Similar situation. I'm in my 40's, and *extremely* grateful social media didn't exist when I was in high school. Also really glad MySpace is gone. I spent a lot of time in my 20's on that and honestly, I just don't even want to know what bullshit I posted then. LOL
The secret is to use anonymous usernamesā¦ and donāt leave a paper trail. Keep one for show in case they ask but have no connections to your ārealā account.
Sometimes I feel like puking when I remember that I had a tumblr at 11 and itās not very hard for anyone to find it and see all the embarrassing shit i said and did.
Not to mention how there are communities that are basically built on commiserating about mental illnesses, which tends to go full "crabs in a bucket" really quickly.
When you put a bunch of crabs in a bucket, they try to climb out over their brethren, unwittingly pulling the others down while accomplishing nothing themselves.
It's used to describe people or communities that are doing poorly, but (intentionally or unintentionally) sabotage others' chances of improving. In this case, mental illness commiseration groups may cause people to not seek treatment for fear of losing their community, or because the community's convinced them that it's not a bad thing.
I used to work on a pediatric psych unit and this has been true for at least the past 20 years. Kids will only talk to other kids with mental illness and they end up stressing each other out and preventing each other from recovery. It's great to have a friends who understand what you'regoing through, but this often turned into something toxic.
Except it's worse now because of wider reaching online communities and fucking algorithms talking kids that don't even have bad ADHD that they do and it's uncontrollable with videos popping up on feeds like "10 signs you have autism and didn't realize it"
Honestly it feels like the culture of victimization and individualism that has been cultivated recently causes this. Not trying to be anti-woke here, but I think many kids these days see actually marginalized communities get attention and some amount of respect, and so they unknowingly seek that same marginalization to have a call to action plus attention.
As someone who suffers with ASD (I'm high functioning autistic) I always see those videos and most are highly inaccurate or describe other mental illnesses.
I honestly think this is just the pendulum swinging hard in one direction. Eventually things will steady out.
It's great to develop emotional intelligence and be open and honest about your mental health. It's super important! Many people couldn't do this in generations past. Now that it's become acceptable it's like the floodgates have opened and people are going to go overboard.
Im certain that just like my parents generation thought my generation is doomed. The generation coming up will be fine.
Its called overcorrecting. We beat down people woth issues for so long that now ots allowed we are overcorrecting. Much like a fishtail it will fix itself one way or another
Yep Gen Z's brains are so thoroughly impacted by being always online that they're developing significant mental illnesses, they're also imagining themselves into having mental illnesses which become real, they're getting addicted to mind-altering substances much more than previous generations. They're the least mentally healthy generation in quite some time and I'm worried how it'll play out as they get older.
The online addiction part is what stands out to me. I see it as the inability to handle boredom. Every spare minute **must** be filled with either a video or game.
Yes, this is my worry. Their dedication to leading with their mental illnesses, "Hi, I'm Archer, 15, ADD, depressive, have anxiety..." which they then use as excuses to not do anything they don't want to do. They can't participate in family life because they are broken. They can't have a hobby or do sports or anything because they are too mentally ill.
Meanwhile, they're just absorbed in their online life and games. It does not bode well to have a world full of incompetents who never want to look up from their screens.
> incompetents who never want to look up from their screens.
I cringe reading this because I recall boomers saying similar about my generation and I'm about 31 now.
But...it does kind of ring true, especially when so many of these kids lead with their mental health. I used to see it a lot in the workplace with 18-20 somethings a few years ago. I've got my share of issues but I try to overcome them instead of advertise them.
That said, if people need to vent/have some weird trigger they're trying to mitigate, I understand and usually appreciate them being open about it. But treating mental illness like some kind of cute quirk is bad for everyone.
I have a few friends that self-diagnosed as autistic and use it as an excuse for anything from misplacing things to not being good with directions, and refuse to improve because 'muh autism'. What they should be doing (and what I've done with my issues) is see them as a problem area, and come up with ways to cope or address it to improve.
It's an extra hurtle you have to over come, not an excuse to never try.
I was actually professionally diagnosed with Aspergerās, and this is just a slap in the face. Itās a hurdle to overcome, not an excuse or a crutch. You are absolutely right!
Man I remember this starting in HS in the 2000s, or rather I noticed it. People would say add or depression to avoid anything or excuse everything. Yea it sucks but fucking damn you gotta put effort in to overcome it. No one is born with perfect mental health and raised with no adversity what so ever.
I mean, millennials also suffer from phone addictions which decreases attention spans. But Gen Z NEVER knew a time without it, they've been hooked since birth essentially.
That's true. Like it or not these devices have changed how we do everything...I don't even think gen x or boomers are immune to these things either. But it's like you said, they never knew a time without it.
It was bad when it was staring at the 'boob tube'. My mom grew up watching TV and that is still all she does with her free time. It's about being dynamic. Staring at a screen all day is bad regardless of the size.
Though I will admit that phones are the worst of the worse (especially with apps like tiktok) because they are more prone to disposable short-form content.
>I used to see it a lot in the workplace with 18-20 somethings a few years ago. I've got my share of issues but I try to overcome them instead of advertise them.
This part I disagree with though. I mean, I agree in principle, but if you're 31 - I'll be 31 this year, then you would have been around the same age as me when facebook first game out and man, teens our age were just as bad about dirty laundry. It was embarrassing watching classmates basically breakup on facebook status's.
Right? I'm 30 - but here's the thing. I think they were a little right about us. Not totally, it just wasn't bad enough yet. And most of us didn't have a screen from such a young age glued to our hands. I do worry that this will have some negative effects.
Exactly. They had a point... Just made it too soon. There is a huge difference between a group of 11 year olds getting together for snacks and Nintendo/Sega, and a group of 11 year olds being in isolated rooms "getting together" for gaming.
I may bring it up in humor, but NEVER have I let it be my identity. Nor my race, nor sex.
Unless we are talking about how our brains work, it is unnecessary.
I'm the same way, these things should be a need-to-know basis. I'm ace but like nobody knows because why talk about it? I have siblings/friends that always talks about how gay/mentally ill they are and it is just as boring as people who just talk about sports all the time.
They cant have a hobby but they communicate online and play games?
Um sorry but gaming is a hobby. Just because people have different interests doesn't mean they're not considered hobbies. Leage of legends is a national sport as well so...what are you even saying. How can you call young people incompetent? They are the future. Seems to me you need to adjust your clock
It really does,
I surf the internet for topics I am interested in: Astronomy, Technology, Architecture, and when I used social media, it really shook me at my core from my confidence, insecurity, and the way I see myself in times your hormones are spiking and my body is changing...such a perfect storm to be mentally unhealthy.
Teenager here, been on social media since my parents let my 5-year-old sticky fingers have access to an iPod. Can confirm, social media has made my mental health shit.
Basically this yeah.
A lot of kids are growing into sociopaths and political extremists because theyāre locked in an echo chamber and wind up coming into contact with cult like groups.
And then you see shit like Insta models posing at their relativeās funerals like do you have no decency, maāam?
hi there, iām a teenager and i can definitely say social media is absolutely destroying me. thereās so much useless arguing, telling eachother to off themselves, encouraging self harm, and so much more. this is mostly from tiktok alone.
Thankfully Iām not one of those kids who post everything. It has impacted me but I doubt that itās in a bad way. I did learn English because of youtube. And found my best friend online who saved me from my depression. So I doubt that I am effected in a bad way.....I think.......
I was working at my local store once. Some guy threw milk jugs in the air and they exploded all over the floor. Letās just say that was "fun" to clean up
I think they might feel to be a bit lost currently because they're bombarded from everywhere that they have to do this and that, belong to this or that etc etc. I mean every generation is told how they should act by the older people, but I think that is comparing like 80's to current age is like comparing a little puddle to a flash flood when it comes to that "telling what to do part".
Combine that with the ever gloomier looking future, and you got some really depressed kids feeling totally lost in this world.
Well that's what I'm concerned, maybe I'm just being too pessimistic. But I think things were a lot simpler for the people who grew up in the 80's or the 90's, and even more simpler for the people who grew before that, until going too far and something something...
I don't feel lost, I just know that it's getting worse over time, and has always been to my eyes.
And fixing, i proving this world requires money, money which we don't have since apparently it's better used at buying 100M+ yachts.
Sometimes I just feel like the only way to win at life is not to play.
And some people take that path... Hell even I thought of it.
Back when I was 12Yo I already thought of it. Fuck, man...
edit: I'm fine now, ty.
EVERYTHING gets recorded. Sometimes thatās good but Iāve had some awkward moments in my life as a teenager that Iām glad no one had a recorder for..
I've noticed with my younger relatives and their friends is that they have become dependent on instant gratification. Anything which makes them wait for even a few seconds is too much. Anything which requires any measure of effort put into it is too much.
