Long before becoming a national treasure and celebrity Twitter addict the 16 year old Stephen Fry sent a letter to his future self, to which he has now responded, in a letter first published in the 25th birthday edition of Gay Times.
posted by Artw on Apr 30, 2009 - 36 comments

Under current proposals, parents to be fined or prosecuted if their children drink underage Home Secretary Jacqui Smith has proposed that parents of children caught drinking underage would be subject to prosecution. text of speech [more inside]
posted by Grrlscout on Jun 1, 2008 - 54 comments

Where has all the pubic hair gone? After sweating through the [eight-year-old girl's] eyebrow wax, Engle [...] was directed to give her pint-size client a … bikini wax. “But … there’s nothing there, right?” I ask Engle. “I mean, at eight? Am I forgetting something?” “Nope,” she says. “There’s not. Doesn’t matter. That’s when the mothers are starting them these days.”
posted by desjardins on Apr 4, 2008 - 207 comments

"Imagine what it would feel like—or think back to what it felt like—when your body and mind are telling you you're an adult while the adults around you keep insisting you're a child." An interview with psychologist Robert Epstein, who argues that American teens are far more intelligent, capable, and moral than we give them credit for. His new book, The Case Against Adolescence, suggests that infantilization of teens leads to psychological problems. See also Epstein's article "The Myth of the Teen Brain" [PDF] from Scientific American Mind.
posted by 912 Greens on Sep 19, 2007 - 61 comments

Barbarism begins with Barbie — the doll, that is. Research done at the University of Bath (UK) posits that prepubescents' pre-eminent plasticine plaything provokes disproportionate punishment. According to the study, which originally focused on the effects of branding on young consumers, the statuesque Mattel mini-miss seems to attract undue savagery. "The researchers had not intended to focus on Barbie, but they were taken aback by the rejection, hatred and violence she provoked when they asked the children about their feelings for the doll. Violence and torture against Barbie were repeatedly reported across age, school and gender. No other toy or brand name provoked such a negative response."
posted by rob511 on Dec 19, 2005 - 46 comments

High School Hazing??? Wha??? What an incredible example of both idiocy and some truly disgusting behavior. Personally, I grew up in the frosty northeast in the mid 80's where there was no shortage of inter-clique "Breakfast Club" style nastiness, but I had never even heard of such a thing until I had seen Dazed and Confused. Is this a regional thing? Certainly, there is no shortage of this kind of juvenile ridiculousness happening elsewhere in the country, but it never ceases to amaze me every time I hear about it. Were any MeFi'ers subject to this kind of awful ritual while they were growing up?
posted by psmealey on May 7, 2003 - 96 comments

"Why Nerds are Unpopular" is an essay by Paul Graham that looks at how being smarter than the average bear -- usually an advantage in "the real world" -- is a liability in the Lord of the Flies world of adolescence. It's a long read, but an engaging writeup of the high school pecking order, how the school structure encourages this behaviour, the freak/geek alliance and gives some hope to the current crop of high school nerds (my fellow dweebs, it does get better). Even though high school is something like twenty years in my past, I still winced when I read the essay. Were you one of the high school geeks? Are you one now?
posted by AccordionGuy on Feb 17, 2003 - 61 comments

Obsolecence and adolescence I came of musical age during the beginning of the tectonic shift between cassette/vinyl/CD (vinyl on the way out, cassette taking precedence and CD waiting in the wings). Crushes, science and lots of bad music I still love (yeah, too much Anglophilian pop) was spooled on those tapes. This story about the demise of the cassette has it all! And it's a great bit of writing, too...
posted by chandy72 on Oct 30, 2002 - 26 comments

Recollections based on the album Doolittle, by the Pixies. Most of the most memorable times in my life, at least the ones during and after adolescence, are linked inextricably with the music I was listening to at the time. Hearing Bowie's 'Modern Love' can set me off to reminiscing for hours about freshman teen angst, and Bob Mould's 'Hanging Tree' can still damn near make me cry with the memories it triggers. Doolittle is one of those albums that takes me right back. You?
posted by stavrosthewonderchicken on Jun 8, 2002 - 91 comments

I Don't Wanna Grow Up... When did you first consider yourself to be a full-fledged adult? How many more years later was it when you realized what a child you were when you first thought that? :-) The Washington Post had this conversation-starting story this morning about stretching the boundaries of what we consider adolescence. Some social scientists now argue that our (e.g. American) society has allowed the maturing process to take longer and longer, and that many people are still adolescent in their emotional and intellectual development into their mid-30s. Needless to say, there's a lot of disagreement.
posted by briank on Jan 2, 2002 - 56 comments

Homo erectus shows he was never a typical teenager. Is it really the hormones in the chicken we eat that cause teenagers to develop at an early age? Seems like the traditional old paleolithic diet had prehistoric humans skipping the adolescence we cherish so much.
posted by Quixoticlife on Dec 6, 2001 - 16 comments

Girl stories Brand new site to include stories and photos by young girls as they embrace, encounter, confront adolescence.
posted by Postroad on Jun 16, 2001 - 8 comments