Alienation, as I pointed out on The Inquirer's Commentary page last Monday, can cause terrible suffering - and the cure is compassion. When children are ridiculed, they are made to feel shame and humiliation. As shame increases, some people withdraw. In a recent discussion I had with middle-school children, about half complained that they had been humiliated by their peers within the past year. After all, these are not mean-spirited kids.
Most adolescents experience some alienation - it's a normal part of development.
That's because the process of finding one's own identity usually involves emotionally detaching from family. As a result, they search for other venues to find their sense of belonging. This is why peer groups have such power at this stage. This allows everyone in the group to feel more identified with one another. Peer groups and peer acceptance is probably more important today than ever before.