Author Jacqueline Wilson says she thinks children these days are growing up too fast.
Some may feel she has pandered in the past to this tendency with titles like “Girls in Love” or the pupil-teacher romance of “Love Lessons” and she herself says it can look as though she is pushing for teenagers to have more freedom.
“But, it’s not what I believe,” she says, advocating a firm stance against teeenage strops and their demands for ever more freedoms.
At the same time, a survey suggests most British parents think childhood is over by 11.
These opinions express a growing feeling that childhood is a precious time which is being overrun by adult notions, ranging from what extra-curricular activities kids should do in their spare time to the now-infamous Health and Safety-inspired ideas of what’s just too risky nowadays.
(And those small, glossy women’s magazines read by young girls in their thousands are enough to make any parent tremble at the thought of what their teenage daughters are getting up to.)
Do you believe children are growing up too fast or could the problem be that adults are growing old too fast and imposing their outdated ideas on the younger generation? And if kids are missing out on childhood, how might it be restored?
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11 comments so far
Having been to university, I can say without a doubt that many children are growing up too slowly.
- Posted by FoyglI think that this survey is only indicative of those families who’ve let their children grow up on the welfare state.
- Posted by Nick RileyAt university, many children don’t have the time to grow at their own pace with all the pressure to suceed and decide a career path by the time they get to uni. And you wonder why there’s so many emotionally dysfunctional people in modern society…let kids be kids, they’ll grow up in their own time and freedom.
- Posted by John SmithI am 26 years old; quiet a few of my friends have young children their ages ranging from new born to 15 years old. I remember being young and playing with friends but in this climate children are going to mature quicker if its music, magazines, books, TV, parents or school. We are as a world at a point were we are requiring children at a young age to deal with more emotionally and physically situations, the days of innocents is really over we can not allow our children to play in the fields and have the experience of innocents that we had as children. Is the pressure on children meant to be this high? When did it all change? With children at a young age expected to ‘grow up’ so early. The only problem is that this is a course that can not be change due to our fear and our own expectations of the next generation can this pressure continue before we realise that the youth is gone? Overall with technology helping advance childrens understanding there seem to be too many factors in the modern day that will expand childrens mind and make them more aware of the world around them.
- Posted by James TownsonMost parents need to be beaten with a large blunt object. The way far too many young girls dress and act reflects exactly what parents allow them to watch on tv and read in magazines filled with smut. “icons” such as Brittany and Paris need to be removed from the screens,books and airwaves. Allow our children to view “whores” as idols and that is exactly what your children will be.
- Posted by MikeBy ‘growing up to quickly’ you don’t mean become mature, responsible adults. By ‘growing up to quickly’ you mean it to be synonymous with drink, drugs and sex. I know 30 year olds who pursue these and I would hardly use the term ‘grown up’ to describe them.
- Posted by MarkHeck yea!!! Children are growing up TOO fast. But the bigger question is why. I say because of the parents and their up bringing. A child is only gonna do what you allow them to do. I am eighteen years old and I would never in a million years do what some of these children doing now. Parents are afraid to discipline their children because they’re scared they might go to jail. PARENTS YOU CAN DISCIPLINE YOUR KIDS!!!! TAKE THINGS AWAY!! GIVE THEM A SPANKIN HERE ONLY IF NECESSARY BUT DON’T AND I MEAN DON’T REWARD THEM WHEN THEY DON’T DESERVE IT!!!!!
- Posted by TyeshaYes it is right children are growing up fast. Faster than they themselves can handle. The reason is the social structure is changing in ways humanity have never seen before. The availability of information of all kinds gives them a feeling of enpowerment. On the other side, many young adults are the parents of these children. The biological father may not be the one whom the kid grows up with. The same thing can happen the other way around. Young couples having children is a major reason for children acting like adults in many situations. The parents just don’t know how to guide their children. By body they may be ready to be a parent, but by mind they are still children. So the new generation is seeing a very playful parent other than a parent who yearned the respect of the child in the past, in many cultures commanded those respects. There is a good side and bad side to this. The good being, children learn to set their priorities of life so early. The bad is the worst, some cannot handle it at all and end up as drug addicts anti social and some end up killing themselves after taking the lives of many of their fellow children.
- Posted by LonelyPoetMike, you need to chill. Also, you bring about a contentious point in your post - there’s a double-standard when it comes to girls. Sure, Britney and Paris aren’t ideal role models (especially Britney now, but I’m pretty sure no one looks up to her anymore) - but they (and all the other stuck-up princesses) have the right to act the way they do (and girls have the right to imitate them). A lot of us guys do the same thing (albeit in a slightly different way), yet our actions are held in a positive light. ex: guys (”player” - compliment), girls (”whore/slut” - deragatory)
- Posted by ArthurI am 13… when i was little like five and six i never really bothered about what i looked like. when i was seven i got critisised at school for playing with a boy who was my best friend. At eight i stopped playing with dolls because my ‘friends’ said
- Posted by meeeeeeit was stupid. At ten i had a party and got loads of make-up and handbags. At eleven my best friend got picked on for not having a bra….. you also get picked on for not having the right mobile phones and staying out early. i say its stupid and i agree
Wilson has certainly attracted attention to herself. I wonder what kind of childhood generation she is relating too? Every childhood time in history is coloured with different norms.
We may have been able to play out, but did we stay younger longer? Our perceptions of childhood are laced with our own ignorance, which I do not think was very helpful. I lived in a city, I was streetwise, I needed to be. Is that staying younger longer?
Rural kids probably still do play out. In rural areas children are not so streetwise and as young adults can be more at personal risk by their lack of knowledge and weaker ability to survive in the larger world.
The next generation of kids will be different, yet again.
The thinking behind the comment needs clarifying.
- Posted by Menhir