Devil’s Playground is a documentary following the lives of several different Amish teens in LaGrange County, Indiana. The film shows the teens during a period in their lives known as rumspringa. At the age of sixteen, Amish teenagers can leave the Amish world to experience the modern world. The teens stay in this lifestyle until they decide they are ready to be baptized and officially join the Amish church as adults.
The concept of rumspringa is extremely controversial and has many aspects that seem troubling to outsiders. There are several different issues with the tradition of rumspringa. First of all, this time can be very dangerous to the teens. Another issue is parents not intervening in their child’s life at all, even if they are doing highly illegal and dangerous activities. Lastly, there is the worry that their actions during rumspringa will haunt them after they have jointed the Amish church and committed their lives.
Translated literally, rumspringa means “running around”. Amish children turn sixteen and are automatically granted freedom. This time is meant for teens to experience life outside of the Amish culture before they decide to join the Amish church and be baptized. But, this time can be extremely dangerous for them. Before rumspringa, these Amish teens have never been exposed to the activities and materials of the modern world. Gerald Vutzy, a seventeen year old Amish boy shown in the documentary, states that when kids turn sixteen they go crazy because it is all coming to them at once. If experiencing everything for the first time at once can be overwhelming and harmful to the teens. Another young Amish teen shown in the documentary is Faron Voder. Faron is the perfect example of teens taking the wrong turn and getting into dangerous activities during rumspringa. Faron is shown partying on multiple occasions, and it is also shown that he became involved with crystal meth and other illegal drugs. This not only harmed his health, but his life was also threatened.
When teens are getting involved in multiple dangerous activities, parents usually get involved in straightening out their behavior. In this documentary, the parents are rarely shown, and when they are shown, they are not doing anything to stop their child’s behavior. The teens are having parties involving underage drinking, drugs, and other activities in their parent’s backyards. They are allowing illegal activity to go on right outside of their window.
It is the parents’ responsibility to guide their children in all of their activities. If parents fail to guide their children, or even go so far as to arm them, then parents are just as liable for the tragic end results as the video game developer who ‘taught’ the child to shoot a gun or a musician who told the child to “go kill yourself,” in a song lyric. Parents must realize that they are the most influential people in their child’s life from the day the child is born. It is up to the parents to try to teach their child the difference between fantasy and reality; how to interpret theatrics meant to sell tickets; how to interpret the true meaning behind seemingly violent content in their entertainment.
Monday morning, Sally, a twelve-year-old American girl, is woken up by her father. As she gets ready to go to school, her mother hands her a backpack and lunch with a quick kiss goodbye. Meanwhile, Zarina, a twelve-year-old Sierra Leone girl, wakes herself up to get ready for work. Her aunt says good morning as they both head from their home to the cassava fields. Both of these girls have a traditional family setting. In America children in a traditional family grow up with both biological parents and any siblings they have. In Sierra Leone, the setting for both The Bite of the Mango and A Long Way Gone, children of traditional families live with aunts and uncles as well as many children from different parents. These different views of what is traditional create uniqe children in many ways. Children who grow up in Sierra Leone are more self-reliant than American children.
Our spirits Don’t Speak English: Indian Boarding school is an 80 minute documentary that details the mental and physical abuse that the Native Americans endured during the Indian Boarding school experience from the mid 19th to the mid 20th century. In the beginning going to school for Indian children meant listening to stories told by tribal elders, parents, grandparents, aunts, uncles and storytellers. These tales past down from generation to generation were metaphors for the life experience and their relationships to plants and animals. Native children from birth were also taught that their appearance is a representation of pure thoughts and spiritual status of an individual.
The Amish culture in general try to withhold the same traditions, values, and language as the original Amish. This individual Amish subculture in Indiana displayed in the Devil's Playground goes to show just how culturally diverse society can be. Though the ultimate desire of the Amish is to be a good example of Christ, the community encourages a positive deviance of their teenagers called Runspringa. Starting at age sixteen Amish teens are allowed the opportunity to explore the English world to better educate their decision to commit their life to the church and the simple way of living or leave the community turning to a life of relative deviance. This value contradiction often results in role conflict within the young people.
