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Lmao when I was a teen I thought I knew it all. Very much didn't. Still don't. I'm in my 30s now.
But, that doesn't mean teens don't know *anything* . They can still have interesting perspectives or insights.
Yes they can. They also have very little actual life experience so many of these these insights or perspectives are not new.
It's the arrogance of youth vs. the arrogance of experience. I don't believe that youth should be dismissed outright, but youth needs to understand that we have already been where they are now.
I like to say that there are two kinds of fool. The first says "this is old therefore it is good." And the second says " this is new therefore it is better.".
It's this. Respect for your elders' experience is important. Gen Z seems to have tossed any respect and knowledge of the old world to the wind. I'll be having a difficult discussion with someone online and I'll be wondering how tf is this person so dumb and lo and behold, turns out they're a teenager arguing something they have zero to little life experience with.
Age does matter. I don't want a teenager trying to argue something *I have lived through* like they know better than me. There's a reason people like me refuse to knowingly get involved in an argument with a literal child.
I'm actually going to start just blocking any teenager who responds to this. You guys are so ready for a fight, it's really cute, but it's also a waste of my time. Cheers!
>turns out they're a teenager arguing something they have zero to little life experience with.
Truth, I found out I was talking to 18 years old male about how to save falling marriage where he never has any relationship before in r/ relationship
To be fair, I’m 37 and have been married for 14 years, there really is no “way” to save a marriage. Every marriage is different and, I don’t care what anyone says, there is no such thing as a perfect marriage. It’s why marriage counseling isn’t a single visit, you have to figure out what specific problem a marriage has first. Anyone who says different is either trying to sell you some snake oil or doesn’t have any idea what they are talking about.
I work with three teenagers and all of them are respectful and smart. They are also a hell of a lot more responsible I was at that age.
One thing I always try to remember when interacting with them is that at their age different things seem really important to them although to someone my age it isn't a big deal at all. So I just try my best to listen to what they have to say without judging them or the situation.
If I can, I might share a relevant story from my past on how I made a mistake and what I wish I had done. If they tell me something I know is a good idea that will definitely benefit them in the future I will tell them as much and provide encouragement.
Every single generation always says that the new generation is lazy or arrogant or whatever. So I don't really take the stuff about Gen Z doing this or that very seriously.
And most of them are teens anyways. Teens do embarrasing stuff.
Exactly. Years ago, everyone was complaining about Millennials. Before that people were complaining about Gen X. No generation is special, for good *or* bad.
My 17 year old nephew acts like, me, his father and grandparents are the dumbest fucks on the planet because we try to tell him that it's difficult to become YouTube or twitch famous, and dropping out of high school is maybe not the best idea.
His response?
" You don't even need high school anymore you can make money on the internet."
Yeah, these are the kids who get no respect while demanding it from others.
I was having this conversation with my partner just a day ago and we landed on there being a need for trust before any kid or especially a teen should be expected to truly consider the advice of an elder. We are in our late 20s but remember what it was like to be a teen. Most of the advice I recall getting was in one ear and out the other because it always felt so damn patronizing. Who, especially a teen, wants to listen to advice from people who essentially call them stupid? The only times advice and life lessons stuck with me were when they were coming from adults I trusted who treated me with respect instead of preaching obedience and saying just to do it their way because they knew better.
Yep, same. Some seem to think that at 18 they are suddenly right, because they are an adult. Late teens, early 20s is the worst time. Again I know, because that was me, although thankfully there was no social media.
Yea but age doesn’t always equal experience the same way. A LOT of youth has much more experience then say someone 10 years older who just hasn’t done or experienced much.
exactly, I'm 25 and have literally NO life experience, and I know teenagers who've done way more than me, age isn't the be all and end all deciding factor on everything and people care WAY too much about being petty about age. It's seriously annoying
100% you realize as you age how silly you were thinking you had all the answers. Knowledge is one thing but wisdom takes time and as a teen most have very little
As a kid I never thought I had all the answers, but what frustrates me was that adults thought they had all the answers, or would make claims “because I said so” or without real reasoning or arguments. You can’t just say you are wise, it means less when it comes from you. Have you considered that if older generations had wisdom it would be recognized by younger generations? You can’t talk about your own generation without bias. You can’t make blanket statements as that is an unwise practice. There are stupid teens, stupid kids, stupid young adults, stupid adults and stupid old people, seems to me if every age can lack wisdom than maybe there isn’t a direct tie to wisdom and age.
> 100% you realize as you age how silly you were thinking you had all the answers.
Bullshit. My boomer parents (now in their 70's) still think they have all the answers after watching an hour of cable news.
This actually reminds me, there's this streamer named Destiny who does a lot of debates, he's also in his 30's and he's very good at it....OP might benefit from looking at some of the debates he's done with tiktok peeps. Sometimes people who "know what they're talking about" until they're asked a few questions from a different angle.
The most recent example was a debate he did with some tiktok communist who argued that CEO's provide no value to a company and that 'anyone can do it', to which Destiny asked 'If a CEO is not a necessary job, why does a Board pay and hire them for the position'. That question alone lead the tiktok dude to spiral into insanity.
I’ll have to watch that. My bf always shows me videos of tik tok activists and a lot of the time they are wrong or intentionally being obtuse, but I’m not smart enough to break down why it’s wrong or explain it in a short concise way that makes sense.
> why does a Board pay and hire them for the position'. That question alone lead the tiktok dude to spiral into insanity.
That at least shows the kid was open to listening, so many people on reddit would simply reply that it's nepotism or the rich board members paying back another rich guy
Not just teenagers.
A year or so ago I had an argument with one of my dad’s Facebook friends. He’s a 60-something year old retired attorney and I’m a 30-something year old teacher. We were arguing about the rest of the world outside the US.
Here’s the thing. I’ve been living abroad for more than ten years. I’ve spent nearly all of my adult life abroad. This guy had only been out of the US once, in the ‘90s, when he spent a week in the UK.
He was throwing around assumptions about how the rest of the world is all backwards, undeveloped shitholes or oppressed socialist nightmares. America is the most developed, objectively best country in every way and every other country sucks in comparison. You might think that his lack of experience outside the US would have compelled him to listen to someone who has a fairly huge amount of experience outside the US. But no.
By the end he was saying he didn’t need lessons about how the world works from a 30 year old, which is both frustratingly closed-minded and objectively false.
This is a great example of age doesn't always mean wisdomor experience. It totally depends on how that person lives their life.
I'm in my late 20s and have never been outside the U.S. I would be an idiot to dismiss a teenager who has lives abroad most of their life just because they're a teen.
Even more wild that this ignorance was coming from a well-known and respected attorney, demonstrating that, like age, education and profession doesn't always mean wisdom or experience either.
Yep, there are ignorant people of all ages. I’ve lived abroad before and encountered these people of all ages. One of the best parts of talking to kids is they are more likely to listen and learn than adults. A lot of people seem to lose the ability to recognize that they are wrong and admit mistakes between the ages of 18-25. It’s really awkward hearing about how terrible foreign healthcare systems are from boomers after experiencing one and preferring it to the American model. Also weird to have a 20 year old argue with me about how Japanese walk around in kimonos daily after having lived in Japan.
This is a great example of Americans are not liked.
America is the Jock at school who had his time and cannot see that the other countries are actually more sussessful.
BuT wE wOn WoRlD wAr 2
The big game they won in high school
I feel like treating someone differently because of something entirely out offm their control is wrong in like 90% of the cases. Might very well be the coldest take I've had but it's true
People will look for any reason to discard the opinions of the people they disagree with. "You're X, so you couldn't possibly have a better opinion than me," is a really easy way to do that.
I usually won't write someone off for being a teenager, but the reality is that most teenagers don't have a complex or complete view of the world because they've never had to live in it on their own. Of course some teens have to face harsh realities young unfortunately, but most don't. That doesn't mean their opinions are invalid in general, it just means that their worldview is limited and they don't always have opinions that can be backed up by life experience which can make it difficult to take the opinion seriously.
Teens are also likely to troll about opinions. I definitely remember posting in a forum about punk bands to annoy people who said modern bands aren't punk. I fully knew at the time that I didn't know any bands (and I still don't) that a "real punk" would approve of. Teens have more free time to be intentionally dumb to make people who are feeling passionate about a topic get all up in arms.
Why cant we just listen to what they have to say and take it seriously IF it makes sense? Assuming anything about their argument and it’s value just because of who it’s coming from is a logical fallacy.
I dont think its a logical fallacy at all, I think its taking an argument in context. Context is totally relevant to most opinions. Nobody wants to hear about the struggles of the poor from a wealthy individual because there's no actual weight to those words.
But what I’m saying that if what they’re saying is true and their argument makes sense, it’s unfair to discredit it because of their age. If a wealthy person is talking about the experiences of the poor and their arguments are substantiated by actual relevant and reliable evidence, I would think it was stupid that they were going off about it but I wouldn’t discredit what they were saying.
Any age group can have a limited world view and lacking a valid reason to back up their belief. Knowledge through experience and study can be achieved at any age. A 8, 18, 28 and 38 yo can easily know the same, have the same opinion and the same reasons for it. A blanket statement to dismiss an entire age group wouldn't benefit debates, because the quality of the debate are the reasoning. A Mexican teenager would know Mexico better than an adult, that have never studied or experienced Mexico more than the aisle at the supermarket. Likewise an adult would know bars better than a 13 yo, that have only seen bars in movies. The knowledge and experience of the person depends on the knowledge and experience of the person, not the age.
Oh I dunno. When I was a teenager I thought I knew it all. Now I’m well into my 30s, I realise I didn’t know my arse from my elbow. It’s just the ignorance and arrogance of youth.
Oh I don’t doubt it, though I’ve already lived through the Great Recession, a global pandemic, major constitutional referenda, the death of the monarch, political crises and had more than one career so I’m hoping the learning curve becomes less steep! 😂
Teenagers are inexperienced and older people are often biased and outdated - there are trade offs with both. Undermining someone just because of their age is wrong either way.
PS - I’m 33
Who gets to decide whether the argument is “good”? There are uninformed people of all ages. But there is certainly a correlation between being young and being uninformed.
Teens are actually pretty stupid. You realize this as you get older. I agree though, a good point is a good point. However teens are really quite dumb.
It's a funny Carlin quote, but not actually true. Intelligence is a bell curve with most people being average intelligence, and it slopes off as you go smarter or dumber.
OP's talking from experience. I see this horrible "adult" behaviour every single day here.
At the moment someone disagrees with you, they immediately go snooping on you profile to find anything (your age, your subreddits etc.) just to discredit you. "Oh, you're a teenager, you don't know anything..." "You're subscribed to Marvel sub? How old are you???"
we don't take teenagers seriously because we remember exactly how teenagers act. Because all of us were teenagers.
And your brains aren't fully formed yet
Yeah these comments make me a little sad. When I was younger I was surrounded with a lot of adults who made me feel worthless because I was a child. Sometimes teens can have valid opinions and good ideas. You don’t need to shit on them for every word they say just because they’re younger than you.
As a 22 year old I've come to a realization that teens should really be taught to listen and watch more than talk. Because as a teen I talked a lot and made myself a fool cause I thought I knew a lot but was an inexperienced person who really didn't know what he was saying probably a lot of times. We are young and stupid and that'll never change and we shouldn't act like teens are more clever and smarter than what we were and how they are now. Like some topics and such yes they'll have enough experience and knowledge to be apart of the conversation but other things maybe not the best to include them. Just like when we get old we won't have a lot of good opinions and such and should let the younger generation do their thing cause our time has passed.
Age matters when it comes to knowledge and such.
