5.09.2012

The Online Secret Lives of Teens

Us teens can do TONS of things— eating, sleeping, Facebooking, Tweeting, studying, etc. But what do the parents who nurture us a thousand ways wonder what we do when we're out of their eye and what we're thinking? Read this post for some answers and you soon will delve into the teens' underworld!

Some things we do without supervision range from surfing YouTube, dating, curfews, drinking alcohol, smoking and basically anything our parents could care less about. However, in school, it's a significantly different story here— there's more bullying both physically, mentally and emotionally.

For the most part, the majority of secret online and reality lives happens in high school and middle school— apparently the latter has more sexuality in its nature! In an expanded version, I have to say that eighth graders rise to the occasion when it counts for today's technology— their job is to close out their parents and siblings and just live in their own online life. We all know their language— emoticons and acronyms encrypted into iPods, iPhones, iPads, etc. worldwide; when parents try to get provocative with them, us teens hold a brick wall which cross-sections them from getting into our minds. Every teen that has breath has about sixty to a hundred secrets locked away from the world's eye— some include distorted body image, low self-esteem, coming out as gay or lesbian, failing to fit in, domestic abuse, cancer, alcoholism, etc.— and parents know that they're not cut out to use reverse psychology to see how their children sum up. Believe it or not, teens will resort to risqué activities to mask their true persona— they'll throw their real life off the island with drugs, alcohol, cutting, oral sex *GAG!*, eating disorders, etc. One question which composedly dangles in the balance for parents is: how can we reach our teens and provide guidance through their teen angst?

Typically, us teens discuss problems and more via text messages, statuses and Tweets— cell phones' jobs have switched from phone-and-web-access to 360-degrees-of-apps-and-more-access; they also are electronic confidants, holding the deepest memories, secrets and lies. While it may sound peculiar by this context, the cell phones testify that actions speak louder than words and the opposite (i.e. words are much more prominent than actions), but the Internet just amplifies their secrets to the world! Unfortunately, it doesn't help that teens dog on  others behind their backs, which only adds to parents' incompetence— insults usually are everything you can find in the "Trash Talk for Dummies" book. Still, it's not sensible for you to be naive enough to accept everything your peers tell you— truth is you've got the responsibility to shape your world and those that compose it!

One of my favorite articles about this subject is "Our Teens' Secret Sex Lives" by Jeannine Amber from Essence magazine (my mom's subscribed to the publication, which is predominantly about women and families). While I was a tad slighted that eighth graders and upwards have been making out and getting intimate in school stairwells; empty classrooms; their home's living rooms, bedrooms, bathrooms, basements, etc., I understood that they're struggling to configure new lives like a phoenix from the ashes. In the article, a few freshmen discuss how in their past year that they've done their own sexual conduct without parental control— one guy said that girls'll send pics of their titties and want him to be in the shower with her; one girl claims that boys'll utilize mind games to hook up with a girl— and sure enough, he'll start campaigning for sex! However, every school clique has at least one "advisor" who oversees the sexual foray of their classmates— according to one advisor, one guy on Facebook said he wasn't ready for sex and his entire grade called him gay! Sometimes, we just have to leave our judgment out and bite our tongues— our parents will continue to warn us about being sexually active. As far as I'm concerned, all I have to say is: COURT DISMISSED, BRING IN THE DANCING LOBSTERS!


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