During the nineteenth century, the government opened up more land for settlement, and pioneers began to make their way across America to “empty” prairies in the Midwest. These “empty” lands were not actually empty—they contained many different tribes of American Indians—but the white Americans saw this as an opportunity for cheap land and a new, better life. The pioneers lived among the American Indians, but it was not a harmonious relationship. Laura Ingalls Wilder in her Little House series talked about her parents’ attitudes toward the Osage. Most of the time, her parents either made fun of the Osage people or feared them, which, in turn, instilled fear and stereotypes in Laura and her sisters. Such was the case for the majority of
He focuses on the need and importance of teaching ancestral values to the young people, in a way that they can relate and understand. Young people of the world have become un-rooted from tradition, not knowing how they are connected to the world, who they can turn to for guidance and support, and lacking in spiritual leadership. This has caused increased violence, disparity, and suffering around the world. It is the responsibility of all leaders, cultural, spiritual, ethnic, religious, and educational to assist in the understanding of traditions, heritage, ancestral roots, belief systems, and values in a way that the young people of today can comprehend and feel connected. The young people of today are the leaders of tomorrow, they need our guidance and support to grow and mature into responsible adults. They must become re-rooted in tradition and beliefs to maintain a since of stability for the
There are many crimes committed by teenagers every year. Crimes that are committed by teens each year are mainly assault, bullying, gang violence, and physical fights. According to National Youth Violence Prevention Resource Center, about 1 and 9 murders are from kids that are under 18 (Center, 2001). In 1998, there were approximately 2,570 among youth aged 10-19. Every day there are at least 7 children murdered in the United States (Center, 2001). Statistics say that between 16%-32% female teenagers have committed a crime before the age of 17. Also 30%-40% male teenagers have committed a violent crime before they turned 17 (Center, 2001). Teenagers that commit crimes are the ones who were abused or bullied as a...
Thea effect of going through Rumspringa is different for every teen, but it does impact the community as a whole. For Doris, Rumspringa impacted her as an adolescent in the following: making a decision to leave home and her family, experiencing a new household, making responsibilities, and come across an abusive relationship without knowing what may happen, due to the fact that she had been sheltered. Doris had shared how an adolescents decision can impact a community. When an adolescent chooses to be a member of the church the leaders of the church and the child's parent are grateful, “The community is grateful that the adolescent has come back because the adolescent has turned away from all their mistakes that have been taken place.” Unlike
In most American families parents are overjoyed as a result of the happiness and success of their teenage children. Across America teenager are enjoying their “rite of passage”, such as friends, after school activities, sports, vacations with their families and their first car. At the same time, little is known of the extreme poverty and despondency existing within the reservations of the Native American communities. Many Native American families are still struggling with the pain and anguish their ancestors suffered during the ethnic cleansing and forced relocation of the 1800’s such as the Trail of Tears.
... such as walking in well lit areas, abstaining from areas know as “hot spots”, and letting someone know your whereabouts, are suggested. Also, these individuals should be aware of the risks that come with certain types of activities. In conjunction to awareness, individuals should be involved in family leisure activities so that their idle hands do not become the devils workshop. Parents provide the primary foundation in the children’s socialization; if this process is not effective or neglected the result could be detrimental. It may lead children to transition into adulthood without the fundamental skills that prevent the development of a criminal disposition. Now that routine activities theory has created a clear understanding of the economics of crime, let’s focus our research on which parenting methods could prevent criminality or crime before if ever develops.
---. “Parents can Act to Keep Teens Safer.” USA Today. 1 Mar. 2005.n. pag. Global Issues 2006.
A widely accepted cause of the murders committed by children is violence in the media. The parents of three students killed at a high school in Padukah, Kentucky filed a $130 million lawsuit against the entertainment industry because they believe that violence in the media inspired the boy, Michael Carneal, who killed their children ("Media"). To some extent, these parents are correct in their assumption. On average, children watch television 16 to 17 hours per week, beginning as early as age 2 (Strasburger 129). Furthermore, when video games are added, some teenagers may spend as many as 35 to 55 hours per week in front of the television set (Straburger 129). Within these many hours of television viewing, there are many violent scenes. The National Television Viole...
The headlines proclaimed the controversial news: race, poverty, and single-parents were NOT the irrevocable harbingers of drug abuse, teen pregnancy, and violence. Instead, researchers were claiming that behaviors that parents and teens could influence -- such as problems at school and the amount of time spent "hanging out with friends" and the type of friends they chose -- could predict trouble.
Diller, V. (2012, November 5). Teens Who Commit Crimes: What Can/Should Parents Do? | Vivian Diller, Ph.D. Retrieved from http://www.huffingtonpost.com/vivian-diller-phd/teen-crime_b_2035255.html
Young people especially the teenagers are sensitive and receptive to learning new things. The media provides more than they can handle. Access to different programs, shows, and movies affect the manner that the teenagers behave. Today, it is unfortunate to say that the media is becoming more sexual and violent than the older days, resulting in similar behaviors among the teens (Craig, & Baucum, 2001). By watching programs intended for the adults, teenagers are drifting even further. They start behaving like adults without the prerequisites of becoming one. This means that they have contents that do not match with their ages. And then terrible things begin – increased college dropouts, teenage pregnancies, and increased cases of suicides. Some teenagers who had bright future ahead of them will