Outcasts in Our Midst

   As anyone who has survived it knows, adolescence is always turbulent and challenging, frequently confusing, sometimes overwhelming, and occasionally glorious. 
   In fundamental ways, it is a different country -- different from both the childhood which precedes it and the so-called maturity which is meant to follow it.
   And it is uncharted. There are no maps. Children enter adolescence abruptly, unarmed, wholly unprepared for what lies ahead of them. Their own minds and bodies seem sometimes to turn on them, betray them. They are vulnerable to every kind of assault.
   The primary task of adolescents is to transform themselves from children to grown-ups. It's always been hard -- kind of like expecting a sandbox to grow up and become a beach -- and not everyone makes it. 
   And here and now it's more complicated than ever. In the marketplace, teenagers rule. Movies, music, TV programs, fashions, computer games, virtually everything but household appliances, is made for and marketed to teenagers. And large numbers of post-teenagers will do almost anything to extend their teenage runs. But in the social arena, teenagers are treated like outcasts or freaks -- denied basic rights, discriminated against, bossed around by alleged authority figures, ignored and sometimes abused. 
   In other words, while society worships youth, it doesn't much like young people -- which, of course, makes the journey through adolescence that much more painful and perilous. 
   The City of Santa Monica is known for its menu of diverse programs which are designed to improve life for all of its citizens -- except teenagers. 
   This city underwrites programs and services for older people, young children, the disabled, the homeless, businesses and women. It has a Commission for Older Americans, a Commission on the Status of Women, a Social Services Commission and apparently will soon have a Commission for the Disabled. It also underwrites a large child care program. But, while the City has sponsored programs for "troubled youth," there are no comprehensive programs and services, no commission for our entire teenage population. 
   City parks have elaborate play areas for small children, and everything from fly-fishing to lawn bowling for adults. They also have soccer fields, baseball diamonds and basketball and tennis courts. But they have no facilities which are designed exclusively for teenagers and offer no activities, beyond team sports, for teen-agers.
   According to local teenagers, there is no place in the city that they can call their own -- no area in any park, no recreation and/or social center, no place for them to simply hang out or to gather to skateboard, play computer games, paint, draw, photograph or sculpt, listen to or play music, hold parties or present shows, no place where they can get accurate information about drugs or sex or help with personal problems.
   The absence of facilities, programs, services and activities for Santa Monica's teenagers is an extraordinary lapse -- especially since an ever-increasing number of adolescents are in peril. 
   Last Tuesday night, the Council allocated $650,000 of the city's $3 million surplus. We urge the Council to allocate a generous chunk of the remaining $2,350,000 immediately for the creation of a teenage center which would be defined and designed by teen-agers. 
   Such a center should certainly have sophisticated music and video systems, banks of computers -- for work and play, a library of books, CDs, DVDs and video cassettes, and an area in which kids could do homework, space and equipment for multi-media and arts projects, a kitchen, some sort of food service, a large area for parties, and so on. Among the things that might be installed adjacent to the center, are basketball hoops, a rock-climbing wall, a skateboarding area and volleyball nets. 
   Counselors, screened by the teenagers, who are knowledgeable in areas of particular concern to teenagers, should be available and/or on call. 
   If we, as a community, can not make a real place in Santa Monica for our teenagers and offer them the same level of attention, programs, services, activities, facilities and opportunities we offer adults and small children, then we have not simply failed them, we have betrayed them. 
   See Bay City Beat for a related take