Teenagers: The True Freedom

[The Guy]

I'm a huge fan of TheAmazingAtheist and watch every video he posts. Here's a speech he made on the state of being a teenager, and how he believes that being a teenager is the closest to freedom we ever come in life.

I suggest you put the video to 8:00.

S2Z42mKf98I


TheAmazingAtheist on being a teenager: I think it's the closest that we come in life to true freedom. When we're teenagers we never conceive the possibility that someone is gonna come along and stuff us in a cubical and force us to sort through data all day. We never think that we're gonna grow up to be a security guard or a night watchman or a janitor... that never occurs to us. We never think that someone's gonna come along and strip our middle fingers away from us. But it happens. The "authority" figures that we rebel against: they win. Not by finally breaking us in some sort of grandiose fashion, but by inviting us to join them. One of us, one of us, we will make you one of us! Welcome to the grown-up club. Here's your mortgage. Here's your SUV. Here's some idiot kids of your own to worry about. That's life, huh? And all the while you know... something is missing. You feel this empty hole inside of you, and... you know that you're missing a part of yourself that you once had, but you can't quite remember what that part was. Well I'll tell you: it was your Zen-stupidity; it was your healthy hatred of authority. Now you spend your days sucking authority's big, fat, mighty c*ck! And no matter how much you swallow... you'll never fill the void inside of your chest -- you'll never fill it. It'll just keep bigger, and bigger, and it will feel more and more empty... 'cause you're grown up now. So, long live Zen-stupidity, long live Zen-selfishness and long live teen angst. Long live the hatred of all authority. If only we could all be like teenagers, the world would be a happier place.

Wise words from a wise man.

[IllicitPopsicle]

I'm a huge fan of TheAmazingAtheist and watch every video he posts. Here's a speech he made on the state of being a teenager, and how he believes that being a teenager is the closest to freedom we ever come in life.

I suggest you put the video to 8:00.

S2Z42mKf98I



Wise words from a wise man.

I disconcur. I feel he's a condescending twatsicle.

[jake williams]

reactionary horseshit
I meant to neg rep you and I accidentally up repped you. My bad.

It's a load of fucking nonsense that teenagers are "the closest to freedom" we ever get. It's almost literally the opposite. Teenagers aren't even legally people in most Western countries, they're largely forced to spend their lives working in state prisons (schools) and/or being spat on in shit jobs, and they're severely sexually repressed. And then for their trouble they get told they're the happiest they'll ever be and they're imagining their problems.

[Invincible Summer]

I fucking hate TheAmazingAtheist. He has really piss poor explanations for everything and takes from the O'Reilly playbook where talking louder and more angrily = better argument.

[Scary Monster]

:lol: Wow if that isnt liberal cynicism, then i dont know what is.


The "authority" figures that we rebel against: they win. Not by finally breaking us in some sort of grandiose fashion, but by inviting us to join them

"Join us or you starve and become homeless!" Is more like it. Yeah, transitioning from a *****y teenager to an adult, we have to give in to authority just to make a decent living and take care of our families, but at the same time, we are proactively working to eventually rid the world of the pricks who make it hell and who set the conditions that make us "give in" (at least, us revolutionaries who are sick of social injustice, or things and people getting blown up or starved).

[-A-kRud-A-]

Have you seen this guys political crap? He's a capitalist terd and a loud one at that. Check out all his videos....hell Ayn Rand was an atheist, doesn't mean I like her.

[Os Cangaceiros]

So "freedom" is just an abstract state of mind, liberated from the very real material conditions of being trapped in a system of compulsory state education, and of being active participants in their own exploitation in the job market*? A good number of my friends as a teen were working overtime hours in a cannery; others were working jobs in retail, hospitality, and roofing...how are they any more "free" than adults who are in the same profession? Because they have hope?

*And that's a best case scenario...ask a black teenager in Chicago's south side how free he or she feels, for example.

[∞]

i subbed him because hes funny, not because i agree him

[The Guy]

I don't advocate any support for this certain opinion per se, so please don't try and attack me (just in case).

