Teenagers? Let’s call them the new adults

At first, I thought it was just me being hypocritical about people who didn’t conform to my views on life.

After all, we do live in a society where everyone has the right to do their thing and under most circumstances, not be criticized or ostracized for doing so.

But once again, my role as an editor continues to badger me with a persistent question that has been nagging at me for years but one that I have found no answer to: Where are all the adults?

That is a question that judges are asking, police are asking, social workers are asking, teachers are asking, and the general public is asking.

Why are so many adults acting like they’ve “gone wild” and dismissed the responsibility and accountability of adulthood as if they’re myths of yore and have no relevance in today’s society?

A better question may be why aren’t adults acting like adults instead of angry teenagers? Why haven’t they shed that teenage angst and moved into responsible adulthood?

Many act like they don’t understand they are adults and their actions have consequences.

A look at mug shots — which used to carry the stigma of shame — that show the stunted growth of some adults as police snapshots are now a fashion portrait to be complemented with smiles and poses to be shared — and ankle monitors are the latest accessory not to be hidden under long pants but displayed as a symbol of ... what?

Press releases from police and the office of the state’s attorney office flood into the Register’s newsroom with a near daily barrage of adults gone wild, displaying outlandish behavior, making childlike decisions and then breaking down in tears and begging for forgiveness with a mea culpa.

But some things that adults are doing are totally irrational, such as letting their kid, 10, drive while streaming it for the enjoyment of social media; or using an electric shock collar to punish a child, or locking children in a dog cage to discipline them, as well as starving their kids.

How does a mea culpa defend those actions? While these things happened in Connecticut, I have stayed away from some of the stupid behavior, as well as horrific acts, adults here in Greater New Haven have committed to spare their family and loved ones— not them — further shame.

Adulthood seems to be the missing ingredient these days in a melting pot that’s in an upheaval. Many parents throw public tantrums, fight publicly at adult and children’s sporting events and many show total disregard for the law and sneer at conformity.

It’s like some people have continued to grow physically but stopped growing mentally, their maturity stuck somewhere between the petulance of adolescent and the reality of being an adult.

Fake news has gotten out that life isn’t supposed to be tough and people don’t have to tough it out or take the necessary steps to improve their lives.

I’ve written a lot about how irresponsible parents, bad behavior and lack of responsibility and accountability has left children mired in a welfare system without the parental guidance and direction they need to be successful in life.

But it is not only low-income, uneducated parents, but a broad spectrum of people who refuse to “man up” to the problems they create. The trials and tribulations a person must endure as they build a better life have been turned into myths. Too many parents have shoved the responsibility of being an adult onto their young children’s shoulders long before they are mentally ready.

It is a phenomenon that has swept through the country, leaving millions of teenagers following in their parent’s footsteps of discontent — and other teenagers beginning to question why they act more adult than their parents..

Psychiatrists have been warning since the early 1990s about the problem of people transferring their personal problems — whether health or social — into government entities to be solved, thereby creating a dependent society — and a nation of many irresponsible adults.

It is something they had labeled extremely dangerous and we are seeing the results: People who never grow up.

Whatever the case, adulthood and the responsibility that comes with it is becoming a vanishing breed much like a species that is headed toward extinction.

And that is leaving teenagers heading into parenthood and the real world with the responsibility of being level-headed adults.

It is something many of them are ill-equipped to handle and know nothing about — because they never learned it from their parents.