Just in time for Valentine’s Day, ABC’s A Million Little Things gifts viewers with more agenda: Danny’s first date. With a boy.

From the very first episodes, viewers knew Danny’s character (Chance Hurstfield) is attracted to other boys.

This is something his TV mom, Delilah (Stephanie Szostak) is over the moon about. She drops her son off with his deceased father’s money clip and comments about how “cute” the boys look:

Delilah: Wait, what movie did you say you were gonna see?

Elliot: “Ghostbusters,” Mrs. Dixon.

Danny: I can’t believe you’ve never seen it. It’s only essential viewing.

Elliot: So you keep telling me.

Delilah: You guys are so cute together.

Elliot: So, uh, you’ll pick us up at 5:00 to take us to the movie?

All goes well until the “date” ends early. Why? Because Delilah “outed” the boys by saying they looked “cute together”. Apparently, this comment made Danny’s “date”, Elliot a bit uncomfortable. Hmm. You think?

Liberal outlets will continue to say any Conservative who comments on this is filled with hate and rage. So, I know that I have immediately been judged by the masses of “woke” that I am asleep at the wheel. Okay. Move on. Those of you who are still here? Great. Thanks for hearing me out. Personally, I am not filled with hate and rage because a television network chooses to promote an agenda. I’m not at all surprised by this in the least. It’s not shocking. I am more angry at the fact that our media sees it appropriate that 12 year-olds (gay or straight) have to “date”!

As a parent of a 13 year-old boy, I was surprised to learn how early this “dating” business starts. When I became privy to it, our son was in 5th grade. Boys were asking girls “out” at recess. I overheard a conversation about how one woman’s son got all caught up in this drama and was talking about him and his “girlfriend” (who he stole from another boy) as if this was something to be proud of. “You need to be kind to her and treat her nice”, she said to him. Where was the lesson of “you should honor your friend”?! You know, the one you stole the girlfriend from?

It’s not like middle-school romances are a new thing. I was never one for “dating” back in the 80s (too scared, was too interested in punk rock and shaving my head and boys smelled funny) but I recall my friends pointing to their “boyfriends” from across the room. It ended there. Today, in the new age of cell phones and social media, the “romance” does not end at school or with a two-hour phone call separated by miles. There’s social media-SnapChat, FaceTime and a plethora of ways middle-school students (and even elementary kids) can get themselves in all sorts of trouble in the “dating” world. Heck, if they’re not in the “dating world”, they can still find trouble at their fingertips!

Parenting Magazine sites seven reasons why kids should not date under the age of 16. Self development, peer pressure, family time, school, friends, creativity and “the timeline of life” are among them. There is no mention of how the dangers of the digital age and social media can impact this development. Let’s tie this in with the simple fact that 12 year-old boys and girls mature physically at different rates. They also are all over the place mentally and emotionally. They are in that phase of graduating from the Disney Channel (laden with brats with attitude on their TV shows) to watching rappers glorifying gangster life, strippers and sex on MTV and do not know how to process any of this. Boys take to their accounts and drop f-bombs to their favorite rap songs and their “girlfriends” take duck-faced selfies. Don’t they look cute?! What a sweet couple they are!

And if this is not enough, let’s add the other layers of gay or bi-“dating” onto this mess, shall we? Let’s make a confusing (and frustrating) time for kids even more confusing and frustrating by magnifying their insecurities because it promotes a bigger agenda; because parents want to boast to other SJW parents. We have gone from the parent boasting how much faster their child is maturing than yours by talking about his “dating” conquests and what a Casanova he is to boasting from the rafters that their 12 year-old son or daughter is out-loud-and-proud because it gives them a certain social clout in their community of like-minded friends. Who are we really hurting in this process? It’s bad enough kids have pressure from their peers and now, we’ve got the media, Hollywood and even their own parents hopping on the bandwagon.

Gay or straight, twelve year-olds need not date. It is not “cute”, nor it is not a sign of “maturity”. Nor should it be a badge parents wear to boast about how “woke” they are. Twelve year-old boys do not belong taking other boys (or girls) on dinner/movie dates. They belong with their families on vacations, making dinner and talking about their day at school. They belong with their friends at pizza parties and all-night sleepover/video game marathons and having belching contests. They belong finding their interests-whether it’s sports or the arts-or a mixture of things-and cultivating these interests. I’m not the world’s best parent but this much I do know. Parents need to focus their kids on becoming good human beings so they can eventually maintain healthy relationships in a landscape of dysfunction. (Like, not stealing their bro’s “woman” for starters…just a thought.) They do this by helping them (not pressuring them) to figure out who they are. They can do this by encouraging them to UNPLUG from the noise of the world and working on being better friends to their peers and respecting their elders. They can do this by assisting them in obtaining a sense of independence (yes, even from the pressures of us) that will eventually lead hopefully to discernment and sound decisions down the road. They can do this by teaching them one simple phrase that takes confusion and aggravation out of the equation…at least for a short time. That phrase?

“I am too young to date.” You’re welcome, parents of pre-teens.

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