Teens are Better Behaved Than Ever

I don't know about you guys, but I always hear from the older generation that our generation is lazy and up to no good. It seems like everywhere grandparents are remarking how sexually active and reckless teenagers are. There always seem to be drug scandals at high schools and even in junior highs and middle schools. Just earlier this year, the North Shore witnessed a sexting scandal that caused one girl to transfer schools. Things like this make our generation seem like it fits what older generations say about us.

Actually, our generation isn't the "worst". According to statistics our generation is the "best"! "Best" is kind of a weird word though... What makes a generation the "best"? Well, our teen birth rate is the lowest it has been in quite a while - just 29.4 births per 1,000 women ages 15-19 compared to 89.1 in the 1960s. High school seniors' use of illegal substances has also decreased - only about 40% of seniors drink alcohol compared to 72% in 1980 - and they are barely using cocaine at all. Although marijuana use has increased slightly within the next past 10 years, it is still much lower than it was in the 80s. So what are kids doing instead of drugs? Exercising. 29.7% of students meet federal exercise guidelines compared to just 18.9% in 1998.

So the next time anybody tells you that teenagers nowadays are all corrupted druggies, you can prove them wrong and tell them that their generation was actually worse behaved than ours.

Should Snowden Return Private Documents?

I'm pretty sure everyone out there right now knows about Edward Snowden, the man who publicized to the American people what they didn't know about the government. He made everyone aware that the NSA has been spying on billions of innocent Americans. For the most part, the American citizens think of him as a kind of "hero" for telling them what they should know.

The US government, however, has not been so happy with him. This past Wednesday, the head of the U.S. intelligence community called Snowden in and requested that he return all the documents that he has not made public yet.

After reading a recent article, I have found out that Snowden has received sharp criticisms from many government employees saying that by releasing private information he has: caused allies to cut off cooperation with the US, caused changes in communications by terrorist networks, and has put the lives of intelligence operatives at risk.

Here is the link to the official transcript of the hearing.

As citizens, we have lost trust in our own government, but I think it is better to know the truth than to live on our lives in ignorance. The government realizes now that they messed up and are trying to prevent their reputation from getting any worse. There is a possibility that Snowden hasn't even released the worst of it yet, and that is why the government is so nervous about the rest of the information being released. But who knows?

This relates to the Vietnam War presentation today with regards to freedom of information and the Pentagon Papers. The government was extremely angry at Daniel Ellsberg for releasing private information to the public, but the public was glad to finally know what was really going on in the Vietnam War. After the conversation we had in class, do you think it was "patriotic" for Edward Snowden to reveal the government's secrets? Should Snowden return the unreleased documents?