[jake williams]

I don't advocate any support for this certain opinion per se, so please don't try and attack me (just in case).
Except you said...

Wise words from a wise man.

[Blackscare]

liberated from the very real material conditions of being trapped in a system of compulsory state education,OH NOES, not compulsory state education! Well, at least those third world children are better off in one sense; they often don't have to go to no durn state schools!

Shame on Castro, focusing on education and all.

Really, are we that spoiled in the west that we have to look upon education (sure, it's not perfect under this system, but at least it's education) as oppression?!

[Sperm-Doll Setsuna]

I know I was fucking stupid when I was a teenager. If being stupid and irresponsible is freedom, then maybe: but I'd consider that to be no form of freedom worthwhile.

[IllicitPopsicle]

Ignorance is bliss, after all (rofl).

As far as "compulsory state education" goes, it goes without saying that the system needs some major fixin'. But we do need compulsory education of some form.

[∞]

Teenagers are sexually repressed, we can't masturbate for fucks sake. What the hell am I supposed to do with all this sperm?:mad:

[Blackscare]

Teenagers are sexually repressed, we can't masturbate for fucks sake. What the hell am I supposed to do with all this sperm?:mad:

You can't?

[∞]

You can't?

Sorry, I mean not allowed to.

[∞]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QDDenJmMhfA&feature=sub&videos=EEprAwQSCxk

I like this one, he talks shit about capitalism

[Blackscare]

goddamn your use of my (yes, MY) avatar is confusing the shit out of me XD

I'll let it slide... for now. One day I'll come a knockin' for my Makhno though... you will RUE THE DAY!

[Old Man Diogenes]

I'm a huge fan of TheAmazingAtheist and watch every video he posts. Here's a speech he made on the state of being a teenager, and how he believes that being a teenager is the closest to freedom we ever come in life.

I suggest you put the video to 8:00.

S2Z42mKf98I



Wise words from a wise man.

It's a very ethnocentric view of the teenage year's, I mean how free is the AK-47 toting 12 year-old African?

And standing against authority I agree with, but I think he's too vague, I mean does he reject all authority or just all irrational authority? Does he reject professors and academics, etc.that are so-called "authorities" in their respective fields?

From reading the video script it just seems like naive venting to me.

I would also say that during our teenage years we are most conscious of inequalities in power and wealth, but in no way more free of them and being conscious does not mean all of us desire to change things, many young people who do get political in their youth rarely get seriously into it, and/or drop it when they grow older (i.e. hippies).

[9]

I'm a huge fan of TheAmazingAtheist and watch every video he posts. Here's a speech he made on the state of being a teenager, and how he believes that being a teenager is the closest to freedom we ever come in life.

I suggest you put the video to 8:00.

S2Z42mKf98I



Wise words from a wise man.

someone would seriously have to pay me to get me to hit 'play' on that youtube video.

[Sperm-Doll Setsuna]

someone would seriously have to pay me to get me to hit 'play' on that youtube video.

Because of that cute emoboy in the thumbnail?

[∞]

goddamn your use of my (yes, MY) avatar is confusing the shit out of me XD

I'll let it slide... for now. One day I'll come a knockin' for my Makhno though... you will RUE THE DAY!

no but you got a cute little froggy...hop?hop?

[Os Cangaceiros]

OH NOES, not compulsory state education! Well, at least those third world children are better off in one sense; they often don't have to go to no durn state schools!

Shame on Castro, focusing on education and all.

Really, are we that spoiled in the west that we have to look upon education (sure, it's not perfect under this system, but at least it's education) as oppression?!

