Long gone are the days when young people learnt lessons, formed opinions from their parents. They now have many other accesses to form their own perspectives, especially from celebrities. But older people who have already adapted to the society are less likely to be influenced by celebrities.
To begin with, the youngster spend most of their time surfing internet, watching television, where they can get exposed to large amount of news of celebrities. On the contrary, older people are more willing to rely on traditional media,such as newspapaer. In this case, they have fewer access to get in touch with opinions from celebrities. For example, when Adam Levine announced that he supports gay marriage on Twitter, our parents may have no idea who Adam Levine is or what Twitter is. But we may easily accept this kind of value that gay marriage is fair because our idol says so.
Moreover, we are still forming our perspective to life, to different situations. Our parents, however, after going through lots of difficulties, have already obtained the ability to figure out how to deal with different things. For instance, I failed in an important exam recently, I felt frustrated. But when I watched the life story of Justin Biber, one of my favorite musicians, it encouraged me stick to my goal and carry on. These up and downs in his life make me believe that we can never get what we want through a peaceful life. However, when my father got fired last year, he smiled and treated himself a vacation. I asked how he could be so restful, he told me that he had already gone through a lot of difficulties, the only thing he could do is to let it go and start over again. Actually, they are already mature enough to deal with their own problems. They don’t need to borrow a lesson from other people’s life story.
Finally, most entertainers and athletes are in the same age of the youngsters, so they may share more similarities. People usually share similar values with their peers. To make an extreme example, if a famous model says crop top represents fashion. A lot of young girls will be eager to own one.But how can we expect our mothers to wear a crop top to work. Although it is only an extreme example, but it is true that there is a huge gap between different age groups.
To sum up, one day, we will become old. We may be so-called “outdated” in our children’s eyes. It is usually true that a “blank paper”,like young people, is more likely to be painted on than some painted paper,like our parents to obtain new pictures.
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TOEFL listening lectures: A lecture from a life sciences class (4)