Sometimes, the most important question is also the simplest.
How are you feeling right now?
That is the question Keready, Hold My Hand’s teen identity campaign, put directly to young people as news of alleged serial killings targeting women in Gauteng continued to dominate social media and everyday conversations.
The response was immediate.
It was honest. It was varied. And some of it was difficult to read.
One teenager asked: “Is it horrible to wish it would all just fade away?”
Another offered a very different response: “It’s not that bad, so I’m okay.”
Together, those responses reveal something important. Young people do not all experience difficult news in the same way. Some feel overwhelmed. Others feel relatively unaffected. Neither response needs to be defended.
When Fear Becomes Part of Everyday Life
For several teenagers, the emotional toll appeared less as panic and more as exhaustion.
One young person asked: “Do you know what’s going on in our society?”
Another described feeling sad because innocent people were being killed and because those expected to protect people were, in their words, causing pain.
For some, even official safety messaging became emotionally difficult.
The instruction to “avoid getting killed” did not necessarily feel like reassurance. Instead, it was experienced as confirmation that fear had become something young people were expected to simply live with.
That sense of disappointment was clear.
Many teenagers said they felt let down by people and systems that were supposed to protect them.
And for some, the fear was not an abstract feeling linked only to headlines. It had entered ordinary parts of their lives.
One young woman described feeling so anxious about walking to school alone that she struggled to concentrate on a test that same week.
Her request was simple:
“I basically just need tips on how to stay grounded and know that I am surrounded.”
It is a powerful reminder that the emotional impact of difficult news can extend far beyond the moment someone reads a headline or watches a report.
Young Men Are Asking Different Questions
Among the responses, some of the most thoughtful came from boys who were wrestling with a different question.
They were not only asking how to stay safe.
They were asking why this keeps happening.
One teenager asked:
“What makes someone want to hurt people they’ve never met?”
Then came another question that reaches even deeper:
“And how do we raise boys who don’t grow up to become that?”
These questions move the conversation beyond fear.
They point towards identity, behaviour, responsibility and the kind of society young people want to help create.
For Keready Lead Dr Katlego Selikane, that willingness to ask difficult questions is important.
“What we heard wasn’t panic, but it was grief, fatigue, and a real desire to understand.”
Dr Selikane said teenagers should not be shielded from how they feel about what is happening around them.
“They need to know it’s normal to feel heavy, and that asking hard questions is exactly the kind of thinking that changes things.”
Making Space for What Young People Feel
Keready’s work focuses on identity, agency and connectedness, supporting teenagers as they navigate purpose, belonging, self-worth and agency.
For young people trying to make sense of themselves and the world around them, difficult news can make that journey even harder.
This moment, Keready says, is no exception.
Rather than minimising what teenagers are feeling or rushing them towards answers that do not exist yet, the campaign will continue creating space for these conversations in the weeks ahead.
That space matters.
Because not every teenager needs the same response.
Some may need reassurance. Some may need to talk. Some may need help understanding what they are feeling. Others may simply need someone to listen without judgement.
And sometimes, being heard is where the conversation needs to begin.
A Channel That Is Open
Keready’s WhatsApp line is supported by a team that includes Dr Katlego, nurses, a counsellor, a communicator and a social worker.
Any teen who wants to talk — about what is happening around them, or about anything else — can reach Keready on WhatsApp:
060 019 0000
The message coming from the teenagers is not one-dimensional.
It is grief.
It is fatigue.
It is fear.
It is curiosity.
It is disappointment.
And, perhaps most importantly, it is a desire to understand.
In a moment when young people are absorbing difficult stories about the society around them, Keready is asking them to do something equally important: speak about how it feels.
