UK teenagers are awful

[Fedupwithteenagers24]

I live between two villages in the UK. Both have playgrounds aimed at under tens. Both are frequently trashed. Broken bottles left there overnight, stuff sprayed over the equipment. This has been particularly bad over the summer holidays. Currently in Germany. Loads of playgrounds, toys are left there anyone can use them. Nothing is vandalised. Why are things so bad in the UK? And before I get asked neither the UK venue or German one have any areas aimed at teenagers. But somehow the German ones don’t wreck their surroundings.

@Hunglikeapolevaulter as I just said I thought it reported that he was a teen.
My original comment was actually a question. Now I have my answer. It wasn't German teens involved in the stabbings. No need to jump down my throat because I asked a question.

May I suggest those of you determined to think 'everywhere is the same read '@Plasticstaircase post below. I know Germany well with work and lived in Copenhagen for 20 months its an attitudinal thing-nowhere is perfect , but we are bringing up a load of people who by necessity think shared houses or living at home till 30 are normal-our youth in the main are extraordinarily needy and incredibly immature due to the obsession with Uni as some kind of overgrown kindergarten, helicopter parents and lack of any kind of social underpinning needs to help suppport young people- we have created an obsession about pensioners due to our right wing press -and yes some pensioners struggle but how many policies are there directed at helping out young people financially?? - very very few- and do most over 60s give a shit ? - nope ( and I'm 62) - and yet plenty of over 60s are moaning about their fuel allowance despite owning houses in many cases 'outright' or close to it-how many 26 year olds in shared houses are gifted cash- none whatsoever.

None of the playgrounds where I live get vandalized 🤷‍♀️ it happening in one location where you live doesn’t = the entire UK. Likewise it not happening where you are in Germany doesn’t mean it doesn’t happen anywhere in Germany. YABU.

It’s way more than blaming gentle parenting. It’s about a whole structure of society that doesn’t support families. Housing, healthcare, education and so on. If you’re a German parent you’ve had access to good early years affordable childcare, secure long term affordable housing tenancies , longer school hours and so on.
For the record most of the parenting I saw in Germany was far more gentle than in the Uk, but I always figured this was because parents were more supported by society and less frazzled and stressed.

But also aggressive parenting at the other extreme. I watched a child of around 10/11 hit my daughter in a playpark on holiday, I was looking around for his parents to go say something, and then saw her hit,swear and scream at him for not looking after all 4 of his younger siblings while she was getting drunk, and i then thought better of speaking to her, she was really scary. These are children who are raised with aggression and violence as their normal, and therefore think this is the standard way to behave.

Sorry needed to end that post-We have created an incredibly immature and needy younger generation because we have loaded them with debt to get qualifications, no affordable housing and often not especially well paid jobs after all that debt-

Yes there are bad teenagers or cause trouble, wreck stuff etc. And there's plenty of teenagers like mine, who certainly aren't angels at home but have never and will never do anything like that, whether in a group or not. And I also know plenty of teenagers who do amazing things (volunteering in many different ways) and put plenty of adults to shame. I'm sure Germany has the same, but maybe instead of wrecking playgrounds their bad teenagers cause trouble in other ways. You can't just say "UK teenagers are awful" as the majority are not.

I agree! When I was a teen, the only option was girl guides/scouts.
No games consoles, 3 TV channels, the cinema was an annual treat, holidays were spent playing on our bikes with our friends and going to the park. If parents could afford it, we'd go swimming and get some chips afterwards, that was the highlight of our week.
Children now have more to entertain them than ever before.

@Plasticstaircase absolutely!! Very much the Same when we lived in Denmark- as a Brit I accept the UK has aspects I do like - but if I had young kids again then Scandinavia , Netherlands and Germany in my opinion are way easier to bring up a family- have fun and keep your sanity at the middle income level

I live in an EU country and there is a big difference. For example insolation rooms are unheard of as not needed. The kids if naughty get a get a naughty point and I suppose a call home to parents is normally enough to fix the problem.
They also generally seem to have close relationships with grandparents. It's the norm to go there for meals at the weekend...I think this helps with respect towards elders.

