Centerville High School

Centerville, South Dakota
Teacher: Mitch Russell

 

 

 

"You Have Brains In Your Head"
By Danielle Buechler

 

“’First let’s look at the growing importance of young adults in the cigarette market.  They represent tomorrow’s cigarette business. As this 14-24 age group matures, they will account for a key share of the total cigarette volume for at least the next 25 years, thus our strategy becomes clear for established brands. We must direct advertising appeal to the younger smokers.’ This quote was from an RJ Reynolds “Marketing Plans” presentation made on September 30, 19741.  For over 36 years, the tobacco industry has been fully aware of the lack of a rite of passage into adulthood each adolescent encounters.  The tobacco industry has preyed on this deficiency accounting for billions of dollars in profits. 

 

They target youth in hopes of making it an adult activity preying on the fact that adolescence experience the desire to be rebellious, cool, independent, and glamorous. They even considered the surgeon generals warning on the cigarette package an advantage because it serves as a constant reminder that young adults are not supposed to have cigarettes. This is the illusion of smoking strictly being an adult activity.  They want teens to believe that they must make the transition into adulthood by making smoking that rite of passage. 

 

After seeing advertisements with beautiful men and women smoking, the rugged Marlboro man galloping on his trusty horse into the sunset, and the fun-loving cartoon character, Joe Camel, one could not but help notice that smoking had found a place of social acceptance, especially amongst young adults.  The tobacco companies spent over 14 million dollars every day in 1997 on advertising alone2. All of the advertising accounts for more than 4 million current smokers between the age of 12-173. Their message conveniently subtracts the part that smoking is the most preventable leading cause of death claiming more than 400, 000 lives each year4. According to the Tobacco Free Kids Campaign, five million children alive today will die prematurely due to tobacco related causes5. Yet, the statistics prove that their plan worked. They have achieved the adult image so that every first grader knows who Joe Camel is and can associate smoking as a ‘big person’s activity.’ They have allowed us teens to believe that we have the right to choose to smoke.  Choice is a powerful tool for a teenager, a tool that is often taken for granted and abused. I do not want my rite of passage into adulthood mixed with stained teeth and tarred lungs. 

           

Adolescence is the time of life that onsets puberty to achieve full adulthood. I would describe it as the time for finding one’s own personal identity and what sets an individual apart from the crowd, breaking away from family ties, and driving parents crazy.  Everyone is aware of the physical changes that one goes through. This just seems to be common knowledge, whether it comes from a heart to heart with mom and dad, or it is heard on the playground, or even from Greg Brady and the “Time to Change” theme song on the Brady Bunch.  It is a crossing over from the world of a child to the adult world and the fine lines that separate them.

           

Even children know when they are engaged in something of value to the adult world.  A five-year-old girl will sneak into mommy’s closet and put on her high heels and find her lipstick concealed in the back of her drawer. At the age of ten, a child will strain his eyes so that he can stay awake all night and watch television, forgoing the normal bedtime.  An early driver will take the car whenever possible and drive absolutely no where for any particular reason. 

           

Maturity is not reached by playing dress up, by sitting up all night and watching television, or by taking the car out on the weekend. Underlying these activities are the motives of trust and mutual respect, granted by parents.  As a teenager strives for independence, autonomy and the need for parental acceptance of maturity increases.  Even though the communication barriers between parents and teens are hard to overcome.  The truth lies in mutual understanding, which is a hard ground to meet on.

           

The battle ground parents and teenagers meet on is the battle of the rights of choice, who has it and who does not.  We live in a wonderful democracy that entitles us to freedoms, especially the freedom to make choices for ourselves.

 

The principal causes of our adolescent’s difficulty are the presence of conflicting standards and the belief that every individual should make his or her own choices, coupled with a feeling that choice is an important matter6. The ability to make choices is of importance because it reflects independence that permeates into adulthood.  Teenagers often forget the ground rule that the choices we make today dictate our future.

 

When I was eight years old, I would often sneak to the back of the library where the corners of the thick, towering bookshelves meet and the heavy aroma of old books encompassed me.  I sat on a small stool and dove into countless books by Doctor Seuss.  My favorite thing that Doctor Seuss said was, “You have brains in your head.  You have feet in your shoes.  You can steer yourself any direction you choose.7” But who will be there for you to make sure that the direction you choose is the right path for your feet in your shoes?  Even though the rite of passage is not clearly defined or commended through a ceremony, it still exists in the society we live in.  The fact that our society does not recognize the rite of passage into adulthood does not mean that society can ignore it.

