Being Young and Dumb Online

A Call for a bit of Grace

What is the statute of limitations for being young and stupid?

I'm asking because I remember saying and doing some really dumb things when I was younger, and if social media had been around back then, I probably would have gotten into trouble that could have affected me later in life.

Nowadays, kids are posting videos, tweets, and selfies that can potentially damage their careers or their reputations year from now. I know, they should be more careful and they should exercise discretion. However, the prefrontal cortex, is not fully developed until around age 25. So, maybe the right approach is to allow those kids some grace and for society to understand that we live in a new world.

Kids are still kids, but they have access to technology that records and keeps everything forever. Nothing is ever truly deleted from the Internet. The internet is a ruthless archive, impervious to deletion. A 16-year-old making a dumb and offensive joke online can cost him a job five years later. That’s the kind of world we live in. It’s a world that is quick to punish and slow to forgive.

One errant tweet, one ill-advised Snapchat story, one cringe-worthy TikTok and BOOM - there it is forever, seared into the immutable internet for future employers, romantic interests, and pearl-clutching Karens to scrutinize. The blunders that older generations committed in relative obscurity are now laid bare for all to see.

And sure, we can lecture them about being smarter, about thinking before posting. But let's be real - how many of us at 16 had the foresight and impulse control to pass up those dopamine hits of going viral and getting likes? Maybe, just maybe, we need to extend some grace to these kids who are navigating territory we never had to.

The world has always been harsh towards youthful transgressions, but at least they had an expiration date before. Now the internet is a permanent record, every cringe moment a bread crumb leading to your downfall years later. It's enough to make you nostalgic for the days when you could be an idiot without it following you into adulthood. This is the world we've made though —one that judges kids by adult standards before they've had a chance to grow up.

So how about spreading a little more empathy and forgiveness? Lord knows we all need the mercy when our own idiocies from a decade or two ago inevitably resurface. Kids are going to do dumb things, wouldn't you rather they do it in an environment of learning instead of brutal cancellation?

What do you think?