RM September 21 - Is your child an Emo?

I borrowed a paragraph from a previous post to use in this column, so you may have read part of it before, apologies!

THE phrase ‘Emo’ is one that has been popping up in our household a lot over the recent months.

You may have heard it yourself if you have teenagers. It would probably be in conversations which sounded something like this ‘ach they are nothing but a weirdo Emo!

It probably shows my age because to me the person who would be called an ‘Emo’ is actually what the majority of us would recognise as ‘Goths’ with a liking for emotionally-charged punk rock music. You know the type, the kind of music that has you banging the wall yelling ‘turn that down’.

Emos is short for emotional and the best person to explain Emos is the Young Wan herself, so over to her.

I am not an Emo before I start explaining. Right an Emo is yes you guessed it another label. An Emo is someone who has black hair short usually and a side fringe that covers his/her eye. They are suicidal and cry all the time. They listen to bands like Bullet for My Valentine (which are the only good Emo band in my opinion). They write poetry and aren’t very good at talking so they express themselves in their own way which is grand but they take it over the top. I have nothing against Emos I have friends who are very Emo but I wouldn’t like to be one. Some idiots would use it as a insult but really it is pretty unimaginative. Emos (as in the real ones not the wannabes) are usually quite artistic. Anyway Emos are good listeners and are nice people in general so if you see one on the street give them a hug. But be warned you may get a punch.

So how do you spot an Emo. Well they will often sport greasy black hair with a long heavy fringe, wear children’s t-shirts, sporting horn-rimmed black glasses and they feel no one understands them.

While being an Emo sounds like the epitome of teenage angst it is not always doom and gloom. If you read anything about them it is normally concerning their propensity to self-harm and other such negative details.

But this is a mass generalisation and has no real basis in truth. I wrote recently about research into Goths which show that Goths are a very accepting and non-violent group as well as being high achievers academically. While Goths and Emos are two separate groupings there is more than a little cross-over in our house.

A British national newspaper recently had an article on Emo and self harming and the Young Wan was all annoyed. The paper claimed Emo is a celebration of self-harm. I have to say that is utter nonsense.

The article went on to say “If this environment is coupled with the psychological traits of self-pity, introspection, self-dramatisation and hormone imbalance, you have a fully-fledged Emo, even without the small T-shirt and black hair.”

Surely that just describes the vast majority of teenagers not a new and foreboding Emo cult.

So to any parents out there who may be worried because their child is displaying some of the characteristics described here, don’t worry. Okay your child is going to look a bit scary for a few years, there may be some door slamming and shouting. And there will definitely be some loud music. All of which is nothing to worry about, is it?

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