On getting off my lawn
Wed Sep 24, 00:04 | OnI understand that my abstaining from normal youth culture (drinking, smoking, drugs, casual dating – you know, all the horrible acts our parents cautioned us against when we were twelve but magically became okay or even encouraged when we reached a random age) isn’t very normal. What no one else seems to understand is that one just masks the sweetest aspects of life when one is under the influence of the above.
Straight edge is a funny clique. What I and others often get ridiculed for became a punk subculture when someone decided to put Xes on their hands to differentiate themselves. Again, fashion makes things “cool.” Straight edge is nice in that it starts encouraging youth to live life more fully, but it’s sad that it actually has to be designated.
It makes me really sad to see people I went to high school with doing nothing with their lives but partying and drinking and picking very stupid life choices. Worse yet is the fact that their parents still believe their children are good children – or even praise them for their bad (“free-spirited”) behaviour.
These are the ones whose parents pay for a house so they can have horrible drunk bashes and smoke marijuana. These are the ones whose parents pay for an education so they can major in theatre or philosophy. These are the ones who are going to school to go to school rather than to learn.
I can’t even listen to high school students’ conversations on the bus anymore. They joke about how a teacher refuses to fail anyone so they always get to pass, how they didn’t have any fun during the summer (“I worked like 10 hours a week and like went to Calgary and go-karting, like I didn’t do like anything”), credit card debts of their parents they’ve racked up… it’s depressing.
It’s hard to have a positive outlook on the future knowing that very very few people my age actually know how to work. I won’t say “everyone younger than me is awful” – I admit that people my age are just as terrible as the younger ones.
There seems to be this significant gap in manners, discipline, focus, and overall social value between people three years older than me and my age and lower. It’s always been there, so it’s not just a maturation thing. I respect my older friends much more quickly.
I’d like to see a push toward young adults being more severely punished for destructive or worthless acts. Sadly, a lack of discipline is what helped get them to this state, and I don’t think there’s much that can be done to fix them.
All the small things Skype me, unless your name is Haithem and it's 5:45 AM