People who are
nostalgic about childhood, were obviously never children. Few people can
remember the truth about
adolescence.
Their minds "censor" their memories; and have them believe that being
a teenager was was one big party, free of
cares and
responsibilities. Well let me say this, you couldnÕt be more wrong if you had a
lobotomy. There aren't that many
adults around who
realise what adolescence was really like. The anguish, the fear, the anxiety,
the stress. People don't
remember those
problems because they want to forget them.
The truth of the
matter is, is that being a teenager is hard, right from the beginning, and it
doesn't get any easier. We are such
easy prey for big
name companies who advertise using the pressure of popularity, looks and sex to
force us to buy their
product that, as
it turns out, we never wanted or needed in the first place. Our lives are
filled with stress. One of the greatest
sources of
pressure is school. Where we are herded like cattle from room to room, chewing
on our cud, while the hay of
knowledge is
force fed to us as we are trying our hardest to gulp it down as more and more
is shovelled in. Another great
source of
pressure is ourselves. We try our hardest to be accepted among a certain group
or circle. Whereas most of the time
we are rejected
and we become depressed. Depression, another problem, along with ignorance and
apathy that thwarts our
lives. A wise man
when questioned about his view on ignorance and apathy, said "I don't
know, and I don't give a damn.
We find outlets
for our emotions through either art, poetry or music, being the three most
common. There are thousands of
poems floating
around written by bitter or depressed teenagers that are never recognised as
works of art. Another form of
escape for
teenagers is, unfortunately, suicide. It is alarming how high the teen suicide
rates have risen over the past decade.
Yet, it is
comforting that there are support groups and counsellors available now to aid
teens through their troubles. Because no
one wants to see
a life full of promise and potential end abruptly because of a little sorrow in
one kid's life. Another reason for
teen suicide is
their home life. The teenager gets caught in the middle of an argument between
their parents, and they take the
blame personally.
This is not right. Sometimes the child is beaten or abused and is forced to run
away into the streets, where
they become
homeless, and sometimes abducted. Sometimes they just die in a back alley
during a cold winterÕs night, and
they are never
missed. At sixteen, a teenager knows about suffering, because he himself has
suffered, but he barely knows that
other beings also
suffer.
Although, some
teenagers face their problems. They plod along through school. Some of them get
after-school or weekend
jobs. They learn
responsibility. Eventually, they enter adulthood and the work force.
Successful, confident, and eager to
work. They lead
their lives using the knowledge they swallowed throughout their education and
the power they gained. But
not long after,
they forget about the dips and drops of their adolescence and become somewhat
hypocritical when they go up to
teenagers and say
"These are the best years of your life", or "What
responsibility? You've got it easy". These lines are heard
much too often.
Hopefully, it can
only get easier for teenagers to cope with the world and to live to their full
potential. Where a teenager can
wade through the
jaws of advertisers, the popularity contest, their parents, and most of all,
depressionÕs cold claws. For, up
until now, it
never occurred to anyone anywhere that the teenager was a captive in a hostile
world of adults.
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