I was recently disturbed to see an excerpt from the Maury show where a 7 year old boy was bragging about smoking, drinking and swearing.

Seven years old, people! Gee, do you think the video games, movies, TV shows and adult behavior has contributed to this 7-year-old lifestyle?

Almost if not every day we hear about school shootings, murders, drugs and in general poor role modeling on the part of adults. How could we not think these negative messages are not filtering down to our children?

Our children are not born smoking drinking and swearing. I am mindful of a parent who once complained to me her child was using “bad” words. She tried to blame the daycare center children but here is the thing in the end she said, “I don’t know where in the hell he got this from.”

No amount of legislation, emails, editorials or news articles are going to change what our children are being taught by adults.

When is the last time you sat down with a child and just talked about life, life without violence, drinking, smoking or swearing?

And when is the last time you examined how you interact with children, what kind of role modeling are you demonstrating in your life?

Childhood has such a short window and yet what happens to a child is what they bring to their adulthood.

Think about what it is you could do each day to save a child. We see the commercials about feeding children and of course this is important. But what about saving children from a life of crime?

Remember each effort we make to save a child can make this world a better place.

As Americans we spend more money on jails, police and drug prevention than we do on early child development and education from kindergarten to 12th grade.

Sue Williams lives in Kelseyville, Calif.