Youth in today
Youth in today
Youth in today’s society feel a need to be rebellious because of individualism and peer pressure from role models. Youth in the 90’s want to be like their favorite actor or actress, they want to be well liked and popular with others, and they want to be an individual doing their own thing; but what are the factors that contribute to youth’s rebelliousness?
One of the big contributors to youth’s rebelliousness starts with individualism. Young people feel as if they do not need to be controlled by anyone. As George Lipsitz states in his essay, We Know What Time It Is, “People resisting domination can only fight in the arenas open to them; they often find themselves forced to create images of themselves that interrupt, invert or at least answer the ways in which they are defined by those in power” (p.179). Lipsitz tells the reader in this statement that young defiant people often rebel from domination in order to become free of any laws or rules that govern them. Lipsitz states, “Despite endless rhetoric about “family values,” the wealthiest and most powerful forces in our society have demonstrated by their actions that they feel that young people do not matter, that they can be our nation’s lowest priority” (p.177). This quote declares that young people are regarded to as the lowest priority in our nation. Lipsitz continues, “From tax cuts that ignore pressing needs and impose huge debts on the adults of tomorrow in order to subsidize the greed of today’s adult property owners, to systematic disinvestment in the schools, the environment and industrial infrastructure, the resources of the young are being cannibalized to pay for the irresponsible whims and reprehensible avarice of a small group of wealthy adults” (p.177). This quote further supports his statement how young people are referred to in the U.S. as the lowest priority in our nation. By young people becoming aware of this fact it makes them feel as if they are goods set aside for a while until America can use them to its advantage. In turn making youth want to rebel against the system.
Another contributor to the rebelliousness of youth is peer pressure from their role models. Many young people want to portray the same image of their role model and live the same way they live, even if the role model is not the best person imitate. Take for example, the movie Ferris Bueller’s Day Off, Ferris is a cool, smooth talking, rebellious, popular guy that decides to take a day off of school by deceiving his parents. He winds up going through a series of adventures on his day off and everything works out okay by the end of the day. Lawrence Grossberg states in his essay, Cinema and the Representation of Youth’s Alienation, “On the surface he appears to be not a troublemaker, but a rather superficial seeker of pleasure: the fact that he doesn’t have a car constantly seems more important to him than issues or beliefs-and he constantly espouses a sort of a conservative individualism” (p.191). There are a lot of younger people that would possibly like to have Ferris Bueller’s traits because of his attitude on life and his status. Grossberg quoted in his essay from Ferris Bueller’s Day Off, “Life moves pretty fast. If you don’t stop and look around once in a while, you can miss it” (p.191). Ferris meant by this statement that life goes by quickly, so have fun while you live it. This remark could very well be what the rebellious youth want in life.
In today’s society we need to be aware of the youth and their problems. They are the future of America and what it stands for.
Lipsitz, George. “We Know What Time It Is”
Grossberg, Lawrence. Cinema and the Representation of Youth’s Alienation
Krieger, Barbara Jo. Dialogue and Discovery
New York: St.Martins Press, 1996.