The Department of Homeland Security's Guide to...Parenting

by Steven Smith

posted 10.04.04

With the world in a constant state of flux, you might find yourself wondering, “Am I safe?” The answer to that question is an assured and resounding “yes”. And you’ve got Tom Ridge, the Secretary of Homeland Security, to thank for that. Ridge, assured by the security of our homeland, isn’t content to just sit idly by letting Americans go about the business of being Americans. In an unprecedented expansion of jurisdiction, Secretary Ridge has now set his sights on…Parenting.

• If your new born is up all hours crying and carrying on, check to see that he/she isn’t hungry or wearing a dirty diaper.  After rocking your newborn back to sleep in your arms, wrap him/her in a sheet of durable plastic sheeting and seal with duct tape.

• When parenting a Muslim child, be sure to register him/her with the Homeland Patriots Program. Membership affords your child admission to one of our many Federal Detention Center summer camps where they will learn the value of truthful confessions and complicity. Friendships and peer bonding are strictly discouraged.

• A systematic campaign of fear and groundless threats is the best way to deal with a child who talks back. Threaten to skin, cook and serve up for dinner Scrappers, the family dog, if your child doesn’t stay in line. Should the sass mouth continue, randomly jump from behind corners with a rusty knife to surprise your child. Bring the knife down just short of your child’s face with erratic, stabbing motions while chanting, “U-S-A! U-S-A!”

• Don’t let your child’s lack of shoes, clothes, proper medical and dental care and a quality education stop you from stockpiling assault weapons and claymore mines to embed in the front lawn. The security of your child is of the utmost importance.

• Boys will be boys and you might find that yours is having trouble with a bully at school. Rather than telling him to talk through their differences, remind him that “these colors do not run” and that he’d be a “pussy” if he pursued any resolution other than a pre-emptive strike. Any resulting blood loss can be stopped with the use of an American flag tourniquet.

• If your daughter is dating a boy you don’t approve of, wrongly imprison her new beau, his brothers, father, uncles and male cousins in Guantanamo. She’ll lose interest in him in a few months, you’ll see.

• Should you suspect that your teen is experimenting with drugs, rifle through the drawers, desk and closet in their bedroom. After all, privacy is one of those civil liberties that were made to be broken. That twinge of reluctance you feel is the sensation of justice being served and security being maintained. If you don’t find contraband in your child’s bedroom, don’t admit your mistake. Just plant some weed in their underwear drawer and punish accordingly.

• If you catch your teenage son masturbating don’t make the mistake of reinforcing this behavior by telling him that his body is going through many changes and what he was doing was healthy and normal. Better to shame the behavior into submission by sending him to school naked with a Polaroid camera and a pair of women’s panties over his head.

• In order to maintain your child’s obedience and a fear of the paranoid, reactionary world you’ve constructed, it might be necessary to kill one of their friend’s every month or so. On second thought, you’d better make it semimonthly just to play it safe.

• You might find that it’s hard to keep all of your lies and fear mongering straight. Should you find yourself drowning in contradiction, blame it on God.