It's been a little while between posts. The end of the semester is hectic, so I apologize. I will make two today, since there are two different things going on in my mind and heart right now...
Recently, in the course of tutoring quite a few young kids in 4th-8th grade, I've noticed a trend of depression and accepting depression as a normal way of life at a very young age. And I would like to ask: what the hell is going on with the younger generation today?
The 8th grader that I work with has been in and out of the hospital and counseling multiple times because she has tried to commit suicide and/or cuts herself horribly. She's on medication and attends professional counseling sessions on a regular basis. I see her father try to do everything that he can to help her. I've also tried to talk to her, thinking that maybe she just needs to know that an outsider cares since she's a rebellious teenager that doesn't think her father knows anything. Yet, it all seems to fall short.
The 6th grader that I work with asked me to read a play that she wrote the other night for her theater class. She had to take a classic fairytale and turn it into her own version. She chose Hansel and Gretel and made it "modern". What happened to Hansel and Gretel in her version? They killed themselves because they were sad. Apparently, suicide and depression are "modern".
So, the first of these children has fallen victim to extreme depression herself and the second has accepted depression (and suicide) as a normal way of life. Why? Why do children these days think this is their first resort?
I'm not very old myself. 27 to be exact. So, I, too, am still part of the "younger generation". And I will admit that there have been times in my life where I fell victim to serious depression as well. But as an adult. These are kids...I didn't even know what suicide was at their age...And even when I was "sad" as a child, I never once saw taking my life as an option, much less my first resort...
It's scary to me that children these days see this as not only a viable option for being sad, but they see it as a norm - that suicide is what everyone resorts to when they are sad. If they are already feeling this way at what's supposed to be "the happiest time in their life", then what's going to happen when they hit adulthood and shit gets real?
This is serious business...as a sociologist, I know that suicide rates are no different than any other pattern of behavior. In every society, they are predictable and reflective of the broader structures of human life. Every year in American society, virtually the same percentage of individuals commit suicide. (For more on this: click here). No matter how many people contemplate suicide each year, roughly the same amount will actually follow through.
Durkheim's theory on suicide also tells us that those that contemplate it and don't follow through are held back by social integration, or the degree to which they feel connected to and needed in the society that they live in. Durkheim also argued that religion was the key to people feeling socially integrated because those countries that were more religious had lower suicide rates, and those that were less religious had higher suicide rates.
In other words, if we see a rise in suicide rates, then there is some sort of major societal change taking place, most likely with religion, that is causing more people to feel disconnected from their society and, thus, more likely to take their life.
So, the three things we're looking at then with this issue: (1) children today are more likely to view suicide as a normal, first resort to depression; (2) children today are more likely to be severely depressed than children in previous generations; and (3) the younger generation is less likely to be religious than previous generations.
Seems like a recipe for disaster to me that is in need of serious, SERIOUS attention...I think we tend to chalk this all up to "oh, they're just typical teenagers..." but I really don't think that is the whole story...I think we are witnessing the beginning stages of what is going to be a very tragic outcome for a generation that is literally crying out for help.
Children today are more likely to grow up in broken homes. They are also being bullied at alarming rates in schools and via social media (thanks, Internet). They are also being exposed to suicide more in the media. The recent case of Robin Williams, for example. Social integration is deteriorating for them as they now have 500+ friends on Facebook, but they don't have a single buddy that they go outside and play with because their parents have to worry about sex predators. And they are rejecting religion...well...because, Christianity, you're simply doing it wrong...
So, the question is: what do we do about our wee-ones? They need our help. Badly. They are asking for it in every possible way that they can. We need to figure out how to deal with the negative side-effects of individualism and social media today. And we also need to figure out how to restore some sort of spiritual purpose within them since they are rejecting organized Christianity (not that I can blame them...). We need to teach them that they don't have to "be" any certain thing to have value. They need to just keep breathing. Unfortunately, I think being able to do this for them is, once again, going to require us all examine our cultural beliefs and societal institutions for how we treat (and teach them about) human life. If we don't do it for ourselves, we should at least do it for them.
As the old saying goes..."from the mouths of babes"...and there is something terribly, terribly wrong going on today...
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