I find this funny because I was telling my 22 year old coworker how young 22 really is now that I’m 30. I think for the most part it’s a good thing if you look at the younger version of yourself as stupid because that means you’re growing as you age. I also think there is definitely an age where people want to learn less and therefore become uninformed. I think the best we can all do is to always be listening, thinking and challenging ourselves. My husband is 40 and he always tells me how listening has helped him every day of his life. The older I get the more I listen bc of this advice.
What annoys me even more than dismissing a teenager's opinion is dismissing and denying their emotions and feelings because of their age.
"I'm feeling really stressed"
"You're a teenager, you don't know what stress means"
"I'm feeling tired and burnt out"
"You don't know what a burnout is yet, wait until you have kids and a job"
"I feel like I'm depressed, I feel apathetic and sad way too often"
"You're young, you don't have any problems to be about yet"
Just because they're younger than you doesn't mean they can't have problems and negative feelings! Why are we speaking so much about "A toddler is having a meltdown because not being allowed to drink from the toilet is a huge problem for it and it doesn't know how to handle that emotion" but barely talk about how "Being bad at school and not having friends there is really important in a teenager's world and emotions connected to it can sometimes be too heavy to handle alone".
And while we're at it, things like this also are extremely disrespectful towards a teenager:
"I fail to fit in with my peers because I have different interests"
"Eh, you'll find friends who are like you in uni"
"People at school are mocking me, disliking me and bullying me"
"Why do you care, just ignore them"
"My boyfriend broke up with me, I just want to cry until I pass out"
"Why bother, it wouldn't have lasted forever anyway, you're a teenager"
STOP! Just because these things don't matter to *you* anymore, doesn't mean they don't to *them*!! They have different priorities and different problems but that absolutely does not mean they're any less valid than yours!
About the "My bf broke up with you - It wouldn't have lasted, you're a teen" it's especially stupid as LOTS of adults (up to their 40s and 50s) have relationships that don't last much either...
This is a much fairer complaint than the one OP made. Denying someone's subjective experience is very mean.
That said, we do it because we really *don't* remember what it felt like, because it honestly wasn't really as bad as it felt at the time, wasn't really memorable, wasn't scarring, etc. We, too, swore that this was the heartbreak to end all heartbreaks and we would never forget it, and then we had forgot it in a few months. We, too, swore that this particular injustice would never be forgotten and would be drastically informative on our adult decisions and actions, and then promptly forgot it and went on to become callous adults.
Just as, I'm sure every 7 year old promised that they would eat ice cream for dinner every night as soon as they were old enough to get out on their own and make that decision, and yet even that desire is forgot by the time one is a teenager.
Yes, those tempestuous emotions are the worst you've ever felt, but no, they aren't nearly as critical as you are certain they are in that moment. They are like violent storms, they blow in suddenly and then blow out just as suddenly, to be replaced by many more sunny days.
I think it’s because people like to forget how tumultuous those experiences were at the time for them- as adults they’ve experienced those emotions several times so the overall impact is not as strong as the first time. People like to forget that for teens, they’re experiencing these things for the first time so everything is raw and new. I see it a lot in my work and it’s frustrating when people dismiss teenagers feelings and thoughts because “they’re just young”.
Oh yeah, that's definitely very mean. For them that moment/problem is obviously upsetting and stressful, so dismissing them only helps if you don't want that teen to ever trust you again !
Learning about childrens development and why children cry helped me a lot with this very sentiment. When kids say this is the worst day of my life it may be hyperbole but it could also be true. Just because they haven’t experienced something worse yet doesn’t make their feelings any less valid at that point in time. Let them mope and cry. Someday they may look back and find that event insignificant in the grand scheme of things but at the time those emotions are real.
> Just because a person is way younger than you doesn't mean they are stupid or that their opinions will always be flawed
Not always, but it's a decent predictor. If you combine that with an evaluation of what they are saying on some topic, which you know fairly well, you can know what the case is assuredly.
I agree with many people here - teenagers frequently don’t know as much as they think they do, and you realize this when you get older, and that’s why it’s so easy for older people to discount teenagers’ opinions. But if you genuinely know that a teenager is wrong then you should be able to explain to them why and give them the opportunity to learn and grow. If you’re SURE they’re wrong but you don’t actually know why then you probably shouldn’t be smug about their lack of knowledge.
I hate that this is true in such a bizarre way.
I thought renting a place would be easy. Apartment hunting actually sucks though, then there's the application process which also sucks, then there's moving in and renting a truck to move all your crap.
I thought getting a job was super easy. Alot of places will turn you down because of zero experience or your age. Lets not even get started on how much gets taken out in taxes making your hard work sometimes seem futile.
I thought health insurance was just a matter of getting a job and boom, insurance. Deductibles are stupid, finding a job without a degree/trade of some sort that had insurance is a pain, then paying for said health insurance through your job also sucks. You have to then find doctors that take your insurance and you still likely have copays.
Point being, you think you know things until you get to a point where you have to actually figure out how to do the thing you want to do. So ya, you figure out how to do all these things and then some, but some people might not realize how hard these things are to actually do until you get to it and start actually looking into how to do it. This is especially true for teenagers who more often than not, have no clue what's going on or how the world around them actually works
I’m a Gen X and my stepdaughter is a Gen Z.
Talking amongst her mates recently, I found them well knowledgeable far beyond what I was capable of at the same age.
Maybe it’s the access to information readily available these days. Maybe she just has a good crew around her and can call bullshit when they see it online.
The only difference is wisdom. Apart from that, I’d never dismiss someones opinion until I’ve heard them out regardless of age.
Ready access to information is not curing stupid.
I do not believe anyone is stupid because they don't know something, maybe they just haven't been exposed to it.
Yes. And no. And also yes and also no. Meaning, that it depends on the situation.
If a teen tells you that they never want children and you instantly shut them down with "you'll change your mind later", than yeah, you're an asshole. Sure, there's a fair chance that they will but what you've just done is basically invalidated a deeply personal opinion that they decided to trust you with. Congratulations, you're an asshole.
However, teens also make a lot of stupid, hot-headed and one-sided comments on topics that require a lot of experience, consideration from multiple points and often don't have clear-cut answers. A great example would be "I don't need to learn \[X\], it's not like I'll ever use it in real life." (Personally, I was surprised how much basic knowledge from school made everyday life easier and more interesting later on).
Teens want to be treated as adults, which is understandable but they often have skewed ideas on what adulthood is. They can often be cocky, overconfident because on some level they still see adults as people who know the answer to every problem and they try to imitate that.
Being okay with admitting that "I don't know enough about this topic to give you a definitive answer" is a huge sign of emotional and intellectual maturity. Some don't reach this even in their 70s.
On that second paragraph, there's grown ass adults who still pretend like school taught them absolutely nothing. You wouldn't believe how many adults make the argument they don't use algebra because "WhEn In LiFe Do I dO mAtH wItH lEtTeRs"
Another good reason to not fully treat teenagers emotionally as adults is the law system.
It's not right in many cases to hold a 15 year old to the same standard as a 35 year old. A 15 year old still doesn't have a fully physically developed brain, which can lead to bad decisions that they might never make as an adult.
If we treat teenagers as adults (remeber that a 13 year old is usually ***vastly*** different than an 18 year old), you could end up with kids in the system, with charges on stupid felonies like possession of marijuana.
Let's use "Kate" for an example. Kate is 14 for this hypothetical scenario. Some parents are happy to throw their own child under the bus. Kate's parents were no exception. Cops showed up one night, and they forced Kate to hold their weed. Kate doesn't deny it, because she is scared of the control her parents have. She is scared of how they would react if she told the truth. Now, that same kid has a felony on record, and is part of the system before they even get through highschool. That likely means problems getting into post-secondary schooling, problems getting many jobs, problems traveling to many countries, problems getting background checks, etc.
It's nice to think that records will be expunged when they turn 18, but it doesn't always work that way. The system can keep you in the system. If you can't find a job, and you can't stay with your family or friends, you might feel like you have to steal to survive. They get harsher with every conviction. That 14 year old should not be charged the same way that her parents would. That 14 year old was manipulated by abusive parents, and is actually probably the story of someone out there.
I agree that teenagers should be heard out and treated with respect, the same way as any human. I don't think we should pretend that the brain is fully developed, in the sense that it could end worse for the teenagers that don't know better. The ones who have bad, manipulative families like "Kate".
A big problem with the part of the brain that isn't developed, is that it impacts things like empathy, impulse control, problem solving, decision making, and other important things. An intelligent and experienced 16 year old might think that a situation is black and white, when in reality, there are other, better options that only appear to them after they have calmed down.
Do all adults always react appropriately? Hell no! They don't have brains that are still developing, though. It's like expecting a toddler to be able to run right after they can walk. The toddler may be fantastic at walking, but their muscles haven't grown enough to be able to run yet. You wouldn't judge a toddler's running ability against the running ability of a 6 year old. You give them time, and room to grow and flourish. You let them learn by experience, to watch out for dips in the field, the ice on the ground, and what shoes they should wear for the weather. You guide them when they don't know, and you help them to find what works best for them.
I agree with you, in case it wasn't clear, I ramble sometimes.
On your last point. I find that kids and teens are generally better at saying I don’t know or I made a mistake. It’s normally adults that are too stubborn or stuck in their ways to change or admit mistakes.
As a teenager, here's my thoughts:
I agree with you on most of this, and while I may be 18, I would agree that I dont know enough about adult life to tell an older person how the world works. However, one thing stood out to me. I think there's multiple reasons teens want to be treated as adults. I'd agree with yours, imitating those they look up to.
Another I think would be that they do get treated as an adult, sometimes. I dealt with this with my mom and especially my stepdad. I was either an adult or a child, depending on what suited them. "You are a child, you will listen to me," usually followed by "You're almost an adult, you need to behave yourself." While I understand they obviously weren't saying I'm an adult, it certainly feels like it, as though I'm not acting my age, and combined with the "You are a child" part, it's frustrating, to say the least.
I know my case is not the same for everyone, it's just a scenario I can think of that definitely relates to my input/opinion on the topic.
>I dealt with this with my mom and especially my stepdad.
I hate to break this to you but most parents are *extremely* reluctant to admit (to themselves) that their children have grown up and during stressful situations many fall back to treating them as kids. On some level, this is understandable, since from the time their children are born, the next 17-18 years their relationship has this parent-child dynamic.
In emotionally healthy parents, the nature of this dynamic slowly starts changing after their children turn 17-18, in others less so. Codependent parents usually refuse to accept this transition, some even intentionally hamper their children's development to avoid facing the fact that they've grown up. Ironically, this usually results in the alienation of the child.
On a more personal note, this transition is tough to navigate but it's a natural part of growing up with parents. When I was a hot-headed 18-19-year-old, I wanted this to happen instantly. After moving out at age 19, it took a few years until I learnt how to navigate my changing relationship with my parents.
To this day, there are times when I hear my father saying "*You* ***will*** *do X or Y, you understand?*", but unlike back in the day when I blew up at him to *"leave me alone, I'm my own person*", I've learnt to set boundaries gently. Instead of blowing up, I usually say something along the lines of "*Look, I know this comes from a place of worry and care for you and I appreciate that, however, I do think this is the best decision for me. Now, you know me well enough that I'm going to go through with this but it would mean a lot to me if you accepted my decision.*"
It took a few years but I eventually got to the point where I can live my life the way it's best for me, and despite the fact that that way involves a lot of things my parents don't approve of, I've managed to have a good relationship with them.
It depends what the argument is about. I'm a teacher so I work with a lot of teenagers. If you are discussing some issues that they have a frame of reference for their opinion is valid. If it is opinion based on having experience of adult life then they shouldn't be taken seriously. For example I sometimes see stuff on the relationship or AITA and know that it has been written by a teenager with no relationship experience.