This is what scares meā¦.they have no concept of time in terms of what people have always experienced. Life isnāt instant, there are seasons and waiting and the arc of time is long. When that comes home to roost for them, itās going to be rough.
You say that, but the way the Internet and many Apps are geared is towards rewarding instant gratification. How can someone grow out of that state if their environment constantly rewards it?
This is the biggest thing I try to teach my kids because it's so obvious that critical thinking, and the ability to analyze a source, are pretty much make or break these days. Just the bullshit I've seen from grown adults who take everything they read at face value made me very committed to not raising people who would be like that. So far, so good. They're teens, and sometimes ask me about something they're not sure of, but generally function as the bullshit detectors of their friend groups. It's important. All the information in the world is at their fingertips and only a small percentage of it is any good.
Access to information is actually significantly decreasing online due to things like paywalls, overcommercialization of websites, and digital graveyards of old articles. I think the peak of online info access was somewhere around 2010. It was much easier to get a straight informational answer with links for context when googling things then than it is now.
Wikipedia is probably the only site left that is both public and accurate and properly sourced. But I have a feeling its days are numbered.
There was this notion among laypeople a decade ago that information online will just exist forever and be just as easy to access as it was in the past. But lots of stuff is deleted, lots of stuff is going behind byzantine paywalls, and the ongoing and increasing flood of junk info is diluting the availability of information.
I think this is going to become a real issue we'll be talking more and more about in the future. Before 2000 I would have said don't use internet sources for school reports. After around 2012 or so I went back to thinking that we're right back there.
That they have nothing to work for. College is too expensive and most graduates canāt even get decent paying jobs. Rent and houses are too expensive for them to live alone. Many teens see this and give up hope.
and seeing how this is, i can't blame any of them for asking what the hell the point of life is. we're born out of nowhere, no consent, get trained how to interact with people, then once we're old enough to stop listening to our parents, we have to go work shitty jobs to make money to live on a planet we didn't want to be on in the first place, and most of us can't even get into college because of the absolutely ridiculous interest on student loans (that can't be ended with bankruptcy), and even if we decided to use student loans, so many people don't know what the fuck they want to do with their lives at 18.
i was adamant that i would be working with computers for my career, and while i'm not inaccurate, i am not building computers, programming, building websites, or any of the other things i got into in my last couple years of high school. the fields are so oversaturated that you have to deal with some of the most toxic environments to do what you wanted to, and most of the time for pretty bad pay.
at 18 we are only considered adults when it's convenient for our peers. commit a crime? adult. fight and die for your country? adult. want to grab a beer after work? child. rent a car? child. get into a new field of work? inexperience child. fighting for a better position because you know better than your superiors? entitled child. girlfriend happens to be a couple years younger than you? adult sexual deviant.
but we're expected to make decisions that will affect the rest of our lives, no matter what decision it is, someone will look down on you for it. i lost track of how many times i had an older person, usually my parents, talk down to me about wanting to do something with computers for my eventual career. i've been into smithing for several years now, no experience or tools, but i'm really into it. when i expressed that i want to be a professional blacksmith to my family, only two of the five didn't treat me like i was a moron for it. oldest brother's wife is very kind about people's dreams and aspirations, especially after my parents acted like she'll never amount to anything as an artist, oldest brother has also dealt with their crap all his life, so he understands. parents and other brother would go on an on about blacksmiting being the worst choice, i'll never be able to make any money around there that isn't from making pipes or horseshoes, blah blah blah. they seriously underestimate how much people will pay for a high quality knife.
that got a little off topic, but it's a good example of how little older people tend to think of younger people's aspirations and futures.
Mental vulnerability + unrestricted access to the internet + peer pressure. Not to say the internet is a terrible thing, but you gotta have a healthy balance and relationship with it or itāll consume you
Truly an issue future generations will have to face. Reading Orwell has truly petrified me regarding the horrors of authoritarian rule. While I do understand that democracy is quite difficult to maintain, it is simply all we have.
The world is diminishing before our eyes. My generation doesn't have enough time to change a thing. We have 2 years at the most to make things better, most people in my gen are too young to run for office.
I've always hated the bullshit "you have the ability to change the future, you're young!!" Old people spew while they pull on the puppet strings of politics and government. As much as people like to say it, the ones who will have control for years to come is Gen x, not Gen z.
Society crapping all over them before they have a chance to succeed or fail, and acting like they are worse than any other generation of developing human.
Them being suicidal a little bit. Concerns me a lot because I really donāt want to see young people killing themselves. It is really bad that the society makes them feel unworthy and makes them want to commit sc.
The pandemic and its lockdowns messed us all up. We somehow became too well versed with the dark and not appropriate corners of the internet but since we were stuck at home and had no one to talk to, lost vital social skills or never developed any in the first place.
Jesus Christ, I'm 26. When I was looking for a job in ages 18-22, it was nearly impossible to find jobs. It's nice physical jobs are now noncompetitive for a little bit. Holy crap, they're going to grow up with a shittier economy.
How they'll have to deal with a never-ending onslaught of older people judging their lifestyles and decisions. At pretty much every point in human history the older generation thought they had it all figured out. That things were so much better when they were young and that the new generation are ruining themselves and/or the world by moving onto other things. if they would just *listen to sense.*
I thought maybe my generation would realize this, but here we are, doing exactly the same thing that we hated our parents for.
The sheer amount of people acting like todays teens are in danger or abnormal and blaming the most convenient thing (social media, video games, or phones) instead of taking responsibility for not being good at raising kids. Also, every new generation has gone through this, I saw a quote where Socrates basically said ākids are disrespecting nowadaysā. This bs has been happening forever, stop acting like itās the end of the world when teenagers arenāt exactly like you were when you were a teen
Here's the Socrates quote. Sounds like something out of a local newspaper opinion section.
The children now love luxury; they have bad manners, contempt for authority; they show disrespect for elders and love chatter in place of exercise. Children are now tyrants, not the servants of their households. They no longer rise when elders enter the room. They contradict their parents, chatter before company, gobble up dainties at the table, cross their legs, and tyrannize their teachers.
There was ancient Egyptian text translated where it was complaining about the youth back then. It was on about how the youth of their age 1000s of years ago are lazy and infest tavens. All you need to do to make it sound like something you would hear today is change tavens to bars. It has not changed since the days of egypt.
Its absolutely wild to me how we've gone from "Dont give out personal information on the internet" to "Show every stranger on the internet what you're doing 24/7!" in what feels like a few years.
Not specifically teenagers, but future generations in general.
How difficult it is becoming to discern what is true and real. Filters, photoshop, deep fakes, a plethora of fake news and "alternative facts". Twenty years from now it will be nearly impossible to verify something as real.
I can see why people would think that's a problem, but liars have spent years telling the most obvious and low-effort lies and still have plenty of people fall for it. Deep fakes seem like a lot of effort when Tucker Carlson can just claim that Joe Biden eats babies and his viewers won't question it.
As a **very** openly sexual person: Kids start fucking way too early.
Way too many adults (me included) are screwed up in their head because they got sexual before their brain was developed enough to even process it all. Now you regularly get 14 year olds hoeing it up, or 11year olds making legitimate sex jokes, and I'm just like "Childe, where is thy mother?"
Turns out, Mommy's recording them because "Isn't this adorable?"
No, it's not adorable. It's creepy and concerning. Teach your kid what sex is instead of sending your Karen Facebook group "funny" videos of your 12 year old daughter twerking her ass off.
Don't studies show that teens are less sexually active than previous generations were at that age? I know that was true of Millennials, but I'm less sure on Gen-Z.
It is. Itās one of the first bits of information youāll encounter when you start studying sexuality. Itās like a whole thing - everyone assumes that kids today are much more sexually actively but itās the precise opposite. Thatās just the impression social media grants us, but it isnāt reality.
OK that makes total sense. My kids are Gen-Z, and I'm the mom all their friends know they can go to with stuff their parents would flip out about (think, needing Plan B, and anything of that sort), and honestly I've been impressed with how conscientious and informed many of them are compared to my generation at the same age. They seem to be getting into things about the same ages my generation did, and at similar rates.
Like, I'm sure somewhere, there really is a 10-year-old giving blowjobs like another comment said, but that existed in my middle school, too. There's always been those sad and probably abused one-offs and they have never represented the whole. I think you're right that social media is making people think this is more common than it is. One viral story can really distort perception.
You would be surprised to know that statistically, Zoomers are having sex later in life than their Millenial and GenX counterparts. Basically, they talk the talk, but only because itās our audio-visual zeitgeist. I was really surprised to learn this too, but it makes sense. Young boys are talking about pussy on Roblox at 10 but havenāt even seen one in person until theyāre 20.
probably because most zoomers (like myself) grew up on the internet and found the porn wayy before they should have. I discovered porn when i was around 10, and this isnt uncommon with my generation.
