Monday, 06 July 2009

• Adolescent Culture

  Do you realize there was a time when there were no teenagers? Before the 1940s and 50s, kids became adults. They grew up fast and had adult responsibilities. Now, instead of growing into adults, it is socially expected for people to lose their minds between ages 11-30.

   

  Do you realize thatthe National Academy of Science defines adolescence from age 11 to age 30? Wow, where did that come from? I saw this in an article the other day, "Somewhere along the way, we ceased to be a culture where kids aspire to be adults and became a culture where adults aspire to be kids." The article said we live in an adolescant culture. Our culture is defined by adults who never grew up!

   

  What are the marks of a culture with a dominant adolescent mindset? Not surprisingly, they are precisely what we have come to expect from adolescents themselves. Read on from John Stonestreet:

  1. Demand for immediate gratification. We want what we want now, and we will not wait or work for it. Spiraling credit card debt, addiction to new technologies, bouncing from church to church, abandoning marriages—the list goes on and on.
  2. Absence of long-term thinking about life and the world. Hand-in-hand with a demand for immediate gratification is a distraction from the real issues that actually matter. Ours is a culture largely ignorant of economic theory, political distinctions, or the rules of logic, but one which is fully up to speed on latest from American Idol.
  3. Motivated by feeling rather than truth. This is a key indicator of a volatile person, and an even more significant indicator of a failing culture. Truth is murdered by pooled and polled ignorance.
  4. Wanting grown-up things without growing up. Ironically, despite our addiction to all things adolescent, we still expect to be treated like adults. “Don’t tell me what to do,” we say. “Every opinion matters” and “Treat me with respect,” we add. Of course, fools actually do not deserve respect and their opinions are, at best, a thorough waste of time and, at worst, dangerous.
  5. Expecting bailouts rather than accepting consequences. Not thinking before acting is a trait of adolescence as is making excuses. Bad mortgage decision? The government should help. Sexual immorality? Birth control, abortion, and HPV vaccines. Falling grades? Reduce standards. Poor behavior? Ritalin will do the trick. And once we accept adolescence as normal, we are then forced to excuse poor behavior. “They’ll grow out of it,” we suggest. A quick look around reveals that “they” are not.
  6. Focusing on appearance rather than depth. Seen in everything from fascination with celebrity to the way presidents and churches are chosen, cultures that choose style over substance quickly become silly cultures. Neil Postman proved this in his classic work Amusing Ourselves to Death: Public Discourse in the Age of Show Business. Worse still, silly cultures are easily deceived and destined for tyranny. History proves this.

  More could be added here, but the point is that sometimes what is normal, well, shouldn’t be. Adolescence is a recent and foolish invention. And, as noted scholar, Richard Weaver taught us, ideas have consequences. Good ideas have good consequences; bad ideas have bad consequences.

   

  Do we live in an adolescent culture?

   

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