Engaging The Disaffected

Having worked for many years as a young person’s drugs worker in the substance misuse sector, I have had contact with a wide range of social affected issues from a variety of backgrounds. Although the issues of my clients have been diverse one thing remains the same, the methods I use to engage them in a meaningful relationship.
With family values changing as a result of the separation brought about my ease of transport and communication and the fact that young people have more power within society as their rights have been recognised, adults have to find new ways to engage certain groups of young people, who for one reason or another have become disaffected by the society we present them.
When we consider the family who holds strong and appropriate boundaries with good communication skills, we can think of the young people who will respond to the consequences of their behaviours as a result of their upbringing. School has the tendency to uphold these values, which works well for the individuals aforementioned. Conversely, we have a generation of young people who are allowed to ‘get away’ with poor behaviour due partly to the separation within the wider family unit and increase of young people’s rights. Parents, schools and even the local bobby can no longer give children a ‘clip around the ear’ and young people know this. It is the tendency of young people to push the boundaries to see how far they will go, and we now have a culture of young people who have been able to push them further than generations have been able to before.
I go into schools regularly and I am surprised at how many pupils I hear swearing at teachers, something that I very rarely heard when I was at school, and that wasn’t even very long ago. I see parents, who say there is nothing they can do to stop their children from staying out all night and using drugs.
So, what is it that we can do to engage these young people and support them on a path that will be the most beneficial for them?
Well, you may be happy to know that the answer is actually pretty simple.
Before we even meet the young person we are going to need to adopt an attitude of respect. The rights of young people have changed, and in my estimation, for a good reason. As parents and professionals we need to change to be in accordance with this. I am not suggesting that we respect the individual’s behaviour if it is poor, but we have to respect the person to be able to put in the boundaries. Too often I see teachers using old Victorian methods of demanding respect and shouting at pupils followed by a barrage of expletives in return from the pupil just before they walk out the school gates.
This methodology is separating young people from main stream society and causing exclusion from school and the resultant affect of young people not being able to achieve their full potential.
One needs to have the respect of the young person before one is able to challenge them on their behaviour and this can easily be gained by giving it first. Respect is preventative in the sense that we do not want to look stupid, or let the people down who we have respect for.
So aside from giving respect, how else can we gain it?
The two main tools I have in my armoury are humour and permissiveness and these are not to be underestimated. Why challenge with anger when you can challenge with humour?
I had one girl, exhibiting some extreme mental health issues, who had been in and out of Psychiatric institutions over the past year.
On our first meeting she told me how she disliked one certain unit because when you spat at the staff, they would spit back at you!
I’m sure this was a test that was designed to shock me but rather than rise to the bait or get angry I responded with a humorous tone that did not condemn the action, but still highlighted the consequences.
The style of permissiveness allows the person to make a mistake, the humour challenges it and the reflecting back of consequences permits the understanding to take place so that behaviour can be modified.
I’m not saying that there isn’t a place for shouting at someone if they are overstepping the boundaries, just that this should be the last resort, generally speaking. If one is to always shout from the first instance then one has little backup if the shouting either does not produce results or produces adverse results. In this way, the person you are responding to will know that it’s serious and really means something because it is not something you usually do.
We have to be careful when using anger as a response so that we are not being used by the anger. By this I mean having the ability to calm down almost immediately after the event. If we are being overrun with our own emotional charges, then how are we going to expect young people, often facing incredibly challenging situations, to be able to manage their own?