Why Social Withdrawal is a Two Way Street

Image Credit: Hernan Pinera

As you read this someone somewhere has made the decision to withdraw from society. They don’t want to do it but they see no other alternative. They are often male, bright and young but not always. They are joining millions of others around the world hidden from mainstream society. This is the point I tell you that it not their fault.

The difficulty is that we view it as a personal pathology rather than a social pathology. We believe that they have the problem. That they are addicted to computer games or are there because they have autism or some other 'debilitating' difficulty. We also believe this problem is small.

In the UK alone there are nearly one million NEETS (those not engaged with education or training). The Prince's Trust have highlighted large percentages of these young people who have withdrawn,  with no sign of work and where the promise that success will follow their rigid conformity to the education system but that remains a promise that ultimately fails to deliver. They are feeling the harsh consequences of an education system that has long since forgotten what it means to be educated.

Social withdrawal is a two way street. It is a relationship between an individual and society, but one where society has lost the ability to listen and the individual cannot raise their voice above the din.

We ask them to come back, we tell them it is all in the way they think and make it personal, but society needs to take responsibility for finding both a platform for the individual and also for discovering how our collective desire for order and sameness within our education systems has lost sight of who these children are and what they are capable of.

Perhaps we need to admit we are responsible and that the buck stops with us and not them?

John Hassall, Founder & Creative Director, Johass