It's simple, the people we consider adults, have lived twice as long as us. Their reasoning, "we have experienced twice as much as you." For people so blessed with experience you think they could come up with a better excuse than some simple math.

Experience doesn't necessarily come with age. It comes in situations. Yes there is a better chance they will have had more experience but times have changed and children are faced with many more hardships today. It seems to me because there is generally a lack of communication between the two parties, adults will just assume everything in our lives is perfect. Kids will often put on an air around their parents to mask what is really going on. What child hasn't heard a story about their parents "back in the day." Our parents seem to think they had it pretty hard back then. Which is true but in a completely different sense. They would have had more chores, probably had to walk further to get to school and didn't have the technologies and entertainment we have today. Yet the problems we are faced with generally are not heard. I didn't live in their generation as they don't live as a teenager in mine.

It's hard to figure out what went on and what is going on and most of what we know about the other is based on assumptions of behavior and attitudes displayed. It seems to me emotional problems seem to be much more of an issue today. Pressures to have sex, pressures of drugs, pressure to drink etc. are a big deal. These things have become a huge part of the high school culture, and to fit into a society, something every kid needs and strives to do, a lot of kids will have to struggle with morals and convictions. To fit into a society people will fit into the culture. At a time when we are just forming our convictions and morals this is rough and the struggle never ends. Dealing with these things every day for most of your teen years counts for a lot of experience in my eyes. It's not a matter of not having the experience it's a matter of how we present it.

The key is communication. I feel strongly that if our parents knew what we went through we would be more respected and our opinions more valued. Easier said than done! What holds us back is the fear of coming clean. For the most part we cave into pressures and talking to our parents would mean coming clean, resulting in punishment. This would most likely be a loss of our social time.