by Sammy-Lou Westwinds
Earlier today I went to the sixth form college where my boyfriend, Derek Jnr, is studying his A-levels to take part in one of their “Large Heated Discussions”.
They hold them regularly and today’s was called – Should Teenagers Get Out More?
I was invited as a member of the panel as I’m still only 18 myself and decided against furthering my education in order to take up a prestigious apprenticeship as a model-maker with Derek Belm & Sons instead. I was arguing that teenagers should be picking up as many life experiences as they can as early as they can.
Other panel members included Sandra Stallyon (a fellow blogger on The Shouty Villager), who was reheating her old argument that children should be locked up until they are 21.
The third panel member was Jimmy Rasher, one-time children’s television presenter who got sacked for encouraging teenage guests on one of his programmes to stay up after the 9pm watershed. Since then he’s been working as a door-to-door salesman, trying to get housewives to buy his knives, forks and spoons:
The discussion was quite large – about 80 audience members – and it did get somewhat heated.
This was mainly the fault of Ms Stallyon, who refused to listen to anyone else and wouldn’t shut up. The college’s Head of Drama tried turning her microphone off, but she hit him with her brolly.
So they managed to sneak up behind her while she was distracted by me standing at the podium and tied a gag around her and chained her hands to her chair.
The discussion was lively. I took the opportunity to highlight a lot of the different festivals and events happening locally and in big Birmingham during the summer, suggesting teenagers should broaden their cultural horizons a bit by going to them.
Ms Stallyon, before she was bound and gagged, went on about evil girls needing to be taken in hand and that all children should be locked away. She also said something about the war on children never being won, which I didn’t really understand.
Jimmy Rasher started well enough, contrasting his own childhood back in the 1970s (whenever that was) with modern times and saying teenagers today aren’t taking enough advantage of all the opportunities that are around. He even showed us a picture of when he was younger:
Awww, he was so cute.
But then he began talking about his TV career and got a bit emotional and stuff.
He ended up crying and saying there was a big conspiracy against him because he’s not gay, or something.
Mr Rasher eventually had to be helped out of the hall and an ambulance was called.
So everyone voted at the end with a show of hands to decide who had made the best argument.
Jimmy Rasher got a few sympathy votes, Ms Stallyon didn’t get any (despite threatening everyone with her brolly after the Head of Drama removed her gag so she could make her closing speech) and I got 98% of the votes because Derek Jnr (he’s my boyfriend) got everyone to vote for me.
The final decision was that teenagers should get out more.
A really worthwhile event with a powerful message and lots of inspiration.