 

In our society, we teens are focusing on becoming individuals. But bold tattoos, various piercings, and loud music cannot fill the void of having someone walk in when the rest of the world walks out as we make our own walk down the multiple paths of life.

 

1The Truth Campaign, “The Lowdown” – 2000.  www.thetruth.com

2 US Federal Trade Commission, “Federal Trade Commission Report to Congress for 1997, Pursuant to the Federal Cigarette Labeling and Advertising Act” – 1999.

3 Substance Abuse and Mental Health Administrations,  “National Household Survey on Drug Abuse,” US Department of Health and Human Services – 1998.

 

4 Growing Up Tobacco Free: Preventing Nicotine Addiction in Children and Youths, Lynch B. and Bonnie R. Editors, Institute of Medicine – 1994

5 Tobacco Free Kids Campaign, “Research Center” – 2000. www.tobaccofreekids.org

6 “The principal causes of our adolescent’s........choice is an important matter.” – Margaret Mead

7 Dr. Seuss – author of children’s books

 

Answers To Required Reading

 

1.      In Margaret Mead’s 1961 Preface to Coming of Age in Samoa, the statement that is

reminiscent of a current Army recruiting advertisement is “the future of young people who, in the United States were becoming less than they might be.”  This statement reflects the Army slogan “Be All That You Can Be.”  This is an imperative message that has a universal impact in the sense that everyone should attempt to find the best in oneself, a message that might be the key to leading a promising life.  Margaret Mead touches upon the fact that this drive was not present in the young people of America.  Even today’s teens have been accused of not living up to their full potential.

 

2.   Even though society has made numerous technological and economic advances, the issues of the 1920’s are still evident today but in a different manner.  The importance of language spoken in the home has varied from a cultural standpoint.  On a neighborhood block one may find at least six different languages spoken.  The language spoken that is inappropriate or disrespectful such as cussing in the home from a moral standpoint is not tolerated in most homes.  Language of teens is more free and verbal, but it still remains an issue.  Familial pressures is an issue that children are often subjected to when dealing with parents.  Parents often believe that they are using positive guidance, but in reality the pressures often hurt, not help, their children.  The factor that differentiates the 1920’s is the family structure that may intensify the at home pressures.  The different family constructions are divorced parents, step parents, or even raised by other family members.  These children that are in these home situations are more likely to find an escape.  Misconceptions about race and color still occur today.  Society might be more educated or rather exposed to different ethnic races, but unfortunately we still see the hate crimes of the 1920’s. Ignorance or pride may never be replaced by tolerance.  The effects of artificially separating children from knowledge of birth, love, and death are still practiced today.  The birds and the bees and the stork story may have been replaced by a stronger truth that is still sugar coated.  These are everyday issues that children  must be well aware of, but parents still try to hold on to their innocence in some areas.

 

3.   In my opinion, culture is man made and that man is free to design it closer to the  desires of his own heart. When examining America’s culture, one would find that it went from being characterized as a ‘melting pot’ to a ‘tossed salad.’  This switch was made instead of the immigrant’s culture combined to form a blend.  They realized that each culture trait was combined but still held its unique flavor.  According to the Webster’s New World Dictionary, culture is defined as the ideas, customs, skills, arts, etc. of a people or group that are transferred, communicated, or passed along, as in or to succeeding generations.

 

4.  Margaret Mead was advocating a greater knowledge and control over civilizing process.  Margaret Mead states “I was not advocating a return to the primitive but rather greater knowledge which would give modern man more control over the civilizing process itself.” 

 

5.  Adults often say that nothing has changed from the time in which they grew up.  I would have to strongly disagree.  I believe that as a teen I live in the information age where anything that I really want to know is at my fingertips.  In this case, knowledge could have too much power.  This is one reason why I agree with A Tribe Apart in the sense that teenagers are more educated and growing up a lot earlier taking on more adult-like responsibilities.  I live in a time where both parents full time jobs, where adult activities such as drinking and smoking are considered weekend activities, and where children are committing adult crimes as serious as murder.  It may be true that we do not have a distinct rite of passage into adulthood, but everyone still wants to grow up.  When you are fifteen, you buy “Seventeen.”  When you are seventeen, you buy “Cosmopolitan.”  However, we teens do want recognition that we are adults, but we do not want adults to recognize these efforts and enforce “boundaries and structure. 