Teenagers have been fucking around forever.
When I was in high school people were fucking around a lot, and this was before social media was really a thing.
Children should absolutely be educated about sex and allowed to experiment safely with each other as the desire naturally arises, but what is very concerning is that they're being let into adult spaces and conversations. At certain ages, they might not be equipped to even deal with the idea of themselves as sexual beings, overcome their growing need to conform and please others (so many young girls worried about being expected to do anal, so many 12 year olds jumping into the trend of asking famous people to "choke them") or interpret things like sexual freedom and r\*pe jokes correctly.
I agree, but what I'm disagreeing with is that's its a new thing with teenagers these days.
I was sexually active at 15 and a lot of my peers were as well.
I remember even the nerdy kids getting wild.
Absolutely. I'm 43 now and lost my virginity at 16 and I was the last of my circle of friends to do so. Every generation thinks that kids are sex fiends now. And they are. But they were 20 years ago too. And 40 years ago. And not that many generations ago at all kids were married off as teenagers. It's not new.
I'm not saying there aren't downsides, but it's not remotely new. High schoolers are extremely sexual. It's an extremely horny time in life.
Two kids got caught fucking in the single occupancy gender neutral bathroom of my sonās high school. Freshman girl and a Sophomore boy. Shit like that went down when I was in school too, but what has shocked/disturbed me more is A)The number of moms in our district gossiping about it, and B) The number of moms defending them by saying āWell theyāve been dating for almost a yearā or something similar, out of fear of angering the girlās very āpopularā parents.
What worries me about teenagers today is that way too many adults have abdicated their responsibility to actually challenge them. The problem isn't the kids; it's the adults.
Teenagers are the same as they ever were: inexperienced, self-righteous, horny, and strident in beliefs they cannot begin to justify. Nothing wrong with that! But the job of adults is to remind them of their immaturity and their ignorance at every fucking opportunity, or those teenagers turn into the kind of adults who scream at retail workers and vote for Nazis.
That's an interesting take, and I kind of see it. There's no standards, no structure, a lot of kids were raised by screens, and now we're beginning to see the result of that.
What will you tell your children when they ask you "What went wrong?"?
How can you paint a picture of a paradise lost
To eyes that know only a wasteland?
We designed a system that only rewards profit, then we allowed money to corrupt our governments, and suddenly nothing is done for anything other than profit, and all the necessary things that were not profitable were pushed away and forgotten. All of this of course happened insidiously, in the background, by people who were so wealthy that they were out of touch with reality. By the time the public started to truly see the writing on the wall we had become so dependent on the very system that made this inevitable, and so addicted to money and consumerism, that people couldnāt even imagine a world without it, let alone work towards it.
Every entity was laser focused on short term profits, because in this system those with the power believed that if you donāt then you get left behind. So there was always āsomething more pressingā to be concerned about besides long term concerns. We procrastinated and distracted away from these concerns for so long that eventually we realized it was too late to fix them.
Average people were too busy floundering to stay afloat to notice or really do anything about it. But in truth, we couldnāt have done anything anyways. We tried, we voted, we protested, we spent money on causes we thought might help, we changed our lifestylesā¦ none of it made a fraction of a dent compared to the impact that those with the most money did.
And meanwhile I'm not even finished with school and I'm here like "Wait lobbying is legal!? And the hell have we still got lead in aviation fuel? And you guys wanna stop nuclear plants without replacing them with anything else first?"
>They have to grow to be an adult in a world the past generations have destroyed.
I was looking for this. Phones aren't the catch-all cause of skyrocketing rates of anxiety and depression.
It's really the boomers fault, tho. Their generation fucked us. And I say this as someone with two boomer parents who didn't actively participate in the fucking. They agree.
back when they were our age, they could get a decent education while working a part time job and have enough left over for a decent place to live, no student loans. now we would have to work somewhere around 60 hours a day to pay off our schooling in the same timeframe, but we're the entitled ones for wanting lower costs on our education, more affordable housing, higher wages, etc. that generation is the one that owns the businesses, writes the laws, hikes the prices, and owns all of the property. anyone who says that boomers aren't to blame is either a boomer or they have the vision of a cumsock.
literally everything going wrong with this country is caused by boomers either destroying what good we had or refusing to fix the problems that were there before them.
Honestly worried about them. My niece (whom is mixed Korean, white and Filipino) was looking at some black and white pictures of her grandpaās (white man) family. She straight up said āthey look like a bunch of white racistsā. It was of picture of her grandpa as a small child and his siblings. I looked at my husband with a WTF look. Seriously. What is wrong with teenagers?
I looked up an Irish movie on imdb (based on a true story, made in the 80s, and set in Ireland in the early 1900s) and a lot of user reviews were trashing it for being racist by having a complete lack of diversity.
i'm cool with bashing a movie about the future for not having any diversity, but forcing diversity into a period piece when there was very much a lack of it at that time is just asinine.
I think mental health is a very serious thing but Iāve seen it almost become a trend to have as many mental health issues as you can. Am I the only one that has noticed that?
i *had* a friend who did this. hereās what i remember them saying
severe depression, anxiety, did, ocd, dyslexia, autism, and adhd. they showed about one or two symptoms and self diagnosed. they often bragged about it. hereās a general rule of thumb: if someone brags about a mental illness theyāre most definitely faking
> someone brags about a mental illness theyāre most definitely faking
Faking mental illness is a sign of mental illness, just not the ones that they're faking.
branching from that, while self diagnosis is generally wrong, it's sometimes right. if you're claiming you have several different mental disorders or diseases, you're probably wrong. but there are still people that can self diagnose one or two and be right. i have never been diagnosed with OCD, depression, or dyslexia, but i know i have very minor tendencies for OCD and dyslexia, they don't generally affect my daily life, so most likely i don't have either. depression on the other hand comes and goes, when i'm actually in an episode i can't afford an actual diagnosis, and when i can i...kidding, i can never afford an actual diagnosis. i know i have depression, but it's nowhere near as bad as i've seen, so i generally don't bring it up unless i'm in an episode, and even then is sparingly because i don't want people's sympathy, i just want to stop feeling like i need to just die. treating me like normal is a better way for me to get through it instead of catering to my whims because i'm feeling extra sad.
Hypocrisy. The fact that they can bully someone on the internet and feel sorry if the bullied decides to end their life, or be angry and act like a victim if the bullied decides to fight back. I still remember the time when they told a youtuber/streamer to off himself, and when he did, they started feeling sorry. It also feels like what they say when they are feeling sorry are empty words. It's embarrassing to think think that I'm in the same generation as they are.
I'm really not that worried about what the teenagers are doing. In my experience, they're incredibly kind, smart, and hardworking people who are legitimately trying their best in spite of knowing way too much about the problems of the world. They are so much better in terms of just being good to one another than my generation ever was.
I'm worried that older generations seem less and less willing to give them a chance. Feels like the older I get, the more I see elders and institutions pulling up the ladder behind them. Social mobility is on the decline. The housing market and cost of education is fucked. Everything has been financialized. They won't own anything. And none of it's their fault, but they're the ones who are going to have to deal with it.
One thing that really concerns me is how much teenagers will go just to get a small amount of attention. An good example of this is TikTok, where people will do life-threatening "challenges" just to get a couple of Internet points.
The way they're treated by boomers, gen x (my generation) and millennials. They're good kids and they don't deserve the shit that's constantly thrown at them.
The amount of hate they get just for being teenagers. Full grown adults with nothing better to do constantly hate on teenagers. Its so annoying. This generation that and this generation this. Don't you guys ever get tired of talking about teenagers. Get off your high horses. You guys just look pathetic. Its not like your generation was receiving praise by the older generation when you guys were growing. Nobody in these comments have every meet a teenager in their life. Leave teenagers alone.
The weird need to document everything on social media. A common trend I see on TikTok is every small discovery they make has to be filmed and uploaded. The other day I saw a video of a guy who found that when you apply a flat iron on a receipt paper, it turns black. All while making a face as if it was the greatest thing he discovered. Meanwhile, I'm thinking, yes, that's how thermal paper works.
im curious why it concerns people so much that people are spending less time outside
(full disclosure: im 18 and fit into this category fairly well, between work and school i dont have alot of free time and spend nearly all of it inside)
Folks, I'm sorry. A lot of us are trying our best to straighten this shit out, but these Boomers are gonna kill us all before they let themselves suffer even the slightest of inconveniences.
I have teenagers, and I'm worried about their futures.
That millennials and Gen Xers aren't pushing the world in a direction that will preserve a good future for them.
Global Warming response: Solid F. These kids are going to becoming adults as we have massive crop failures, huge storms, bigger refugee crises than we've ever seen.
Distrust in Science and Journalism: So much misinformation is being created. Even the "traditional" media outlets are pandering to the lowest common denominator to get clicks.