And by the way i don't think UK teens are especially awful- I think there is a lack of focus on stuff for them these days - be it youth clubs or Saturday jobs at 15 etc

I currently have 8 teens in my house. Lots of laughter. They’re loud but lovely. Also, the parks round here are great. Occasionally vandalised but council acts fast to rectify. When travellers trashed a local park and rec the community, including teens, got together to tidy it up.

some teens are dicks. My memories of Germany are mostly fond but there was a lot of Graffiti.

My teens would be disgusted at that behaviour. My teens are well brought up by decent parents and grandparents. They have respect for their environment.

The teens you speak of are poorly brought up. Tbh, you can see how when you look at their lousy poorly-spoken, scruffy, tattooed parents. Those same parents drop litter and swear at you if you call them out.

Low standards ppl OP.

I used to work with teens. A controversial view but I think there is zero accountability for being a rubbish parent. If a teen is awful;

It's the governments fault.
It's the teachers fault.
It's the headteachers fault.
It's the police who are at fault.
Society in general.
No opportunities.
Not enough support from xyz.
Why are you picking on them!

Why is it unacceptable to say awful teens can be the outcome of poor parenting. We don't hear this enough in my opinion.

I'm talking about the majority here.

I used to speak with parents of awful teens and ended up feeling sorry for them because many had no role model, no boundaries and parents with all sorts of issues.

It's obviously not all teens, but there seems to be a great central west Scotland tradition of sizable numbers of them making the lives of the rest of the population miserable. And thanks to recent SNP policies they are completely untouchable.
I feel really sorry for any decent teens that have to share schools with them.

YANBU - I live in what is classed as a nice area. All the parks & under cover areas are full of feral teens. Just last night they’ve popped all the zorbs in the local park & left loads of broken glass. If I go on a weekend morning there’s empty Pringles can, beer cans & added usually are a couple of used condoms.

I’m quite unflappable but walking my dog I often feel intimidated.

Thats what I call ‘Soft touch’…children in other very less well off countries who are also way less fortunate than our children, have no future to look forward to, are more well behaved than ours.

Stop giving them excuses to be badly behaved and disrespectful of public property and others and authority in general . It is all down to their upbringing and the culture of blame and entitlement.

UK teenagers are awful

so we have Ageism :

1. prejudice or discrimination on the grounds of a person's age.

and racism

In the Equality Act, race can mean your colour, or your nationality (including your citizenship).

Let's not judge massive groups of people based on characteristics that they cannot change.

We have trouble with some teens in our area but it's a tiny minority. Still awful outcomes though

Tbh I agree.

I think something has happened in the UK. When labour were in power last time, they fostered a public attitude of entitlement through generous benefits and a notion that you are a worthy individual who should be well looked after and pandered to by the state, even if you give nothing back.

Public facing roles are also gagged from saying perfectly reasonable things for fear of complaints. Schools can’t tell a parent the reason their kid struggles to concentrate is because they live off chips and Tango Ice Blasts, not because they need an urgent ADHD assessment. They can’t tell somebody who endlessly pesters the GP with fictional ailments to stop calling unless there’s a genuine issue as they’re a nuisance. They can’t tell the person outraged they can’t get a 4 bed council house that maybe they should’ve thought about that before having 7 kids and not to have any more as they can’t afford it.

It’s a culture of pandering which has got massively out of hand and the public play the system as they ‘know their rights’.

Well we can’t discuss ‘babies’ or ‘toddlers’ then can we?

@Blueybanditbingochilli it has nothing to do with Labour- this bunch of teens have grown up 100% under the Tory's

not if you're applying a negative stereotype to the entire group

No I’m talking about where the culture began, because I don’t think this batch of teens have been born inherently bad. Everyone is born the same, it’s the culture they grow up in.

So discussing ‘tantrumming toddlers’ is ageist?