Getting Blamed
I would like to vent about an important topic that likely bears mention to those currently struggling through the thickets of an egocentric adolescence, which is that time during which your parents or other authoritative adults choose to assign greater fault to you because you are the youngest semi-mature person present.Ā
This may be because they believe (in a blinkered sort of way) in respect for your elders, ie. everyone your parents or guardians know who are at least very slightly older than you, or perhaps because you are meant to be simultaneously 1) more intelligent and respectful than your bratty *younger relations* and 2) younger than whoever is chewing you out and therefore unfit (see aside about being respectful to your elders).Ā
An example of this is when your screaming three-year-old twin cousins have arrived, it seems, with the express purpose of turning your bedroom (ie. your inner sanctum) into a shambles and being very loud in the process. You, like a normal, suffering, flawed person, have chosen to start bellowing like a pregnant sow and have been caught terrorising the spawn of the devil, which leads to your subsequent punishment. Why? Because, very simply, you are meant to tolerate this outrage in order to prove yourself a mature, capable human being (never mind that youāre probably a ten-year-old ninny). Also, since you are being punished by an adult, you cannot show the slightest sign of displeasure, which will almost certainly be interpreted as insulting (within the how dare you category).
Itās even more frustrating when the spawn of the devil turns out to be (God forbid) an older person. Heaven help you if they are senior citizens, because these hallowed human beings are immune to the stains of misbehaviour. For example, you, a barely-sane sixteen-year-old, have noticed that your antique copy of AmadĆs de Gaula has disappeared from your bookshelf. It might be completely unintelligible and old as all-get-out, but it means things to you, and everyone in the house has strongly affirmed their innocence.Ā
And then (O Horror of Horrors) it reappears: sitting on your grandmotherās desk is a leather-backed gold-stamped wreck; dropped, caked in tea-and-cracker residue, water-logged, and stamped on by a dragon (WARNING:Ā liberal use of hyperbole). Your grandmother apologises very unsatisfactorily, and attempts to give it back. You, in your understandable outrage, have begun relentlessly questioning her about her moral code, and whether it is right to take other peopleās things, lie about it, and turn them into chicuca. By the time youāve lapsed into an incensed silence, another adult has arrived to bail out your downright evil grandmother and start sputtering at you for being aĀ relatively sane and understandably angry person Ā stupidĀ brat who dares to be this rude to YOUR GRANDMOTHER.
These situations are fictional and obviously exaggerated, and who knows, maybe being insulting in your speech is a greater offence than destroying an antique without permission or being an enormous room-destroying prick. It does, however, seem a little strange.Ā
Is it right to tell children and teens that they only need to grow up in order to take advantage of kids, that the limited maturity afforded to a tween automatically makes them perfect arbiters of behaviour, that punishment is the most effective road towards improvement? And more importantly, is it healthy?Ā
Certainly, it could be argued that because Iām biased in favour of adolescents (or just myself) and because I have a tendency, according to my family, to manage being simultaneously being very rude and superficially calm and respectful; this rant is invalid, but I think adolescents are the most unpleasant, rude, repulsive creatures humankind has the misfortune to live with (myself included), and that rudeness is an unfortunate (though controllable) side effect of this. I think everyone should strive for better things, especially those of us with the most to ponder in terms of self-improvement.Ā
I am also of the opinion that articulating your discomforts is generally healthy and helpful, because solutions to these discomforts become readily available and you can comfortably move on with your self-improvement crusade. Hence, I can now say that unfairness is a plague, I perpetrate much of it, and grandparents will likely keep ruining my books and kids will keep on trashing my room. I have to prepare for that. Lock my bedroom door, for instance. Avoid having to get angry, or just being a mature person and knowing how to deal when I actually do get angry.Ā
Anyway, Iād like to affirm that getting blamed is normal, not at all dramatic, and part of the life of a first-world worm. For all fellow annelids, this does not mean you feel better about it, but that you can start to see it for what it is, and start actively doing something about it.