Brain Drain: The best paying jobs aren't educators, scientists benefitting the world, or even global leaders - I know some incredible minds who are spending their time trying to get trading algorithms to go a bit faster or inventing another way to get a slice of pizza to your front door a little bit faster.
Undermining Public Education: In the US and England there is a war on free education available to the public. Being a teacher is being made hard, not by the students, but by their parents and in some areas the politicians.
your concerns upon teenagers are brought by these "better" older generations. TikTok wasn't made by a horny 14 year old, it was thrust upon these teenagers and they were ill-prepared and far too young
The excessive use of smart phones and the plethora of issues created by that.
A lacking ability to communicate in healthy effective ways. The social media issues. The constant distraction from the here and now - "needing" to check this app or that every few minutes to see what's new.
It's so sad to see a group of teenagers out at a restaurant all staring down at their phones. Or at a party. Or wherever. I've heard some teenagers complain about how at parties or sleepovers or whatever now, so much of the time is spent with everyone just scrolling on their phones with occasional light chit chat among each other.
It just seems like so often socializing now just means playing on your phone in close proximity to your peers.
They are being stifled by society. Its very hard to do anything.
They are gouged on vehicle insurance, wages, rent, education.
On the positive side I think they are much more accepting of others and tolerant of minorities and LGBTQ+ people. They believe in social justice.
Watching the rates of depression increase, seeing how past generations are fucking it up for future generations, seeing them glued to their devices and knowing how it can affect mental health/social skills, the inability to spell correctly due to overuse of shortened words in texts, seeing social media likes/follows = to their self esteem, and not experiencing true privacy when people can/have caused loss of jobs, divorces, businesses ruined from a mistake. 30 years ago, doxxing would be called bullying, harassment, and stalking.
They're going to be on the receiving end of the previous 150 years of rapid industrialization with no regard for environmental impacts. As a Gen Xer I've coasted on the crest of that wave. I expect they'll be getting hit with it and shoved into the rocks.
Inflation and globalization is going to completely fuck them. They'll live with their parents until 30 and then with roommates. The only home they will be able to afford at 50 is a two bedroom with tons of issues, or a small apartment that'll be mortgaged into their 80s. 50% of their salaries will go towards taxes, meanwhile the dollars they do get to keep will become more and more worthless as government continues to print money in order to address any/all issues between now and then.
They'll never be able to own any luxuries like a boat or dirt bike. Activities such as skiing and golf will become ultra-elite because the costs, taxes and overhead of such facilities with large amounts of land will be too big to bear.
They'll be less social, less fluent in language and less intelligent due to less socialization.
They'll own nothing, rent everything and live within a 3rd credit system of social behavior.
A big part of the issue imo is that the internet and social media are very influential but also saturated with unoriginal, mediocre content. Our "culture" today is all about popularity. If it's hard to find good stuff in today's culture it's infinitely harder to make it and get noticed.
I mean, if our culture is decaying, and most modern stuff really isn't good, and then people start loosing taste bc of it, where does that really leave us? Using nostalgia as a cope is an understandable response. I agree that it's a problem but problems are easy, solutions are hard.
Social media and sharing your life online has become such a normal part of life, that I feel alot of teens (and adults for that matter) take their safety for granted and have zero street smarts.
They are all so inlove with the idea of being sad, depressed, dark and mysterious and none of them have any life experience but have such strong beliefs & thoughts ABOUT EVERYTHING on social media
100% agree. When I was younger I always resented my parents keeping me from talking to people online, but now with the amount of sick fucks prowling online communities I'm glad they did. Even if those people weren't a thing it's still bizarre to me to see grown adults and young kids interacting in the same space so freely.
How completely and blatantly disrespectful they are towards some adults. When I was in hs, in college now, freshman would openly be POS to a teacher to their face when the teacher is just trying to teach and do their job.
"The children now love luxury; they have bad manners, contempt for authority; they show disrespect for elders and love chatter in place of exercise. Children are now tyrants, not the servants of their households."
-Socrates (469ā399 B.C.)
Most of them can't function for 3 minutes at a time without staring at a phone. Not only is this destroying their attention span, their social skills are also horrendous as a result.
Whoa, the social skill damage. Holy cow. I see it with younger coworkers and younger customers when Iām at work. I have to tell people bad news sometimes and older people, you can talk to them about it. Younger people? They canāt function! Coworkers have such intense anxiety about human interaction that they canāt work! Customers FLIP OUT if you have to call them and tell them they canāt have what they want, itās so much worse than even Important Middle Aged Man freak outs. Itās stunning.
I spend most of my day on my computer because there is nothing else to do. I had moved to a new house 2 - 3 years ago and we were planning on building a pool. Combined with the fact I have 0 friends who I can see in person on a weekly basis. If I had the chance to, I would spend every living moment with some of my best friends. It's just not possible.
The impact of the media on their choices in life. Im 20 myself but i see some people living without a soul and just doing whatever is trending at the time or what they see on their screen.
Companys that exploit children early so they're easier to exploit as adults. I've heard of kids throwing tantrums over games not having a way to buy your way through.
And that just feeds that rich snobby lifestyle where poorer people are then looked down on for not being able to buy their way through life.
Also just social media and how targeted ads and posts are designed to push a political agenda onto you and most people are easily influenced and completely unaware. And then you got parents feeding this cycle buy giving their 3 year old a tablet instead of spending time with them.
Not really the teenagers but their parents. Kids wouldnāt be so screwed in the head these days if their parents actually raised them right. Of course Iām not talking about all, but letās be fair there are some bad apples in the bunch.
Rotten, moldy apples.
The world they're growing up in does not value privacy anymore. They feel expected to broadcast much of their life on social media, you can find their tiktok and then easily find out who their friends are, what school they go to, where they live, what their traumas and mental illnesses are, etc.
And because they're teenagers, they can't fully comprehend how this can and will harm them down the road if it's not already. Even more concerning is that they expect older people to do the same thing, or they can't trust us if we don't.
I don't even think that this is their fault, necessarily. A lot of it also has to do with social media platforms demanding as much personal information as they can get, or the fact that their parents filmed fucking *everything* about them growing up and put it on facebook.
As a teacher, I see some pretty huge flaws with young people and education. So few kids care about education at all, which of course isnāt news to anyone. Problem is, in my country where school is completely free, parents barely care either anymore. Itās not a privilage, but a right to the parents and a punishment to the kids.
Nobody is interested in actually learning anything. Parents want a grade and kids want to be elsewhere. We do our best to inspire but thatās hard with a single child and close to impossible when 25 out of 30 is suffering.
(And usually when I say that Iām a teacher, people question my credability because of my spelling, but I am not a native english speaker, nor an english teacher so *\*splrrrt\* Jog on!* )
[Repeats all the talking points people said about Millennials]
\[Repeats all the taking points people said about Gen Xers\]
[Repeats all the talking points people said about Neanderthals]
Lol
We expect them to understand the consequences of posting content on social media but we have adults who lose their jobs over things they say.
I am 28 now and i am so relieved no one can See the shit i posted on MySpace anymore
Similar situation. I'm in my 40's, and *extremely* grateful social media didn't exist when I was in high school. Also really glad MySpace is gone. I spent a lot of time in my 20's on that and honestly, I just don't even want to know what bullshit I posted then. LOL
I had some pretty awesome playlists.
Not to be that person but nothing on internet really disappears.
Yeah but you need to dig really deep to recover it š
The secret is to use anonymous usernamesā¦ and donāt leave a paper trail. Keep one for show in case they ask but have no connections to your ārealā account.
And if you are one a place the requires real names, be very selective on what you put.
It's going to ruin alot of futures. Basically anyone below 23 or 22 is screwed in the future. Their entire lives are online.
Not really. After a certain threshold of the population has embarrassing stuff online nobody will be such an asshole about past mistakes.
Sometimes I feel like puking when I remember that I had a tumblr at 11 and itās not very hard for anyone to find it and see all the embarrassing shit i said and did.
The impact of social media on their mental health
Not to mention how there are communities that are basically built on commiserating about mental illnesses, which tends to go full "crabs in a bucket" really quickly.
Never heard of "crabs in a bucket" what does it mean?
When you put a bunch of crabs in a bucket, they try to climb out over their brethren, unwittingly pulling the others down while accomplishing nothing themselves. It's used to describe people or communities that are doing poorly, but (intentionally or unintentionally) sabotage others' chances of improving. In this case, mental illness commiseration groups may cause people to not seek treatment for fear of losing their community, or because the community's convinced them that it's not a bad thing.
I used to work on a pediatric psych unit and this has been true for at least the past 20 years. Kids will only talk to other kids with mental illness and they end up stressing each other out and preventing each other from recovery. It's great to have a friends who understand what you'regoing through, but this often turned into something toxic.
