my Saturdays are being taken away from me for 3 months

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Social services in agreement with my parents have decided to put me on a course/attendance thing for 7 hours every Saturday for 3 months and taken away my free time after 5 days at school every week, i said i don't want my Saturdays taken away from me like this to attend this thing but i've been told i have to. They say its aimed at teenagers (boys) with behavioral problems to learn to behave better and teach us life skills and early intervention and there are usually a small group of about 10-12 boys. they say it will benefit me, but its 7 hours of my free time gone,its 10am-5pm so thats the day gone, i can't do much after 5pm. it doesn't quite seem fair and i will only have one day of freedom a week on Sundays with School mon-fri and doing this program on Saturdays. Does this seem fair?! just because i'm a teenager they decide to make me do this and even when i said how i feel i was told i will do as i'm told and thats final.

Have you asked your parents and/or "social services" to look for a suitable after-school program for you instead?

I’m sorry this has happened to you. It sucks. It is unfair.

I don’t know anything about you, so you’ll have to think for yourself about whether, annoying as it is, this programme is right for you. Are there things you’d like to get better at? Are there some things that you need to get better at quite urgently - for example, if you are behaving in a way that is making you unsafe? Please don’t feel as if you have to answer these questions here as they are deeply personal.

If you still feel as if you don’t want to do this, you have two options:

1) Engage constructively. I think negotiating with your parents is the best step here. Get them to explain why they want you to do this. Ask for specifics. If you are unconvinced then you should offer to meet them part way - for example, agree to do three hours, or to do the first week and see how you like it. Emphasise that you want a sense of control over your life and that they are stripping this from you. Say that you want to be treated with respect and allowed to make decisions that affect your life. Explain why the weekend is important to you. Is it tiring being around other people all week and you need that time to recover?

2) Refuse. I’d probably recommend this only as an option of last resort. On Saturday when they try to take you away, just refuse to go. Don’t use violence, but don’t go willingly. This will be most effective if you have already used option 1 and shown willingness to engage but after attending the first session you have found that it hasn’t worked. Be aware of the possible consequences of this course of action - but also be aware of the consequences of compliance.

The fact that social services are involved makes it slightly more difficult. Without knowing how they came to be involved, it’s hard to say to what extent resistance would be a sensible option. Again, you do not have to share these things with us, but you do need to be honest with yourself.

Depends. You said it's for those with behivioral problems, right? How bad trouble do you cause for others? Does it happen often? Do you brake stuff? Harm people? If the answer is yes to all three and it happens often, then it's anything but unfair. If the answer is no and whatever you do could be counted as normal teen angst then yes, it is unfair.

Of course, there's a lot between those two. Without knowing the reasons why your parents think you need it we can't really know if it's fair or not.