As I was reading It’s Complicated: The Social Lives of Networked Teens, the experiences and words really reminded me of my younger sister. She is on every social media outlet, and is a big fan of twitter. She’s a huge fan of One Direction and has met fellow fans that have become really close friends because of twitter. She doesn’t like me going on her twitter. She even has 2 twitters: a safe family-friendly and school-friendly twitter and a nerdy, one direction, ranting-type twitter that she only shares with her closest friends.

I, as an annoying older sister, sometimes go on her not-allowed-for-everyone twitter and I see her cussing sometimes. I used to cuss at her age, and I was very like her in a lot of ways. But I still get mad and sometimes scorn her for it! And I know that’s bad. But I want her to be better than me (even though I know cussing is NOT a big deal!).

I am twenty-three now and do not relate to her teenage self anymore. We relate in so many other ways but I know I should just let her act as her teenage self. I sometimes tell her not too binge watch TV, even though I used to do that, too. It’s a weird thing to change mindsets with years. Teenagers cuss, teenagers binge watch TV, and they should be left alone.

I know she wants to be herself, and talk about shows with her friends, and cuss when she’s really mad – therefore I am all for teenagers being teenagers.

On a different note, with teenagers having such a huge presence online, they’re definitely influenced by the media. My sister constantly sees people talk about different issues on twitter and comes to me to have a conversation about it and I think that’s awesome. While I hope teenagers don’t easily buy into everything said online and approach it with a critical lens, I know that teenagers are more informed than ever! So even though I still don’t like the cussing and binge TV watching, I’m glad there is an outlet for discussion!