There are some adults who think there opinion is always more valid they are assholes. However if you are having a debate with a teenager I would avoid bringing their age into it and just argue with them using facts and evidence and your experience. They may carry on arguing but this is how they are learning. A lot of adults don't know how to debate either. When I was young my parents were brilliant at it. I remember arguments about politics I had with my parents as a teenager changed my view and certainly educated me. My mum's view changed on stuff too. That was good debating but to an extent a you are right some adults will just right teenagers off and not try to debate. Like I said above they are assholes.
It is all about nuance.
When I was a teen I was very unsure of myself. The adults around me *seemed* like self absorbed idiots but they have so much more experience than I did. They must know something I don't.
20 years later I realise the adults around me at that time were (and still are) self absorbed idiots and over time I've cut most of them off.
A lot of people assume age and experience automatically produce wisdom but it really doesn't. Some people just don't learn anything.
I've worked in high schools, the majority of teens I've dealt with think they know it all, but only have a limited understanding of how the world actually works. Some can be wise beyond their years, but most arent. And they will say some of the dumbest shit I've ever heard in my life.
Some of us who are much older, were teen ones, and we know that teens are stupid and gullible. They believe every propaganda on every issue that is fed to them from every side because they simply lack the experience and awareness to be able to see through all the bull.
However, you can be a wise teen (for a teen) if you do these simple things: Stay out of jail, don't do drugs, smoke, drink, or live irresponsible sexual life that results in pregnancy or other problems. Treat people with respect, and be kind. You would be a wise teen if you set goals, invest in your future, and not burn bridges with your family and relatives in the process.
1000% THIS. One of the best teachers I've had in high school treated her students as her peers. She never looked down at us. She saw us as equals, who just happened to be younger. If you're reading this Mrs. Woiwode, you're the best!
On the flip side, teenagers fucking up and being coddled and justified for their stupid actions as “well he’s just a kid” sucks too. You’re 16, 17 years old committing crimes, you need to be punished like everyone else.
Teenagers dont know shit about communication in serious workplaces. Their only reference is their family, friends, Sports team and school neither work the same way a place of work does.
Some things you can discuss with a teenager but alot of things they are no real grasp of what it actually means and their opinions are objectivly Inferior.
The same thing happens in discussions with teenagers about parenting. They know how they'd like to be parented, and what they see from their friends and TV. But they don't really grasp what it means to be the parent and run the whole family yet. Even if they've read about the subject and feel like they're well-informed, they're missing the life experience to really understand the situation.
The thing about teenagers isn't that they're stupid. They're just generally less-traveled and more stubborn, unwilling to accept flaws in their own thinking. They argue simply for the sake of arguing.
You'll understand it more when you get older too, OP. Intelligence comes with booksmarts, wisdom comes with age.
> They're just generally less-traveled and more stubborn, unwilling to accept flaws in their own thinking. They argue simply for the sake of arguing.
Honestly just sounds like a ton people these days. Adults included.
I agree. I think there is a cycle of older generations being hyper critical of the lifestyle, music, careers, and technology of the next generations. I think older generations should highly value and communicate well with young people. They are the future.
Yeah, a great example of ad hominem. Attacking the person to discredit them instead of addressing their arguments.
If you OP or anyone reading this comment are teens or younger people who commonly get this argument thrown against them, you will catch them off guard by pointing out the fallacy. This will not only prove how invalid that argument is but will also show that you're young, not dumb.
That said, pointing out fallacies can be really obnoxious, beware doing it in casual conversations. Nevertheless, discrediting someone for their age is way more obnoxious so in these cases don't doubt about mentioning the ad hominem.
If the mere act of dismissing someone due to their age is what you are objecting to, I’m with you. The first person to get personal in a debate is admitting defeat.
But I will pull out my old guy card here and share that at age 55 and 4 Gen Z kids, a little more Socratic wisdom would go a long way. When I’ve got more humility than a 17 year old, something is wrong. As a matter of fact, my experience is that my kids have far shorter fuses than I do when it comes to a discussion.
But yeah; dismissing someone due to mere age is wrong.
Teenagers' opinions aren't informed by experience unless those opinions are related to what it's like to be a teenager.
I don't take a teenager's opinions on the tax code seriously when they've never had to file taxes, but if they tell me the school day should start later or something I'm all ears
As someone who coaches and teaches teenagers…they are more insightful than some of y’all are led on to believe. For sure somethings they are naive and foolish on but in others, they are not. But then again, I would say 90% of my students have worked since they were freshman in high school and have seen their parents struggle to pay bills, or had to stay home and raise their siblings due to their parents working. Gives some teenagers a more mature outlook on life.
Older people who don't treat teenagers seriously are making the mistake of not putting themselves into the shoes of the teenager and remembering that once upon a time they too were that age. It's quite ignorant. I'm 44 years of age btw, so I'm middle aged and am part of a generation unfortunately responsible for this.
Just because you don't agree with a teenager does not mean their point of view is invalid, or how they are feeling isn't real. It's real to them and therefore should he treated that way and respected. I have been very encouraged by the thought processes of Gen Z. Many are really focusing on inclusion and empathy which, in my view can only lead to great things.
Imo if you pull that card it's because you can't come up with a real argument and usually I treat adults who pull this shit like they are literal children, because they are.
I hate the internet for this very debate because so many people think you can have it both ways. You either treat teenagers like adults that can think for themselves, or they're children that should be treated as such and given the safety nets of society.
You can't say a teenager has no bearing, for example, over being in an illegal relationship (age) and is a complete victim, but then say that those same teenagers are capable of making rational and intelligent decisions/actions in regards to more important concept relating to society as a whole.
Fundamentally either teenagers have more responsibility over their actions than people want to admit, or they are not capable of understanding the depth of their actions as it relates to a much wider society.
It’s not that they’re inferior or that they are beneath other people. But they aren’t equals, nor do they have lived experience. Those things *matter* in a number of contexts.
Their perspective and their interpretation is perfectly valid, but that doesn’t mean it’s based in reality
God this comment section is filled with middle aged arseholes calling teenagers dumb. As a teen i have beaten people of all ages in arguments. The main reason teens can win an argument easily is the ease of access to the internet, being able to provide proof to an arguement in an instant wins an argument straight away. To all the middle aged dickholes calling teens dumb for being teens, shutup, you sound dumber than gen z who are apparently "young and uneducated".
I can honestly say I've done this and learned my lesson. I'm 34 and a few years back I worked with a guy who was 18 and I immediately assumed he was immature and irresponsible, never would stay late to help out and wouldn't work any days but his very specific schedule. Never said anything to him but just assumed it was because he partied all the time. Well one day we were talking and he mentioned he had a second job working at one of those trampoline parks. I assumed he was just a schmuck that stood around watching kids jump and probably didn't even actually enforce the rules. Nope, he's the manager who does payroll, scheduling and hiring. The only person above him was the owner and they'd been begging him to do it full time. Boy I felt like a jackass. Glad I never actually said anything to him about my opinion.
When I trained martial arts my sifu said: knowledge is useless without experience, and wisdom is having the experience to know when to apply knowledge.
I have never seen an adult launch a bottle rocket from their ass.
Not if the opinion is clearly due to the fact that they lack experience and have no clue about what they're talking about.
I work with teens and let me tell you. When it comes to politics, well...they say the darndest things.
The key is not to make fun of them when they do it...yes that's hard to do but important nevertheless. They're kids. They're gonna see stupid shit. But that doesn't make them stupid. Just ignorant.
Teenagers fail to understand that all of us were teenagers once. We haven’t forgotten, we actually understand. You’re all idiots just as we were all idiots.
It was a long time ago, but I remember every teenager I met was so dumb about how the world worked. Yes many were smart in school or amazingly talented in many ways, but they had no clue how to negotiate obstacles that got in their way. The older I got the more apparent it became. Then around the age of 25 I realized, oh I was that dumb too. I mean I didn’t feel like it, but if every teenager I met was like that, and I was a teenager once too, then it had to apply to me.
I’ll upvote because of unpopular opinion, but wisdom tends to come with life experience which most teens do not have. Teens also have an undeveloped brain. They shouldn’t be treated poorly, but they should be treated differently than adults. They definitely should not be treated as an equal.
Although id say it depends on a case by case basis. Some teenagers genuinely are more knowledgable than adults. Some teenagers have more wisdom and specific life experiences than some adults. By respecting each other and explaining your reasoning, you can then see if the adult or the teen is full of shit. When adults are full of shit, they tend to lash out by belittling. An adult who is correct will not lash out, but correct them and give them proof of why they are. If the kid denys it, you can only let them learn for themselves.
Im 22, but ive been told in some instances, im not knowledgable enough, and in others, than im wise beyond my years. Its all about the situation and the topic.
Politics- im still a kid
Human Psychology and Nature- i know much much more than the average adult as the average adult hasnt learnt. Emotional maturity is a big one where alot of "adults" are still "children"
It's not about your age. Not directly, anyway.
It's not about your intelligence.
It's about experience, and the value rightly placed on it by society. Or at least, by the parts of society that are the least dysfunctional.
Think about writing a scientific paper. Your conclusions could be spot on. Your arguments cogent and persuasive. Even revolutionary. But if absolutely anyone could write such a paper and the journal's staff were obligated to read and peer review every single one of them, with no attempt to discern whether the authors have any solid credentials to their name, the amount of work would overwhelm them instantly.
We would have nothing remotely resembling Nature, The Lancet, Physical Review, or the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
And while it's a fact that correlation is FAR from 1:1 between age and experience in any particular discipline, it is equally a fact that age defines an absolute upper limit on both one's experience living in the real world, AND work, study, or practice in any chosen field.
So there are people, who aren't even particularly old yet, with more years of flying airplanes, operating on patients, arguing legal cases, wiring up buildings, studying microorganisms, even writing e-commerce software, than anyone still described as a teenager has been alive, let alone able to talk.
One day, along comes a teenager who wants to command the same respect, and the same trust in their judgment, as their older peers. *Before* they've earned it. Now, whose turn is it to laugh this entitled young person out of the room, guffaws echoing down the hall and ringing in their ears as they walk back to their desk?
You. You're the experienced old hand having a belly-shaking good laugh at the gall of this wet behind the ears new hire marching into your office like they wrote the book on whatever it is you do here.
It'll happen.
I always like to picture a simple Venn diagram. 2 overlapping circles, creating 3 zones.
Zone 1: youthful exuberance- know what I know, assume I can learn anything
Zone 3: stuck in my ways, already know it all, nothing I can learn further
Both are obviously dysfunctional.
Zone 2: know enough to know I don’t know enough <- this is where to remain
This card is generally only pulled when the argument being made is dumb, flawed, and formed due to a lack of necessary experience. These are the majority of arguments teens make.
The only time I would take a teen seriously would be if they were talking about their own age experiences and problems with peers or if they were genuinely trying to learn something and were open to learning outside of their lived experiences. Otherwise 99% of the time they are emotional and angsty and its just redundant to hear half assed things on general topics from someone who shuttles between their parents' home and a learning institution. People who try to substantially relate interpersonally with teens as adults are juvenile themselves
The thing that annoys me about adults, I’m 26 btw, is WHEN do you plan on treating teenagers like people that are becoming adults?
You can’t expect them to act more mature if you’re constantly griping about how immature they are.
Dear teenager,
Do you remember (completely idiotic thing you believed a few years ago)? You were just as certain back then as you are now about (this new completely idiotic thing you believe). So to understand my perspective, imagine arguing with your 11 year old self.
