This isn't an attack on crap mainstream pop (even though it is like shooting fish in a barrel) but more on the message this song and many other songs/movies/books imprint onto our minds.
Why do I have a problem with the Teenage Dream? Let's take a closer look.
So having just completed being a teenager (turned 20 in July) I can now write my memoirs on 'being a teenager'. Now I'm not self absorbed enough or famous enough to warrant writing such a thing, but if i did, I'd probably start with something about what it means to 'be a teenager'. Perhaps i'd find some inspiration in a song, a movie, or a book, about 'being a teenager'. So having stumbled upon 'Teenage Dream' by Katy Perry, I had to ask myself this question:
Did I have the 'Teenage Dream'? Was I going to beach parties, having sex with girls, with not a care in the world?
The answer, for anyone who knows me with even a relatively shallow amount of detail, is no. The consolation here though is this: I'm not alone in saying that. Being a teenager was good! Not worrying about a lot of things was good, hanging out with friends was good. But coming to grips with a lot of adult concepts and being introduced to the 'real world' and realizing that 'there's a first time for everything' also encompasses bad experiences just like good experiences. It's a pretty up and down experience.
The problem I have with the 'Teenage Dream' is that it seems like reality for some people, but for the majority of teenagers, a dream is all it is. Some people did have those lives as teenagers, and were relatively popular, did things with the opposite sex, drank underage, went to the beach parties, etc etc. But for most teenagers, that wasn't the reality! It only could be a dream, because a lot of teenagers didn't exactly have everything go the way they wanted it to.
The 'Teenage Dream' wasn't the reality for me obviously. I'm speaking for others here but I bet a lot of teenagers today are asking themselves 'My life certainly isn't like that' and feeling let down, feeling they should be fitting into this teenage 'mould' that this song and so many other love songs and movies are creating. It's the equivalent of looking at an airbrushed model on a magazine cover and wondering why you don't look as attractive and thin as they do. We constantly hear the debate about body image problems and how these artificial role models are being created with computer wizardry, and the detrimental effect they have on easily influenced teenagers. Are these 'Teenage Dreams' any different, perfectly crafted pop songs and movies created to give the impression of an ideal life, yet leaving so many impressionable teenagers feeling like they have fallen short of the mark?
I look back on being a teenager with mixed emotions, but all in all the good would definitely outweigh the bad. The problem I have is, that songs like this, make me feel like i fell short of the mark. That my teenage years weren't the 'Teenage Dream'. I should feel completely OK about how my life as a teenager was! In terms of the big picture, it was pretty good! Yet like a picture of a model on a magazine making an already beautiful girl make her feel like she wasn't quite beautiful enough, this song is trying to make me feel like my teenage years 'weren't quite good enough'.
The Taylor Swift love stories, the Justin Bieber 'baby's, the Baz Luhrmann Romeo & Juliet's, the 10 Things I Hate About You's, the constant bombardment of what a teenager should be feeling and doing and how it should all work out to be a happy ending. THIS is what I have the problem with. You can tell yourselves "oh it's just a song" or "oh it's just a movie" but when people are always seeing what could have been, or what 'should' have been in the media they view, mixed messages are going to start appearing in heads.
It can swing in the opposite direction though. People who have led perfectly happy childhoods might listen to 'Disarm' by The Smashing Pumpkins and think they used to be a little boy, that the killer in them was the killer in themselves. The real 'Teenage Dream' is a mix of both, the magnification of every emotion, wanting to connect with the perfect love story or the perfect carefree lifestyle, but still wanting to connect with that feeling of sadness and wanting.
Katy Perry, don't tell me that I should have been living the 'Teenage Dream', but at the same time, I don't want Robert Smith to tell me that "The girl was never there, it's always the same, I'm running toward nothing, again and again and again." Being a teenager was neither of those experiences for me, but instead of feeling glad that my life really wasn't as depressing as The Cure laid it out to be (which I honestly am), I feel disappointed that I wasn't the popular kid who surfed, hung out at the beach, got with girls and lived Katy Perry's idea of the 'Teenage Dream'. Chalk it up to sour grapes.
