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In Reply to: Re: Also, posted by Charlie on April 27, 2004 at 09:03:02:
Drugs, sex & rock-n-roll: I believe these are the "coming of age" initiation rites for adolescents in western societies. Some cultures circumcise their young as they enter adulthood, other societies put them through elaborate rituals of pain and endurance--like scarification or tatooing or a solitary lion hunt or a peyote-induced vision quest under the supervision of a shaman.
We give our young a lot of mixed messages. We have created a culture that has a very low tolerance for pain and a major love affair with alcohol and drugs. Then we act surprised when we learn that our young are experimenting with street drugs or playing dangerous drinking games. As if they didn't need rituals for fitting into a society that has a pill on the market to fix just about any problem imaginable.
