Teenagers are a mystery wrapped in an enigma, and when you finally start figuring it out, they change, just to keep you on your toes (or mightily piss you off if you prefer the unpolite version). It’s fair to say that whenever you were young was the best generation of teenagers, your music was better, you were cooler, and you weren’t as rude or stupid as they clearly are. It’s staggering the rate that things change and although this has always been the case it sometimes seems that the rate of change is accelerating. But it’s sometimes good to at least try and figure out their ways so let’s look at 7 unexpected trends that the young folks are getting up to today, basically what’s cool or with it, but you’ll no doubt be told those terms are not!
Retro Fashion Trends
This one is absolute proof that your generation got it right! Today’s youth are obsessed with retro fashion and this is undeniably infuriating as you were there first. Although you can embarrass them by showing them photos of you dressing in their cool retro style first time round. You do sometimes get the strange situation of kids who wear a branded T-shirt but not understanding the origin of the design, the Rolling Stones, ‘lips’ design, the Nirvana ‘face’ or even some who would wear a New York Yankees logo not even knowing that they are a baseball team!
Less is More
When we think of popular trends it’s true to say what the young ones are into isn’t all bad. When they are not trying to mimic our generations, which let’s be honest sometimes is a good thing, some of the current trends are really quite anti-invasive! Minimalism is quite the thing these days, basically keeping it simple and using gentle shapes and patterns rather than loud, brash statements. I, for one, think they may have it spot on with this one. Maybe we are missing some of the worst fashion statements as they always seemed normal at the time when we look back on some of the horror-shows of the past.
Not Drinking or Smoking
What they wear is not the only change in teenage trends we’ve seen over the years, how they behave is also different as well. We were all probably a total nightmare for our parents back in our teenage years. We were smoking, drinking and taking drugs, on average, much more than our counterparts today. This is shown out when you look at the data, and this fascinating website allows you to enter your date of birth and see the difference between your generation and today’s in a whole number of behaviors from smoking, drinking and drugs to sex and teenage pregnancy rates, and don’t hold your breath, they come out as better!
What do they do then?
So what are they doing if they are not smoking drinking or generally getting up to no good as we all used to do? Well for a start there are so many other distractions, it’s not just TV, there are a million website apps, etc for them to waste their time on. Even social media has moved on, we all have a Facebook account, right? Well not the teenagers, they’re way beyond that! It’s all Snapchat and Instagram rather than Facebook and Twitter.
Also, if they are not drinking and smoking then what are they doing? Well, e-cogs are all the rage these days, some even use them having never smoked! But in general as you avoid all the tar and many other toxins it’s a much cleaner habit and it’s so easy to buy e-cigarettes in Canada these days.
Broadcasting
Every teenager owns their own tele
