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IN MODERN Irish society, where we work more hours than any other country in Europe, and where the country is developing faster than almost any other, we have created a hectic social context that many adults aren't equipped to deal with. But in children, such destructive behaviour has far more serious consequences. While eight-yearold girls wear clothes best suited to strippers and pre-teens drink bottles of spirits, their very attempts to act grown-up are paradoxically a rejection of adulthood and responsibilities.
There are plenty of people to blame because, try as we might, we can't lay this one on the kids.
Nor can we equate their problems with ones we faced in the past. Cash-rich, time-poor parents are the obvious culprits, too busy earning money to support their Celtic cubs. But the state is also to blame for failing to tackle the suicide epidemic or providing adequate psychiatric services for children. And let's not forget the media, which celebrates models with eating disorders and suggests physical perfection is achievable in tandem with achieving 600 points in your Leaving Cert.
With information available at the touch of a button, youngsters are inundated with mixed messages. Girls must dress 'sexy', while the media demonises paedophiles; boys must be the man of the house and replace absent fathers. The perfect woman's figure is stick thin with big breasts, so get your boob job now even though you're 15.
While children face pressures previously known to adults, they are also coping with new problems unknown by previous generations. These pressures, brought on by a rapid acceleration of wealth, do not discriminate between any social class or geographical location in this country. Endless information, a complex youth popular culture, an astounding rise in the availability of drugs, warped sexual values (or lack thereof) and hyper-consumerism have conspired to catapult children into a new kind of intense adolescence. The 2006 Noel Clarke film labelled this new period of hyper-adolescence 'Kidulthood' . . . but in reality, it's more complex than a catchphrase.
The passing of responsibility from parental control to peer influence has also affected the context of children's reference points. Parents seem to be willing to hand over their control to their children's friends, to a rudderless new media and to popular culture while unable to monitor the new forums of friendship online. Such a speedy change has altered childhood and adolescence forever. Now, it's about damage control.
The end of childhood? For some, it never even began.
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YOU ARE HERE: 11 November 2007 / tribune.ie / 2007 / 08 / 12
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