The amount of fake and situational support we have to deal with is unreal. It can be very dangerous to target people who support Youth Rights in the moment, even if it's only situational support. If we lose this support, the people attacking children's will get whatever they want.

Why is there so much shifting loyalties? It's because children's rights are not about children. Children can almost always be coerced by someone else, into waiving their rights or children's rights come with no enforcement. For example the rights students in education are supposed to enforced by entities who have no actual obligation or desire to enforce the rights. The only reason children are given rights is to shift authority or power to parents from some other authority, shift authority or power between 2 different authorities or the rights are so weak as to be of little practical effect. When people fight over children's rights they're fighting over the right to the child, not the rights of the child. That's how you end up with parents rights extremists fighting "discrimination" against children.

When children's rights have been warped so far, it's hard to fight for real rights. I believe dismantling parent and school authority is nessecary for children to have any rights. Rights aren't rights when they depend on the concurrence and active support of at least 3 other people to have them. In other words, the only path to youth rights, is youth liberation.

It’s a genuine question.

Somehow feminism, civil rights and LGBT rights movements became mainstream and socially accepted causes.

But youth liberation is seen today as a fringe, extremist position.

What’s the historical reason for this?

Forgive me for being stereotypical or a little ageist, but I kept reading about the whole “brain doesn’t fully mature until 25” thing, so people younger than that aren’t fully mature. And I hear about young people in their mid or even late 20s being immature. So, is 30 the new 25?

Forgive my ignorance, but have mid-20s ALWAYS been slightly immature or it’s because of the current infantilization / delayed adulthood?

I know people can be childish at any age, but just generalizing the 25-29 age range…

What age do you guys think a 13+ year old who can use social media should have full privacy, not mom checking their dms and all. Or 11 year olds who have phones, what do you guys think of that?

Honestly, My parents educated me pretty well on the dangers of social media and predators before they gave me a smartphone which was like age 10 and I never encountered problems online because my parents gave me privacy and told me that I should always let them know if someone i don’t know is trying to talk to me on the internet. So anytime a weird creep would hmu the first thing I did was block right away. What’s your guys thoughts on smartphone privacy??

i suspect we will see a raising of the age of majority in america to 21 or 25 in my lifetime, based on shoddy evidence of course

Hi, my name is Theodore Fotou and I am writing this article to share my experience about the program. It's title is "Get hired". The project took place in the capital of Lithuania, Vilnius. It's a city not so popular in Greece and generally as a destination, but it's such a beautiful place.

During the project we had the chance to express our thoughts about youth unemployment, our wonderings and how we deal with it. We learned about other countries reality about the topic and how youngsters face it. After that we did some workshops to find solutions and how to create skills to be more competitive as candidates.

Also, we had two very useful and informative speeches from a businessman and a career guidance counsellor. That helped as to find some answers in our inner thoughts about the career.

The last activities we did was to volunteer in an animal shelter and in different stores in the center of Vilnius. A really nice experience that gave us confidence and the sense of giving.

In conclusion, this experience will be memorable for me, because I was collaborating with people with other background and culture, shared our thoughts and in the end making meaningful connections. The project was so well organised and I suggest anyone to live the experience of being part of youth mobility.

People in power take steps to mitigate any chance of proving that they know that children are being abused in schools (and other institutions) and having their rights trampled over. However, in order to avoid any chance of definitive proof, they take actions that only make sense if they are trying to maintain plausible deniability. Even in instances where plausible deniability cannot be maintain, they ensure that most of the blame is placed on others.

Or maybe it is incompetence. I mean the government forgot how to file a valid regulation. (That education-related regulation is invalid because the entity making it did not have the authority to make it).

I have seen shorts on youtube that suggests american health care practitioners can disclose personal health information to parents, while the parent is not acting as substitute decision-maker without prior consent. Is this true?

I actually remembered the date this was coming out. Love that this artist spent about a month interrupting the videos of parents on tiktok to advertise the release of the song. We gotta admit, it's catchy. https://youtu.be/W-j5FzbJI-U?si=7-kK6tWGdEd9zZCz

An examples of how he advertised it; I liked every single one. It never got old, especially the one with the religious bigots bragging about how they indoctrinate their kids. Hope that was embarrassing for them...

https://www.tiktok.com/@moonwalkerband/video/7335225716063325486

People say "youth = naivety" yet the most naive people are the ones saying any variation of the title. They condone depriving an entire demographic of their rights (treating them like slaves) claiming they have a date of emancipation anyway, so they can just suck it up.

