NAME: LEE TACK HOOI

MATRIX NUMBER: D20081032349

TITLE: DO YOUNG PEOPLE TODAY MAKE A GOOD USE OF THEIR LEISURE TIME? OR
DO THEY SPENT TOO MUCH TIME WATCHING TELEVISION AND PLAYING VIDEO
GAMES, INSTEAD OF TAKING PART IN MORE PRODUCTION ACTIVITIES.

Nowadays, young people are very different from those young people in the older days.
They have a better technology, more entertainment, and a much better lifestyle. The situation is
totally different for the young people in the older days. They do not have the technology –
powered material, not as much entertainment as nowadays and a very difficult lifestyle. They do
not have much leisure time to spent like the young people today. The young people in the older
days needed to do many daily routine to complete their basic needs and they just have a tiny
space for their leisure activities. In the other hand, the young people nowadays have lots of
leisure time left due to the development of the technology in their life. However, all these
enhancements from the technology development actually do not help much in building up their
positive characteristics and maturity development. This is because the young people nowadays
do not make a good use of their leisure time. They might spend too much times watching
television and playing video games instead of taking part in more production activities.

There is no doubt that the technology today is developing very fast and bringing up
many news things for us daily. However, the market value of this new technology is always
depends on the acceptance of the young people. For example is the introduction of the 3G
communication system. The young people today do not seem to accept or use the 3G
communication due to the reason of the price and the connectivity. Thus, the 3G communication
is still in the introduction phase of a new technology. If the young people have accept this new
technology and most of them are using it, then we might see that all the communication –
device seller are selling the 3G phones everywhere.

However, there is two things that is very welcome by young people is the video games
and the television. Laptop or personal computer is also growing and becoming one of the basic
needs that must be owned by young people. The wide acceptance of the video games actually
is due to the introduction of new games almost every month. Most of the young people will
spend their time playing video games in their house or in the cyber café in their neighborhood.
Video games actually do not bring much of the positive effect to the young people. It actually
made an individual become anti – social in the future. This is because some of the players are
very addicted to the video game that they can play it for 24 hours non – stop. Some might plays
at home and some might plays with their friend in the cyber café. This actually will limit the
social development of the young people. They will not learn to communicate or socialize with
the people surrounding them. Instead, they might be an expertise in socializing through the
virtual world. No matter how, we need to bear in mind that social life in the virtual world is very
much different from the real social world. So, they might soon come out as an anti – social
young people.

Playing video games and watching television actually does bring some good effects on
the young people. By playing video games, an individual actually will develop his or her brain
cells faster than those who do not play video games. They can be a fast thinker and they might
as well always come out with new ideas that we might not think of. Why does this happen? This
is because in video games, the player will always need to think and find out the best solution to
avoid from losing the games to others. Thus, they might be able to train themselves to be a fast
thinker. At the same time, the video games actually turning the young people into violence
oriented individual because most of the video game such as war craft and Dotta involve the
violence aspect of killing the enemy with some special tool animated in the games. As a result,
a few years ago, a young man in the western country had killed his lecturer and friend using a
hand gun. This might be the influence of the video games named Counter Strike which involve
killing the enemy by using the hand gun or pistol. Not just that, over – playing of video games
might actually killed the brain cells too. If an individual plays video game for 24 hours non –
stop, it is just like another form of unintentional suicide.

Watching television actually bring both pros and cons to the young people. The
television might be able to send out messages and news to the young people. For instance, the
television is advertising the ways to prevent the Swine Influenza or the H1N1 illness. This
message is able to be send throughout the whole country except the country side where lack of
electricity. Not just that, young people might enhance their imagination by watching television.
They might produce some good ideas from what they had watched from the television. This
might bring up some brand new things that we think is impossible to be done. However, how
many of the young people have made a good use of the television? It is true that the young
people might impersonate the character they watch in the television but most of the character
they chosen to impersonate is always those that perform violence and some dangerous stunt.
For example, my young brother was trying to impersonate the Jackie Chan in New Police
Stories 2. After watching the movie, he will always plays with his gun and perform some stunt he
learnt from that movie. A few days later, he was bruise for falling down from tree.
 Actually, the young people nowadays were very much enhanced by the introduced new
technology. As a good user of the technology without abusing it, we must be wise enough to
use it. Actually, as young people we are not necessary to spent out times on television and
video games. There are many social works out there that we can involve in. For example is the
RELA community. This community is one of the volunteering activities that always lack of young
people participation. By joining this community, the young people can spend their leisure time
with the activities organized. Thus, this will help them to increase their credibility in socializing
with other. This skill is very useful for every individual in the future. There are stil other such as
the Rakan Muda association. In this association, the young people can join the activities like
mountain hiking, jungle tracking, assailing, diving and others. All these activities actually provide
hands – on experience to the individual participated and can enhance their knowledge rather
than just playing video games and watching television. However, all these volunteering
association and community are always lack of young people. They do not fully utilize their
leisure time with all the beneficiary activities provided for them.

Another bad habit of the young people nowadays is that they like to sleep when they
have free times rather than doing other activities. They felt tired and will spend their whole
weekend sleeping. This is just a wasting of time. Life is just like the burning candle. It should not
be waste just for sleeping and useless activities. Actually, the above statement is more
concentrated on watching television and playing video games. The young people nowadays are
also more likely to be involved in clubbing, illegal racing, gambling and virtual chatting.

As a conclusion, each individual has their own right and risk to choose the best way to
full use of their leisure time. it is very dependent on the way they spent on each activities. If they
are too addicted to an activities no matter it is a video games or the volunteering activities, it
might affect their other performance as well. This is because they had spent too much time on it.
Young people should bear in mind that all these activities is just used to filling up their leisure
time and not as an important event that must be done. There is no harm playing video games
and watching television if the individuals do not abuse these two technologies provided to them.
Lastly, it will back to each individual to think of what is necessary to be done and what is not
necessary to be done.