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Garden State Plaza Mall opened on May 1, 1957, and is the 15th largest mall in America. It housed over 300 stores and was the filming location for several Soprano episodes.
Friday night in 1982, what were you doing? Some of us were cruising up and down our small town streets after the football game, but some of us may have been hanging out at the mall with our friends, without our parents. And having a great time. You can have a great time while acting like a decent human. But it won’t be all fast times for the teenagers in the Garden State.
Seems those fast and good times are gone in 2023. Garden State Plaza Mall will require teens under 18 to be with a chaperone on the weekends.
With the desire to make something go viral and become famous on TikTok, it seems teenagers are trying to outdo each other with challenges for the social media site. Business and mall officials report disruptions, fighting, and large groups of turbulent teens.
If insurance companies stopped paying for this and big box retailers lost money, you would see lawmakers put a stop to it #DemocratsAreDestroyingAmerica pic.twitter.com/CdIGbAm8zm
— • ᗰISᑕᕼIᗴᖴ ™ • (@4Mischief) April 16, 2023
I’m unsure of the ages of the people shown in the Twitter video above. And when I used to work retail, we saw this way too often. It’s not just blatant thievery happening, either. We’ve caught people trying to have sex in the changing rooms too.
From the New York Post article about the Garden State Plaza Mall –
Police and security guards will be stationed at the entrance of the mall to check IDs and anyone who refuses will reportedly be asked to leave, mall officials said.
It sounds harsh and totalitarian police-state-like, and people will be upset by this new approach.
Three cases of lousy behavior were reported in two months at the Garden State Plaza, which has escalated. The one report does list a 17-year-old as one of the culprits.
And in early 2017, Westfield Culver City Mall in California had 200 teenagers hanging outside the mall, some of them fighting.
So what do you do?
The Fashion District Mall in Philadelphia is doing the same thing. Oklahoma, Virginia, and Maryland also are putting a policy in place.
And this is from Colorado –
Violent crimes that land kids and teens in Colorado’s youth corrections system are on the rise, accounting for 41% of admissions in 2022.
Whether it be a stupid TikTok mischief challenge, pandemic blame, or defunding the police movement, crime has been on the rise since 2020.
Murder, aggravated assault, and vehicle theft were among the highest increases in 2020, according to the FBI Uniform Crime Reporting Program.
And this article from Forbes lists the 15 Safest and 15 Most Dangerous cities in America. I had to check a few times on the date of this article because they list New York City as one of the safest cities.
On a personal note, I had to go to our mall just a few weeks ago on a Saturday early evening. This is a time I would not usually be at the mall, and I have to tell you, it definitely was not the crowd of my teenage years. I did not feel safe, and I couldn’t get out of there fast enough. It just had an odd feeling to it. I’m not sure that it is only teenagers, though. And I am in a small southern town.
Weirdness is creeping in everywhere, and we are becoming more and more like Gotham City.
Feature Image: Photo by Tuur Tisseghem/Pexels/Free Use
Cameron says: Thank God my teen years were in the 80s and I could go to the mall without dealing with crap like this.
Carol Marks says: Amen! Thank you for reading and taking the time to comment. Always appreciated.
NTSOG says: Here in Australia we are seeing increasing number of gangs of teens [including ‘real’ girls] aged in the early teens breaking into houses [called aggravated burglary over here] to steal car keys and then taking off joy riding and committing more crimes. Very often they broadcast their dangerous and often violent exploits in real time as they go so as to obtain recognition from their gullible age-peers. On Good Friday one such gang of 5 was caught. Aside from one of the boys being 13 several others had just been granted bail for similar offences a few weeks before. The eldest member was a 16-year-old girl.
Apologists for such gangs ignore the effects of their behaviour, financially and emotionally, on their victims.
Scott says: Interesting that this primarily happens in democrat run areas…
GWB says: Like Oklahoma?!
The red places aren’t nearly as “red” as some think them to be. Just as lots and lots of Christians are a lot more Progressive than Christian.
Scott says: Agreed GWB, no matter the state, cities are generally filled with “progressive” hive mind types..
GWB says: This is what happens when you don’t discipline – and I mean often smacking their behinds – your children. You treat them as co-equals, just on a lark, they shouldn’t have any consequences for bad behavior, they’re just kids, right? NO. And, because loads of parents were taught that crap by their parents, we now have a large set of feral kids running about, and so nobody can have nice things.
BTW, that above is exactly how adult thugs are treated now, too. And that will only stop once We, The People, reassert our values through direct action.
NTSOG says: ” You treat them as co-equals …”
Yes. Adults cannot be ‘friends’ of and with children. Adults may be friendly towards children, but children and adolescents actually [in my experience in schools] want adults to be in charge and ensure that they are safe from their own immature shenanigans. They may voice their own individual ability and confidence but like to know they have a safe adult to ‘backstop’ them when they over-reach themselves. Of course, there are adults of a certain type who demand children be their ‘friends’ but they are suspect as far as I’m concerned. Children don’t really trust adults presenting themselves as friends.
Anna A says: Beachwood Place in the Cleveland OH area has similar rules, except it starts at 4 pm on Fridays and Saturdays. I didn’t see a date on the info that confirmed my memory
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