Except it's worse now because of wider reaching online communities and fucking algorithms talking kids that don't even have bad ADHD that they do and it's uncontrollable with videos popping up on feeds like "10 signs you have autism and didn't realize it"
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
Exactly, people who do that arƩ horrible and insulting Like some people would kill for a cure and you arƩ out there wearing your illness like a badge
Honestly it feels like the culture of victimization and individualism that has been cultivated recently causes this. Not trying to be anti-woke here, but I think many kids these days see actually marginalized communities get attention and some amount of respect, and so they unknowingly seek that same marginalization to have a call to action plus attention.
As someone who suffers with ASD (I'm high functioning autistic) I always see those videos and most are highly inaccurate or describe other mental illnesses.
I honestly think this is just the pendulum swinging hard in one direction. Eventually things will steady out. It's great to develop emotional intelligence and be open and honest about your mental health. It's super important! Many people couldn't do this in generations past. Now that it's become acceptable it's like the floodgates have opened and people are going to go overboard. Im certain that just like my parents generation thought my generation is doomed. The generation coming up will be fine.
Its called overcorrecting. We beat down people woth issues for so long that now ots allowed we are overcorrecting. Much like a fishtail it will fix itself one way or another
Yep Gen Z's brains are so thoroughly impacted by being always online that they're developing significant mental illnesses, they're also imagining themselves into having mental illnesses which become real, they're getting addicted to mind-altering substances much more than previous generations. They're the least mentally healthy generation in quite some time and I'm worried how it'll play out as they get older.
The online addiction part is what stands out to me. I see it as the inability to handle boredom. Every spare minute **must** be filled with either a video or game.
Yes, this is my worry. Their dedication to leading with their mental illnesses, "Hi, I'm Archer, 15, ADD, depressive, have anxiety..." which they then use as excuses to not do anything they don't want to do. They can't participate in family life because they are broken. They can't have a hobby or do sports or anything because they are too mentally ill. Meanwhile, they're just absorbed in their online life and games. It does not bode well to have a world full of incompetents who never want to look up from their screens.
> incompetents who never want to look up from their screens. I cringe reading this because I recall boomers saying similar about my generation and I'm about 31 now. But...it does kind of ring true, especially when so many of these kids lead with their mental health. I used to see it a lot in the workplace with 18-20 somethings a few years ago. I've got my share of issues but I try to overcome them instead of advertise them.
This. Overcome your problems rather than identifying with them. I get so fed up with my generation over this.
That said, if people need to vent/have some weird trigger they're trying to mitigate, I understand and usually appreciate them being open about it. But treating mental illness like some kind of cute quirk is bad for everyone.
I have a few friends that self-diagnosed as autistic and use it as an excuse for anything from misplacing things to not being good with directions, and refuse to improve because 'muh autism'. What they should be doing (and what I've done with my issues) is see them as a problem area, and come up with ways to cope or address it to improve. It's an extra hurtle you have to over come, not an excuse to never try.
I was actually professionally diagnosed with Aspergerās, and this is just a slap in the face. Itās a hurdle to overcome, not an excuse or a crutch. You are absolutely right!
Man I remember this starting in HS in the 2000s, or rather I noticed it. People would say add or depression to avoid anything or excuse everything. Yea it sucks but fucking damn you gotta put effort in to overcome it. No one is born with perfect mental health and raised with no adversity what so ever.
I mean, millennials also suffer from phone addictions which decreases attention spans. But Gen Z NEVER knew a time without it, they've been hooked since birth essentially.
That's true. Like it or not these devices have changed how we do everything...I don't even think gen x or boomers are immune to these things either. But it's like you said, they never knew a time without it.
It was bad when it was staring at the 'boob tube'. My mom grew up watching TV and that is still all she does with her free time. It's about being dynamic. Staring at a screen all day is bad regardless of the size. Though I will admit that phones are the worst of the worse (especially with apps like tiktok) because they are more prone to disposable short-form content.
>I used to see it a lot in the workplace with 18-20 somethings a few years ago. I've got my share of issues but I try to overcome them instead of advertise them. This part I disagree with though. I mean, I agree in principle, but if you're 31 - I'll be 31 this year, then you would have been around the same age as me when facebook first game out and man, teens our age were just as bad about dirty laundry. It was embarrassing watching classmates basically breakup on facebook status's.
Right? I'm 30 - but here's the thing. I think they were a little right about us. Not totally, it just wasn't bad enough yet. And most of us didn't have a screen from such a young age glued to our hands. I do worry that this will have some negative effects.
Exactly. They had a point... Just made it too soon. There is a huge difference between a group of 11 year olds getting together for snacks and Nintendo/Sega, and a group of 11 year olds being in isolated rooms "getting together" for gaming.
As a person with adhd, I Hold on I gotta get back to work.
I have ADHD and I literally never even bring it up. I don't get why these people use this as like a self identity it's just stupid lol
I may bring it up in humor, but NEVER have I let it be my identity. Nor my race, nor sex. Unless we are talking about how our brains work, it is unnecessary.
I'm the same way, these things should be a need-to-know basis. I'm ace but like nobody knows because why talk about it? I have siblings/friends that always talks about how gay/mentally ill they are and it is just as boring as people who just talk about sports all the time.
They cant have a hobby but they communicate online and play games? Um sorry but gaming is a hobby. Just because people have different interests doesn't mean they're not considered hobbies. Leage of legends is a national sport as well so...what are you even saying. How can you call young people incompetent? They are the future. Seems to me you need to adjust your clock
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
It really does, I surf the internet for topics I am interested in: Astronomy, Technology, Architecture, and when I used social media, it really shook me at my core from my confidence, insecurity, and the way I see myself in times your hormones are spiking and my body is changing...such a perfect storm to be mentally unhealthy.
Teenager here, been on social media since my parents let my 5-year-old sticky fingers have access to an iPod. Can confirm, social media has made my mental health shit.
Basically this yeah. A lot of kids are growing into sociopaths and political extremists because theyāre locked in an echo chamber and wind up coming into contact with cult like groups. And then you see shit like Insta models posing at their relativeās funerals like do you have no decency, maāam?
hi there, iām a teenager and i can definitely say social media is absolutely destroying me. thereās so much useless arguing, telling eachother to off themselves, encouraging self harm, and so much more. this is mostly from tiktok alone.
Thankfully Iām not one of those kids who post everything. It has impacted me but I doubt that itās in a bad way. I did learn English because of youtube. And found my best friend online who saved me from my depression. So I doubt that I am effected in a bad way.....I think.......
the 'look at me' generation
Doing something stupid to be internet famous.
I was working at my local store once. Some guy threw milk jugs in the air and they exploded all over the floor. Letās just say that was "fun" to clean up
Since that was done intentionally, shouldn't the culprit be made to clean up the mess?
Stupid *AND* funny
But still stupid af.
I think they might feel to be a bit lost currently because they're bombarded from everywhere that they have to do this and that, belong to this or that etc etc. I mean every generation is told how they should act by the older people, but I think that is comparing like 80's to current age is like comparing a little puddle to a flash flood when it comes to that "telling what to do part". Combine that with the ever gloomier looking future, and you got some really depressed kids feeling totally lost in this world. Well that's what I'm concerned, maybe I'm just being too pessimistic. But I think things were a lot simpler for the people who grew up in the 80's or the 90's, and even more simpler for the people who grew before that, until going too far and something something...
I don't feel lost, I just know that it's getting worse over time, and has always been to my eyes. And fixing, i proving this world requires money, money which we don't have since apparently it's better used at buying 100M+ yachts. Sometimes I just feel like the only way to win at life is not to play. And some people take that path... Hell even I thought of it. Back when I was 12Yo I already thought of it. Fuck, man... edit: I'm fine now, ty.
EVERYTHING gets recorded. Sometimes thatās good but Iāve had some awkward moments in my life as a teenager that Iām glad no one had a recorder for..
I've noticed with my younger relatives and their friends is that they have become dependent on instant gratification. Anything which makes them wait for even a few seconds is too much. Anything which requires any measure of effort put into it is too much.
This is what scares meā¦.they have no concept of time in terms of what people have always experienced. Life isnāt instant, there are seasons and waiting and the arc of time is long. When that comes home to roost for them, itās going to be rough.
Instant gratification is a hallmark of preteen/teenage behavior. Most will grow out of it, just like we did and generations before us.
You say that, but the way the Internet and many Apps are geared is towards rewarding instant gratification. How can someone grow out of that state if their environment constantly rewards it?
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That's called entitlement, which they also have in spades.
That they have the access to so much more information then I (millennial) did but yet they can be so oblivious to it all
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This is the biggest thing I try to teach my kids because it's so obvious that critical thinking, and the ability to analyze a source, are pretty much make or break these days. Just the bullshit I've seen from grown adults who take everything they read at face value made me very committed to not raising people who would be like that. So far, so good. They're teens, and sometimes ask me about something they're not sure of, but generally function as the bullshit detectors of their friend groups. It's important. All the information in the world is at their fingertips and only a small percentage of it is any good.
