As Brits, we're worried about our young people. We're worried about what they do, where they go and what they download.
We're worried about what reported rises in youth crime and anti-social behaviour say about our society, and what kind of future our young people are going to create.
According to the Prince's Trust, 72% of us feel nervous, threatened or scared when we pass a group of young people on the street. More than a quarter of people think young people in their area are involved in crime, and just 1% of us are pleased to see them out in our communities.
This year's National Youth Week – from 15 to 21 November - gives us the chance to question these perceptions. It is an opportunity to hold our neuroses up to the light, and examine the facts behind the moral panic.
We're terrified of passing young people in the street, but the statistics show that young people are far more likely to be the victims of crime than the perpetrators.
Only 9% of adults think that young people make a positive contribution to their communities, but Home Office figures demonstrate that today's teenagers are more likely to volunteer than any other generation.
The vast majority of the 11 million young people in our country are positive, contributing members of our society; but 60% of media coverage on young people is negative.
Youth Week is not about denying that there are problems with the younger generation; it's about challenging stereotypes of them.
It's about celebrating young people's contributions as well as proselytising about their failures.
It's about recognizing their right to have their individual voices heard, and giving them the opportunity to tell their stories for themselves.
That's why, over the next week, SocietyGuardian.co.uk will be publishing a series of blogs by young people from around the country. Each young contributor has something important to say. Each day, young people will draw on their own experiences to write a comment on one of the big issues of domestic government.
Without this democratic participation in our media, our young people are likely to fall victim to misrepresentation – and society will bear the cost of that informational breakdown through stereotypes and discrimination.
It's time for adults like us to step back, and hand the stage over to the real experts in youth affairs: young people themselves.
