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    • Medical AutonomyExpand
      • Making Decisions About Treatment
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    • Age DiscriminationExpand
      • Business Discrimination
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    • Voting AgeExpand
      • Top Ten Reasons to Lower the Voting Age
      • Voting Age Status Report
      • Voting Age: Facts and Resources
      • The Movement to Lower the Voting Age: A History
      • Age of Candidacy
    • Drinking AgeExpand
      • Reasons to Challenge the Drinking Age
      • Drinking Age: Facts and Resources
      • Solutions and Alternatives to the Drinking Age
      • State Guide to Drinking Age Law
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      • Top Five Reasons to Abolish Curfews
      • Curfew Laws by State
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NYRANYRA

Youth Rights Theory

  • The Teen Brain: Risk Seeking Or Primed For Learning?

    The Teen Brain: Risk Seeking Or Primed For Learning?

    When it comes to mainstream society’s understanding of the adolescent brain, we are often limited to research which perpetuates harmful stereotypes and myths. Teenagers are lazy. Teens take stupid and dangerous risks. They’re impulsive and obsessed with approval from peers. While the people who stand by these stereotypes may point to neuroscience as evidence for…

    Read More The Teen Brain: Risk Seeking Or Primed For Learning?Continue

  • Surprise, Everyone is Ageist

    Surprise, Everyone is Ageist

    I often see people in NYRA’s Facecbook group say they are surprised or disappointed that some political leader or group they like is ageist. There is nothing surprising about it. Everyone is ageist. They aren’t ageist because they are bad people or irrational or hate kids, they just don’t know that there is any other…

    Read More Surprise, Everyone is AgeistContinue

  • 18 Years Is Half My Life

    18 Years Is Half My Life

    Time speeds up A year represents less perceived time to someone in their 90s than it does to someone in their teens. You can see how time accelerates as we get older in this interactive visualization by Maximilian Keiner. Keiner argues that to human beings, the first 18 years of life seem just as long…

    Read More 18 Years Is Half My LifeContinue

  • Youth rights lessons from “Lord of the Flies”

    Youth rights lessons from “Lord of the Flies”

    The “Lord of the Flies” argument The “Lord of the Flies” argument goes like this. Let’s say I want to lower the voting age, or give students more constitutional protections in school. Someone using the argument would reply, “Bad idea. That would undermine adult authority and lead to a ‘Lord of the Flies’ scenario.” However,…

    Read More Youth rights lessons from “Lord of the Flies”Continue

  • Time Flies When You’re Having Fun, And Drags When You’re Young

    Time Flies When You’re Having Fun, And Drags When You’re Young

    When I talk to people about lowering the voting age to 16 or lowering the drinking age to 18 they often say “Why the rush? Two or three years isn’t so long to wait.” Or they will respond, dismissively with, “You young people are always in such a hurry, just be patient, you’ll be an…

    Read More Time Flies When You’re Having Fun, And Drags When You’re YoungContinue

  • Ageism and a Bike Thief:  When We Should and Shouldn’t Respect Our Elders

    Ageism and a Bike Thief: When We Should and Shouldn’t Respect Our Elders

    I recently got into an argument with a stranger who was trying to cut through my bike lock with a torch. This was in the middle of a crowd, and I knew he would be long gone if I waited for the police to show up. When I saw him at work, I figured that…

    Read More Ageism and a Bike Thief: When We Should and Shouldn’t Respect Our EldersContinue

  • A Brief Overview of the Problems with Teen Brain Science

    A Brief Overview of the Problems with Teen Brain Science

    Until very recently, I thought neuroscience had put up barriers to youth rights that no argument could cross. If the teenage brain is physically incapable of handling freedoms, then that’s the end of the discussion. It doesn’t matter how much we argue about the Constitution and equality under the law—no amount of arguing can make…

    Read More A Brief Overview of the Problems with Teen Brain ScienceContinue

  • Making Common Cause Against Ageism

    Making Common Cause Against Ageism

    I was pleased to come across this article in the Washington Post today about the struggle against ageism. The article profiled Ashton Applewhite, an author and advocate, who runs a site called This Chair Rocks. Applewhite focuses primarily on discrimination against the old, but she doesn’t do so myopically. Her website, and the Post article,…

    Read More Making Common Cause Against AgeismContinue

  • The Incentive to Be Sick:  Why many young people play along with diagnosis culture

    The Incentive to Be Sick: Why many young people play along with diagnosis culture

      In his book, Teen 2.0, psychologist Robert Epstein gives an account of the medical profession’s complicity in the movement to marginalize young people: “In short, my own colleagues have long played and continue to play a leading role in the maintenance of the artificial extension of childhood. They have pathologized socially induced behavior and…

    Read More The Incentive to Be Sick: Why many young people play along with diagnosis cultureContinue

  • R-Rated Superhero Movies?