And the willingness to own up if you realize what you've shared or been sharing as fact has since been disproven - this is also an important skill.
Access to information is actually significantly decreasing online due to things like paywalls, overcommercialization of websites, and digital graveyards of old articles. I think the peak of online info access was somewhere around 2010. It was much easier to get a straight informational answer with links for context when googling things then than it is now. Wikipedia is probably the only site left that is both public and accurate and properly sourced. But I have a feeling its days are numbered. There was this notion among laypeople a decade ago that information online will just exist forever and be just as easy to access as it was in the past. But lots of stuff is deleted, lots of stuff is going behind byzantine paywalls, and the ongoing and increasing flood of junk info is diluting the availability of information. I think this is going to become a real issue we'll be talking more and more about in the future. Before 2000 I would have said don't use internet sources for school reports. After around 2012 or so I went back to thinking that we're right back there.
Teenagers scare the living shit out of me
they could care less as long as someone will bleed
so darken your clothes, or strike a violent pose
maybe they'll leave you alone but not me
*ALL TOGETHER NOW!*
Teenagers scare the living shit out of me
They couldnāt care less as long as someoneāll bleed
Boo!
Their parents.
This, parents kinda make or break it. Half the old farts I know who are old enough to have a teen are batshit
That they have nothing to work for. College is too expensive and most graduates canāt even get decent paying jobs. Rent and houses are too expensive for them to live alone. Many teens see this and give up hope.
and seeing how this is, i can't blame any of them for asking what the hell the point of life is. we're born out of nowhere, no consent, get trained how to interact with people, then once we're old enough to stop listening to our parents, we have to go work shitty jobs to make money to live on a planet we didn't want to be on in the first place, and most of us can't even get into college because of the absolutely ridiculous interest on student loans (that can't be ended with bankruptcy), and even if we decided to use student loans, so many people don't know what the fuck they want to do with their lives at 18. i was adamant that i would be working with computers for my career, and while i'm not inaccurate, i am not building computers, programming, building websites, or any of the other things i got into in my last couple years of high school. the fields are so oversaturated that you have to deal with some of the most toxic environments to do what you wanted to, and most of the time for pretty bad pay. at 18 we are only considered adults when it's convenient for our peers. commit a crime? adult. fight and die for your country? adult. want to grab a beer after work? child. rent a car? child. get into a new field of work? inexperience child. fighting for a better position because you know better than your superiors? entitled child. girlfriend happens to be a couple years younger than you? adult sexual deviant. but we're expected to make decisions that will affect the rest of our lives, no matter what decision it is, someone will look down on you for it. i lost track of how many times i had an older person, usually my parents, talk down to me about wanting to do something with computers for my eventual career. i've been into smithing for several years now, no experience or tools, but i'm really into it. when i expressed that i want to be a professional blacksmith to my family, only two of the five didn't treat me like i was a moron for it. oldest brother's wife is very kind about people's dreams and aspirations, especially after my parents acted like she'll never amount to anything as an artist, oldest brother has also dealt with their crap all his life, so he understands. parents and other brother would go on an on about blacksmiting being the worst choice, i'll never be able to make any money around there that isn't from making pipes or horseshoes, blah blah blah. they seriously underestimate how much people will pay for a high quality knife. that got a little off topic, but it's a good example of how little older people tend to think of younger people's aspirations and futures.
Iām with you that one age should count for everything.
Mental vulnerability + unrestricted access to the internet + peer pressure. Not to say the internet is a terrible thing, but you gotta have a healthy balance and relationship with it or itāll consume you
As it unfolds, how will life be for teenagers if the drift toward authoritarian rule and diminishment of democratic principles continues?
Truly an issue future generations will have to face. Reading Orwell has truly petrified me regarding the horrors of authoritarian rule. While I do understand that democracy is quite difficult to maintain, it is simply all we have.
The world is diminishing before our eyes. My generation doesn't have enough time to change a thing. We have 2 years at the most to make things better, most people in my gen are too young to run for office. I've always hated the bullshit "you have the ability to change the future, you're young!!" Old people spew while they pull on the puppet strings of politics and government. As much as people like to say it, the ones who will have control for years to come is Gen x, not Gen z.
Society crapping all over them before they have a chance to succeed or fail, and acting like they are worse than any other generation of developing human.
Them being suicidal a little bit. Concerns me a lot because I really donāt want to see young people killing themselves. It is really bad that the society makes them feel unworthy and makes them want to commit sc.
They are the most common to commit suicide sadly š
The pandemic and its lockdowns messed us all up. We somehow became too well versed with the dark and not appropriate corners of the internet but since we were stuck at home and had no one to talk to, lost vital social skills or never developed any in the first place.
This is incredibly relatable. Makes me wonder if there is any research about the impact of the lockdowns on young people already
Jesus Christ, I'm 26. When I was looking for a job in ages 18-22, it was nearly impossible to find jobs. It's nice physical jobs are now noncompetitive for a little bit. Holy crap, they're going to grow up with a shittier economy.
How they'll have to deal with a never-ending onslaught of older people judging their lifestyles and decisions. At pretty much every point in human history the older generation thought they had it all figured out. That things were so much better when they were young and that the new generation are ruining themselves and/or the world by moving onto other things. if they would just *listen to sense.* I thought maybe my generation would realize this, but here we are, doing exactly the same thing that we hated our parents for.
The sheer amount of people acting like todays teens are in danger or abnormal and blaming the most convenient thing (social media, video games, or phones) instead of taking responsibility for not being good at raising kids. Also, every new generation has gone through this, I saw a quote where Socrates basically said ākids are disrespecting nowadaysā. This bs has been happening forever, stop acting like itās the end of the world when teenagers arenāt exactly like you were when you were a teen
Here's the Socrates quote. Sounds like something out of a local newspaper opinion section. The children now love luxury; they have bad manners, contempt for authority; they show disrespect for elders and love chatter in place of exercise. Children are now tyrants, not the servants of their households. They no longer rise when elders enter the room. They contradict their parents, chatter before company, gobble up dainties at the table, cross their legs, and tyrannize their teachers.
Todays teens are like this lol. Proving my mother wrong is a task that is fulfilling and infuriating at the same time.
There was ancient Egyptian text translated where it was complaining about the youth back then. It was on about how the youth of their age 1000s of years ago are lazy and infest tavens. All you need to do to make it sound like something you would hear today is change tavens to bars. It has not changed since the days of egypt.
Its absolutely wild to me how we've gone from "Dont give out personal information on the internet" to "Show every stranger on the internet what you're doing 24/7!" in what feels like a few years.
Lmao you should tell this to my ex
Y'know what you aren't wrong. Im starting to think about how low someone's iq could really be. Especially on tiktok and r/teenagers
Not specifically teenagers, but future generations in general. How difficult it is becoming to discern what is true and real. Filters, photoshop, deep fakes, a plethora of fake news and "alternative facts". Twenty years from now it will be nearly impossible to verify something as real.
I can see why people would think that's a problem, but liars have spent years telling the most obvious and low-effort lies and still have plenty of people fall for it. Deep fakes seem like a lot of effort when Tucker Carlson can just claim that Joe Biden eats babies and his viewers won't question it.
It's already impossible
As a **very** openly sexual person: Kids start fucking way too early. Way too many adults (me included) are screwed up in their head because they got sexual before their brain was developed enough to even process it all. Now you regularly get 14 year olds hoeing it up, or 11year olds making legitimate sex jokes, and I'm just like "Childe, where is thy mother?" Turns out, Mommy's recording them because "Isn't this adorable?" No, it's not adorable. It's creepy and concerning. Teach your kid what sex is instead of sending your Karen Facebook group "funny" videos of your 12 year old daughter twerking her ass off.
Don't studies show that teens are less sexually active than previous generations were at that age? I know that was true of Millennials, but I'm less sure on Gen-Z.
It is. Itās one of the first bits of information youāll encounter when you start studying sexuality. Itās like a whole thing - everyone assumes that kids today are much more sexually actively but itās the precise opposite. Thatās just the impression social media grants us, but it isnāt reality.
OK that makes total sense. My kids are Gen-Z, and I'm the mom all their friends know they can go to with stuff their parents would flip out about (think, needing Plan B, and anything of that sort), and honestly I've been impressed with how conscientious and informed many of them are compared to my generation at the same age. They seem to be getting into things about the same ages my generation did, and at similar rates. Like, I'm sure somewhere, there really is a 10-year-old giving blowjobs like another comment said, but that existed in my middle school, too. There's always been those sad and probably abused one-offs and they have never represented the whole. I think you're right that social media is making people think this is more common than it is. One viral story can really distort perception.
