Amirah / Parents: Relax

Firstly, the article states that teens are more responsible and mature than the teens of previous generations. Thus, they should be entitled to privileges adults hold. For example,there was nearly 40% of teens reported drinking in the past month in 1995; less than a third did in 2005.Hence, the author is trying to show that a teenager's maturity need not be restricted to age and that certain teenagers should be exceptions to the law as they can be responsible as well as aware of their actions.

Secondly, an important point brought up was that teens should be administered a 'maturity' test to determine if one would be entitled to adult privileges such as voting, having sex with people of any age, drinking, smoking, driving and getting a tattoo. By passing said test, the teen would be deemed responsible and thus, make decisions like an adult. Thus, teens would be able to do as they please and not be conformed by age limits.

However, there are many flaws to this suggestion which the author emphasizes in the article. It is a waste of time and resources for society and the government to conduct such tests to deem who is fit to take on adult privileges.
Furthermore, even though teens may know how to make good decisions, they don't actually make good decisions as often as adults. Often, these bad decisions made by teens may affect their entire life.

Hence, i do agree with the author regarding the issue of passing a 'maturity' test and i feel that it would be ineffective and of little advantage to society as a whole. On the other hand, i do not agree that parents should 'reward' their child with more freedom just because statistics show that the percentage of teens doing vices has dropped. By 'rewarding' the child, there will be less firm supervision imposed onto the teen thus leading to a higher percentage of wayward teenagers just like how it used to be previously.