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Youthful Rebellion
This is an excellent essay from John Taylor Gatto’s Underground History of American Education. It deals with the topic of how adulthood has been pushed farther and farther back over the last two centuries. He illustrates his points with historical anecdotes such as:
When I was a schoolboy in Monongahela, I learned with a shock that the men who won our Revolution were barely out of high school by the standards of my time: Hamilton was twenty in the retreat from New York; Burr, twenty-one; Light Horse Harry Lee, twenty-one; Lafayette, nineteen. What amounted to a college class rose up and struck down the British empire, afterwards helping to write the most sophisticated governing documents in modern history.
Never once thought of it like that. Fucking - crazy.
July 26th, 2005 at 11:04 pm
How many graphically simulated murders has an American of 21 in 2005 witnessed?
I don’t even want to think about the uncharted territory our culture is steaming through.
July 26th, 2005 at 11:51 pm
in america these days, i round things off and say that on average childhood lasts from 0-10 years of age, adolescence from 10-30, and adulthood from 30 on.
it’s been amazing to watch the culture change and get fully into marketing to 25-year-olds as if they were 15.
July 27th, 2005 at 12:09 am
Well, you know Hobbits aren’t considered adults until after their “tweens”. It would be a good thing if humans become more hobbit like….bla,bla It appears to be true being in your 20’s is an extended adolesence period. Which is fine because I hate the pressure that I have to be a college graduate or married by the time I’m 22. Anyway age isn’t all that important beyond its biological implications. I think its great when people feel alive and not young, old or middleaged..
July 27th, 2005 at 1:11 am
Isn’t a perpetually suspended adolescence pretty much a requirement for a successful consumer culture?
July 27th, 2005 at 10:21 am
Yes, I’d say so. Since adolescents tend to be more impulsive than adults, making it easier to pull them into mindless consumer zombiehood. Being in my 20’s I definitely feel I should be further along and more inner directed and self-disciplined than I am. Yet, those of my age who I see around me seem to be much in the same condition, if not worse. I’m reminded of a line from Zappa’s ThingFish, “Ya’ll take too long to grow up in America.” But it’s up to individuals to do the hard work of growing up for themselves since the culture often has very little reason to help you.
July 27th, 2005 at 12:21 pm
This totally amazes me. I don’t even know where to start. I remember once reading of a 12-year-old French officer — perhaps during the height of the Napoleonic Wars, I am not sure. Makes you really take a look in the mirror and ask wtf, both personally and socially.
July 27th, 2005 at 1:09 pm
i just turned 26 and dont care.
26 times around then sun, thats all…..
http://www.fitnessandfreebies.com/seniors/healthyaging.html
i dunno if that a reliable resource, its the first one i found…
of course there is some kind of oppression of the mind going on…. but you also have to consider changes in time itself….
im comforable right now with my level of knowing, having never completed high school but i can argue (and win!) easy with people twice my age (at least)
one
human?
July 27th, 2005 at 1:10 pm
comfortable even, with a t key that doesnt work well….
July 27th, 2005 at 5:56 pm
i still adolesce at 44. what`s the hurry? i could live to a hundred and three. or be gone tomorrow.
there are children in africa carrying russian guns paid for with g-8 money(yours and mine) as young as 6 or 7 shooting the shit out of jungle cover and the odd goat and once in a while a person. and inner city kids selling crack and kids in bogata selling thier sister at 9. we grow up and then, sometimes, we turn around and grow back down. if we can afford the luxury.