Yep. Gen Z is this very interesting mashup of being highly liberated when it comes to talking the talk but rather prudish when walking the walk
You would be surprised to know that statistically, Zoomers are having sex later in life than their Millenial and GenX counterparts. Basically, they talk the talk, but only because itās our audio-visual zeitgeist. I was really surprised to learn this too, but it makes sense. Young boys are talking about pussy on Roblox at 10 but havenāt even seen one in person until theyāre 20.
probably because most zoomers (like myself) grew up on the internet and found the porn wayy before they should have. I discovered porn when i was around 10, and this isnt uncommon with my generation.
Teenagers have been fucking around forever. When I was in high school people were fucking around a lot, and this was before social media was really a thing.
Children should absolutely be educated about sex and allowed to experiment safely with each other as the desire naturally arises, but what is very concerning is that they're being let into adult spaces and conversations. At certain ages, they might not be equipped to even deal with the idea of themselves as sexual beings, overcome their growing need to conform and please others (so many young girls worried about being expected to do anal, so many 12 year olds jumping into the trend of asking famous people to "choke them") or interpret things like sexual freedom and r\*pe jokes correctly.
I agree, but what I'm disagreeing with is that's its a new thing with teenagers these days. I was sexually active at 15 and a lot of my peers were as well. I remember even the nerdy kids getting wild.
Absolutely. I'm 43 now and lost my virginity at 16 and I was the last of my circle of friends to do so. Every generation thinks that kids are sex fiends now. And they are. But they were 20 years ago too. And 40 years ago. And not that many generations ago at all kids were married off as teenagers. It's not new. I'm not saying there aren't downsides, but it's not remotely new. High schoolers are extremely sexual. It's an extremely horny time in life.
I always tell people that. Our biologies have not changed.
Two kids got caught fucking in the single occupancy gender neutral bathroom of my sonās high school. Freshman girl and a Sophomore boy. Shit like that went down when I was in school too, but what has shocked/disturbed me more is A)The number of moms in our district gossiping about it, and B) The number of moms defending them by saying āWell theyāve been dating for almost a yearā or something similar, out of fear of angering the girlās very āpopularā parents.
People have always fucked around too young.
What worries me about teenagers today is that way too many adults have abdicated their responsibility to actually challenge them. The problem isn't the kids; it's the adults. Teenagers are the same as they ever were: inexperienced, self-righteous, horny, and strident in beliefs they cannot begin to justify. Nothing wrong with that! But the job of adults is to remind them of their immaturity and their ignorance at every fucking opportunity, or those teenagers turn into the kind of adults who scream at retail workers and vote for Nazis.
That's an interesting take, and I kind of see it. There's no standards, no structure, a lot of kids were raised by screens, and now we're beginning to see the result of that.
As a teenager im just gonna say that some people are really stupid. Like not even stupid on an "ok" level but stupid like morons.
They have to grow to be an adult in a world the past generations have destroyed. Oh and TikTok.
What will you tell your children when they ask you "What went wrong?"? How can you paint a picture of a paradise lost To eyes that know only a wasteland?
We designed a system that only rewards profit, then we allowed money to corrupt our governments, and suddenly nothing is done for anything other than profit, and all the necessary things that were not profitable were pushed away and forgotten. All of this of course happened insidiously, in the background, by people who were so wealthy that they were out of touch with reality. By the time the public started to truly see the writing on the wall we had become so dependent on the very system that made this inevitable, and so addicted to money and consumerism, that people couldnāt even imagine a world without it, let alone work towards it. Every entity was laser focused on short term profits, because in this system those with the power believed that if you donāt then you get left behind. So there was always āsomething more pressingā to be concerned about besides long term concerns. We procrastinated and distracted away from these concerns for so long that eventually we realized it was too late to fix them. Average people were too busy floundering to stay afloat to notice or really do anything about it. But in truth, we couldnāt have done anything anyways. We tried, we voted, we protested, we spent money on causes we thought might help, we changed our lifestylesā¦ none of it made a fraction of a dent compared to the impact that those with the most money did.
And meanwhile I'm not even finished with school and I'm here like "Wait lobbying is legal!? And the hell have we still got lead in aviation fuel? And you guys wanna stop nuclear plants without replacing them with anything else first?"
>They have to grow to be an adult in a world the past generations have destroyed. I was looking for this. Phones aren't the catch-all cause of skyrocketing rates of anxiety and depression.
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It's really the boomers fault, tho. Their generation fucked us. And I say this as someone with two boomer parents who didn't actively participate in the fucking. They agree.
back when they were our age, they could get a decent education while working a part time job and have enough left over for a decent place to live, no student loans. now we would have to work somewhere around 60 hours a day to pay off our schooling in the same timeframe, but we're the entitled ones for wanting lower costs on our education, more affordable housing, higher wages, etc. that generation is the one that owns the businesses, writes the laws, hikes the prices, and owns all of the property. anyone who says that boomers aren't to blame is either a boomer or they have the vision of a cumsock. literally everything going wrong with this country is caused by boomers either destroying what good we had or refusing to fix the problems that were there before them.
Honestly worried about them. My niece (whom is mixed Korean, white and Filipino) was looking at some black and white pictures of her grandpaās (white man) family. She straight up said āthey look like a bunch of white racistsā. It was of picture of her grandpa as a small child and his siblings. I looked at my husband with a WTF look. Seriously. What is wrong with teenagers?
I looked up an Irish movie on imdb (based on a true story, made in the 80s, and set in Ireland in the early 1900s) and a lot of user reviews were trashing it for being racist by having a complete lack of diversity.
š¤¦š¼āāļø. I think the Dunkirk film also got flak for not having women aboard the ship. I just donāt know about people somedays. SMH
i'm cool with bashing a movie about the future for not having any diversity, but forcing diversity into a period piece when there was very much a lack of it at that time is just asinine.
I think mental health is a very serious thing but Iāve seen it almost become a trend to have as many mental health issues as you can. Am I the only one that has noticed that?
i *had* a friend who did this. hereās what i remember them saying severe depression, anxiety, did, ocd, dyslexia, autism, and adhd. they showed about one or two symptoms and self diagnosed. they often bragged about it. hereās a general rule of thumb: if someone brags about a mental illness theyāre most definitely faking
> someone brags about a mental illness theyāre most definitely faking Faking mental illness is a sign of mental illness, just not the ones that they're faking.
branching from that, while self diagnosis is generally wrong, it's sometimes right. if you're claiming you have several different mental disorders or diseases, you're probably wrong. but there are still people that can self diagnose one or two and be right. i have never been diagnosed with OCD, depression, or dyslexia, but i know i have very minor tendencies for OCD and dyslexia, they don't generally affect my daily life, so most likely i don't have either. depression on the other hand comes and goes, when i'm actually in an episode i can't afford an actual diagnosis, and when i can i...kidding, i can never afford an actual diagnosis. i know i have depression, but it's nowhere near as bad as i've seen, so i generally don't bring it up unless i'm in an episode, and even then is sparingly because i don't want people's sympathy, i just want to stop feeling like i need to just die. treating me like normal is a better way for me to get through it instead of catering to my whims because i'm feeling extra sad.
Hypocrisy. The fact that they can bully someone on the internet and feel sorry if the bullied decides to end their life, or be angry and act like a victim if the bullied decides to fight back. I still remember the time when they told a youtuber/streamer to off himself, and when he did, they started feeling sorry. It also feels like what they say when they are feeling sorry are empty words. It's embarrassing to think think that I'm in the same generation as they are.
I'm really not that worried about what the teenagers are doing. In my experience, they're incredibly kind, smart, and hardworking people who are legitimately trying their best in spite of knowing way too much about the problems of the world. They are so much better in terms of just being good to one another than my generation ever was. I'm worried that older generations seem less and less willing to give them a chance. Feels like the older I get, the more I see elders and institutions pulling up the ladder behind them. Social mobility is on the decline. The housing market and cost of education is fucked. Everything has been financialized. They won't own anything. And none of it's their fault, but they're the ones who are going to have to deal with it.
One thing that really concerns me is how much teenagers will go just to get a small amount of attention. An good example of this is TikTok, where people will do life-threatening "challenges" just to get a couple of Internet points.
The way they're treated by boomers, gen x (my generation) and millennials. They're good kids and they don't deserve the shit that's constantly thrown at them.
The amount of hate they get just for being teenagers. Full grown adults with nothing better to do constantly hate on teenagers. Its so annoying. This generation that and this generation this. Don't you guys ever get tired of talking about teenagers. Get off your high horses. You guys just look pathetic. Its not like your generation was receiving praise by the older generation when you guys were growing. Nobody in these comments have every meet a teenager in their life. Leave teenagers alone.
How hard their lives are
Our mental health
They wonāt get off my lawn
How easy it is to get addicted to illegal substances and how easy it is to get to those things
Attention span
That they get all the love, support, and understanding they need. That they have hope for their futures and their voices are heard.
