英语四级听力美文第14篇:About Streaking

　　In America, we value individuality and like to think that everyone is different. It is expectedthat most youth will be somewhat rebellious sometime around college age. Youthful rebellionis often seen as a healthy and normal groping toward individuality, especially as needed tobecome distinct from one’s parents.

　　The rebelliousness may be related to major social issues —peace, or racial justice, as we hadin the late 1960s. On the other hand, normal, healthy rebelliousness may be an individualtest of the line between foolishness and trouble.

　　Early teens may try to shock and worry their parents. Tattoos, pierced noses, and brightlycolored hair are examples.

　　By college age, students may be expected to be testing broader social norms. Of particulardelight are actions that point out the hypocrisy of older generations.Streaking, or “runningnaked through a public place”, is a fine example of that kind of testing. Public nudity is widelycondemned by officialdom and can be punished.

　　However, as long as the streaker escapes without being caught, streaking is clearly harmless; one would be sorry to miss seeing a given instance. Streaking is a fad. A fad allows everyone todemonstrate how different he is — in the same way.

　　Fads wear out. Fads come and go. Streaking became a fad in the fall of 1973, soon makingnational headlines.

　　It faded out and then came back in the 80’s and again in the 90’s. On at least one campus (Princeton University, a highly respected school), a form of streaking has become a tradition. Each year at midnight on the night of the first snow, nude sophomores run around Princeton’s Holder Courtyard. The tradition has taken hold to anextent that it gets favorable treatment in the national press, and official attempts to end thepractice get no public support.