Savvy or Materialistic

You’ve probably heard about 16 year Ella Birchenough getting stuck down a drain, a consequence of trying to retrieve a phone that she dropped. Over the past week, many reports and articles have been published trying to make out that this generation is so “materialistic” that people will “risk their lives for the sake of a phone”. Well here’s the reality that these adults need to accept, a phone on a contract could be worth around £300- if you dropped a purse with £300 down a drain, you would be trying to get it too! Just because it’s a phone- a gadget most typical to teenagers- does not make the cash value any different. Also, that girl probably knew that her parents would be absolutely seething if she came home and said she’d lost her phone.

Fair enough, there are better ways than climbing down a drain to recover an item, but still, the argument still stands that this girl is being unfairly condemned because of her age. The approach would be different if some middle aged person dropped their £300 brooch down a drain and got stuck in it. If this was the case, do you think that their whole generation would be called “materialistic”?

Another ridiculous claim from people is that it was “selfish” to the firemen to do something so stupid. Well the job of the emergency services is to rescue people. And they rescued her. Thus doing their job. Using the “selfish” argument is so unsustainable. It’s like saying that a teacher would find it “selfish” if someone wanted to learn. Or it is “selfish” towards a lollypop lady to want to cross the road. Or having a burglar raiding your cupboards is “selfish” to the police.

It is just so outrageous to call the whole generation “materialistic”, especially when they’re no more materialistic or selfish than any other generation. Besides, she’s had a great time as a result of her stunt, as she appeared on Ant and Dec’s Saturday Night Takeaway and will probably be declared a “legend” in her school.