Random Thoughts On... Justin Bieber vs. Jesse McCartney

As any Borders lover will know, the third level of Borders Chadstone has comfy armchairs scattered around the place. Now, any lover who has been there recently and has a good geographic sense as to where everything is positioned will remember that there are two particular armchairs near the children and young adults section (adjacent to the escalators). Two days ago at around 2pm you would have found me happily ensconced in one of these armchairs reading a racy Sara Douglass novel. However, my reverie of romantic fantasies was shot when I overheard the following conversation, triggered by the key word, "Twilight",spoken by a squealing tween:

Tween: "MOMMYYY!!! THE TWILIGHT SERIES IS ON SALE FOR ONLY $25.99!!!"

Tween's Mother: "Darling, please try to be quiet."

Tween: "But Mommy! It's the Twilight series and it's on sale!"

Tween's Mother: "Darling, $25.99 is a bit much for one dvd like that."

Tween: "Gosh! It's Twilight! I need to have it!!!"

Tween's Mother: "...No."

Tween: "GRAH!"

(Tween stalks away and I breathe a sigh of relief. The tween's mother continues to read until the next disturbance.)

Tween: "OH MY GOSH. OH MY GOSH. LOOK LOOK MOMMY. IT'S A JUSTIN BIEBER BOOK."

Me: 'Holy Flying Shite. They make stalkerish books about Justin Bieber now. What is this world coming to.'

Tween's Mother: "That's nice darling."

Tween: "Can I have it? Can I have it? Please mommy?"

Tween's Mother: "..."

Tween: "Please? It's a book! I'll be reading!"

Tween's Mother: sigh. "Fine."

Tween: "OH MOMMY I LOVE YOU. I LOVE YOU. I LOVE YOU. I HAVE A JUSTINE BIEBER BOOK. EVERYONE'S GOING TO LOVE IT. I mean look at it! It even has a poster of Justin Bieber and quizzes..." She proceeds to unfold an A3 poster of Justin Bieber.

I feel that I can safely speak for a large majority of the Y generation when I say that Justin Bieber and Twilight are some of the more disreputable vices of the tween generation. Such things threaten the equilibrium of society and the sanity of every individual over the age of 17. But wait a sec. I suppose it wouldn't be entirely fair to cut in at this point in time and say, "When I was your age, I was never like that". Surely we must also have some sort of shortcoming that accompanied our growth pains.

So on we go to the timeline of our lives.

Perhaps the closest thing we had to Justin Bieber was Jesse McCartney. To be honest, I wasn't on that bandwagon but then again, I was the dork back in those late primary school-early high school days. And just as a refresher, here's some eye candy (if you can call it that):

But hey, at least he wasn't a pre-pubescent kid who had yet to go through the puberty blues. What you saw was what you got. Instead, you have Justin Bieber who has yet to go through the throes of puberty unscathed:

Yes tweens, that cute baby fat is likely to melt away. Sorry darlings.

And perhaps our equivalent to the Twilight series was the Saddle Club or even Harry Potter. I don't think it takes any genius to find the big differences between these series. Twilight has a sequined Edward Cullen, a constantly breathy Bella and a baby destined to be soul mate of an overly-muscular werewolf (lolita anyone?). Instead, Harry Potter has a serpentine Lord Voldemort, wands and broomsticks. The Saddle Club had horses, saddles, girls interested in horses and benign bitchiness. Yes, I might be biased but come on! Harry Potter and Saddle Club win in being healthy G-rated fads for kids who aren't yet teenagers. Furthermore, in our day, headlines like, "Girls ask me to bite them on the neck -Robert Pattinson" or "Young fan asks Twilight star Robert Pattinson to 'Bite Me'" never made the news. All we had was, "Thousands line up to see 'Wizarding World'".

It is quite worrisome to think that these tweens will grow up and enter into society as adults. There is no way in telling what their EQ will be like but rest assured, at least the more grounded Gen Y will be there to take all the managerial positions and rule the world with a grip as strong as Hagrid's.