 

6.      I am a member of an Improvisational Solutions Team and Teen Against Tobacco Use, so I deal with my peers and drug and alcohol prevention.  I absolutely, positively, know that I have never experienced drugs and alcohol and that is something that I am very proud of.  For every action there is a consequence.  Even though I don’t witness the action first hand, I see the consequences.  I see it when someone gets kicked off the basketball team because of alcohol.  I see it when a girl in my class tried to quit smoking and couldn’t even make it through an entire day without getting sick because she needed a cigarette so bad.  I know that my school is very lucky compared to the surrounding schools.  We have very active prevention programs, such as those that I am involved in, step in and step up awareness.  Our drinking and smoking rates are less than those in schools surrounding us.  I believe the reason why teens smoke or drink is that they are trying earn their right to have adult privileges and responsibilities.  In those societies where there is passage between adolescence to an adult, they have less drug problems than in America where adolescence is stage to adulthood.

 

7.      I have no solution for the plight of a black teenager.  Racism is a problem of ignorance and close mindedness.  In a study performed, they matched on a screen a white face and the word “good” and a black face with the word “bad.”  Then words flashed across the screen such as “war,” “peace,” and “love.”  The person must classify these words as either good or bad.  The person being tested had no problem matching the words.  In the second part of the test, the white face was matched with the word “bad” and the black face was matched with the word “good.”  The same words flashed at the bottom of the screen, except this time the person being tested had a rather difficult time classifying the words.  I think that this proves the story of the plight of the black teenager.  All of the examples where the black teen is being discriminated against dealt with stereotypes that have been socially acceptable.  This is by no means an excuse, but I can do my part by being aware and open minded.

 

8.      No, it would not be a relief if all I had to do was “go to class and learn” because I would be missing out on unbelievable experiences.  The activities that I participate in outside of school have allowed me to find talents that I never knew I possessed, make life long friendships, and find a sense of self-accomplishment of overcoming those challenging activities.  I think that I am also fortunate to go to public school verses being home schooled.  I think a public school environment is more than reading, writing, and arithmetic.  You learn communication, leadership, and social skills of interacting with people of relatively the same age that challenge you.  Academics should however be presented in an exciting way and learning should be admired.  In many cultures, knowledge is a highly regarded trait and a wise person is given highly regarded respect.  Single-sex private schools do focus more on academics and excellence, but the added pressure can often create a learning environment that is undesirable to most students, especially for those who learn at a slower rate.  Education is an issue that is imperative because it deals with sculpting the minds of our future.  

 

9.      The comments made by Pete Seeger and Jonathan reflect that they may have been oblivious to the fact the information presented in schools, although a person may not directly use it, is still essential to the real world.  It may be hard to directly relate logarithms, the complete works of Walt Whitman, or the events of World War I to the typical nine to five job, but schools do prepare us for the real world.  They teach the students how to solve problems for themselves and evolve their own creative thinking process.  The only sense that schools can be compared to prisons is when we have to go to school with a security guard and a metal detector checking for hidden weapons, or drug dogs racing through our halls looking for a concealed stash.  In this case, even though some of our freedoms have been taken away, our safety has been reinstalled.  It would be helpful if more incorporated community-based learning was a part of the curriculum.  It would allow the student to learn more direct career skills and make a positive impact in their community.  I am involved in such a program.  It is a vocational program where I obtain agricultural skills.  Students in this program have the opportunity to build park benches for our community’s park while still learning about genetic engineering in plants and growing hydroponics plants in a greenhouse. 

 

10.  Hillary Clinton addressed the imperative issue of how society affects the raising of a child.  She asked, “Does It Take a Village.”  Her answer was yes; it does take a village.  The environment that a child grows up in affects how that child thinks, talks, and acts.  Children need mentors or positive role models in their life.  In today’s society, our family structure is different considering that the parents may not serve that role model position.  Where will that child go for comforting, advice, and acceptance?  The “bottom line” also comments on this stating that there will be a generation gap evident as time progresses.  As a teen, I know that I cannot be a vessel on the sea floating along without some kind of light guiding me along the way.  As I grow up and move farther away from shore, my strong, dependable lighthouse fades deeper away and I am to rely on the stars in the sky to help guide my path.  These stars are my teachers and professors, my friends, my employers, and other role models.  I need these people to be real to me, and most importantly, listen to what I have to say.  There needs to be a mutual respect.  Respect is often misunderstood between adults and adolescents.  Adults believe that you get respect when you demand it.  Adolescents believe that you earn respect by giving respect