Why do children take offense to being called a kid or child?

Question

All ages... 3-17. 10 year olds don't want to sit at the kids table... teens can't believe adults don't consider teens to be adults... why is this? Why is there such a need to grow up? Then once you are an adult you take offense when someone calls you "old" or says "Happy 30th birthday!".

Answer 1

well im 14 and i would be kinda annoyed if someone called me a kid. i dont expect someone to call me an adult, but i would like to be called a teen.

Answer 2

I don't take offense to being called a kid/child. I actually take offense to being called a young adult.

Answer 3

I don't take offense to being called kid... I never have.

But yeah I think the reason most people do is the pressure to grow up, and how when you're one age, the next age looks oh so much better. The grass is always greener...

Answer 4

bc it always puts me down

Answer 5

Teenagers don't want to called kids is because they are often incredibly responsible. In a lot of places they can work any job they want, any amount of hours they want, the same as an adult. The only thing that separates teenagers from adults in society is school and many teenagers would happily leave it. Biologically, too, teens are adults. Teenagers not 'children'. They may be younger than you but treat them with respect. Don't discriminate. It will only cause problems.

www.youthrights.org

Answer 6

Because, once you hit 15, you're in high school, driving and possibly working.

I'd rather be compared to an adult than a five year old. I'm closer in age to an 18 year old than a 10 year old. Why shouldn't I take offense when someone calls me a child?

The technical term for my age group (13-17) is TEENAGER. Why can't people call us what we really are? Yes, we're underage, No we can't vote or drink legally.

Why does that make us children?

Answer 7

I don't mind being called a kid at all, lol :)

But I also think it's peer pressure and media pressure, etc. Kinda sad, really

Answer 8

The reasons for this are many.

First consider the word kid. For most people this is used interchangeably with the word "child," but consider that it originally referred to newborn and yearling goats. To those who realize this, it is an incredibly dehumanizing thing, being told you are, essentially, no better than a goat.

Secondly, there is, as has twice before been said on this very question, rather a lot ageism in the world today. How many times must  people be reminded of their age, and how not-good-enough it makes them? It reminds me of the one old man on "The Boondocks" who doesn't like to be reminded that he's black because he's so deeply convinced white people really are that much better.

Our society hangs so much on age - ages, we must remember, that were established by the laws of other people - that we take it as though it were holy writ. As though nothing else determines a person's worth but the number of seconds in their lives. Does someone 18 really know that much better than someone seventeen and six months? That much better than someone 16? No. Not really. Or do they?

That depends on the person. What other way is there to judge people fairly than on their own merits? Amy - above - is a dear friend of mine. I know she is a responsible, well-spoken, literate, caring, courageous person. At 24 I wish I had half the backbone she has at 17. In the seven years I existed upon this Earth without her, I experienced nothing that makes me better, wiser, or more enlightened than she is. Why should she be considered less of a person than I am? Why should I be looked at askance for being her friend?

That is why young people dislike being reminded of it. Because the age limits in effect right now are arbitrary and refer to nothing. Because this is America, where all men are CREATED equal, and we are not created 18 years to the day after we are born. Because nobody whacked me over the head with the smart stick at Midnight in January of 2002, and nobody's waiting with a branch from the genius tree for Amy next June either.

Judge people for who they are, not how long they've been at it, and there will be a lot less hostility in the world.

Answer 9

Maybe because teens are not children? Maybe because people generally use it in a patronizing and condescending manner?

There's a need to "grow up" because most teens realize they do get treated unfairly, but most accept it because it's a social norm, just like 200 years ago it was socially acceptable to treat women the same way.

Answer 10

I think a child needs "help". They can't do things on their own, like cooking, driving, etc. So when a teen has someone call them a child, they feel mad, cause they can take care of themselves, at least they think they can.

I am 21 with a 15 month old, but I look very young and it makes me mad when people call me little girl or whatever, cause I have a family in which I care for and I do so much for. I cook, clean, work, do everything. It makes me feel like I am not valued as an adult member of the community and I am just a teen.  

Answer 11

I think it's because they feel like they are being held back and want to make their own decisions. Kids are in such a rush to grow up while adults are the complete opposite.

