Welcome back to campus! Did you have a good break? Me, I followed the usual holiday routine — shopping, eating, some family squabbles and watching socially sanctioned child pornography on television. What? Wait a minute! Back up the train. Did she just say what I think she said? Yes, you read it correctly. Believe me, I was just as taken aback as you are.

The weekend after Christmas, I was doing a little channel surfing when I came across cheerleading competitions. The girls on the screen were no longer teenagers decked out in their school colors. Instead, I found myself watching half-naked ten year olds prancing around the stage. It was a flurry of glitter, spandex and enough skin to make me wonder where their mothers were.

I am not as old-fashioned as you might think. I may not agree with someone else's taste in fashion or level of modesty, but c'est la vie. Under these circumstances, however, I found myself completely disgusted with what I was seeing — not just because it was indecent, but because it was downright sad.

We seem to talk out of both sides of our mouth when it comes to what's acceptable and what's unacceptable in our society. On any given day, I can find someone who tells me how horrible it is that we objectify women and hold up impossible female ideals in the media. I can also find someone who will tell me that women have every right to dress however they choose and express their sexuality just as much as men do.

That said, what happens when we are dealing with children or venturing into the wide horrific world of adolescence? Do these people need to be overly concerned with "expressing their sexuality"? I doubt it. They need to be kids. If you'll recall, that's hard enough without adults making them grown-ups before their time.

We shake our heads in sad disbelief over stories of first graders who think they are fat, little girls who decide to go on diets, teenagers who opt for plastic surgery, and young women with eating disorders. Certainly, it's sad, but it shouldn't surprise us.

Why do we break out lipstick, eyelash curlers and slinky outfits to doll up little girls for "beauty" pageants and then wonder why their values are wacked? Why do we have ten year olds gyrating in "cheerleading" costumes that show off every possible area of skin this side of modesty, flaunting themselves as though they had something to flaunt, and then wonder why they are so self-conscious? Why do we make it OK for them to be compared to their peers, made-up and paraded in front of an audience and then wonder why their self-esteems are wrecked? We are condoning and even encouraging the very behaviors that lead to consequences we don't like. Are we really too stupid to see the connections?

Before you get the idea that I think cheerleading is of the devil, let me just say that I am not against such events, per se. It is the manner in which they are handled and the expectations attached to them which I sometimes find disconcerting.

I fully realize that many girls and young women participate in cheerleading (dancing, pageants, insert your program of choice) of their own free will. They have every right to — especially if they are able to keep proper perspective on it. When it comes to children, however, adults need to take their obligations a bit more seriously.

Adults, who supposedly know better, have a responsibility to protect children — more than just holding their hands at crosswalks and reminding them not to talk to strangers. Children need safeguarding from many kinds of abuses. If you ask me, objectification and the imposition of warped societal expectations certainly qualify.

If we are going to continue to champion the causes of children, then we need to give serious thought to the ways we treat them. We can't say we are incensed by child pornography and then proceed to take ourselves right to the limit of tolerance and expect it to be okay. We can't run off at the mouth about helping girls achieve higher self-esteem and then actively participate in things that defeat that purpose. In short, we have to get some basic common sense.