Shush silicon valley6/22/2023 ![]() In May, Mejia says, the Redevelopment Agency closed down his Thursday and Sunday dance nights at Hamburger Mary's on St. There they have Pier 39, the Embarcadero, City Nights. "Kids would rather not deal with the hassle, so they go to San Francisco. "It's almost like downtown San Jose is anti-youngsters," he says. ![]() He blames the city's overly protective attitude toward downtown for the waning interest in the San Jose scene. "It doesn't know what it wants, so it's inconsistent. The 21-year-old Los Angeles native came to San Jose wanting to vitalize the youth club scene, but flagging Friday night attendance at what used to be known as the Fun House at Club 47 has left him frustrated. MAURICIO MEJIA DIRECTS promotions at Club 47, a downtown venue on Notre Dame Street with an 18-and-over license. Police cop an atttitude with local teens. They want to be treated like young adults, not potential criminals. They want to listen to loud music and stay up late. But what many of them want is a place to go, legally, and hang out with other kids. They go to the mall, play pool, watch movies, bowl, go to school dances, loiter, drink coffee and have parties when their parents leave town. They still find ways to entertain themselves in the void of places to mingle with their own kind. Just what teenagers want to do: group geometry.įortunately, kids are resourceful. They've shut down venues for kids and offered in their places homework centers. They've printed special "How's My Driving?" bumper stickers for young drivers and set up a countywide hotline so other drivers can report them. They've slapped curfews on teens, refused to build skate parks and allowed the existing handful of teen centers to fall into disrepair and to stagnate. They're left in the much-touted limbo between childhood and adulthood.īut angst and ennui aside, San Jose and the other cities in the valley have done little to endear themselves to teenagers. At the same time, they lack the money or the age requirements to partake in adult activities. They're not content with kids' games anymore, except once in a while when they're feeling goofy. And teens have reason to be dissatisfied, too. It's unfashionable to be satisfied with too many aspects of life, particularly the ones in which adults play a role. ![]() Sure, part of that's teen angst and affected boredom. But on one matter kids seem to agree: As a place for teenagers, the valley sucks. Condescension runs thick, and the imperative to stick to the group is overwhelming. The rave kids come to school Monday morning bragging about how good it was on Saturday, while straight-edge skaters from Willow Glen tell harrowing tales about close calls with the downtown cops.Īdolescence, as ever, is a forest of subgroups, each with its own value system and code of behavior. ![]() A Bellarmine Prep senior admits he's indifferent to alcohol and prefers to spend his weekends indoor rock-climbing, while a trio from Gunderson likes to spend Friday nights rounding up a bottle of brandy and polishing it off in the park. Girl ska fans from Saratoga wear Vans and V-neck shirts with athletic stripes-things their platform-shoe-struttin', itsy-bitsy-shirt-wearin', gangsta-rappin' counterparts at Independence High wouldn't be caught dead in. TEENAGERS IN THE Santa Clara Valley disagree on a lot of things. Can society ever learn to love its teens? Most of the attention given to teenagers in Santa Clara County comes in the form of restrictions driven by law enforcement, instead of what kids really need. The Kids Are All Right: Teens find a place to have fun at a recent ska show, held at the Gaslighter Theater in Campbell.
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