Our hold over our years of adolescence

It seems like it happened over the span of a day when I went from being a teenager skating through highschool in a breeze to an adult in college with real responsibilities. Seemingly instantaneous as well was the realization that in the media, the entertainment industry by a greater magnitude, classify the glorious ages of 15 through 18 as the best time of your life wherein after that you start aging at rapid speed working in a corporate job. This couldn’t be further from the truth, we have enough life to span over eight decades worth of new experiences and memories yet the media’s sole fixation on teenagers permits us from seeing how much more there is to live through.

1. I’m no longer a teenager.

Addressing an obvious point head on, as I’m no longer a teenager the content once aimed for my age group isn’t relatable or simply doesn’t call my attention anymore. I’m a young adult in college trying to balance life, where are my movies? You age out of the Teens and suddenly there is less and less media to be found with college students as the center or freshly new adults navigating life. While in my teenage years the abundance of movies portraying high schoolers was comforting having found an endless amount of movies and shows to choose from, my life has moved on from there and the media should do the same.

2. Teenagers are being given a voice, older generations are being silenced

The vast array of entertainment content starring ‘teenagers’ having the time of their life packed with loads of fun and unforgettable memories typically always end with the characters going off to college, movie over. What comes after? What type of things happen in college? Is that really the most fun we’re ever gonna have all our life ever? All of the teenage-based content I’ve consumed placed a high emphasis on “this time of your life being the most eventful, jam packed era”, completely disregarding all that happens once you reach adulthood.

3. Milestones from adulthood aren’t spoken about as much

Seeing as most of us will live past our teenage years, we’ll most likely get to experience the joys of adulthood. Attending college, buying your own car, being retired and having no care in the world again, there is a lot left to celebrate that is equally if not more rewarding than anything that could’ve happened in my years of adolescence. Yet the media had me thinking the world turned gray and birds stopped singing after my high school graduation. Watching movie after movie drone on about the same teenage experiences conditioned me into thinking my 20’s and 30’s and so on nothing of importance or joy was awaiting me.

4. Even the teenagers have problems with teenage movies

In recent years there have been many productions made with adolescents as the target audience however a majority of them flop. The content being made these days is ‘out of touch’ and generic with huge criticism over the employment of social media influencers, a unique career to this generation, in major productions over qualified actors. Another main issue teenagers became increasingly aware of in casting choices were the major age differences between the actors and characters they were set to portray as well the inaccurate representation. Having a 23 year old Rachel McAdams and a full grown guy with a beard portray highschoolers can not possibly have the best impact on adolescents.

5. Normalizes minors in adult situations

“Things were different” used to work as a passable excuse however, times are changing and the constant sexualization along with making minors act out mature situations will not go ignored any more. Even if the actors themselves aren’t minors, the fact stands they are meant to be playing as such. When their roles demand them to act out hyper-sexualized scenes, doing drugs and partying it has the possibility to lead teenagers to similar situations they might feel uncomfortable with but do so because they see such behavior all over their shows.

6. Inaccurate portrayal of the teen life

Shows and movies for adolescents can be great forms of media for teeangers to connect with and enjoy yet, instances still arise where we find ourselves not relating to what we’re seeing at all. Looking back at my teen years I didn’t fall in love with a star athlete, or get trapped in detention and make new friends, or even attend prom and graduation, though that was due to different reasons. Classic tropes of highschool feuds or love triangle drama are not experiences an average high school student will have so when movies are constantly adapting them a disconnect is formed.

7. Sets up a bad comparison for teenagers

Something more relatable than the movies were trying to show is the universal feeling shared when learning first hand high school was nothing like what we’ve seen. Growing up with High School Musical, while I’m smart enough to differentiate between the dramatics certain aspects I expected, relied on, to be true. These shows and movies are filled with many unspoken promises of first relationships and everlasting friendships that when students leave high school without having experienced them, they feel robbed and left with all these portrayals of what could’ve been.

Conclusion

Society's hold on our teenage years as well with our own inability to let go is affecting the lens in which we view the rest of our lives. By constantly having movies, shows, magazines catered towards teens and recalling our years of adolescence with high regard, we start to think of what follows with discontent and displeasure which should scream bizarre. We are only in our teenage years for a small portion of our life where from a relative standpoint not a whole lot happens. So why do we focus more on that place of our life rather than our adulthood? However, it would be better to first ask how does having the media continuously revolving around teenagers influence our perception of adulthood?

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