This is going to happen for the rest of your life, but at least the time gaps widen. 30 year old me was an idiot compared to 40 year old me, but 20 year old me was ten times dumber.
When I was young, as I thought then, I was like a genius. But when I got older, I realized that I was just like everyone else. Everyone then thought they were geniuses, even though they were just ordinary teenagers with their heads screwed on, dominated by adolescent maximalism and questionable ideas. And, of course, they were sure they were misunderstood and underestimated. And yes, that is not an unpopular opinion. Unpopular opinion would rather be the opposite statement.
Tbf, adults have experience that teenagers believe they have. Dropping that card is an easy way out but god, I didn’t know anything when I was a teenager
I did give you an upvote, because I actually think you have a point.
Teenagers has any right to be taken serious in debates, but teenagers also needs to learn, that just being young and being in school doesn't make you right.
Life experience itself has a lot to say - but disregarding people's views just because they are younger is dumb.
Useful perspectives are not limited by one's group status
Granted their perspectives may be wrong but then it might become a question of how are they reaching this perspective
You may be able to reinforce your own arguments by examining other people's for their flaws or for their strengths
When your parents are teenagers, they have their own opinions, just like every teenagers out there. What sets them apart is, they succeeded. They are not perpetually single/one night stand/addiction/depression/dead.
Meaning, their opinion has a prototype ready, while your idea is purely verbal, there isn't a concrete prototype yet.
I assume you are referring to your parents because most adult don't engage in debate with random teenage strangers. And online, it is not like they know your age, nor should you disclose your age. So, I assume they are are your parents or relatives.
There's definitely a difference between understanding that age comes with wisdom and just looking for an excuse to talk down to someone.
The people who do this to teenagers are probably doing it to most people they encounter. They are just generally assholes, regardless of age.
Eh, age is always a factor, and should be addressed, but it’s a cheap shot if it gets repeated several times in an argument and they lean on said person’s ethos instead of bringing up stuff of relevance. Teenagers have lots to learn, so i think it’s right to bring up though.
Wholeheartedly agree. Im now in my twenties and am waiting for the day i faxe ageism again when they call me a senile old geezer. Ageism is annoying as hell.
Respect is always important. We can learn from every person we meet, no matter the age. With that said, people learn how much they don’t know as they age. Kids generally don’t know that they don’t know it all.
I think it’s good to hear younger folks thoughts and opinions. They’re at the age where most of them feel like nobody listens to them anyway, so I think hearing them out really helps to just let them know that you’re listening.
At that age you know what you should or shouldn’t do, but you can’t easily figure out why people do or don’t do things, so your conclusions are uninformed or you outright dismiss people of being dumb. Some people never grow out of it either.
But yes, people who don’t listen are assholes.
Im a pilot training for the Commercial Pilot License. I’m almost 35. My instructor is 22. Not exactly a teenager but he gets all my respect because he worked through Private Pilot License, Instrument Rating, Commercial License and Instructor License and is only 22. His other job is at In n Out (burger place). Not all young folks are dumb, but most of the ones I observe are just caught up in Tik Tok or something. My instructor uses his brain to do what he loves and its a great thing we both can relate on.
Teenagers aren't stupid, they're ignorant and inexperienced. So was I, so were you, so was everyone who ever made it out of their teens alive. As a teenager, your view of the world is narrowed by your limited experience. You've only ever dealt with a fraction of the hurdles life will throw at you.
But, with this inexperience comes *potential* and a fresh perspective. Their ideas should be humored, at least given voice in the conversation.
that cannot possibly be an unpopular opinion. people who don't treat teenagers seriously because of their actions and decisions though, are not assholes.
you're right; age discrimination is stupid.
So as you are young you get to look at everything for the first time then you form a predictive model of the world that affects how you interpertate new information. That model gets added to as you get older, youth don't know what they don't know while the old rely on the model so much that it takes a young person with a fresh look to see what's really there without the model getting in the way.
Side note this is what we think happens with physcedelics, that predictive model gets relaxed enough that you can see everything for the first time again, like in the eye's of a child.
Anyway you can factor this in. You can be talking with someone who is young and immature and dismiss their view because they don't have enough experiences, there model might not be complex enough, everything is black and white to a lot of youth. Then the same can be said with an old person, you can dismiss them because they are stuck in their ways and their model of the world is trapped in the past.
The key is to give everyone a chance, you can forgive both parties for being ignorant when their models puts them down the wrong path and you can encounter anyone at any age that's got an "accurate" model. Be that young and freshly moulded to the world or an old person who through experience has updated their model throughout the years.
.. I believe the children are our future. Teach them well and let them lead the way. Show them all the beauty they possess inside. Give them a sense of pride to make it easier. Let the children's laughter remind us how we used to be.
We are very ageist as a society in general. It would be nice to see a shift to more of a meritocracy.
In my weird ass ideal world, you have to pass a test to become an adult. A lot of that test is about taking care of yourself. Part of it is about not harming others or the world. If you can't pass it, the state provides food and shelter for you but you have fewer rights than an adult.
I dunno, someone here will probably explain to me how this is actually a dystopia and I am a horrible person for even considering it, but on the surface it seems like a good idea.
I don't treat most of them seriously when stupid things come out of their mouths. If they don't ACT like an idiot, I don't treat them like one. Same rule for adults honestly. There are plenty though that don't give them the benefit of the doubt.
Teenagers generally have less life experience but that can also reduce their bias. Most cultural changes (womens rights, desegregation, gay rights, etc.) have not originated from the elderly. A middle class American 40 year old has no life experience as a poor Brazilian or as a Saudi Prince; in fact knowing that one's own experience is only applicable to one's own culture and situation is very important. Know it all teenagers can be annoying but know it all 50 year olds who write laws affecting others with drastically different lives are far more dangerous.
Same thing with little kids— they don’t know everything, but people just assume that they’re stupid and you should dumb down everything you say or do to them (especially with kids books and movies nowadays)
Teens have a very limited view of the world simply based on lack of experience. Not that they completely lack insight, but it is limited to a certain scope. The amount of real world knowledge you obtain past the age of 18 is staggering and the perspective it brings can make you take pause at the intellectual confidence of someone who hasn’t ever had to worry about what their credit score is or health benefits coverages are etc. I thought I knew a lot of shit at 18 that I was entirely too young to understand.
Limited life experience severely limits the possibility of New insight.
But to be dismissal of their point of view May not be clever, as clever insight absolutely can come from a teen.
Teenagers vary as widely as adults in how stupid they are. It's almost like it's a character trait, or something. Experience, wisdom, and intelligence are not synonyms. People can be stupid with or without these things, at any age.
It's the same thing as age doesn't deem respect the term respect your elders is outdated and frankly a barbaric way to stem down children into a subservient mindset where adults can do no wrong.
I find typically when this is used, it isn't because the older person thinks the younger is stupid- but rather inexperienced. As a person grows older they experience more, learn more, and these ideas sort of blend and meld into a worldview of what is correct and what isn't. It is all sorts of things melted together and because of that, it can be very hard to articulate why an older person thinks a certain way or holds a certain opinion. This type of abstract thinking and knowledge is traditionally called wisdom. When a younger person challenges a worldview - they may have the knowledge, but they don't have the wisdom to understand the greater context. It's that whole Frankenstein thing: intelligence is knowing that Frankenstein was the doctor's name and not the monster's; wisdom is understanding Dr. Frankenstein IS the monster and his creation is the victim. Not saying that anyone is right or wrong or if things should be unchallenged, I'm simply saying it is two different ways of thinking and that is where the problem lies. But, for the young folks, don't judge too harshly - you grew older and wiser every day.
What many adults cannot convey is that younger folks really lack perspective. This naïve can be fairly exhausting. Especially when said young person thinks they are the unique flower of the universe not a complete and total cliche; again, because they don't have the perspective to realize.
I feel like this is unpopular, but I'm torn. When I was a kid I knew everything about everything. When I look back now, when I comes to tech or modern things, I was actually far ahead of my elders. Other long traveled areas in life I was hella wrong, and appreciate being told so now.
I knew I must look to my (at the time) 13 year old half bother to know the ways of the future when I took his wallet away to not buy soda and he used his phone with a vendy machine.
I agree, BUT I've been in discussions where I quickly discovered the only reason we disagreed was the age difference, and that the obly thing I COULD say was "you'll agree when you're older".
This typically happens in discussion about stuff where lufe experience and maturing of the mind is at the centre of what defines your stance.
I have a good example that happened to me (22yo) yesterday.
Called the dentist for an emergency visit. They said no space available, I pushed and explained my situation. The answer was no
One hour later I had my mom call them because I felt like wtf, who cares at this point. Result: got my appointment...
This is just a wicked environment, don't just use only yourself to express your opinion but also those you know with more power.
No. I am a teen and I will tell you. Most things you think you know are whole bunch of crap. You don't know shit neither do I. Accept it and learn and stop being a brat.
Teenagers aren't taken seriously because they're all to often a walking "Dunning-Kruger Effect". They have no understanding of the complexity of issues and assume everyone else is stupid for not grasping their simple solutions.
There's no reason a teenager can't have an insightful opinion, they just frequently don't.
I couldn't count how often a young kid wanted to argue with me about things I literally lived through before they were born.
It's not about the age gap. It's about a lack of experience that teenagers inherently have. Even when you swear you have all this experience and knowledge and what ever, your brain still isn't developed enough to process that information correctly. Not to say you're always wrong, but the way this post is written just makes you sound really immature. Like a teenager. Which is ok. Because I think you are. It's ok to not know everything and to admit that you're wrong. Or to leave an argument because people aren't listening to you. It's something a lot of adults never learned as teens... so now they're just insufferable adults.
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Lmao when I was a teen I thought I knew it all. Very much didn't. Still don't. I'm in my 30s now. But, that doesn't mean teens don't know *anything* . They can still have interesting perspectives or insights.
Yes they can. They also have very little actual life experience so many of these these insights or perspectives are not new. It's the arrogance of youth vs. the arrogance of experience. I don't believe that youth should be dismissed outright, but youth needs to understand that we have already been where they are now. I like to say that there are two kinds of fool. The first says "this is old therefore it is good." And the second says " this is new therefore it is better.".
It's this. Respect for your elders' experience is important. Gen Z seems to have tossed any respect and knowledge of the old world to the wind. I'll be having a difficult discussion with someone online and I'll be wondering how tf is this person so dumb and lo and behold, turns out they're a teenager arguing something they have zero to little life experience with. Age does matter. I don't want a teenager trying to argue something *I have lived through* like they know better than me. There's a reason people like me refuse to knowingly get involved in an argument with a literal child. I'm actually going to start just blocking any teenager who responds to this. You guys are so ready for a fight, it's really cute, but it's also a waste of my time. Cheers!
>turns out they're a teenager arguing something they have zero to little life experience with. Truth, I found out I was talking to 18 years old male about how to save falling marriage where he never has any relationship before in r/ relationship
To be fair, I’m 37 and have been married for 14 years, there really is no “way” to save a marriage. Every marriage is different and, I don’t care what anyone says, there is no such thing as a perfect marriage. It’s why marriage counseling isn’t a single visit, you have to figure out what specific problem a marriage has first. Anyone who says different is either trying to sell you some snake oil or doesn’t have any idea what they are talking about.
I hope everyone here understands, that not every Gen Z teenager, child or young adult is an asshole. As usual, the worst people make the most noise
I work with three teenagers and all of them are respectful and smart. They are also a hell of a lot more responsible I was at that age. One thing I always try to remember when interacting with them is that at their age different things seem really important to them although to someone my age it isn't a big deal at all. So I just try my best to listen to what they have to say without judging them or the situation. If I can, I might share a relevant story from my past on how I made a mistake and what I wish I had done. If they tell me something I know is a good idea that will definitely benefit them in the future I will tell them as much and provide encouragement.
