Meh, this is just another example of the generation gap, really. Generation X was never like this, apparently.
Everything was 'good' and everyone 'obeyed their parents' and 'the school system was better' and EVERYTHING was apparently better. Wait, we've hit Generation Y now! What's this? School shootings, street muggings, EMOS????!!!!!!! The whole generation is to blame! The whole lot of them are nothing but moronic, degenerative thugs! Tsk, two teenagers beating up a 40 year old male...well, I guess we better take some more rights teenagers have.
The school system's faults? All because of teenagers. Their defiance to learn can clearly not be traced back to flawed curriculums and half-assed, lazy and depressed 'teachers'. No, no, definitely not, it's all because the teenagers don't do what they are told.
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For those that knew of the whole 'Corey Delaney' story (Australian 16 year old, invited friends to a party while his parents were gone, ended up with a shitload too many and caused some damage...just a stupid stereotypical twit teenager) that was an example of how quickly and easily the media can take a story and use it as a vice to demonstrate how bad Generation Y is. Of course, we are all going out and destroying society. So what if there's about a billion teenagers in this world, we're going to single out a couple of them and use them to show us adults just how much better we were than these 'louts' and degenerates.
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Truth is, it doesn't take a lot to create a stereotype, in particular, a bad one. There's nothing anyone can do about it. There will always be a fear in adults that some moronic teenagers will do something to them, because it's happened before to people. No, it's not as if every single teenager is going to do something, but in a world of growing violence, etc, there is always a need for precaution with adults when it comes to teenagers, simply because there is a SLIGHT chance they'll come across some idiots.
I can agree with the fear some adults have, it's justified. What I don't agree with for a start, is teenagers that do this which is undoubtedly and forever will be creating a bad image for communities and teenagers alike, but also the adults who see this behaviour and choose to label the majority of 'better' teenagers as being all a part of this anti-social, immoral minority. The ultimate perpertrators of this are the media. They have the power to influence, and choose to make their money off of tearing down and devaluing a whole generation because of a few actions because they can and they know that people will begin to believe this.
Some teenagers are growingly conformative people, and the cynosure for these teenagers right now is what the media is writing about in regards to stupid teenage actions and how they write about it. They see a story like the Corey Delaney one and see how much the public condemns it, and then they want to emulate it's 'badassness'. Maybe it's time the media toned down the bashing of teenagers, because all that does is create moronic and degrading stereotypes and entice more teenagers to ruin the image of the majority.