Teens Talk Back

While doing some research on teens talking back about how they are represented by mainstream media sources, I expected to find more interviews/articles with teenagers expressing their point of views and explaining their feelings about the media.  When I typed "teens talk back" into the search engine, a lot of things about "how to deal with a teenager who talks back", which was funny to me because it fits the stereotype of the view that society has on all teenagers.  I finally found Talking Back: Chicago Teens Gather to Explore Media Messaging and Social Change, a source that showed a video of an interview with teens to discuss their thoughts about the media.  These teenagers realize that the media changes people and makes their peers believe that they have to look a certain way, act a certain way, and like certain things in order to "fit in".  They were asked things, such as whether they think that media brings change to their community and what they think that youth media is important.  There were a few different opinions and ways of looking at things, but the following quotes stood out to me most.

"I don't think it brings a good way of change, but it brings change because it's there.  It's what everyone else is doing basically, so they're pretty much convincing themselves that those are the conditions that need to be met."

"They are aware that the images that are being portrayed in the media is negative and it's not a good light.  There's more negativity than positivity and they seem to be wanting to change all of that."

These comments came from 2 different people and I found them interesting because it shows that not all teenagers follow the trends that are portrayed all over the media.  They know that it's okay to just be yourself and like whatever you want to like, not just because it is what everyone else "pretends" to like.  Some of the other teens in this video think that media is good for society and it helps us to choose what we like/dislike and what we want to be in life.  This interview helps people to see that teenagers should not be stereotyped or grouped into one category.  These teenagers who talked back have their own view about the media and not all of them follow the trends.  Everyone is different and will become who/what they choose to become.