Teenagers and the World

I had the pleasure of the company of five young people today (between 13 and 20, and a baby, but she didn't say anything) over dinner. Since the male of the species were playing "I'm-cooler-than-you" show-off-talk games, I decided to ask a discussion question to the round.

"Do you think they will have to call off the Olympics this summer?"

T13: When is the World Cup? [WiseWoman answers "2010" and then explains the difference between the Soccer World Cup and the Olympics]

T16-1: Why should they have to call the Olympics off?
WiseWoman: Because of the earthquakes and the danger of diseases.

T16-2: Isn't the president of China in Berlin right now?
T16-1: Yeah, what's his name?
WiseWoman: Ahem. It's not the president of China, but the spiritual leader of the Tibetians who is in Berlin. Do you know his name?

[Silence]

T20: It's something really easy, I think.
T16-1: Chang or something?
T16-2: Himalaya?
T16-3: No, that's the mountain, silly.
WiseWoman: No, he's the Fourteenth ...... and he even got a Nobel Peace Prize - can any one name him?

Eventually, I give up and explain who the Dalai Lama is and why he is in exile and why the Tibetians are so riled up right now. T16-1 then asks a thought-provoking question: if he's the spiritual leader, why did he leave because he was afraid of getting killed? I thought religious types didn't mind dying because they get new lives or something.

T14 then chipped in with something about a girl born in India with two sets of arms and two sets of legs and T20 said that was the born-again Shiva and off they were talking about that. I think they meant Lakshmi, but I seem to have missed that item in my news feeds, maybe my RSS is broken.

The Killing Children

The other day the media in Germany ran large headlines on how the police in Cologne had - by means of all their fancy new Internet detection stuff and what not - avoided a Colombine-like massacre at a local school. It was noted that the purported killer committed suicide after being confronted by the police after they searched his room and found soft-air guns and a cross-bow.

It turned out, though, that while he had indeed been planning such a deed, it had been called off four weeks ago. But he hadn't pulled the YouTube announcement that he had made.

Fellow students had informed the principal, who had called him in for a talk. When this talk was "unsuccessful", the police were called. They investigated, searched his room, hauled him in for a talk. They forgot to inform his parents - he was only 17, and by law his parents need to be informed and have a right to attend such a hearing. He asked to go to the bathroom during the talk, crawled out the window, and threw himself under a streetcar.

The police first said that he had left calmly, that they didn't see him as being suicidal.

How should they have handled this? If they did nothing and he had caused a massacre, the press would have screamed at them. As it is, the police were apparently trying to use this as a nice example of why the police need access to all of our data to "protect" us. Protection like this we don't need.

We need to start listening to the children and youth who feel that life is treating them so bad that they have to die and take others with them. There is a song popular with young people (I will repeat neither band name nor title here) about just this - the song is so violent, I shuddered as I read it. There are many other, very violent songs that many young people like to listen to. It makes them feel powerful, at least for the length of the song.

After all, what is their lot? Crowded schools with oldish teachers who are tired; youth centers closed; churches not offering anything for them; parents either at work, trying to make ends meet, or drunk in the living room. Their lives consist of TV and Internet, a very tainted reality. They want fun, they want money for all the cool things and clothes they see advertised. There are no jobs for them, there is nothing to do. They are just bored, as I have noted before.

What scares me is the ease with which many obtain weapons and drugs. How can we put a stop to this? How can we get them to see that killing is not a game, how can we give them a future?

One thing is for sure - even more surveillance of Internet "sources" is not the answer.

They are just bored

We read daily in the papers about all the horrible things teenagers do every day: smoke and drink themselves to death, take drugs, beat up people, steal, deface buildings and subway trains, and other amusements. The older ones kill themselves in their cars by driving too fast while under the influence.

Why is this? Sure, every generation bitches about the youth of today. That old Greek Hesiod is supposed to have said "I see no hope for the future of our people if they are dependent on frivolous youth of today, for certainly all youth are reckless beyond words... When I was young, we were taught to be discreet and respectful of elders, but the present youth are exceedingly disrespectful and impatient of restraint."

Okay. But I have recently spent time observing what young people have to amuse themselves other than the above listed things. Note: school does not count.

Nothing. There is just nothing to do. They are bored.

There are no fields in town that need harvested. No tractors they can prove themselves by driving around without other vehicles in the area. No real work to do, no adults taking them seriously. Nothing interesting to look at, to experience, to enjoy, to talk with your pals about - unless you have lots of money to rent a go-cart for the afternoon. Even the swimming pools - should they still be opened and not closed because of disrepair - are very expensive to attend. Even with money, we walked around a part of town Sunday with a teenager, looking for something to do. We ended up eating in a restaurant, that was all we could find.

Sure, there are a few, a very few, youth centers in town. But there are no empty lots around. I spent many hours as a child in the woods or on an empty lot playing all sorts of games. I borrowed books from the library, was lucky that my family could afford music lessons, attended clubs at school and activities at my church. There was always a choice of things to do, I was never bored (okay, that's probably why I am a hyperactive person always doing 7 things at once, but that's another story).

They can't even learn to cook - who cooks anymore? We just zap in the microwave.

So they watch TV, listen to garbage on the radio, hang out, drink, and do stupid stuff with their buddies. I think we need to come up with some things to do with and for teenagers very soon. They will be running the country in a very few years.....