When Do Children Become Adults

One question has troubled the thoughts of society since the beginning of time. That question is: when do kids become adults. The farthest back anyone can remember is back when kings existed, and their sons were considered adults by the age of sixteen, the age to be able to rule. This should be a question that everyone wonders about, were the people back in the olden days onto something?

In modern times, children and most importantly, teenagers, don’t have much freedom as children and teenagers did in the early 20th century and before.
Children could go to the store, teenagers could apply for the military at age sixteen during WWI and WWII. Nowadays kids are kept in the house, playing video games and watching TV with their parents a stone’s throw away. Yes, back then they had an easier life, but there also was bad things, such as “We… stood in line for our pay with was twelve fifty.” (Soto #413) These were teenagers who were working from dawn to dusk picking grapes, and they only got twelve fifty. Even by the olden day standards that is pretty low. This shows that even in the olden days, there still was hardships.

Children become adults when they start acting like one, and not by age.

Full grown adults can act like twelve-year olds, and twelve-year old can act like full grown adults. An example is when Tom Sawyer tricked the whole neighborhood into whitewashing his fence. “Tom went on whitewashing—paid no attention to the steamboat.” (Twain 397) This is a good example because I doubt a twelve-year old could convince other children to do their chores for them. Kids become adults when they are fully mature, not when they turn 18 or 21, you could be ninety and racist and sexist, and that does not mean you are an adult. You still act childish, and therefore you may be an adult in age, but a crass uncouth baby