Why do so many teenagers think they're immortal?

[Telaeth Everdark]

So I'm driving down a fairly busy street, two lanes going either way. It is night time and the street is poorly lit. Suddenly the headlights of the car next to me flash upon a group of four or five teenage girls. They're dressed all in dark clothing, and have dark colored hair, so that with their faces turned away from me, the only indication I had that they were there was the movement in the darkness.
This group of young idiots were jaywalking across this busy street, and found themselves confronted with a car in one lane, and another car in the other. They bunched up on the middle white line to let us pass (with the speed limit being 40 miles per hour) while giggling and chatting to themselves so loudly that I actually heard it in passing.
There was a crosswalk half a block back, and another one half a block ahead. Why do so many kids think themselves to be immortal? If one of them had stepped six inches forward, they would be dead, it was that close. :|

[Ramlador]

And the real beauty of the situation is, that if one of them had been 6 inches forward and you had hit them, it would have been your fault. Don't you just love personal injury lawyers? :roll:

Ahhh to be immortal...

I don't remember it well, but I do have a picture.

It looks like a forest scene, just a few very tall pine trees towering over my childhood home... when I found it in a box I was wondering why we had taken the picture.

Looking a bit closer the tree, which was at least 75 feet tall by comparison to the house... is slightly bent at the top.

Looking even closer memories flood back... my dad, upon seeing me way up the tree, decided to get a camera instead of calling 911.

Then I remembered the climb, and how at the bottom the branches were farther apart than I was tall, so I couldn't quite reach the bottom branch. So I had to jump from the roof onto one that was close enough to the one above it for me to start my way up....

I can't believe I made it through childhood, the tree couldn't have been thicker than my arm at that height, just seeing the picture scared the heck out of me.



P.S. Yes, I plan on getting it blown up and framed, it's very nice to remember immortality every once in a while.

[Cigarskunk]

I'm 30 and I still think I'm imortal.

However!

That was stupidity - not god complex - inlike the kinda stuff I still do.

[ArrakeenNaedShoj]

I'm immortal. I'm not a teenager. No one has proven me wrong yet.

However, some people, and this certainly is not exclusive to teenagers, are just stupid. And I mean that to be stupid, not ignorant. No amount of education or injury will improve these people, because they don't want to be improved. They like being stupid.

I wish they could see how stupid they are, and learn something, and get better, but they won't. They will continue to take up space and waste oxygen, until their stupidity catches up with them.

It's sad really, but there seem to be more and more of them every day. It is appearantly contagious.

[Thicket Tundrabog]

Splat

This thread reminds me of the statement 'I am determined to live forever, or die trying'.

There are also the Darwin awards for people who improve the human race by removing themselves from the gene pool.

My favorite Darwin award is the lawyer who wanted to impress articling law students of the strength of the plate glass in a Toronto high-rise office complex. With astonished students as an audience, this fellow took a long run down a corridor and hurtled himself against the plate glass window. A few seconds later there was an unpleasant splat on the pavement below.

Thicket

[ArrakeenNaedShoj]

I love the darwin awards. Just wish there weren't as many "runner ups".

[Cigarskunk]

I wish they could see how stupid they are, and learn something, and get better, but they won't. They will continue to take up space and waste oxygen, until their stupidity catches up with them.

Sounds like my ex - I just hope that when she does die dumb that it's in such a way that they don't come asking me questions or that I atleast have a good and airtight aliby. O_o

[Maevenniia]

Re: Splat

This thread reminds me of the statement 'I am determined to live forever, or die trying'.

There are also the Darwin awards for people who improve the human race by removing themselves from the gene pool.

My favorite Darwin award is the lawyer who wanted to impress articling law students of the strength of the plate glass in a Toronto high-rise office complex. With astonished students as an audience, this fellow took a long run down a corridor and hurtled himself against the plate glass window. A few seconds later there was an unpleasant splat on the pavement below.

Thicket

I lived in Toronto at the time and worked not far from the office where that happened. All of a sudden there were sirens and such, and the next day when I heard what had happened, while sad for his family one of my immediate thoughts was “Darwin awards – this is definitely a candidate, if not a sure winner!” Feh, warped sense of humour

[Lilosh]

I wish they could see how stupid they are, and learn something, and get better, but they won't. They will continue to take up space and waste oxygen, until their stupidity catches up with them.

Sounds like my ex - I just hope that when she does die dumb that it's in such a way that they don't come asking me questions or that I atleast have a good and airtight aliby. O_o

I fully expect one of my customers to keel over one of these days, on the phone with me


Can bad thoughts cause harm? If so, I'm screwed. Otherwise, I have an airtight aliby.


-Lilosh

[Quesci]

The thing that I notice, however, is that the stupid people seem very often to be the happiest. They live their lives watching television that they think is the best thing in the world. They don't worry about politics, or war, or the stock market, because they don't understand them. They hang with their friends and have "o my gawd" conversations that, to them, are as deep as Stephen Hawking and Steven Jay Gould discussing the nature of God.

Sometimes (sometimes!) I wish I could be stupid. Stupid people don't know how stupid they are: http://www.thisistrue.com/incomp.html

[Pojodan]

Jaywalking teenagers is one thing.

People who go out at night in their jet black pants, shoes, and hooded coat in the middle of a rainstorm and walk on the white line with their back to traffic on a road with a speed limit of 55 really sorta deserve their eventual fate of getting smacked by some trucker's 5 foot wide rear view mirror.

Whatever happened to common sence?

They don't worry about politics, or war, or the stock market, because they don't understand them.

I have had a saying since shortly after I started my first job.

"As long as I don't have to dodge bullets walking from my car to my work, I could care less who wins an election."

As for war... thats just too big of a can of worms to open.

The stock market, you don't have to be an idiot to avoid, you just have to be somewhat poor. My 401k will be worth more in 30 years than it is worth now, thats all I really care about.

I happen to think there is a distinct difference between not knowing, and not caring. You'd be suprised how much the guy sitting on a rocking chair watching the sunset knows, and just lets be.

[Lilosh]

The thing that I notice, however, is that the stupid people seem very often to be the happiest. They live their lives watching television that they think is the best thing in the world. They don't worry about politics, or war, or the stock market, because they don't understand them. They hang with their friends and have "o my gawd" conversations that, to them, are as deep as Stephen Hawking and Steven Jay Gould discussing the nature of God.

Sometimes (sometimes!) I wish I could be stupid. Stupid people don't know how stupid they are: http://www.thisistrue.com/incomp.html

This is so true. I wish for ignorance on a daily basis, as the ignorant people always seem to be the happiest.

They truly don't know any better.

Lucky Bastards

-Lilosh

[Stokvorn Warwalker]

Teenagers are not immortal. They are just not trained to use their brain for something
other the hair fertilizer. I have found in my current job that the people think only of
themselves and not of the things that can happen.

Now me on the other hand I might be immortal. In my life I have been shot, knifed,
bombed, and even dropped off a small mountain. :?:
Or maybe just really lucky