Question
Some people think that young people should follow traditions of their society, and others think that young people should be free to behave as individuals.
Discuss both views and give your own opinion.
Sample answer
Every generation, young and old, should be allowed freedom to deal with the breaking down of certain patterns and standards being handed down from the past. As individuals, young people are particularly keen to the need to end whatever tradition they think is unreasonable for the society. All rebellious minds think alike--tradition is a guide for the past but not a jailer for the future.
Too often young men and women are enthusiastic about the evolution of beliefs and practices of their society, and their behaviors tend to challenge a number of elements of tradition. For that matter, mental independence is required because without an amount of freedom, tradition would be only an explanation for acting in conformity without thinking independently. Accordingly, young people ought not to be forced to express their new feelings in a mummified form, otherwise the evolution in tradition could not happen. The point is that not just because something is traditional, so there is reason enough to do it. It is good, however, for young people to continue a worthwhile tradition, and it is also good not to be captive of an unreasonable tradition which is not worth having. Although social bondage persists, it makes a difference if young people are permitted to think and act in such a way as different from that of a conservative mind in which the word 'tradition' means a shortcut to thinking or an excuse for acting.
Probably a society can only successfully function with traditional values--diverse customs, thoughts, lifestyles, religion, music, dance, arts and languages, among other things of culture. Young people had better learn that modern traditions are built on the past just as the past was built on the times that went before it. Traditions bring continuity to one's existence in a society, even though this sort of continuity is precisely what has been increasingly lost through modernity. Thus, it behooves young individuals to preserve their traditions of value by safeguarding against the negative influence from various factors such as industrialization, globalization, and assimilation or marginalization of special cultural groups. It certainly makes patriotic sense that young people's love for traditions worth continuing always strengthens the well-being of the society and never weakens all that is meant to identify themselves with their country. Good tradition being a good guide, young people, however rebellious, should not be entirely negative about the past with all its enduring heritages and necessary evils.
In conclusion, since a modern society is not supposed to be a dead community, young people may behave freely in treating tradition as the living faith of the dead and not as the dead faith of the living. They should not believe in traditions simply because many beliefs and practices have been handed down for many generations, but should instead observe and analyze anything that agrees with reason and is conductive to the good and benefit of the society. It takes a lot of history to make a tradition, so the best of which must be accepted and lived up to, from generation to generation.
