<i> My Turn</i> : Don’t Assume the Worst of Teens

When I was younger, I thought it would be forever until I would be the age I am now. Now it seems like forever until I’ll be the age that I want to be. Whatever happened to the middle? The middle is what’s happening now.

Growing into an adult seems to be the hardest part of life. There are so many decisions to be made--about sex, drugs, peer pressure and other things. Sometimes the right answer isn’t always there. However, it isn’t fair to assume that all teen-agers are sexually active, drink and take drugs. Each and every one of us is very different.

As a teen-ager in today’s society, I have experienced different forms of discrimination. This discrimination comes from adults who generalize about all young adults. They forget how they were when they were “growing up” and how different everyone else was from them.

Many rules and regulations throughout the community are directed toward teen-agers. For instance, no-loitering signs often appear to be telling teens not to “hang out” there with their friends.

One of my teachers suggested the reason that society feels that teens must have these rules is due to the weakened family structure. Society then feels that young adults need some type of structure since they are not getting it at home.

A lot of incidents regarding teen-age discrimination occur because of the lack of communication between adults and teens. When the news media report negative incidents that are teen-related, it causes us to be stereotyped.

In my own life, two incidents stick out in my mind that made me feel I was discriminated against. I was in a drugstore not too long ago when a clerk asked my friends and me to remove our backpacks. This order made us angry, so we inquired further to understand why. Well, my hunch was right--the man thought that we might steal something. We felt so frustrated. Here’s this man who doesn’t even know us and he just presumes we are going to shoplift.

Another time I was with some friends and we decided to go into a rather fancy store to look at dresses. The people who worked there were very rude to us, and then they told us that they were closing the store. Well, after we had left the store, one of the clerks immediately reopened the doors. We were annoyed by their rudeness and felt it was directed at us because of our age.

I’m not the only teen-ager who has stories of discrimination. When I asked other students at my high school about it, nearly all said that they had felt discriminated against at least once in their life. Whether they were treated second-best at a restaurant or ignored in a store because of their age, it isn’t right!

Teen discrimination is an important issue that needs to be dealt with. Adults and teens need to work together to create better means of communication and a stronger relationship between the two generations.

Our generation is ready to conquer the world’s big problems, and the world should be ready to listen, respect and not misjudge the young adults of today.