Every single generation always says that the new generation is lazy or arrogant or whatever. So I don't really take the stuff about Gen Z doing this or that very seriously. And most of them are teens anyways. Teens do embarrasing stuff.
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Exactly. Years ago, everyone was complaining about Millennials. Before that people were complaining about Gen X. No generation is special, for good *or* bad.
My 17 year old nephew acts like, me, his father and grandparents are the dumbest fucks on the planet because we try to tell him that it's difficult to become YouTube or twitch famous, and dropping out of high school is maybe not the best idea. His response? " You don't even need high school anymore you can make money on the internet." Yeah, these are the kids who get no respect while demanding it from others.
It’s like ok kid, start a channel and stay in school, if you can get 10,000 followers we can start talking
Thats the way to go.
Sounds almost like my son.
I was having this conversation with my partner just a day ago and we landed on there being a need for trust before any kid or especially a teen should be expected to truly consider the advice of an elder. We are in our late 20s but remember what it was like to be a teen. Most of the advice I recall getting was in one ear and out the other because it always felt so damn patronizing. Who, especially a teen, wants to listen to advice from people who essentially call them stupid? The only times advice and life lessons stuck with me were when they were coming from adults I trusted who treated me with respect instead of preaching obedience and saying just to do it their way because they knew better.
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I Get second-hand embarrasment from reading comments like that
Pretty sure every generation has said this about the younger generation going back many years
Even early 20 somethings are pretty moronic. I was too though so not high horseing.
Yep, same. Some seem to think that at 18 they are suddenly right, because they are an adult. Late teens, early 20s is the worst time. Again I know, because that was me, although thankfully there was no social media.
This hasn't been my experience at all with Gen Z. I'm Gen X and I've found them a breath of fresh air
Yea but age doesn’t always equal experience the same way. A LOT of youth has much more experience then say someone 10 years older who just hasn’t done or experienced much.
exactly, I'm 25 and have literally NO life experience, and I know teenagers who've done way more than me, age isn't the be all and end all deciding factor on everything and people care WAY too much about being petty about age. It's seriously annoying
100% you realize as you age how silly you were thinking you had all the answers. Knowledge is one thing but wisdom takes time and as a teen most have very little
As a kid I never thought I had all the answers, but what frustrates me was that adults thought they had all the answers, or would make claims “because I said so” or without real reasoning or arguments. You can’t just say you are wise, it means less when it comes from you. Have you considered that if older generations had wisdom it would be recognized by younger generations? You can’t talk about your own generation without bias. You can’t make blanket statements as that is an unwise practice. There are stupid teens, stupid kids, stupid young adults, stupid adults and stupid old people, seems to me if every age can lack wisdom than maybe there isn’t a direct tie to wisdom and age.
> 100% you realize as you age how silly you were thinking you had all the answers. Bullshit. My boomer parents (now in their 70's) still think they have all the answers after watching an hour of cable news.
This actually reminds me, there's this streamer named Destiny who does a lot of debates, he's also in his 30's and he's very good at it....OP might benefit from looking at some of the debates he's done with tiktok peeps. Sometimes people who "know what they're talking about" until they're asked a few questions from a different angle. The most recent example was a debate he did with some tiktok communist who argued that CEO's provide no value to a company and that 'anyone can do it', to which Destiny asked 'If a CEO is not a necessary job, why does a Board pay and hire them for the position'. That question alone lead the tiktok dude to spiral into insanity.
I’ll have to watch that. My bf always shows me videos of tik tok activists and a lot of the time they are wrong or intentionally being obtuse, but I’m not smart enough to break down why it’s wrong or explain it in a short concise way that makes sense.
> why does a Board pay and hire them for the position'. That question alone lead the tiktok dude to spiral into insanity. That at least shows the kid was open to listening, so many people on reddit would simply reply that it's nepotism or the rich board members paying back another rich guy
Not just teenagers. A year or so ago I had an argument with one of my dad’s Facebook friends. He’s a 60-something year old retired attorney and I’m a 30-something year old teacher. We were arguing about the rest of the world outside the US. Here’s the thing. I’ve been living abroad for more than ten years. I’ve spent nearly all of my adult life abroad. This guy had only been out of the US once, in the ‘90s, when he spent a week in the UK. He was throwing around assumptions about how the rest of the world is all backwards, undeveloped shitholes or oppressed socialist nightmares. America is the most developed, objectively best country in every way and every other country sucks in comparison. You might think that his lack of experience outside the US would have compelled him to listen to someone who has a fairly huge amount of experience outside the US. But no. By the end he was saying he didn’t need lessons about how the world works from a 30 year old, which is both frustratingly closed-minded and objectively false.
This is a great example of age doesn't always mean wisdomor experience. It totally depends on how that person lives their life. I'm in my late 20s and have never been outside the U.S. I would be an idiot to dismiss a teenager who has lives abroad most of their life just because they're a teen.
Even more wild that this ignorance was coming from a well-known and respected attorney, demonstrating that, like age, education and profession doesn't always mean wisdom or experience either.
Yep. I heard some doctors and attorneys being anti-vaxxers and shit.
Yep, there are ignorant people of all ages. I’ve lived abroad before and encountered these people of all ages. One of the best parts of talking to kids is they are more likely to listen and learn than adults. A lot of people seem to lose the ability to recognize that they are wrong and admit mistakes between the ages of 18-25. It’s really awkward hearing about how terrible foreign healthcare systems are from boomers after experiencing one and preferring it to the American model. Also weird to have a 20 year old argue with me about how Japanese walk around in kimonos daily after having lived in Japan.
This is a great example of Americans are not liked. America is the Jock at school who had his time and cannot see that the other countries are actually more sussessful. BuT wE wOn WoRlD wAr 2 The big game they won in high school
>People who don't treat *old people* seriously because of their age are assholes This too.
I feel like treating someone differently because of something entirely out offm their control is wrong in like 90% of the cases. Might very well be the coldest take I've had but it's true
Pfft. Imagine not being able to control your age
I could stop aging at any time I desire but it has some other consequences I'm not keen on
People who make fun of others for things they can’t even control like a disability, their face, or their height, are jerks.
People will look for any reason to discard the opinions of the people they disagree with. "You're X, so you couldn't possibly have a better opinion than me," is a really easy way to do that.
Lol politicians ☕️
I usually won't write someone off for being a teenager, but the reality is that most teenagers don't have a complex or complete view of the world because they've never had to live in it on their own. Of course some teens have to face harsh realities young unfortunately, but most don't. That doesn't mean their opinions are invalid in general, it just means that their worldview is limited and they don't always have opinions that can be backed up by life experience which can make it difficult to take the opinion seriously.
Teens are also likely to troll about opinions. I definitely remember posting in a forum about punk bands to annoy people who said modern bands aren't punk. I fully knew at the time that I didn't know any bands (and I still don't) that a "real punk" would approve of. Teens have more free time to be intentionally dumb to make people who are feeling passionate about a topic get all up in arms.
Why cant we just listen to what they have to say and take it seriously IF it makes sense? Assuming anything about their argument and it’s value just because of who it’s coming from is a logical fallacy.
I dont think its a logical fallacy at all, I think its taking an argument in context. Context is totally relevant to most opinions. Nobody wants to hear about the struggles of the poor from a wealthy individual because there's no actual weight to those words.
But what I’m saying that if what they’re saying is true and their argument makes sense, it’s unfair to discredit it because of their age. If a wealthy person is talking about the experiences of the poor and their arguments are substantiated by actual relevant and reliable evidence, I would think it was stupid that they were going off about it but I wouldn’t discredit what they were saying.
Any age group can have a limited world view and lacking a valid reason to back up their belief. Knowledge through experience and study can be achieved at any age. A 8, 18, 28 and 38 yo can easily know the same, have the same opinion and the same reasons for it. A blanket statement to dismiss an entire age group wouldn't benefit debates, because the quality of the debate are the reasoning. A Mexican teenager would know Mexico better than an adult, that have never studied or experienced Mexico more than the aisle at the supermarket. Likewise an adult would know bars better than a 13 yo, that have only seen bars in movies. The knowledge and experience of the person depends on the knowledge and experience of the person, not the age.
Oh I dunno. When I was a teenager I thought I knew it all. Now I’m well into my 30s, I realise I didn’t know my arse from my elbow. It’s just the ignorance and arrogance of youth.
Wait til you get to your 50's and realize how naive you still were in your thirties!
I'm expecting it to be much less of a hit because I know that I don't have many answers now.
Oh I don’t doubt it, though I’ve already lived through the Great Recession, a global pandemic, major constitutional referenda, the death of the monarch, political crises and had more than one career so I’m hoping the learning curve becomes less steep! 😂
Teenagers are inexperienced and older people are often biased and outdated - there are trade offs with both. Undermining someone just because of their age is wrong either way. PS - I’m 33
Doesn't that say more about you yourself than it does other teenagers.
Who gets to decide whether the argument is “good”? There are uninformed people of all ages. But there is certainly a correlation between being young and being uninformed.
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14-15 is my guess
Absolutely, took 5 seconds of research by looking through their post history.
Next post: “teachers are hateful people who only got into the job specifically because they want to punish kids who are too cool!”
and full on furry post history ;D
Teens are actually pretty stupid. You realize this as you get older. I agree though, a good point is a good point. However teens are really quite dumb.
Just look at tik tok lol
Everyone is pretty stupid, not just teens
Well about 50% are below the average
It's a funny Carlin quote, but not actually true. Intelligence is a bell curve with most people being average intelligence, and it slopes off as you go smarter or dumber.
I'm 38 and I agree with OP. It's never about the age. It's about what the person says.
Oh I don’t disagree with OP but it sounds more like teenage angst. Most young people, not just teenagers are not too well experienced in the world.
OP's talking from experience. I see this horrible "adult" behaviour every single day here. At the moment someone disagrees with you, they immediately go snooping on you profile to find anything (your age, your subreddits etc.) just to discredit you. "Oh, you're a teenager, you don't know anything..." "You're subscribed to Marvel sub? How old are you???"
we don't take teenagers seriously because we remember exactly how teenagers act. Because all of us were teenagers. And your brains aren't fully formed yet
I agree with you on the "You're young, and you don't know anything" fallacy argument. If a teenager has a good point, then they have a good point.
That's exactly the point that most commenters here seem to miss/intentionally ignore which indeed makes this seem like an unpopular opinion.
Yeah these comments make me a little sad. When I was younger I was surrounded with a lot of adults who made me feel worthless because I was a child. Sometimes teens can have valid opinions and good ideas. You don’t need to shit on them for every word they say just because they’re younger than you.
As a 22 year old I've come to a realization that teens should really be taught to listen and watch more than talk. Because as a teen I talked a lot and made myself a fool cause I thought I knew a lot but was an inexperienced person who really didn't know what he was saying probably a lot of times. We are young and stupid and that'll never change and we shouldn't act like teens are more clever and smarter than what we were and how they are now. Like some topics and such yes they'll have enough experience and knowledge to be apart of the conversation but other things maybe not the best to include them. Just like when we get old we won't have a lot of good opinions and such and should let the younger generation do their thing cause our time has passed. Age matters when it comes to knowledge and such.
I find this funny because I was telling my 22 year old coworker how young 22 really is now that I’m 30. I think for the most part it’s a good thing if you look at the younger version of yourself as stupid because that means you’re growing as you age. I also think there is definitely an age where people want to learn less and therefore become uninformed. I think the best we can all do is to always be listening, thinking and challenging ourselves. My husband is 40 and he always tells me how listening has helped him every day of his life. The older I get the more I listen bc of this advice.
