explored what he termed “group evil,” the kind of thing that happened in Vietnam when some of our wonderful young men were sent over there to fight and ended up raping women and killing children and wiping out whole villages that they were never ordered to do. When asked why they behaved that way, when it all came out it was because none of them ever thought they would get caught. No one was responsible, so they all acted like animals.

If your kid was at Maria’s that night, even if they weren’t the ones tossing melons into her Jacuzzi or throwing eggs on her walls, they are guilty by association. If you don’t hold your kids responsible just standing there passively and not saying anything, you might as well have been trashing her house yourself. If you let your children get away with this your child can just adopt the same mentality as the guy who was just driving the get-away car, but didn’t kill the liquor store owner. If the driver gets caught, he feels it isn’t fair because he didn’t pull the trigger, but it doesn’t matter. That person is guilty just being around people that would pull the trigger.

When your kid is making a field goal or performing in a school play, you are right there on the field or stage with them. That’s you down there because of all the money and time you put into them to help them have all those opportunities. It’s the same when they are disrespecting someone’s property. That’s you jumping on Maria’s couch and cussing out the neighbors when they come by to help. I know it’s hard because we can’t always control what our kids do, but that’s you.

Lorraine Williams