Meh...it's that state education in the capitalist world that is helping make 99% of the U.S. population think that people like you and I are completely nuts, so I don't feel weird or anything by criticizing it. I'm not exactly sure what all of that passive aggressive sarcasm was about...:unsure:

[ComradeOm]

Meh...it's that state education in the capitalist world that is helping make 99% of the U.S. population think that people like you and I are completely nuts, so I don't feel weird or anything by criticizing itIf I may rephrase... "it's that state education in the capitalist world that is helping make 99% of the U.S. population become literate"

Is education in a capitalist society perfect and without flaws? Of course not. It is however infinitely superior to the education systems of pre-capitalist societies or indeed many countries in the world today. Comparing it to prison, as others have done in this thread, strikes me as bizarre

[Zanthorus]

The fact that the modern education system is derived from the Prussian education system designed to keep the lower classe subordinate and eradicate the languages of ethnic minorities might be a hint...

[ComradeOm]

The fact that the modern education system is derived from the Prussian education system designed to keep the lower classe subordinate and eradicate the languages of ethnic minorities might be a hint...Yes. All education systems in the West are derived from the Prussian model and their primary purpose, as specifically designed, is the suppression of class conciousness. No, that is simply not the case

[punisa]

Ah you serious proletariat dogs you :laugh:
The guy was really funny and I enjoyed watching him, especially the way he screams "fuck" all the time (and pretty good too).

Anyway, I get what he was trying to say - but from a perspective of middle class white possibly-burgouise young man.
As a teenager he was apparently free of life's major problems, but was already able to look at clearly at the world around him.
Thus this is simply a wild rant about the good ol' times that are gone forever, no deep philosophy here - although he tries to make it look so.

[The Guy]

Except you said...

You could argue that Hitler was a very well-spoken and intelligent man, but it doesn't mean that you advocate any support for him.

[bcbm]

wise- 1: having the power of discerning and judging properly as to what is true or right

[∞]

TAA is funny, thats all he'll ever be to me.

[Adi Shankara]

You could argue that Hitler was a very well-spoken and intelligent man, but it doesn't mean that you advocate any support for him.

you deserve a citation for a violation of Godwin's Law :rolleyes:

besides, being a "free teenager" only works if you have bourgeois parents to pay for your luxurious, empty existence.

[Invincible Summer]

besides, being a "free teenager" only works if you have bourgeois parents to pay for your luxurious, empty existence.

What if you're 22.... :crying:




















:lol:

[Raúl Duke]

I have more "freedom" at college than when I ever was a teenager...

Only teenagers from relatively wealthy/well-off families who give them nearly unlimited access to cash/credit and let them do whatever the fuck they want are the "free" teenagers but in other cases you ain't free at all.

[AerodynamicOwl]

Ignorance is bliss, after all (rofl).

As far as "compulsory state education" goes, it goes without saying that the system needs some major fixin'. But we do need compulsory education of some form.

Is it right to hold a gun to anyone's head for anything? sounds a bit Authoritarian to me. Although i agree that Education is the Foundation for any Society.

[Outinleftfield]

Really, are we that spoiled in the west that we have to look upon education (sure, it's not perfect under this system, but at least it's education) as oppression?!

Anything we learn is education. Everyday life is education. The system forces a narrower, more limited idea of education on everybody. People are taught only what they want us to hear, and then people don't get any education outside of the system because the subjects they teach about is thought of as what they have to do and they think "why do extra homework?" so especially for subjects like civics and history they wind up only hearing about the system's side. They know the system sucks, but their revolutionary consciousness rarely rises above just doing what they figure the system wouldn't want them to do. By not learning about radical ideas it becomes easier to turn them to the system's side when they get older or even to coopt them into capitalist movements that pose as radical like 'libertarianism'(capitalist) or objectivism.

This might be changing a little now that reading about revolutionary ideas is easier with the internet.

[MellowViper]

If I told my parents to go fuck their selves, I would have had a boot up the ass.

[L.A.P.]

God, the *****ing on this forum is almost as bad as the one of Richard Dawkins

"Wah wah wah he's not a leftist therefore I hate him and everything he says is stupid reactionary capitalist bourgeois douche-bag bullshit" and then they go on with other colorful but for the most part incoherent adjectives.

Plus in the videos following this one he basically sums up how capitalism runs the average American's conformist life (though indirectly). But god forbid if he doesn't follow our exact political views.