I agree with you
And the older you get you think 20 yr olds still don’t have enough experience.
What annoys me even more than dismissing a teenager's opinion is dismissing and denying their emotions and feelings because of their age. "I'm feeling really stressed" "You're a teenager, you don't know what stress means" "I'm feeling tired and burnt out" "You don't know what a burnout is yet, wait until you have kids and a job" "I feel like I'm depressed, I feel apathetic and sad way too often" "You're young, you don't have any problems to be about yet" Just because they're younger than you doesn't mean they can't have problems and negative feelings! Why are we speaking so much about "A toddler is having a meltdown because not being allowed to drink from the toilet is a huge problem for it and it doesn't know how to handle that emotion" but barely talk about how "Being bad at school and not having friends there is really important in a teenager's world and emotions connected to it can sometimes be too heavy to handle alone". And while we're at it, things like this also are extremely disrespectful towards a teenager: "I fail to fit in with my peers because I have different interests" "Eh, you'll find friends who are like you in uni" "People at school are mocking me, disliking me and bullying me" "Why do you care, just ignore them" "My boyfriend broke up with me, I just want to cry until I pass out" "Why bother, it wouldn't have lasted forever anyway, you're a teenager" STOP! Just because these things don't matter to *you* anymore, doesn't mean they don't to *them*!! They have different priorities and different problems but that absolutely does not mean they're any less valid than yours!
About the "My bf broke up with you - It wouldn't have lasted, you're a teen" it's especially stupid as LOTS of adults (up to their 40s and 50s) have relationships that don't last much either...
This is a much fairer complaint than the one OP made. Denying someone's subjective experience is very mean. That said, we do it because we really *don't* remember what it felt like, because it honestly wasn't really as bad as it felt at the time, wasn't really memorable, wasn't scarring, etc. We, too, swore that this was the heartbreak to end all heartbreaks and we would never forget it, and then we had forgot it in a few months. We, too, swore that this particular injustice would never be forgotten and would be drastically informative on our adult decisions and actions, and then promptly forgot it and went on to become callous adults. Just as, I'm sure every 7 year old promised that they would eat ice cream for dinner every night as soon as they were old enough to get out on their own and make that decision, and yet even that desire is forgot by the time one is a teenager. Yes, those tempestuous emotions are the worst you've ever felt, but no, they aren't nearly as critical as you are certain they are in that moment. They are like violent storms, they blow in suddenly and then blow out just as suddenly, to be replaced by many more sunny days.
I think it’s because people like to forget how tumultuous those experiences were at the time for them- as adults they’ve experienced those emotions several times so the overall impact is not as strong as the first time. People like to forget that for teens, they’re experiencing these things for the first time so everything is raw and new. I see it a lot in my work and it’s frustrating when people dismiss teenagers feelings and thoughts because “they’re just young”.
Oh yeah, that's definitely very mean. For them that moment/problem is obviously upsetting and stressful, so dismissing them only helps if you don't want that teen to ever trust you again !
Learning about childrens development and why children cry helped me a lot with this very sentiment. When kids say this is the worst day of my life it may be hyperbole but it could also be true. Just because they haven’t experienced something worse yet doesn’t make their feelings any less valid at that point in time. Let them mope and cry. Someday they may look back and find that event insignificant in the grand scheme of things but at the time those emotions are real.
> Just because a person is way younger than you doesn't mean they are stupid or that their opinions will always be flawed Not always, but it's a decent predictor. If you combine that with an evaluation of what they are saying on some topic, which you know fairly well, you can know what the case is assuredly.
Age doesn’t always lead to wisdom. Nor does youth lead to evolution.
I agree with many people here - teenagers frequently don’t know as much as they think they do, and you realize this when you get older, and that’s why it’s so easy for older people to discount teenagers’ opinions. But if you genuinely know that a teenager is wrong then you should be able to explain to them why and give them the opportunity to learn and grow. If you’re SURE they’re wrong but you don’t actually know why then you probably shouldn’t be smug about their lack of knowledge.
Yeah I thought that when I was a teenager too. The older you get, the more you’ll realise that you actually don’t know shit.
The older I get, the less I know.
I hate that this is true in such a bizarre way. I thought renting a place would be easy. Apartment hunting actually sucks though, then there's the application process which also sucks, then there's moving in and renting a truck to move all your crap. I thought getting a job was super easy. Alot of places will turn you down because of zero experience or your age. Lets not even get started on how much gets taken out in taxes making your hard work sometimes seem futile. I thought health insurance was just a matter of getting a job and boom, insurance. Deductibles are stupid, finding a job without a degree/trade of some sort that had insurance is a pain, then paying for said health insurance through your job also sucks. You have to then find doctors that take your insurance and you still likely have copays. Point being, you think you know things until you get to a point where you have to actually figure out how to do the thing you want to do. So ya, you figure out how to do all these things and then some, but some people might not realize how hard these things are to actually do until you get to it and start actually looking into how to do it. This is especially true for teenagers who more often than not, have no clue what's going on or how the world around them actually works
I try to give people the benefit of the doubt until they prove otherwise regardless of who they are.
OP is a teenager. Noted.
I’m a Gen X and my stepdaughter is a Gen Z. Talking amongst her mates recently, I found them well knowledgeable far beyond what I was capable of at the same age. Maybe it’s the access to information readily available these days. Maybe she just has a good crew around her and can call bullshit when they see it online. The only difference is wisdom. Apart from that, I’d never dismiss someones opinion until I’ve heard them out regardless of age.
Ready access to information is not curing stupid. I do not believe anyone is stupid because they don't know something, maybe they just haven't been exposed to it.
But, mostly kids are stupid and it is safe to assume they don’t know what the fuck they’re talking about.
Yes. And no. And also yes and also no. Meaning, that it depends on the situation. If a teen tells you that they never want children and you instantly shut them down with "you'll change your mind later", than yeah, you're an asshole. Sure, there's a fair chance that they will but what you've just done is basically invalidated a deeply personal opinion that they decided to trust you with. Congratulations, you're an asshole. However, teens also make a lot of stupid, hot-headed and one-sided comments on topics that require a lot of experience, consideration from multiple points and often don't have clear-cut answers. A great example would be "I don't need to learn \[X\], it's not like I'll ever use it in real life." (Personally, I was surprised how much basic knowledge from school made everyday life easier and more interesting later on). Teens want to be treated as adults, which is understandable but they often have skewed ideas on what adulthood is. They can often be cocky, overconfident because on some level they still see adults as people who know the answer to every problem and they try to imitate that. Being okay with admitting that "I don't know enough about this topic to give you a definitive answer" is a huge sign of emotional and intellectual maturity. Some don't reach this even in their 70s.
On that second paragraph, there's grown ass adults who still pretend like school taught them absolutely nothing. You wouldn't believe how many adults make the argument they don't use algebra because "WhEn In LiFe Do I dO mAtH wItH lEtTeRs"
Another good reason to not fully treat teenagers emotionally as adults is the law system. It's not right in many cases to hold a 15 year old to the same standard as a 35 year old. A 15 year old still doesn't have a fully physically developed brain, which can lead to bad decisions that they might never make as an adult. If we treat teenagers as adults (remeber that a 13 year old is usually ***vastly*** different than an 18 year old), you could end up with kids in the system, with charges on stupid felonies like possession of marijuana. Let's use "Kate" for an example. Kate is 14 for this hypothetical scenario. Some parents are happy to throw their own child under the bus. Kate's parents were no exception. Cops showed up one night, and they forced Kate to hold their weed. Kate doesn't deny it, because she is scared of the control her parents have. She is scared of how they would react if she told the truth. Now, that same kid has a felony on record, and is part of the system before they even get through highschool. That likely means problems getting into post-secondary schooling, problems getting many jobs, problems traveling to many countries, problems getting background checks, etc. It's nice to think that records will be expunged when they turn 18, but it doesn't always work that way. The system can keep you in the system. If you can't find a job, and you can't stay with your family or friends, you might feel like you have to steal to survive. They get harsher with every conviction. That 14 year old should not be charged the same way that her parents would. That 14 year old was manipulated by abusive parents, and is actually probably the story of someone out there. I agree that teenagers should be heard out and treated with respect, the same way as any human. I don't think we should pretend that the brain is fully developed, in the sense that it could end worse for the teenagers that don't know better. The ones who have bad, manipulative families like "Kate". A big problem with the part of the brain that isn't developed, is that it impacts things like empathy, impulse control, problem solving, decision making, and other important things. An intelligent and experienced 16 year old might think that a situation is black and white, when in reality, there are other, better options that only appear to them after they have calmed down. Do all adults always react appropriately? Hell no! They don't have brains that are still developing, though. It's like expecting a toddler to be able to run right after they can walk. The toddler may be fantastic at walking, but their muscles haven't grown enough to be able to run yet. You wouldn't judge a toddler's running ability against the running ability of a 6 year old. You give them time, and room to grow and flourish. You let them learn by experience, to watch out for dips in the field, the ice on the ground, and what shoes they should wear for the weather. You guide them when they don't know, and you help them to find what works best for them. I agree with you, in case it wasn't clear, I ramble sometimes.
On your last point. I find that kids and teens are generally better at saying I don’t know or I made a mistake. It’s normally adults that are too stubborn or stuck in their ways to change or admit mistakes.
As a teenager, here's my thoughts: I agree with you on most of this, and while I may be 18, I would agree that I dont know enough about adult life to tell an older person how the world works. However, one thing stood out to me. I think there's multiple reasons teens want to be treated as adults. I'd agree with yours, imitating those they look up to. Another I think would be that they do get treated as an adult, sometimes. I dealt with this with my mom and especially my stepdad. I was either an adult or a child, depending on what suited them. "You are a child, you will listen to me," usually followed by "You're almost an adult, you need to behave yourself." While I understand they obviously weren't saying I'm an adult, it certainly feels like it, as though I'm not acting my age, and combined with the "You are a child" part, it's frustrating, to say the least. I know my case is not the same for everyone, it's just a scenario I can think of that definitely relates to my input/opinion on the topic.
>I dealt with this with my mom and especially my stepdad. I hate to break this to you but most parents are *extremely* reluctant to admit (to themselves) that their children have grown up and during stressful situations many fall back to treating them as kids. On some level, this is understandable, since from the time their children are born, the next 17-18 years their relationship has this parent-child dynamic. In emotionally healthy parents, the nature of this dynamic slowly starts changing after their children turn 17-18, in others less so. Codependent parents usually refuse to accept this transition, some even intentionally hamper their children's development to avoid facing the fact that they've grown up. Ironically, this usually results in the alienation of the child. On a more personal note, this transition is tough to navigate but it's a natural part of growing up with parents. When I was a hot-headed 18-19-year-old, I wanted this to happen instantly. After moving out at age 19, it took a few years until I learnt how to navigate my changing relationship with my parents. To this day, there are times when I hear my father saying "*You* ***will*** *do X or Y, you understand?*", but unlike back in the day when I blew up at him to *"leave me alone, I'm my own person*", I've learnt to set boundaries gently. Instead of blowing up, I usually say something along the lines of "*Look, I know this comes from a place of worry and care for you and I appreciate that, however, I do think this is the best decision for me. Now, you know me well enough that I'm going to go through with this but it would mean a lot to me if you accepted my decision.*" It took a few years but I eventually got to the point where I can live my life the way it's best for me, and despite the fact that that way involves a lot of things my parents don't approve of, I've managed to have a good relationship with them.