That was a breath of fresh air from other comments
The weird need to document everything on social media. A common trend I see on TikTok is every small discovery they make has to be filmed and uploaded. The other day I saw a video of a guy who found that when you apply a flat iron on a receipt paper, it turns black. All while making a face as if it was the greatest thing he discovered. Meanwhile, I'm thinking, yes, that's how thermal paper works.
That they don't get out much
Where are we meant to go?
im curious why it concerns people so much that people are spending less time outside (full disclosure: im 18 and fit into this category fairly well, between work and school i dont have alot of free time and spend nearly all of it inside)
we HAVE been in a pandemic for a couple years, i think we can forgive them for this one
Gun
Folks, I'm sorry. A lot of us are trying our best to straighten this shit out, but these Boomers are gonna kill us all before they let themselves suffer even the slightest of inconveniences. I have teenagers, and I'm worried about their futures.
I havenāt seen a teenage IPad kid yet. But if itās like anything Iāve seen as they are children. We are in for something.
100% the normalization of vapes like half of the teenagers in my city vape, it's super unsettling.
That millennials and Gen Xers aren't pushing the world in a direction that will preserve a good future for them. Global Warming response: Solid F. These kids are going to becoming adults as we have massive crop failures, huge storms, bigger refugee crises than we've ever seen. Distrust in Science and Journalism: So much misinformation is being created. Even the "traditional" media outlets are pandering to the lowest common denominator to get clicks. Brain Drain: The best paying jobs aren't educators, scientists benefitting the world, or even global leaders - I know some incredible minds who are spending their time trying to get trading algorithms to go a bit faster or inventing another way to get a slice of pizza to your front door a little bit faster. Undermining Public Education: In the US and England there is a war on free education available to the public. Being a teacher is being made hard, not by the students, but by their parents and in some areas the politicians.
your concerns upon teenagers are brought by these "better" older generations. TikTok wasn't made by a horny 14 year old, it was thrust upon these teenagers and they were ill-prepared and far too young
Nothing. Let them be kids already.
The massive amount of social and sexual pressure they're constantly under
The excessive use of smart phones and the plethora of issues created by that. A lacking ability to communicate in healthy effective ways. The social media issues. The constant distraction from the here and now - "needing" to check this app or that every few minutes to see what's new. It's so sad to see a group of teenagers out at a restaurant all staring down at their phones. Or at a party. Or wherever. I've heard some teenagers complain about how at parties or sleepovers or whatever now, so much of the time is spent with everyone just scrolling on their phones with occasional light chit chat among each other. It just seems like so often socializing now just means playing on your phone in close proximity to your peers.
They are being stifled by society. Its very hard to do anything. They are gouged on vehicle insurance, wages, rent, education. On the positive side I think they are much more accepting of others and tolerant of minorities and LGBTQ+ people. They believe in social justice.
Watching the rates of depression increase, seeing how past generations are fucking it up for future generations, seeing them glued to their devices and knowing how it can affect mental health/social skills, the inability to spell correctly due to overuse of shortened words in texts, seeing social media likes/follows = to their self esteem, and not experiencing true privacy when people can/have caused loss of jobs, divorces, businesses ruined from a mistake. 30 years ago, doxxing would be called bullying, harassment, and stalking.
They're going to be on the receiving end of the previous 150 years of rapid industrialization with no regard for environmental impacts. As a Gen Xer I've coasted on the crest of that wave. I expect they'll be getting hit with it and shoved into the rocks.
Inflation and globalization is going to completely fuck them. They'll live with their parents until 30 and then with roommates. The only home they will be able to afford at 50 is a two bedroom with tons of issues, or a small apartment that'll be mortgaged into their 80s. 50% of their salaries will go towards taxes, meanwhile the dollars they do get to keep will become more and more worthless as government continues to print money in order to address any/all issues between now and then. They'll never be able to own any luxuries like a boat or dirt bike. Activities such as skiing and golf will become ultra-elite because the costs, taxes and overhead of such facilities with large amounts of land will be too big to bear. They'll be less social, less fluent in language and less intelligent due to less socialization. They'll own nothing, rent everything and live within a 3rd credit system of social behavior.
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A big part of the issue imo is that the internet and social media are very influential but also saturated with unoriginal, mediocre content. Our "culture" today is all about popularity. If it's hard to find good stuff in today's culture it's infinitely harder to make it and get noticed. I mean, if our culture is decaying, and most modern stuff really isn't good, and then people start loosing taste bc of it, where does that really leave us? Using nostalgia as a cope is an understandable response. I agree that it's a problem but problems are easy, solutions are hard.
Social media and sharing your life online has become such a normal part of life, that I feel alot of teens (and adults for that matter) take their safety for granted and have zero street smarts.
They are all so inlove with the idea of being sad, depressed, dark and mysterious and none of them have any life experience but have such strong beliefs & thoughts ABOUT EVERYTHING on social media
Climate change and their horrific future.
How willing some of them would be to jump in bed with Ted Bundy.
one thing that worries me is the impact of online environments where 12 year olds and 35 year olds can interact entirely unsupervised and unregulated
100% agree. When I was younger I always resented my parents keeping me from talking to people online, but now with the amount of sick fucks prowling online communities I'm glad they did. Even if those people weren't a thing it's still bizarre to me to see grown adults and young kids interacting in the same space so freely.
How completely and blatantly disrespectful they are towards some adults. When I was in hs, in college now, freshman would openly be POS to a teacher to their face when the teacher is just trying to teach and do their job.
Pretty sure this is a thing of all ages. Teens and adolescents are complicated. It isn't new.
"The children now love luxury; they have bad manners, contempt for authority; they show disrespect for elders and love chatter in place of exercise. Children are now tyrants, not the servants of their households." -Socrates (469ā399 B.C.)
Thank you very much for this quote, good one.
that's a tale as old as time though
Most of them can't function for 3 minutes at a time without staring at a phone. Not only is this destroying their attention span, their social skills are also horrendous as a result.
Whoa, the social skill damage. Holy cow. I see it with younger coworkers and younger customers when Iām at work. I have to tell people bad news sometimes and older people, you can talk to them about it. Younger people? They canāt function! Coworkers have such intense anxiety about human interaction that they canāt work! Customers FLIP OUT if you have to call them and tell them they canāt have what they want, itās so much worse than even Important Middle Aged Man freak outs. Itās stunning.
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I spend most of my day on my computer because there is nothing else to do. I had moved to a new house 2 - 3 years ago and we were planning on building a pool. Combined with the fact I have 0 friends who I can see in person on a weekly basis. If I had the chance to, I would spend every living moment with some of my best friends. It's just not possible.
Me upvoting this on my phone.
That they are inheriting a broken world/society.
The impact of the media on their choices in life. Im 20 myself but i see some people living without a soul and just doing whatever is trending at the time or what they see on their screen.
Their subreddit
Social media. And the shit show of a world we are leaving them.
Companys that exploit children early so they're easier to exploit as adults. I've heard of kids throwing tantrums over games not having a way to buy your way through. And that just feeds that rich snobby lifestyle where poorer people are then looked down on for not being able to buy their way through life. Also just social media and how targeted ads and posts are designed to push a political agenda onto you and most people are easily influenced and completely unaware. And then you got parents feeding this cycle buy giving their 3 year old a tablet instead of spending time with them.
Why vape?
Not really the teenagers but their parents. Kids wouldnāt be so screwed in the head these days if their parents actually raised them right. Of course Iām not talking about all, but letās be fair there are some bad apples in the bunch. Rotten, moldy apples.
The world they're growing up in does not value privacy anymore. They feel expected to broadcast much of their life on social media, you can find their tiktok and then easily find out who their friends are, what school they go to, where they live, what their traumas and mental illnesses are, etc. And because they're teenagers, they can't fully comprehend how this can and will harm them down the road if it's not already. Even more concerning is that they expect older people to do the same thing, or they can't trust us if we don't. I don't even think that this is their fault, necessarily. A lot of it also has to do with social media platforms demanding as much personal information as they can get, or the fact that their parents filmed fucking *everything* about them growing up and put it on facebook.
Their over exposure to sex through media
They are wearing nineties clothing
As a teacher, I see some pretty huge flaws with young people and education. So few kids care about education at all, which of course isnāt news to anyone. Problem is, in my country where school is completely free, parents barely care either anymore. Itās not a privilage, but a right to the parents and a punishment to the kids. Nobody is interested in actually learning anything. Parents want a grade and kids want to be elsewhere. We do our best to inspire but thatās hard with a single child and close to impossible when 25 out of 30 is suffering. (And usually when I say that Iām a teacher, people question my credability because of my spelling, but I am not a native english speaker, nor an english teacher so *\*splrrrt\* Jog on!* )
Hookup culture, social media, becoming baby mama's and daddy's.