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By Paul Robertson
Even though we see glimpses of positive change in the
Canadian youth culture at present, as in all generational expressions there
are some trends that should cause us concern. Although not exhaustive these
are trends that most adults should be aware of.
Peer pressure
Peer pressure has always been part of growing up.
However, for our current generation, the nature of the pressure has changed
significantly. Kids are more susceptible to peer pressure because they are
growing up at a time when there is no such thing as truth. Truth is
something to be decided upon by the group or individual at any given moment
and can change just as quickly. Two significant shifts have occurred:
First, the teen who does something wrong is now somehow better off than a
teen who refuses to do something he or she feels is wrong. It used to be
that if you stood up against the crowd you were admired. Today you are
ridiculed and belittled for thinking that you have the right to tell the
crowd what is right or wrong. Second, many of today’s pressures are
felt not as verbal invitations and intimidations but as unspoken
expectations. You are just expected to go along with the crowd without
question. After all, who are you to tell the majority what to do? In
today’s youth culture, your concept of truth doesn’t always
apply to others.
Churched vs unchurched
Church kids, who traditionally lived differently from
the culture at large, no longer do so. The majority of church-going young
people also struggle with issues of media and music choices, oral sex,
drugs, lying and cheating. There has been a growing disconnect between
their beliefs and their behaviour. It is difficult, based on observation,
to tell church kids from kids who haven’t ever entered a house of
worship. The U.S.-based Barna Group’s latest research shows that 9
out of 10 evangelical Christian youth no longer believe in truth.
Therefore, they struggle with finding the right guidelines for life.
Families without fathers
Nearly two million children in Canada will go to bed
tonight without saying good night to their fathers because their fathers
don’t live at home. There are over 1.3 million single parent
families, with the majority of them being headed up by moms. The
significant cost of fatherlessness in our culture can never be calculated.
For kids growing up without dads, the impact is tragic. Children growing up
without fathers are five times more likely to commit suicide, seven times
more likely to get pregnant, 15 times more likely to end up in prison, and
24 times more likely to run away from home. Our culture no longer values
fathers the way it once did.
Buying into media
It could easily be argued that the most significant
social institution in the life of our young people is the media. With an
average consumption of over 50 hours a week, the media now speaks loudly in
a place where once only the voices of family and the church could be heard.
Media has well established itself as the mentor to a generation of kids
hooked on technology and abandoned by the nuclear family. The media’s
greatest power is to define reality and answer young people’s
questions about life: Is there a God? Is it okay to have oral sex? Can I
have a body like the one I see in magazines? Young people are looking for
answers and in the process their values,attitudes and worldviews are being
shaped by musicians and marketeers who have a very different agenda for
their lives. Most kids have now been reduced to mindless consumers whose
self-image is determined the latest sales at Old Navy and Abercrombie &
Fitch.
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Looking for hope
The number of young people dealing with anxiety and
depression continues to rise. By grade 10, 21 percent of boys and 35
percent of girls reported problems with depression(Trends in the Health of Canadian Youth).
The suicide rate (www.mental health.com) for adolescents has increased more
than 200 percent over the last decade. Growing up in a time that they feel
has unprecedented danger (West Nile disease, SARS, HIV, mad cow, drive-by
shootings, kidnappings and terrorism, to name but a few) has resulted in
many kids hungering for hope. You see their sense of hopelessness displayed
in all kinds of risky behaviours such as choking games, cutting,
huffing, body piercing, building jumping, gang behaviours, street racing
and promiscuity where at least for a few moments they feel alive. Many kids
are looking to experience things in an extreme way because they have lost
respect for themselves. Some have lost their sense of who they are, and
along the way lost their sense of hope as well.
Seeking spirituality
This may well be the most spiritual generation in
history thanks to the amount of information available to teens. The
spiritual smorgasbord now includes reincarnation, numerology, psychic
readings, palmistry, witchcraft, Eastern mysticism, New Age, Kabbalah,
native spiritualism, horoscopes, psychic telecommunications, world
religion, and Christianity. Many kids today pick and choose a little of
this and a little of that to formulate their own personalized postmodern
spirituality. However, most are looking for an answer to the emptiness
inside that hasn’t been filled by the glitter and glitz offered by
the world.
Paul Robertson is the youth culture specialist as well
as the director of church, school and family resources for Youth Unlimited
(Toronto YFC). His ‘Understanding Today’s Youth’ seminars
have been presented to social workers, professional groups, civic leaders,
parents, educators, pastors and youth workers.
Options Spring 2008
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