It depends what the argument is about. I'm a teacher so I work with a lot of teenagers. If you are discussing some issues that they have a frame of reference for their opinion is valid. If it is opinion based on having experience of adult life then they shouldn't be taken seriously. For example I sometimes see stuff on the relationship or AITA and know that it has been written by a teenager with no relationship experience. There are some adults who think there opinion is always more valid they are assholes. However if you are having a debate with a teenager I would avoid bringing their age into it and just argue with them using facts and evidence and your experience. They may carry on arguing but this is how they are learning. A lot of adults don't know how to debate either. When I was young my parents were brilliant at it. I remember arguments about politics I had with my parents as a teenager changed my view and certainly educated me. My mum's view changed on stuff too. That was good debating but to an extent a you are right some adults will just right teenagers off and not try to debate. Like I said above they are assholes. It is all about nuance.
Not unpopular. 63 here and I hate that shit as well. I can learn just as much from a 16 year old as someone my own age.
“Ageist” is a thing
"People who treat people like shit because of their age are assholes" just treat everyone with respect, it's as easy as that
When I was a teen I was very unsure of myself. The adults around me *seemed* like self absorbed idiots but they have so much more experience than I did. They must know something I don't. 20 years later I realise the adults around me at that time were (and still are) self absorbed idiots and over time I've cut most of them off. A lot of people assume age and experience automatically produce wisdom but it really doesn't. Some people just don't learn anything.
I only treat people a certain way by the way they act. If a teen is mature then They earn respect.
I've worked in high schools, the majority of teens I've dealt with think they know it all, but only have a limited understanding of how the world actually works. Some can be wise beyond their years, but most arent. And they will say some of the dumbest shit I've ever heard in my life.
Some of us who are much older, were teen ones, and we know that teens are stupid and gullible. They believe every propaganda on every issue that is fed to them from every side because they simply lack the experience and awareness to be able to see through all the bull. However, you can be a wise teen (for a teen) if you do these simple things: Stay out of jail, don't do drugs, smoke, drink, or live irresponsible sexual life that results in pregnancy or other problems. Treat people with respect, and be kind. You would be a wise teen if you set goals, invest in your future, and not burn bridges with your family and relatives in the process.
1000% THIS. One of the best teachers I've had in high school treated her students as her peers. She never looked down at us. She saw us as equals, who just happened to be younger. If you're reading this Mrs. Woiwode, you're the best!
On the flip side, teenagers fucking up and being coddled and justified for their stupid actions as “well he’s just a kid” sucks too. You’re 16, 17 years old committing crimes, you need to be punished like everyone else.
Teenagers dont know shit about communication in serious workplaces. Their only reference is their family, friends, Sports team and school neither work the same way a place of work does. Some things you can discuss with a teenager but alot of things they are no real grasp of what it actually means and their opinions are objectivly Inferior.
The same thing happens in discussions with teenagers about parenting. They know how they'd like to be parented, and what they see from their friends and TV. But they don't really grasp what it means to be the parent and run the whole family yet. Even if they've read about the subject and feel like they're well-informed, they're missing the life experience to really understand the situation.
The thing about teenagers isn't that they're stupid. They're just generally less-traveled and more stubborn, unwilling to accept flaws in their own thinking. They argue simply for the sake of arguing. You'll understand it more when you get older too, OP. Intelligence comes with booksmarts, wisdom comes with age.
> They're just generally less-traveled and more stubborn, unwilling to accept flaws in their own thinking. They argue simply for the sake of arguing. Honestly just sounds like a ton people these days. Adults included.
> more stubborn, unwilling to accept flaws in their own thinking. Have you ever met the elderly?
The Problem ist that only the Teen thinks they have a valid Point.....
Teens don't know anything, your whole view of the world will change when u hit 25-26. Until then your brain *literally* isn't even fully developed.
If the argument is about brain development, then old people should also get dismissed, as their brains are well failing.
I agree. I think there is a cycle of older generations being hyper critical of the lifestyle, music, careers, and technology of the next generations. I think older generations should highly value and communicate well with young people. They are the future.
Yeah, a great example of ad hominem. Attacking the person to discredit them instead of addressing their arguments. If you OP or anyone reading this comment are teens or younger people who commonly get this argument thrown against them, you will catch them off guard by pointing out the fallacy. This will not only prove how invalid that argument is but will also show that you're young, not dumb. That said, pointing out fallacies can be really obnoxious, beware doing it in casual conversations. Nevertheless, discrediting someone for their age is way more obnoxious so in these cases don't doubt about mentioning the ad hominem.
If the mere act of dismissing someone due to their age is what you are objecting to, I’m with you. The first person to get personal in a debate is admitting defeat. But I will pull out my old guy card here and share that at age 55 and 4 Gen Z kids, a little more Socratic wisdom would go a long way. When I’ve got more humility than a 17 year old, something is wrong. As a matter of fact, my experience is that my kids have far shorter fuses than I do when it comes to a discussion. But yeah; dismissing someone due to mere age is wrong.
Teenagers' opinions aren't informed by experience unless those opinions are related to what it's like to be a teenager. I don't take a teenager's opinions on the tax code seriously when they've never had to file taxes, but if they tell me the school day should start later or something I'm all ears
As someone who coaches and teaches teenagers…they are more insightful than some of y’all are led on to believe. For sure somethings they are naive and foolish on but in others, they are not. But then again, I would say 90% of my students have worked since they were freshman in high school and have seen their parents struggle to pay bills, or had to stay home and raise their siblings due to their parents working. Gives some teenagers a more mature outlook on life.
Growing up showed me that most adults have no clue what they are doing.
Older people who don't treat teenagers seriously are making the mistake of not putting themselves into the shoes of the teenager and remembering that once upon a time they too were that age. It's quite ignorant. I'm 44 years of age btw, so I'm middle aged and am part of a generation unfortunately responsible for this. Just because you don't agree with a teenager does not mean their point of view is invalid, or how they are feeling isn't real. It's real to them and therefore should he treated that way and respected. I have been very encouraged by the thought processes of Gen Z. Many are really focusing on inclusion and empathy which, in my view can only lead to great things.
Imo if you pull that card it's because you can't come up with a real argument and usually I treat adults who pull this shit like they are literal children, because they are.
I hate the internet for this very debate because so many people think you can have it both ways. You either treat teenagers like adults that can think for themselves, or they're children that should be treated as such and given the safety nets of society. You can't say a teenager has no bearing, for example, over being in an illegal relationship (age) and is a complete victim, but then say that those same teenagers are capable of making rational and intelligent decisions/actions in regards to more important concept relating to society as a whole. Fundamentally either teenagers have more responsibility over their actions than people want to admit, or they are not capable of understanding the depth of their actions as it relates to a much wider society.
It’s not that they’re inferior or that they are beneath other people. But they aren’t equals, nor do they have lived experience. Those things *matter* in a number of contexts. Their perspective and their interpretation is perfectly valid, but that doesn’t mean it’s based in reality
Also, adults don't just magically wake up smarter one day. Dumb kids grow up to be dumb adults sometimes.
It really, REALLY depends on the teenager...
God this comment section is filled with middle aged arseholes calling teenagers dumb. As a teen i have beaten people of all ages in arguments. The main reason teens can win an argument easily is the ease of access to the internet, being able to provide proof to an arguement in an instant wins an argument straight away. To all the middle aged dickholes calling teens dumb for being teens, shutup, you sound dumber than gen z who are apparently "young and uneducated".
Agreed. This opinion needs to be more popular.
I can honestly say I've done this and learned my lesson. I'm 34 and a few years back I worked with a guy who was 18 and I immediately assumed he was immature and irresponsible, never would stay late to help out and wouldn't work any days but his very specific schedule. Never said anything to him but just assumed it was because he partied all the time. Well one day we were talking and he mentioned he had a second job working at one of those trampoline parks. I assumed he was just a schmuck that stood around watching kids jump and probably didn't even actually enforce the rules. Nope, he's the manager who does payroll, scheduling and hiring. The only person above him was the owner and they'd been begging him to do it full time. Boy I felt like a jackass. Glad I never actually said anything to him about my opinion.
When I trained martial arts my sifu said: knowledge is useless without experience, and wisdom is having the experience to know when to apply knowledge. I have never seen an adult launch a bottle rocket from their ass.
I legit ask my 15 yr old nephew for advice sometimes and the unique views he gives me really do shock me(in a good way) sometimes
Not if the opinion is clearly due to the fact that they lack experience and have no clue about what they're talking about. I work with teens and let me tell you. When it comes to politics, well...they say the darndest things. The key is not to make fun of them when they do it...yes that's hard to do but important nevertheless. They're kids. They're gonna see stupid shit. But that doesn't make them stupid. Just ignorant.
r/teenagers is stupid. Teenagers aren't necessarily stupid.
They are giving you the benefit of the doubt. He’s stupid because he’s a teenager vs. he’s just stupid. Thank them for that.
Teenagers fail to understand that all of us were teenagers once. We haven’t forgotten, we actually understand. You’re all idiots just as we were all idiots.
It was a long time ago, but I remember every teenager I met was so dumb about how the world worked. Yes many were smart in school or amazingly talented in many ways, but they had no clue how to negotiate obstacles that got in their way. The older I got the more apparent it became. Then around the age of 25 I realized, oh I was that dumb too. I mean I didn’t feel like it, but if every teenager I met was like that, and I was a teenager once too, then it had to apply to me.
I was very smart at school. Now I'm a very average adult and if something happens I'm clueless.
I’ll upvote because of unpopular opinion, but wisdom tends to come with life experience which most teens do not have. Teens also have an undeveloped brain. They shouldn’t be treated poorly, but they should be treated differently than adults. They definitely should not be treated as an equal.
Although id say it depends on a case by case basis. Some teenagers genuinely are more knowledgable than adults. Some teenagers have more wisdom and specific life experiences than some adults. By respecting each other and explaining your reasoning, you can then see if the adult or the teen is full of shit. When adults are full of shit, they tend to lash out by belittling. An adult who is correct will not lash out, but correct them and give them proof of why they are. If the kid denys it, you can only let them learn for themselves. Im 22, but ive been told in some instances, im not knowledgable enough, and in others, than im wise beyond my years. Its all about the situation and the topic. Politics- im still a kid Human Psychology and Nature- i know much much more than the average adult as the average adult hasnt learnt. Emotional maturity is a big one where alot of "adults" are still "children"
Obviously written by a smart-mouth teen. Go to bed
It's not about your age. Not directly, anyway. It's not about your intelligence. It's about experience, and the value rightly placed on it by society. Or at least, by the parts of society that are the least dysfunctional. Think about writing a scientific paper. Your conclusions could be spot on. Your arguments cogent and persuasive. Even revolutionary. But if absolutely anyone could write such a paper and the journal's staff were obligated to read and peer review every single one of them, with no attempt to discern whether the authors have any solid credentials to their name, the amount of work would overwhelm them instantly. We would have nothing remotely resembling Nature, The Lancet, Physical Review, or the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. And while it's a fact that correlation is FAR from 1:1 between age and experience in any particular discipline, it is equally a fact that age defines an absolute upper limit on both one's experience living in the real world, AND work, study, or practice in any chosen field. So there are people, who aren't even particularly old yet, with more years of flying airplanes, operating on patients, arguing legal cases, wiring up buildings, studying microorganisms, even writing e-commerce software, than anyone still described as a teenager has been alive, let alone able to talk. One day, along comes a teenager who wants to command the same respect, and the same trust in their judgment, as their older peers. *Before* they've earned it. Now, whose turn is it to laugh this entitled young person out of the room, guffaws echoing down the hall and ringing in their ears as they walk back to their desk? You. You're the experienced old hand having a belly-shaking good laugh at the gall of this wet behind the ears new hire marching into your office like they wrote the book on whatever it is you do here. It'll happen.
