I can agree with some of this but I'm not exactly sure where I stand (thank you for countering the 'brain isn't fully developed until 25' myth. Apparently, this is based on a 2005 or 2006 study where 21 year-old subjects had underdeveloped prefrontal cortexes and the researcher assumed that 25 would be the standard age for prefrontal cortex development, maybe because that's considered the start of general decline, I don't know, but it was never supported by evidence and research since has shown that it's not uncommon for the prefrontal cortex to develop well after 30, there is no standard age for that. In my understanding, I'm no neuroscience expert).G@yWad69 wrote: Wed Jul 23, 2025 11:20 pm As we all know, teens are a frustrating age group, being legally children, socially adolescents, and biologically adults. Until the 1800s as a response to the industrial revolution, people were treated as adults, young and learning adults but still adults, once they reached puberty in most parts of the world. Adolescence is a recent concept created in the west that spread across the globe due to colonialism, and is no treated as a natural developmental stage instead of what it really as, an artificial manmade social/legal concept.You become an adult once you are capable of reproduction, that is true of literally every animal species on earth including humans until as recently as two centuries ago.
God forbid that you suggest to someone that teens are BIOLOGICALLY adults, hell, if you even suggest that they are anything but literal children nowadays people will cancel you. I am not even saying that teens are LEGALLY adults or SOCIALLY adults, which they are objectively not, im just stating a basic biological fact. They are capable of reproduction, by the time they hit 14-16 most of them are fully grown and wont change much, if it all, for the next couple years. The “teen brain” is a myth, the brain doesnt stop developing at 25 because it NEVER stops devloping. They arent “mentally/emotionally children”, they ARE “mentally/emotionally” STUNTED because they are treated like children, held to the standards of children(except for the rare cases where they commit a serious crime), expected to act like children and are severely shamed and called “grown” or “fast” if they dare to act like the adults they biologically are. How is someone supposed to act like a mature adult if everyone, from the goverment to every day citizens, treat them like they are devolopmentally 9 years old at best? Obviously they will “act like kids” if you force them to “act like kids” and shit on them if they “act grown”.
But if I even mention to people that teens are biologically young adults they act as if I have said something like “black people should be enslaved” or “women are inferior” or something extremely offensive and cruel, and get defensive like their own lives depend on it.
There are so many parts of “teenage hood” that would work out so much better for everyone if we stopped babying them and policing their bodies. Like teen preganancy, who gives a shit if they get pregnant? If they werent treated like 8 year olds this wouldnt be a problem. They are just doing what nature has prepared them to do. At worse all you need to do is give them proper sex ed and access to birth control and abortion, instead of treating them like little babies who will explode if they follow their natural biology. Or underaged drinking, there shouldnt be an age limit on drinking in the first place, minors should be tought to drink safely and responisblly. Or lying about their age to sneak into clubs, why should clubs have an age limit in the first place? Or at least such a high one? Its not like anyone can tell the difference between a 16 year old and 21 year old anyway, which is why 16 year olds have such an easy time passing as the age on their fake id(because theres zero biological, physical, emotional, or mental difference between an underaged teen and a young 20 year old except for a couple extra years of expiernce, clubs wouldnt ask for ids in the first place if there was a difference that you could tell). Or staying out late and sneaking out. Why should they have a curfew in the first place? They arent 5. Or truancy. They are old enough to make their own descions on their education, and a hs diploma or college diploma shouldn't be the only route t o success. Adults put stupid childish infantile rules on teens then call them “rebellious” or “spoiled brats” or “fast and grown” for breaking these stupid ass rules that shouldnt even exist in the first place.The reasons teens are so “rebellious” against legal adults is because legal adults treat them like children or “adolecents” (which lets be real, is just childhood 2.0. Adolecents is to childhood as pullups are to diapers, its the same damn thing, just worded different to make people feel more mature) which deep down, teens know, or at least used to know, is objectively false
A problem that I have with the idea of adulthood based on reproductive ability (or the completion of puberty, since not everyone can reproduce. I'm sure there are some medically unusual 'adults' who never went through puberty either) is that people mature at different rates (the average girl has her first period at 12; it typically occurs two years after thelarche begins, but it's not considered delayed unless it hasn't occurred by 15 and it's not premature unless it happens before 10, according to most of what I've read, so reproductive ability as a justification for 13 as the start of adulthood doesn't apply to some 14 year-olds and it would include some 10 year olds, even though the sexually underdeveloped 14 year olds are cognitively the same as sexually developed 14 year olds and more cognitively developed than sexually developed/underdeveloped 10 year olds, in terms of averages anyway. I can see the sense in basing this on statistical averages though, especially since it's not clear to me what is meant when people say that 'medically normal' girls have experienced menarche by 15- it would be clearer if every single 16 year old girl who hasn't had her period is a late bloomer because of malnutrition or some medical issue but that's not always the case. I ignored semenarche because I'm not sure about the average appearance of that, if it's not 12 I'd assume it was 13 or 14. I ejaculated for the first time at 12). I've also read from different sources that adult cognition is typically developed by 16 or 18 but it's also not clear to me what 'adult cognition' means (isn't a lot of this just a matter of degree?). I've read that it more or less peaks at 18 or 19 and more or less declines thereafter so if the average 60 year old is below the average 16 year old (I have no idea whether or not they would be) what would make 16 the marker for adult cognition and again, what even is 'adult cognition,' adult IQ can range from below 70 to beyond 200 in rare cases. These aren't rhetorical questions. It's also strange to me that we judge people by whether or not they've reached their potential and not their actual cognitive ability (so someone who's well above me has less freedom because they haven't reached their peak).
I don't really agree with you on teen pregnancy. It's a huge responsibility and I think it's better if people have time to enjoy their youth, map out their life, etc. before being bogged down by that. I guess you could say that any line I drew would be arbitrary and not something I could universalize and I'm not claiming that it's just inherently wrong in every conceivable scenario, but I think it's generally a good idea to wait rather than having children as soon as you can reproduce (and I'm leaving aside the ethics of reproduction to begin with).
I think it's dishonest when people lump 16 year olds in with 5 year olds but I tend to see around 12-15 as a somewhat ambiguous age zone, somewhere between true adulthood and childhood but leaning more toward adulthood.
