From the outside, American high schools often appear to be everything portrayed in the hit movie High School Musical: thriving communities of fresh-faced young people, living vibrant and contented, happy, stable and focused lives.

Recently I attended a local high school basketball game. The experience began well: The buildings were neat, the grounds manicured; the gymnasium was impressive, brightly lit, clean and fresh. The atmosphere, band playing, cheerleaders dancing, crowd hooting—charged with youthful energy—was refreshing, exhilarating, infectious.

Soon, however, it became apparent that everything was not as positive and vibrant as it seemed.

As I absorbed the wash of sights and sounds in the room, it became painfully obvious: This wasn’t a healthy community of happy, emotionally stable, focused young people. It was a veritable freak show of wacky-haired, sloppily dressed, body-pierced, emotionally unstable, shifty-eyed teenagers drifting aimlessly through life.

Peaceful, positive thoughts fled the mind at the onslaught of loud, thrashing music. The smell of cheap perfume lingered in my nostrils, only to be interrupted by the occasional whiff of alcohol (which is why a handful of policemen patrolled the bleachers, I later learned).

What was supposed to be a light-hearted evening of recreational enjoyment rapidly spiraled into a sad and shocking experience.

All around, teen girls who looked more like strippers than high school students were smothered in cosmetics, looking as if make-up grenades had accidentally exploded on their faces. Their jeans were strategically ripped to expose flesh or underwear and clung so tightly it was as if they had crawled into them when they were 10 and had never taken them off since. Their shirts were cut so low, worn so tight and sported statements so suggestive, even explicit, they’d make most mature women blush.

Yet despite this garish glitz and glamor, it was obvious these girls weren’t fulfilled. Their eyes were lifeless, their stares blank. They weren’t happy.

Even the ever-popular cheerleaders, the supposed models of joy, were devoid of genuine happiness. They danced. They cheered. They smiled. But they feigned happiness. Behind heavy mascara hid hollow eyes. Beneath the skimpy outfits beat unfulfilled hearts. They were cheerleaders without cheer.

It was a depressing sight. These girls had sacrificed modesty, decorum and honor on the altar of vanity. They had an emotional vacuum in their lives, and it was evident that many were prepared to do whatever it took to stand and be noticed, to be accepted and embraced, and to earn the “love” of a teen boy.

This same emotional void, this gaping need to be admired and loved, was evident in the teen boys. Watching these pretty-boy, image-focused, selfish, undisciplined boys fob themselves off to the young girls as mature young men was an insult to masculinity. The popular boys strutted around the gymnasium like peacocks, girl on one side, entourage on the other. Other boys, disheveled, wimpy, pants sagging around their knees, their hair as misguided as the head beneath it, walked aimlessly, hopelessly, around the room in search of recognition.

It was a dreadful sight.

If materialistic belongings were the solution, these young people would be set. You name it, they had it: expensive clothing, jewelry, iPods, Blackberries, cell phones, expensive shoes. But despite all they possessed—and despite the loud, “invigorating” music, the weird, attention-grabbing hairdos, the trendy, provocative, eye-catching clothing, the cool techy gadgets and everything else they had to make them stand out in the crowd—these teens all suffered the same unspoken, unmet need: a yearning that these material belongings will never fill.

Ironically, that need was sitting in that gymnasium alongside those teens. What these young people needed above all was the love, the appreciation, the time, the devotion and the guidance of caring parents and other adults.

During time-outs and at half-time, the scantily clad cheerleaders jived provocatively across the gym floor, hips thrusting, chests shaking, as crowds of teenage boys and married men, hooting and hollering, enjoyed the show.

What father would allow his daughter to dress and dance like that? I thought to myself. Don’t they know their daughters are essentially teenage strippers?

Turns out, they did. After the game, many of the girls flocked into the stands to hug and kiss their parents, who were right there! Their beaming dads had been applauding their efforts all night, joining the crowd as it hooted and hollered at their half-naked daughters gyrating across the floor.

Watching the parents and adults was the most gut-wrenching part of the whole experience.

The fathers and mothers of America’s derelict teens sat in complete ignorance of the desperate tragedy unfolding on the court and off it in the lives of their sons and daughters. They didn’t see anything wrong with their oversexualized girls and their boys roaming the bleachers as lost souls. In fact, they were facilitating it!

Looking around that gymnasium, I couldn’t believe how many naturally pretty teenage girls were allowing themselves to be pawed by undisciplined, disrespectful, ill-mannered, long-haired louts they perceived to be loving boyfriends. Doesn’t it say something about a father when his teenage daughter chooses to invest her trust and confidence, her emotional stability and even her sexual health, in a hormone-filled, uneducated, one-track-minded teenage boy?

The gaping emotional and spiritual void in the lives of those teens screamed at anyone willing to take their eyes off the game, glance into the stands and soak in the atmosphere. There was something madly wrong with these young people!

If this isn’t enough to convince us, consider what the facts tell us: The U.S. has the highest sexually transmitted disease rates of any industrialized nation, with teens and young people accounting for nearly half of new infections; one quarter of sexually active teens contract a sexually transmitted disease; more than 800,000 teenage girls get pregnant each year, and by age 19, seven out of ten teens in America have had sexual intercourse.

At the same time, teenage depression is reaching epidemic levels: Suicide now accounts for 13 percent of deaths for Americans between the ages of 15 and 24, and it’s the third-leading cause of death for American teens. Almost one in five high school students has seriously considered attempting suicide, and more than one in six has made plans to commit suicide.

These terrifying figures tell us something is dreadfully wrong with America’s teens; there’s a gaping void in their lives. But what makes this debacle more than sad—what makes it truly outrageous—is the fact that the cause of the crises plaguing America’s young people, rather than being detected and dealt with by parents, teachers and society, is being promoted and fueled by these adults.

These cheerleaders need mothers willing to teach them the meaning of modesty and decorum and what it means to have self-respect. They need their fathers to protect them from danger, from being mistreated and disrespected by undisciplined, teenage boys. The teen boys need fathers to teach them about masculinity, how to be humble and disciplined, what it means to sacrifice and how to treat a girl respectfully.

America’s teens are starving for rules and direction. Instead, most adults are condoning their immature, misguided actions!

In spite of their whited exteriors, America’s high schools are thriving communities of morally bankrupt, socially inept teenagers living misguided, unfulfilled and unstable lives. Don’t believe me? Just visit a football or basketball game at your local high school and look past the Abercrombie & Fitch veneer into the hollow eyes and longing hearts of these poor souls. It’s a melancholy experience.

If you have a teenager in need of proper love and direction, or even if you’re not a parent of a teen but you still want to play a role in helping young people, theTrumpet.com can help. Consider reading these articles: “Lost Boys,” “The Best Man I Ever Knew,” “Fatherhood 101,” “Sexual Health: What Every High School and College Student Needs to Know,” “Recapture Value in True Womanhood” and “Recapture Value in True Manhood.”