EDITORIAL — Youth, violence, and adversity

Two news items involving minors made it to the headlines recently.

In one news item, a Grade 10 student of an unidentified public school in Maasin, Iloilo, allegedly died due to “undisclosed circumstances”. While details aren’t clear, the fact that there were “psychosocial interventions” provided by the school's Child Protection Committee to the student seems to suggest that the student committed suicide.

In the other, a 14-year-old boy in Sitio Lawis, Barangay Suba-Basbas, Lapu-Lapu City, allegedly bludgeoned then drowned his five-year-old half-brother over a grudge against his stepfather, the victim’s biological father.

Is this a case of young people getting exposed to too much violence and not knowing how to deal with stressful or adversarial situations?

While we can say with some certainty that the two incidents by themselves are isolated cases, we also cannot deny the fact that there seem to be more frequent reports of young people resorting to violence against others as well as turning to suicide or at least attempt it.

Remember that more minors seem to be attacking others over trivial reasons. Recall also that since the start of this year two students have jumped off the Marcelo Fernan Bridge; a 19-year-old last February and a 15-year-old last March. Fortunately, the 15-year-old was saved from the waters.

Is this nothing to worry about or is there something we are missing in matters of guiding the younger ones in terms of how they deal with adversity?

There are no quick or easy solutions when it comes to building resilient youths who can take on unexpected hard times. However, studies have shown that little things help; and we are talking about the little things like being able to talk to others about their troubles and frustrations, or having a creative outlet for what can otherwise be destructive behavior. Little things like watching out for anything that seems to be bothering or unsettling our kids, or changing their behavior.

We would like to think that the spate of student suicides that happened during the worst of the pandemic lockdowns was the worst-case scenario. We have to make sure that such an event is already behind us.