ADD

Is ADHD getting more prevalent, or do they just want us to think everyone has it? Can you classify my hereditary leaping from interest to interest as ADD? The fact that I have to try doing all this different stuff, attempting different instruments, devouring books like a glutton, making too many friends, making something different for dinner every night--speak of a short attention span? Is my son ADHD because I have to tell him 8 times to feed the dog because he gets distracted in the way by a Pokemon card, a shoe, a video game or is he just being a normal 7 yr old?

I've seen the awesome South Park episode where all the kids get ritalyn and start liking Phil Collins. I have always said that ADHD is a bullshit diagnosis aimed at soothing the parents who can't handle that their kid is acting like a KID. Ritalyn is being used just like laudanum was used in the Victorian era, to create sweet, well-behaved, calm, speak-when-spoken-to, glassy-eyed, listless children. It's sick.

But then again, consider what MTV has done to movies and tv. We now require constant motion, weird camera angles, frenetic music, random dancing graphics in the corner, and a tickertape across the bottom of the screen to keep us entertained. That way of looking at the world caught me at the beginning of my teens, or late adolescence. Kids today were born looking at the world that way. Now they're being born into the world of the instant gratification, the at-your-fingertips wealth of information and entertanment of hi-speed internet, digital cable, cell phones, and i-Pods. So would it be impossible that ADHD is on the rise? Not really.

Is there anything we can do about it besides getting kids hooked on stimlants at an early age (I know people who swear they later became coke addicts or speed freaks because their parents gave them Ritalyn). Is there anything we should do? Is it going to be a requirement to be ADHD to learn in this fast-paced, info-packed world? Or will it interfere with the ability to learn? I don't really have any scientific bg on the subject, so I should just stop theorizing, probably, until I do some research, but honestly, I've already lost interest in the subject...I think I'm going to go look for one of those internet sites that teach you how to play piano.