    R-Rated Superhero Movies?

    Bob Chipman had a very interesting take over at ScreenRant on the rumored R-rated directors cut version of Superman V Batman to be included on the DVD. Put simply, as he does, he sees it as an awful idea and a perversion. His reasons are rather interesting for youth rights activists. This isn’t the first…

    Read More R-Rated Superhero Movies?Continue

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  • Powerschool vs Student Privacy

    Powerschool vs Student Privacy

  • Eric Kennedy, Imogen Gannon, and Susan Milton holding large signs reading Youth Rights, Youth Liberation Now and Voting Rights For Youth respectively, in all caps.

    Introducing the Seattle NYRA node

  • Democracy Collapse & the Ignorance of Civics

    Democracy Collapse & the Ignorance of Civics

  • James Baldwin – Writer & Civil Rights Activist

    James Baldwin – Writer & Civil Rights Activist

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Our Blog

Powerschool vs Student Privacy

If you’ve been young lately, you might have taken some sort of “Digital Safety” class. It was probably mediocre. Perhaps you used Powerschool’s Schoology learning platform that lesson, your teacher very likely used Powerschool SIS to mark you present, and perhaps standardized tests that month were on Powerschool’s Performance Matters service. On January 7th, “Customers”…
June 30, 2025
TagsEducation
Underdeveloped Prefrontal Cortex
Eric Kennedy, Imogen Gannon, and Susan Milton holding large signs reading Youth Rights, Youth Liberation Now and Voting Rights For Youth respectively, in all caps.

Introducing the Seattle NYRA node

The new Seattle NYRA node has taken to the streets to spread our message of youth liberation. We have been out peacefully protesting every Tuesday near public locations around the city, such as the Seattle Central Public Library, the Capitol Hill light rail station, and Franklin High School. We also have plans to participate in…
June 6, 2025
NYRA
Comment Count2

Democracy Collapse & the Ignorance of Civics

The amount of the American public who can name the three branches of government is, and should be, terrifyingly alarming. Moreso when those within the government itself cannot name them either. Why this should alarm you is when corruption occurs the public is unequipped and unable to identify these actions. Without having that baseline understanding…
February 25, 2025
TagsEducation, Government
Allison Jenkins
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  • ABOUT
    • What We Do
    • Why We Do It
      • Land Acknowledgement
    • What Are Youth Rights?
      • Principles of Anti-Ageism
      • Resources
    • Our Team
    • Our Movement
    • Contact Us
  • ISSUES
    • Medical Autonomy
      • Making Decisions About Treatment
      • Who Decides What a Mental Disorder Is?
      • The “Troubled Teen” Industry
    • Student Rights
      • Student Bill of Rights
      • Academic Freedom
      • Corporal Punishment in School
      • Dress Codes and Uniforms
      • Free Speech in Schools
      • The Pledge of Allegiance and the National Anthem
      • Policing and Punishment in Schools
      • Search and Seizure
      • Student Clubs
      • Student Decision-making
      • Restraint and Seclusion
      • Fighting for Students’ Rights through the Courts
    • Age Discrimination
      • Business Discrimination
      • Censorship
      • Driving Age
      • Labor
    • Voting Age
      • Top Ten Reasons to Lower the Voting Age
      • Voting Age Status Report
      • Voting Age: Facts and Resources
      • The Movement to Lower the Voting Age: A History
      • Age of Candidacy
    • Drinking Age
      • Reasons to Challenge the Drinking Age
      • Drinking Age: Facts and Resources
      • Solutions and Alternatives to the Drinking Age
      • State Guide to Drinking Age Law
      • The National Minimum Drinking Age Act
    • Curfew
      • Top Five Reasons to Abolish Curfews
      • Curfew Laws by State
  • TAKE ACTION
    • Donate
    • Volunteer
    • TRAIN IN ACTIVISM
      • How to be a Spokesperson for Youth Rights
      • Working with Elected Officials
      • Media Guide to Promoting Youth Rights
      • Organizing a Protest, Walkout or Boycott
      • How to Change Policy at School
      • How to do Outreach in your School and Community
      • How to Promote Youth Rights Online
      • How to Fundraise
      • How to Direct Your Own Education
    • Become A Member
    • FORM A NODE
    • Active Nodes
    • NYRA Merch!
  • Blog
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