Column: The Truth About Being a Teenager

Ava Krema, Student of Journalism

I am going, to be honest. Being a teenager is not always easy. While we do not have to worry about things like taxes or how we are going to get our next meal we do have to worry about how we are doing in school, are we going to get into college, are going to have a good job that will provide us with the means to have food and shelter.

Being a teenager is anything but stress-free. 

Alright, so I am going to let readers in a little secret. Teens are incredibly misrepresented by the media and in society. In the media, teens are shown as young people who really do not have a care in the world. TV shows portray teens partying every, shopping during the days, and going out to lunch every other day. Phan and Syed, who are journalists, wrote, “These different portrayals of teens make real teens feel like they are missing out on ‘high school activities’ or of the teenage ‘experience’ that the media so horrendously exaggerates.” Ruffolo, who did a paper on this topic wrote: “The show The Secret Life of the American Teenager portrays a young girl who gets pregnant at 14, things like sex happen often between teens during the show, and they rarely are shown giving consent.” The problem with something like this is that it sexualizes young people, which is something that sadly our society does often. In shows, they make younger girls the focal point for sex just to get more views and attention. 

Now, society also views teens as young people who are lazy, unproductive, live on their phones, love to party, bully others, and use drugs and alcohol. Sadly there are teens who are like this, but it is not fair to generalize it and say that every teenager does those things. And if a teen does then there might be other things going on that people do not really see. Unfortunately, a survey in Michigan did find that marijuana use in 12-graders is almost as high as it was two decades ago. Another thing that society puts against teens is bullying and it is sad to say that they are not wrong. Deliver, a journalist, conducted for youth risk behaviors showed that 19 percent of students reported that they had been bullied on campus in the past 12 months and that 14.9 percent said that they experienced cyberbullying.

I know that those statistics really do not paint a pretty picture, but the thing is that what I just talked about is not everything that a teenager is capable of. What I feel that adults and older generations forget is that we are the future of this country and of the world. Barbuto, a journalist writes,  “What we do, what we accomplish, what we are exposed to has every effect on, not only our personal futures but the future of society as a whole.” Teenagers are some of the biggest risk-takers ever, and instead of shutting that down by the time adulthood gets here society should learn to harness things like that. People who are not afraid to take risks and try something new can bring so many new things to the table. Society needs to realize that teenagers are capable of some amazing things, but we need people to believe in us and to give us these opportunities to prove that. 

Teenagers are so much more than lazy kids who just spend time on their phones. Teens have the ability to change our world, but we have to stop putting all these stereotypes on being a teen. It is hard enough for us already because we are trying to figure out who we are as a person and what we want to do with our lives and having people telling us that we are always lazy or making trouble is not helpful. Just because we are young does not mean that we do not have brilliant ideas. I believe that we can move mountains if only given the opportunity to try.