Representation of the Age in media

Young people in the media today are represented in many different ways. On top of that, there are many stereotypes that represent the behaviour of the young people such as having no respect to society and elders, being good with technology, obsessed with social media, being obsessed with sex, violence, being easily lead and only caring about status and popularity. Throughout television, there have been different soaps and shows to portray the young generation and there general behaviour. These can be seen in shows like Eastenders and even cartoons like the Simpsons. However, in  my opinion, the Inbetweeners is one of the best TV show to portray the lives of the young generation. The show is very accurate because of the type of language that is used by the teenagers, the way they act generally and the situations they fall into. Furthermore, this shows give an idea of how actual teenager are in the media making it have a good representation of the young generation.  Another interesting aspect is the school in the show. Throughout the show, kids can be seen running around in the school, disrespecting teachers, bullying other kids and using mobile  phones during school hours. Although the show does not cover all the stereotypes of the young generation today, it does cover some as well as giving people the idea of how young people behave today.

The Inbetweeners is a British age-sitcom series about the misadventures of four mischievous teenagers Will, Simon, Jay and Neil. Throughout the show, we can see how the teenagers talk about girls, sex, not having respect for people and society, doing drugs and alcohol, lack of forward thinking, and being naive. The four teenagers are all different from each other and they are all represented differently.


Obsession with Sex

All through the show, the teenagers are obsessed with girls and wanting to have sexual intercourse. However,  the character of Jay is very different to the others when it comes to sex. Jay is the most immature and arrogant of the teens. He is obsessed with sex more than anyone else, with almost everything he says is about that subject. In his mind, he is the one with the most sexual experience as he always tells wild stories about his experiences, even though all his stories are lies. The way he goes on about his stories tells us that he has no sexual experience and that he lies to gain attention and make himself seem interesting, no matter how unbelievable his stories are.
Jays character gives a good representation of young people act in the media today. Some young people today may exaggerate about what they do in their lives making them seem interesting and gain attention from friends. Jays character may be overdramatised, but we can see his obsession with sex just like the young people today. Because of what some young people are exposed to, it makes them want to have sexual intercourse with girls.

Naivety

All the characters on the show are all naive, They all show lack of experience, wisdom, judgement but all are innocent. All though Jay shows a lack of experience when it comes to sexual terms, all of the teens are seen to be naive throughout the series. By the way the four teens act, behave and what they get themselves into, we can clearly see that they lack wisdom. However, they are seen as innocent and harmless. The most naive character in the series in my opinion is Will. Through the first episode of the series, Will seems like the nerdy type of person, but is easily lead by his friends to make bad choices and do outrageous things. An example of this is when Will is peer pressured to vandalise property (S03 EP5). Another example of Will being easily lead is when he is peer pressured into smoking cannabis (S03 EP2). In the episode, we can clearly see that he doesn't want to take part in doing drugs but does it by peer pressure of friends and to feel part of the community. Also, in that same episode, all of them show a lack of experience when doing drugs.
Overall, naivety is a good stereotype of young people. Most young people are naive because of the people they associate themselves with. Statistic show that 70% of kids are peer pressured into doing things they don't want to do, but do it to feel part of the community. Also, some young people show a lack of experience when it comes to sex, drugs and girls. Lastly, wisdom. Young people are not to be seen as wise because they don't have experience, lack of knowledge. The older generation are seen to have wisdom.





How old people are represented

Old people in the media today are represented mostly opposite to young people. Old people are seen as slow, boring, grumpy, clueless, useless, being isolated and being poor with technology. Throughout the media and television, there are shows and cartoons to portray old people. An example of a old person is Abe "Grandpa" Simpson from the Simpsons. Abe is portrayed as clueless, not bothered about anything, useless, slow and usually not aware to anything important.