Teenage Wasteland

Living in the Suburbs

 I have lived in the suburbs my whole life and going to school in the city has made me realize that there actually are differences in how kids interact with each other and the society that they live in. Donna Gaines wrote the internationally acclaimed book called Teenage Wasteland: Suburbia’s dead-end kids. In this reading, Gaines talks about her experience in the suburbs of Bergenfield, New Jersey where four teenagers were found dead and were labeled as the suicide kids on the morning of March 11, 1987. The purpose of her research was to find out why these kids were believed to have made a suicide pact and the causes of this social phenomenon.  Donna Gaines had actually been somewhat familiar with suburban kids, because she was born and raised in the suburbs. During her research, she was able to enter this world of “burnouts” in order to understand and see why they were labeled this way. Most people in the town saw these kids as “drop-outs”, “rebels”, “good-for-nothing”, but in reality no one had taken the time or chance to get to know them. She found that the usual “burnouts” are kids whose families are at the bottom of the social ladder. They were also the kids who did poorly in school and were the outcasts of their schools and towns. Gaines talks to other kids of different areas to understand the reasons why these teens turn out the way they are. She wants to understand why they are so wounded and why they don’t participate in their society. After her field study, she concludes that most of these so-called-burnouts don’t have a place to go in the towns where they are from. They feel like there is no place for them and everywhere they go people call them names and are looked down on. Kids like these are usually townies, whose parents and grandparents have lived there for generations, therefore is harder for them to just leave the places they are so attached to. I personally understand this story, because I have lived in Long Island for about ten years. I went to middle school and high school in a small town where most people know each other. Even when I was in El Salvador, I was living in a suburban area and the kids that were often in hangout in the streets were labeled as druggies and bad kids. I always found that to be unfair, because there were kids that were actually bright students, who were not even close to being a “burnout” or a “dropout”. They were kids who listened to heavy metal or just rock, wore baggy clothes. When I came to this country the same thing happened. I saw kids hanging out in the streets, wearing all black, listening to punk rock, heavy metal, you name it. They were not necessarily bad kids, but they were always called freaks, losers, stoners, any name that would lower their image. I always thought that the school I went to had a clique problem. I even felt like a loser, especially when I was new to the school and I didn't speak the language. I was friends with those “losers”. To be honest I felt like a loser because other kids looked at me weird or at least I felt that they were looking at me weird. I was always shy to make friends, especially in a place where I didn't know anyone and communicating was difficult. I did have friends who used to cut. Sometimes I feel like some might have done it to follow others and some had real issues that led them to do what they did. Some stopped and some never did. There are those townies that will probably stay in this town forever. There is a vast amount of wealthy people in this town and you would be surprised, but even some of those kids had issues. A lot of them always lived with the pressure of being the best, because if they didn't their parents would freak. At least they were still popular. We've had kids kill themselves and for some we will never know why just like in Gaines’ story. The truth is that when you are labeled as something from a young age, you will most likely believe it and stay that way. We will never know what goes on behind closed doors. Sometimes you wish that they would have at least left a note.

-E.V.