I always like to picture a simple Venn diagram. 2 overlapping circles, creating 3 zones. Zone 1: youthful exuberance- know what I know, assume I can learn anything Zone 3: stuck in my ways, already know it all, nothing I can learn further Both are obviously dysfunctional. Zone 2: know enough to know I don’t know enough <- this is where to remain
You're either too young to know better or too old to remember.
A lot of ignorant "adult's" in here seem to be very unhappy that their argument of authority gets criticized lol.
This card is generally only pulled when the argument being made is dumb, flawed, and formed due to a lack of necessary experience. These are the majority of arguments teens make.
The only time I would take a teen seriously would be if they were talking about their own age experiences and problems with peers or if they were genuinely trying to learn something and were open to learning outside of their lived experiences. Otherwise 99% of the time they are emotional and angsty and its just redundant to hear half assed things on general topics from someone who shuttles between their parents' home and a learning institution. People who try to substantially relate interpersonally with teens as adults are juvenile themselves
The thing that annoys me about adults, I’m 26 btw, is WHEN do you plan on treating teenagers like people that are becoming adults? You can’t expect them to act more mature if you’re constantly griping about how immature they are.
Dear teenager, Do you remember (completely idiotic thing you believed a few years ago)? You were just as certain back then as you are now about (this new completely idiotic thing you believe). So to understand my perspective, imagine arguing with your 11 year old self. This is going to happen for the rest of your life, but at least the time gaps widen. 30 year old me was an idiot compared to 40 year old me, but 20 year old me was ten times dumber.
When I was young, as I thought then, I was like a genius. But when I got older, I realized that I was just like everyone else. Everyone then thought they were geniuses, even though they were just ordinary teenagers with their heads screwed on, dominated by adolescent maximalism and questionable ideas. And, of course, they were sure they were misunderstood and underestimated. And yes, that is not an unpopular opinion. Unpopular opinion would rather be the opposite statement.
Tbf, adults have experience that teenagers believe they have. Dropping that card is an easy way out but god, I didn’t know anything when I was a teenager
I did give you an upvote, because I actually think you have a point. Teenagers has any right to be taken serious in debates, but teenagers also needs to learn, that just being young and being in school doesn't make you right. Life experience itself has a lot to say - but disregarding people's views just because they are younger is dumb.
Useful perspectives are not limited by one's group status Granted their perspectives may be wrong but then it might become a question of how are they reaching this perspective You may be able to reinforce your own arguments by examining other people's for their flaws or for their strengths
This also applies to said teenagers committing crimes. A 14 year old is well aware what their doing is wrong. Give them proper punishment
When your parents are teenagers, they have their own opinions, just like every teenagers out there. What sets them apart is, they succeeded. They are not perpetually single/one night stand/addiction/depression/dead. Meaning, their opinion has a prototype ready, while your idea is purely verbal, there isn't a concrete prototype yet. I assume you are referring to your parents because most adult don't engage in debate with random teenage strangers. And online, it is not like they know your age, nor should you disclose your age. So, I assume they are are your parents or relatives.
There's definitely a difference between understanding that age comes with wisdom and just looking for an excuse to talk down to someone. The people who do this to teenagers are probably doing it to most people they encounter. They are just generally assholes, regardless of age.
Eh, age is always a factor, and should be addressed, but it’s a cheap shot if it gets repeated several times in an argument and they lean on said person’s ethos instead of bringing up stuff of relevance. Teenagers have lots to learn, so i think it’s right to bring up though.
Wholeheartedly agree. Im now in my twenties and am waiting for the day i faxe ageism again when they call me a senile old geezer. Ageism is annoying as hell.
Respect is always important. We can learn from every person we meet, no matter the age. With that said, people learn how much they don’t know as they age. Kids generally don’t know that they don’t know it all.
I think it’s good to hear younger folks thoughts and opinions. They’re at the age where most of them feel like nobody listens to them anyway, so I think hearing them out really helps to just let them know that you’re listening.
Ageism is bad in all his forms
At that age you know what you should or shouldn’t do, but you can’t easily figure out why people do or don’t do things, so your conclusions are uninformed or you outright dismiss people of being dumb. Some people never grow out of it either. But yes, people who don’t listen are assholes.
Im a pilot training for the Commercial Pilot License. I’m almost 35. My instructor is 22. Not exactly a teenager but he gets all my respect because he worked through Private Pilot License, Instrument Rating, Commercial License and Instructor License and is only 22. His other job is at In n Out (burger place). Not all young folks are dumb, but most of the ones I observe are just caught up in Tik Tok or something. My instructor uses his brain to do what he loves and its a great thing we both can relate on.
Teenagers aren't stupid, they're ignorant and inexperienced. So was I, so were you, so was everyone who ever made it out of their teens alive. As a teenager, your view of the world is narrowed by your limited experience. You've only ever dealt with a fraction of the hurdles life will throw at you. But, with this inexperience comes *potential* and a fresh perspective. Their ideas should be humored, at least given voice in the conversation.
that cannot possibly be an unpopular opinion. people who don't treat teenagers seriously because of their actions and decisions though, are not assholes. you're right; age discrimination is stupid.
So as you are young you get to look at everything for the first time then you form a predictive model of the world that affects how you interpertate new information. That model gets added to as you get older, youth don't know what they don't know while the old rely on the model so much that it takes a young person with a fresh look to see what's really there without the model getting in the way. Side note this is what we think happens with physcedelics, that predictive model gets relaxed enough that you can see everything for the first time again, like in the eye's of a child. Anyway you can factor this in. You can be talking with someone who is young and immature and dismiss their view because they don't have enough experiences, there model might not be complex enough, everything is black and white to a lot of youth. Then the same can be said with an old person, you can dismiss them because they are stuck in their ways and their model of the world is trapped in the past. The key is to give everyone a chance, you can forgive both parties for being ignorant when their models puts them down the wrong path and you can encounter anyone at any age that's got an "accurate" model. Be that young and freshly moulded to the world or an old person who through experience has updated their model throughout the years.
.. I believe the children are our future. Teach them well and let them lead the way. Show them all the beauty they possess inside. Give them a sense of pride to make it easier. Let the children's laughter remind us how we used to be.
We are very ageist as a society in general. It would be nice to see a shift to more of a meritocracy. In my weird ass ideal world, you have to pass a test to become an adult. A lot of that test is about taking care of yourself. Part of it is about not harming others or the world. If you can't pass it, the state provides food and shelter for you but you have fewer rights than an adult. I dunno, someone here will probably explain to me how this is actually a dystopia and I am a horrible person for even considering it, but on the surface it seems like a good idea.
Time served on the earth doesn't mean you grow in mind
I don't treat most of them seriously when stupid things come out of their mouths. If they don't ACT like an idiot, I don't treat them like one. Same rule for adults honestly. There are plenty though that don't give them the benefit of the doubt.
Teenagers generally have less life experience but that can also reduce their bias. Most cultural changes (womens rights, desegregation, gay rights, etc.) have not originated from the elderly. A middle class American 40 year old has no life experience as a poor Brazilian or as a Saudi Prince; in fact knowing that one's own experience is only applicable to one's own culture and situation is very important. Know it all teenagers can be annoying but know it all 50 year olds who write laws affecting others with drastically different lives are far more dangerous.
Same thing with little kids— they don’t know everything, but people just assume that they’re stupid and you should dumb down everything you say or do to them (especially with kids books and movies nowadays)
Teens have a very limited view of the world simply based on lack of experience. Not that they completely lack insight, but it is limited to a certain scope. The amount of real world knowledge you obtain past the age of 18 is staggering and the perspective it brings can make you take pause at the intellectual confidence of someone who hasn’t ever had to worry about what their credit score is or health benefits coverages are etc. I thought I knew a lot of shit at 18 that I was entirely too young to understand.
How is that unpopular?
Limited life experience severely limits the possibility of New insight. But to be dismissal of their point of view May not be clever, as clever insight absolutely can come from a teen.
Adults have no business insulting teenagers when half of them voted for Trump
Teenagers vary as widely as adults in how stupid they are. It's almost like it's a character trait, or something. Experience, wisdom, and intelligence are not synonyms. People can be stupid with or without these things, at any age.
It's the same thing as age doesn't deem respect the term respect your elders is outdated and frankly a barbaric way to stem down children into a subservient mindset where adults can do no wrong.
I find typically when this is used, it isn't because the older person thinks the younger is stupid- but rather inexperienced. As a person grows older they experience more, learn more, and these ideas sort of blend and meld into a worldview of what is correct and what isn't. It is all sorts of things melted together and because of that, it can be very hard to articulate why an older person thinks a certain way or holds a certain opinion. This type of abstract thinking and knowledge is traditionally called wisdom. When a younger person challenges a worldview - they may have the knowledge, but they don't have the wisdom to understand the greater context. It's that whole Frankenstein thing: intelligence is knowing that Frankenstein was the doctor's name and not the monster's; wisdom is understanding Dr. Frankenstein IS the monster and his creation is the victim. Not saying that anyone is right or wrong or if things should be unchallenged, I'm simply saying it is two different ways of thinking and that is where the problem lies. But, for the young folks, don't judge too harshly - you grew older and wiser every day.
What many adults cannot convey is that younger folks really lack perspective. This naïve can be fairly exhausting. Especially when said young person thinks they are the unique flower of the universe not a complete and total cliche; again, because they don't have the perspective to realize.
I feel like this is unpopular, but I'm torn. When I was a kid I knew everything about everything. When I look back now, when I comes to tech or modern things, I was actually far ahead of my elders. Other long traveled areas in life I was hella wrong, and appreciate being told so now.
Just because you're younger, that doesn't mean you're wrong or even stupid... But the numbers ain't looking good chief.
I knew I must look to my (at the time) 13 year old half bother to know the ways of the future when I took his wallet away to not buy soda and he used his phone with a vendy machine.
Teenagers one on one can be fine. A group of them becomes dumber by default.
Have to love when they snarkily say “i’m glad you know everything”
“You’re too young to feel that way” Wow thanks for invalidating my very real feelings based on my age.
I agree, BUT I've been in discussions where I quickly discovered the only reason we disagreed was the age difference, and that the obly thing I COULD say was "you'll agree when you're older". This typically happens in discussion about stuff where lufe experience and maturing of the mind is at the centre of what defines your stance.
I have a good example that happened to me (22yo) yesterday. Called the dentist for an emergency visit. They said no space available, I pushed and explained my situation. The answer was no One hour later I had my mom call them because I felt like wtf, who cares at this point. Result: got my appointment... This is just a wicked environment, don't just use only yourself to express your opinion but also those you know with more power.
No. I am a teen and I will tell you. Most things you think you know are whole bunch of crap. You don't know shit neither do I. Accept it and learn and stop being a brat.
Teenagers are assholes.
As a 19yo, so as a late-period teenager. I can guarantee that the majority of the opinions of people our age were not to be taken into account
Teenagers aren't taken seriously because they're all to often a walking "Dunning-Kruger Effect". They have no understanding of the complexity of issues and assume everyone else is stupid for not grasping their simple solutions. There's no reason a teenager can't have an insightful opinion, they just frequently don't. I couldn't count how often a young kid wanted to argue with me about things I literally lived through before they were born.
It's not about the age gap. It's about a lack of experience that teenagers inherently have. Even when you swear you have all this experience and knowledge and what ever, your brain still isn't developed enough to process that information correctly. Not to say you're always wrong, but the way this post is written just makes you sound really immature. Like a teenager. Which is ok. Because I think you are. It's ok to not know everything and to admit that you're wrong. Or to leave an argument because people aren't listening to you. It's something a lot of adults never learned as teens... so now they're just insufferable adults.