It's quite violent to hear when you are told all the time that you won't make it to adulthood due to an illness for example (yet this is not the main message from this post).

If you condone this being done to others, it will happen to you, sooner or later. For example, when they made it harder for women under 18-21 to abort, it was only a matter of time before this right was in jeopardy for everyone else.

To come back to youth rights, read what follows, especially if you're over 18.

Do NOT take the rights you are given at 18 for granted, ever.

It seems ridiculously easy to get them (actually it's not), however it is even easier to lose them, especially if you are disabled. Just see what happened to Britney Spears.

All it takes is a greedy person/relative, an accident, domestic violence or just someone who does not like you, a psychiatrist and a shady judge. Then wait for the right moment/create an opportunity (i. e. reunite all the conditions for the person to break mentally and blame them for the problem you caused) and file for a guardianship/conservatorship.

A guardianship means losing rights, being at the mercy of someone else for everything and all the decisions being made for you, aka what is done to youth within the utmost indifference. And once you're in, it is (almost) impossible to get out. It took 13 years for Britney to get out of her conservatorship, so imagine a random (not famous) person in this situation!

Although Britney is free, remember : All of this could happen to YOU!

Hi all! I'm Ben, I'm a 19 year old grown unschooler. I'm writing here because I attended Not Back To School Camp last year and it was a truly wonderful, and dare I say, life changing experience. It's a camp for self-directed learners with sessions in Oregon and Vermont. If you don't like school, and are interested in a place that takes youth seriously, this camp is a great place. It brought a wonderful community of people and a new range of new experiences into my life! I would sincerely recommend it other self-directed learners. They're in the early bird state of sign-ups right now, so I would definitely check it out if you know someone who may be interested. Happy to answer any questions based on my personal experience : )

I just randomly remembered of this very interesting law project that the country of Spain passed back in 2021 regarding their already existing prohibition of the corporal punishment of children:

This law, called the BOE-A-2021-9347, proposes a very comprehensive program with the goal to eradicate violence against children by 2030, and among the ways they're doing it, they include classifying age as a cause of discrimination in violence, eliminating the forgiveness of the offender as a cause of extinction of criminal responsibility, harsher sentences for corporal punishment (especially if it's more abusive forms, or when the victim is disabled), massive awareness campaigns on the harms of corporal punishment as well as information on non-violent forms of discipline aiming all age groups and types of media (including but not limited to school PSAs, television PSAs and internet ads), and the assignment of a duty on ALL citizens, not just current mandatory reporters, to report any and all forms of violence against children. Here's the text of this law in case you want to read it. (also have this translated version if you don't speak Spanish)

This in my opinion is just as good if not even better than Sweden's pioneering ban on corporal punishment of 1979, and I was actually surprised that this project is being done in by far one of the most problematic Western European countries when it comes to intergenerational violence. If this is currently being done right, I could see the eradication goal being at least partially achieved. I can only hope that they don't suddenly shelf this project if it fails or if some right-wing nutters decide to strike it down, and I hope that it can influence other nations all around the world to follow Spain's steps.

What do you think?

I've noticed that, at least on Reddit, you literally can't criticize teachers or the school system without being jumped on by teachers and defenders of the system. For example, This guy posted on /r/offmychest about his awful experience with school and teachers and multiple people in the comment are going to the teachers' defense and criticizing the OP in complete violation of rule number 1 of the subreddit (which was course not enforced in this case). winter_puppy makes every excuse they can think of for the teachers, shifts the blame to the parents, and even doubts the OP's claim of having been bullied, which is ridiculous. Aylthrowaway empathized with OP but defended teachers as well. The worst one is Amos_Dad (middle-aged based on his statement that he was in high school over 20 years ago) who explicitly victim-blames OP for all his problems saying he was the "common denominator" when he was literally a child through most the story and later an adolescent who had little to no power or control over anything plus neurodivergencies on top of that. He also horribly misuses the quote " "If you run into an asshole in the morning, you ran into an asshole. If you run into assholes all day, you're the asshole." That quote really doesn't apply to child-adult interactions because of uneven power balance. With greater power should come increased responsibility. The commenter tries to claim that they had childhood trauma as well but they way they mention it is so casual and nonchalant (like it's an afterthought) that I don't believe it for a moment combined with incredibly callous and unempathetic attitude. Not once does Amos_Dad have any words of compassion for OP. It's all criticism. If he really had childhood trauma, it definitely wasn't school related.