Answer 12

i dont i think its funny because when i get mad my bf says l look like a 5 yr old and that is cute and i personally start cracking up.i am who i am.

im a big 14 yr old kid=]

i dont wanna grow up

haha

Answer 13

I didn't like sitting at the kids table because I felt separated from everyone. Plus like one person said it depends on who it's coming from. Like, if it were senior citizens calling me a kid? Okay, whatever. But if someone in like their early 20's or something calling me a little kid it's like "what?". I guess it goes both ways for adults because like you said some of them take offense when someone calls them old.  

Answer 14

it makes us feel like you are trying to be better than us

Answer 15

Your answers are sometimes so offensive to me I tried to look for a block button. I do not want my intelligence insulted by someone off of yahoo answers. I may only be seventeen but I am not a child. I do not say that I am an adult and I do not say that I am grownup, but your answers are extremely offensive.

Who wants to be called a child? I remember your answers from a few months ago mimicing a 16-year-old asking her 20-year-old boyfriend to prom and him saying he has to work. You said, "Why would an adult want to be with a child?"

Why would an adult want anyone? Have you ever stopped to think that they wanted to be treated as people and not "little kids"?

I do not take offense to being called a kid, but when someone who is only 25-years-old calls me a "child" I take extreme offense. I work, I pay my own cellphone bill, half of my car insurance, and I am planning on going to college in one year. I am not a child, and you sure in h**l should not go off and call me one. My seven-year-old cousin is starting 1st grade. He plays with toy trucks and watches hannah montana. HE is a CHILD.

You seriously sometimes disgust me when you answer. You show absolutely no respect whatsoever and talk down to anyone who is not over eighteen. How about you grow up too and learn to treat people with a little respect? I am a member of a youth rights organization who has a few members that visit this section. We often point out extremely ageist answerers. Your name has come up on more than one occasion; infact it was a 24-year-old ADULT who I am great friends with who pointed out something you said as ageist.

Yes, wow. I am friends with a 24-year-old man. I am just a child, I must be being raped and abused? No, I made friends because I am a person with a personality and we hit it off. Why would an adult want to be with a child? I dont know... ask him that when he stayed up talking to me after my father beat me so badly I couldn't move. Ask this man.

Answer 16

It brings them down, it makes them think that they are too young and immature, which they are but they can't handle the thought if it. They don't feel that that kind of treatment is getting them anywhere, they want to show people how 'big' they are - that is why kids these days are having s*x, doing inappropriate things and getting themselves into dangerous situations. The ones that are called kid or child take it offensively and they feel as if they are not good enough and not anywhere close to becoming an adult. Or sometimes that person just wants to have more repsect and attention.

Answer 17

I Guess its because children want to be older then what they are and adults want to be younger than what they are..lol I never liked being called a kid when i was like 16 and older, because it made me feel like i wasnt being looked at as somebody who was responsible. I didnt mind it when i was a kid, under 16 because back then, i knew i was one.

btw, great name choice, my daughter's name is Alyssa too <3

Answer 18

"""teens can't believe adults don't consider teens to be adults"""

Teens are biological adults. Treating them like kids causes them to rebel.

"""Why is there such a need to grow up? Then once you are an adult you take offense when someone calls you "old" or says "Happy 30th birthday!"."""

This is completely normal. People are "over the hill" around age 24. That's the age that everyone wants to be. Younger people want to be older, and older people want to be younger. Calling a 15-year-old a child is like calling a 40-year-old an old (wo)man.

Also, it could be because there is so much age discrimination in the country. Young people are prohibited from doing a lot of things just because of their age. They don't like being judged by their birth dates.

National Youth Rights Association - http   youthrights org

Answer 19

lol, when i was a little girl i would get so offended when my mom would call me "a little girl", lol, which is what i was.. Idk why though.. Now i see that I was naive and ignorant. Now i just want to enjoy the rest of my adolescence and youth... :)

Answer 20

well depends who its coming from....for example i'm in the 8th grade and this 12 grader (senior) was flirting ALOT with this other girl and he said "be careful..there's a little girl watching us" and was pointing right at me!!so it depends i s'pose

Answer 21

Well i think... its because when were young we always want to act older than we really are,,,, because the big kids do this and that...... and we want to be apart of that....

and at this age we always think we know more than we actually do thats why we get offended when called little or a baby