Writer's Block: Adult Onset

[uberreiniger]

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When you make your first kill, take your first drink, get your first car, your alcoholic father hires you your first prostitute, and you find your spirit animal.

Those are the most tried and true methods. I figure if you throw all of them at the kid at once one of them's bound to work.

No seriously, I think just assigning it at an arbitrary age works just fine. Although I might place it at 17 rather than 18, or maybe even 16 since that's already the legal age to work and drive in this country.

Comments

[gothicbeauty21.livejournal.com]

I would go the other way, and say it's 22. Every single teenager I knew at that age was FAR from being mature enough to be called an adult. It wasn't until the majority of college was under the belt that they became any approximation of an adult. That kind of maturity comes with actual life experience, not just however many candles you have on your cake.


There are always the kids that grow up too fast, because of terrible things that happen to them. Personally I'd probably had more shit happen to me by 18 than most people by 30 -- but I still didn't have the truly important experiences to make mature decisions until I was 20. By then I'd already fucked my credit over (which at 27 I'm still suffering from) and had to move back in with my parents.


Personally I don't think the US should allow students under 20 to enroll in universities, unless they can prove they're stellar students. I know the first year of "general education" is supposed to weed out the good from the bad, the serious from the fuckoffs, but there are a lot of kids that fuck up in that first year that really do want to be there, the curriculum is just so dumbed down they stop trying. Those are the rare kids that came from a highschool that really prepared them. And once they fuck up that first year, usually that's it -- it's next to impossible to get back on the right track.

[uberreiniger.livejournal.com]

Universities really need to update how they do things in some respect. For the fuck ups, the year of "general educaction" doesn't really provide them any real incentive to get their acts together. For the ones who have their acts together the general education year seems like a waste of time and can be a stumbling block to them. It was for me.

It's a complicated question. For much of human history you were an adult at 15 and expected to handle things as such. But now we live longer and perhaps biologically our mental adolescence has been extended as well. I wonder if there's been research into that aspect of it?

[gothicbeauty21.livejournal.com]

I would expect this is a popular discussion in behavioral psych. I shall point one of my friends who works in that field (at least I think she's in behavior, maybe she's development...related to this discussion at any rate) and see what she thinks :)

[rustie25.livejournal.com]

Brain research shows that a brain is not fully developed until the age of 25. Maybe that should be the age. I know I was an idiot until the age of about 27...even then I am still questionable.

[chaeri.livejournal.com]

i say get rid of any arbitrary age. it does no one any good, at least in America. the age for adult here for most things is 18. that's when you are considered a legal adult - and its simultaneously too late and too early. parents and teachers don't teach any kind of responsibility or life skills, or give appropriate trust and responsibilities because oh, they aren't an adult yet. anytime they screw up its excused as them being a child or teenager.

then, as soon as they hit 18 with no training whatsoever they expected to be able to make good decisions. if they don't, then they get told to act like an adult because by god they are 18 now.

i say stop worrying about the age of anyone, and just teach life skills. if an age law is necessary for organization and convenience - like driving and working - base it something. look at the psychology, the ability of a teenager and go from there.

14 is the legal working age for certain jobs, then 16 for others, 18 for others and 21+ for others. that's fine. that takes into account a person's ability to cope. but, allow discretion if a person is of above average ability or below average. if they are 14 and able to take on a 20 year old's job, let them do it.

conversely, if they are 35 and obviously not close to mature enough to drive a car, don't let them pass the test until they can prove they are responsible. put responsibility questions on the test like 'if your friend wants you to take them out at 2am on a school night, you say...' and if you fail those questions, you fail the test.

basically, a person should be judged as an adult when they prove they are. for some it will be 14. for others, never.

[uberreiniger.livejournal.com]

Yes but that is utterly unfeasible in a society our size. A mandatory age pretty much has to exist for purposes of law.

[chaeri.livejournal.com]

as i said, for some things it does. there is a necessity for an age for working, driving, voting. but that doesn't need to translate in everyone's mind as The Age of Adulthood. its just the age you can drive, or vote, or whatever. just because a person can vote doesn't mean they are an adult in any meaningful way, same with driving or even working.