"We've invented adolescence, and stretched it out too far" says psychologist

[aneeshm]

Originally posted by Guynemer
I'm rotating through the teen clinic this month, and I can say this without reservations:

Nearly all teenagers are, in one way or another, idiots, and incapable of functioning as adults. Now, whether or not that is due to the facts of biology or just the way society functions, I don't know. But I do know I wouldn't trust a teenager to do jack ****.

That's because that's the way society makes them. Nobody had these problems back when teens either took up work, or went for higher education with the same standing as adults.

[aneeshm]

And you can say that any chosen age group is not biologically adult by arbitrarily revising the definition of biological adulthood to exclude them.

[Guynemer]

Well, fine. Devil's Advocate: society made them this way.

It matters ****-all to me, since they are the way they are--dumber than a sack of hammers.

[Jon Miller]

Honestly I See this problem in myself. I feel like I Am still an adolescent, even though I have mostly been paying for myself (through work, scholarships, and loans) since I entered college. I have tied it to getting married/having children, but maybe it is more of an attitude that I acquired and haven't lost yet.

JM

[OzzyKP]

Originally posted by Guynemer
Well, fine. Devil's Advocate: society made them this way.

It matters ****-all to me, since they are the way they are--dumber than a sack of hammers.

That is why society has to change to give them more rights and responsibility so they can grow up properly like God intended.

[aneeshm]

Originally posted by Guynemer
Well, fine. Devil's Advocate: society made them this way.

It matters ****-all to me, since they are the way they are--dumber than a sack of hammers.

So shouldn't we try to fix it?

[Guynemer]

Originally posted by OzzyKP


That is why society has to change to give them more rights and responsibility so they can grow up properly like God intended.

If true, yeah, go ahead and try to fix it. In the meantime, they're still ****ing idiots, and if we let them all loose right now, we're gonna see a lot of dead kids.

[OzzyKP]

Surely it is a gradual process.

Epstein's recommendations are for competency tests of some kind that people can take at any age to prove themselves able to handle X, Y, or Z.

[Guynemer]

Who's gonna stop them from doing X, Y, or Z? They're still doing them now, and getting into deep **** because of it, even through they're not supposed to (sex, drugs, alcohol).

[OzzyKP]

Yea, obviously.

Allowed to do them legally, and not be looked down on for doing them.

[DanS]

One thing to keep in mind is that there isn't one correct way to determine the stages in life. There are lots of different approaches in evidence today.

By the way, this strikes me more as a sociology question rather than a psychology question.

[Guynemer]

Have you worked with drug addicted teens, teens with STDs, pregnant teens? I'm not convinced they can handle those things, even if they are treated as adults.

[OzzyKP]

Are drug addicted teens so much worse off than drug addicted adults?

For a lot of those people we may be too late. Their character has been shaped by the ageist, infantilizing world we live in. If we can reshape things for the next generation you'll see much less drug addicts and STDs and such.

[Barnabas]

They have been able to handle those things for most of human history, I think education created adolescence, now you have to go to primary school, secondary schol, university etc, but in the past the man would learn since he was a little boy a profession like shoemaking, baking, as a blacksmith etc, get married at age 16 or 17, and work like an adult to take care of his family.

[Jon Miller]

I agree. It is a lack of responsibility that is an issue here, as such they take on this lack of responsibility and continue it on in their lives (in drugs and sex, for example). If they were given responsibility, they would be more responsible in other areas (like drugs and sex).

JM