/r/teachers is probably the most anti-youth space on the entire site and people who work in schools generally hate youth more than anyone (at least on the internet). I can't bring myself to to visit that sub properly but from what I have seen (from posts the make the front page or appear in my searches), the teachers there say the most vile and nasty things about their students, especially those with neurodivergencies or learning differences. There's so much anger and bittnerness there that there's no way it doesn't bleed into their teaching. And you're giving kids and teens way too little credit if you think they can't sense that their teacher hates them, or at least hates their job, without being explicitly told or shown. They also look down on teachers who are popular with students (seeing them as weak and pushovers) and take pride in being unpopular hardasses. Maybe, just maybe, if your students actually like you and genuinely respect you (as opposed to just fearing the power you hold), they'll be more willing to cooperate with you and thus make your job easier. Finally, teachers there also have a completely warped view of how their occupation is perceived by the public. There are posts like this asking why so many people hate teachers and this asking why teaching is the most disrespected profession. Those things are literally not true because in reality, it seems clear to me that teaching and nursing are, by far, the two most revered professions in America and the most off limits to criticize. If I had kids, I would never trust them in the care of anyone who posts on /r/teachers. As long as compulsory Prussian schooling is a thing, all other aspects of how we treat youth will be forced to serve that.

In the 1990s and 2000s conservative views on parenting were substantially different than they are now. Some of the most major beliefs have fallen to the wayside. For example conservatives used to believe:

1. Discretion and flexibility were key in family matters when others were involved
2. Children could participate in family decisions, if they didn't challenge their parents
3. The government should only intervene in private matters as a last resort, generally when families cannot
4. Sometimes children were capable of making their own decisions
5. Major decisions about children should be left to the family
6. Parents should be consulted about matters concerning their children (There was a lot of disagreement between conservatives on this one)
7. If children wanted to be independent, they weren't entitled to the support of their parents
8. Sometimes another person can take the role of a parent in a child's life, independent of courts or the government and those people deserve recognition

Then Liberals started pushing their own views many of which were even worse:

1. Limit flexibility in some matters concerning children (eg. expand compulsory schooling)
2. Children's opinions matter the least.
3. The government should be active in children's private lives
4. Parents should be pushed out of some aspects of a child's life
5. Children are not entitled to independence
6. The government should be involved in major private matters
7. Only the government can choose parental figures unless its something punitive, then other parental figures are recognized

These were necessarily beliefs held by every liberal or conservative but were common among many liberals/conservatives. However, the new reactionary beliefs being pushed by conservatives is mostly based on beliefs held by liberals mixed in with conspiracy theories and hatred. I would generally say they are:

1. Limit flexibility around decisions made concerning children.
2. Children's opinions do not matter.
3. The government should be active in children's private lives
4. Parents should be pushed out of some aspects of a child's life
5. Children are not entitled to independence ever
6. The government should be involved in major private matters
7. Only the government can choose parental figures
8. Parents should be consulted about matters concerning their children
9. Decisions about children should be made by parents if they aren't being made by the government.

Hello, everyone. I've noticed a lack of discussion about Mike Males. Essentially, Mike Males is a very brilliant sociologist and youth rights advocate who does a really good job at debunking myths about teens. He has written a number of books about this subject, such as "The Scapegoat Generation: America's War on Adolescents", "Framing Youth: Ten Myths about the Next Generation", and "Teenage Sex and Pregnancy: Modern Myths, Unsexy Realities". Additionally, he has written quite a number of great articles debunking myths about young people as well. Yet, he receives surprisingly little attention on this subreddit.

So, I want to know what everyone thinks of Males's arguments, because frankly, I think he deserves way more attention here.

​

Some really great articles written by Males:

https://www.laprogressive.com/law-and-the-justice-system/astounding-youth-trends

https://www.laprogressive.com/law-and-justice/brainless-teenager

https://jjie.org/2020/07/10/whatever-happened-to-the-teenage-shoplifter-and-vandal-arsonist-burglar-joyrider/

https://youthtoday.org/2003/01/freedom-for-adults-only/

https://youthtoday.org/2003/03/bio-illogical/