“These Kids Man…”

Kids are the same as they’ve ever been.

A favorite pass time of teachers, coaches and adults is ragging on how “these kids” just don’t get it.

And, while yes there are fun stories of the weird and head scratching things kids do, what’s there to get?

Were we any better?

Can you just imagine how much havoc social media and wifi would have wrought on your life?

Kids today don’t have the luxury of making a mistake that everyone will forget.

Everyone has an HD audiovisual production studio in their pocket on their iPhone networked up to 7 billion other people ready to record you at you worst.

Imagine if your worst moments were catalogued somewhere on a server for all eternity?

Do you care to remember even 10% of the probably less than intelligent things you said while you were trying to look cool in middle school?

Imagine if someone brought a camera to some of your less than best moments in high school or college.

Social media is an amplifier. It just makes you more or less of what you already are.

Kids can use Tik Tok to save the world or destroy each other. You can use a $500K KickStarter for water purifiers in Ghana or monetize a YouTube channel making derogatory videos on unsuspecting people.

People have always found ways to lift each other up or tear each other down. Social media is just the newest tool for it.

Technology changes faster than we can wisely use it.

It took years before the first traffic lights came out. It took 10 years to figure out Facebook was spying on us. And, 15 years to ticket people for driving while on their phones.

This gap between invention and wise usage is only speeding up.

Social media combines two things you biologically can’t resist: novelty and status.

Every time you post you might get lucky- a like, new followers, comments, poop emojis 💩, retweets. If you’re really lucky you hit the jackpot — going viral. The mind loves the randomness of it all. That’s novelty.

With every like, comment or post your status is dictated in real time: Who’s up? Who’s down? What’s hot? What’s not? Status is a biological imperative for survival. If the tribe doesn’t like you, caveman you starves.

Social media companies know this and amplify the addictive nature of their products.

Being a kid is hard. It’s even harder when adults forget how hard it was for them.

The next time you get ready to launch into a “these kids” tirade just remember while kids can be frustrating, their world is changing a lot faster than ours probably did.