cubicle47b
Member
I agree that it's a catch 22, but there are still good ways and bad ways or discussing it. If you take *this* article and turn "over sensitive" into "can't use racial slurs" that's a really bad way of discussing it.
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Generation Wuss - shuri finally makes another troll thread
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Deleted member 20920
Unconfirmed Member
I don't know enough to say what each generation is like but man this writer sure sounds whiny as hell.
Zen_Arcade
Banned
I didn't read the article, but I just wanted to say that Bret Easton Ellis is a shit writer.
DoktorEvil
Banned
Millennials are too afraid to even touch a sharp knife, let alone a gun.
hardcastlemccormick
Banned
It works both ways; what one generation sees as a negative can seen as a positive by another. That's the discussion bullet point.
"Ah kids these days are so politically correct, so over sensitive about everything" really has become code for I can't say the terrible shit I used to get away with because people call me an asshole (and rightfully so).
If anything, the internet has just brought out certain personality types and allowed them to communicate within their own platforms. The person who can't take any criticism? You would have never seen their work pre-Internet, but now they can curate their own echo chambers. That's not a generational thing.
Coriolanus
Banned
Absurd.
What do you think suburbian life in the pre-internet era entailed? Either conform, go to church and say your prayers or be ostracized. And god fucking help you if people started suspecting you were a commie.
What do you think tribalism entailed?
That has always happened. If anything, the internet, with its multitude of voices, increased the likelihood that shit views will be called shit views. That this does not result in a change of views is standard contradiction entrenchment.
Anyway, on the plato quotation, it aint his. Or socrates'.
Have a go.
Feeling is the same, obviously.
There's also an interesting google answers thread on the topic.
themoreyouknow.png
Coriolanus
Banned
Wasn't that the case with boomers at the start? New hope and all.
Aren't you a Millennial?
Yeah. The boomers were extremely coddled for their time period.
Lower teen pregnancy rates too. Too busy fucking thanks to all this birth control to worry about killing.
But is this a unique trait among millennials, or just the nature of social media in general?
My own experiences with social media lead me toward the latter, as I've seen Gen X-ers and Boomers similarly wall themselves off from criticism and carve out spaces where they will rarely if ever be challenged on their views. The main difference being they also get to use the age defense, wherein they can deflect any disagreement with "I'm xyz years old so you can't tell me shit."
This I agree with, but again I think that's a result of age; young people always think they have the world all figured out. Speaking as a 25 year old guy, it took a lot for me to finally just accept that I don't know shit. lol
With all the slayings that go on daily, I don't know how you can say that.
cubicle47b
Member
That's why I put asterisks around "this". It's clearly not being used that way in this article.
I haven't read much of his comments but I do have to say something regarding the Plato quote - people that use it as if there aren't any differences between generations, which is wrong. Old people complaining about kids? That's been happening forever but you can't say there aren't generational differences as that's how societies evolve and change. Whether it makes the latest generation any worse than the older is up for debate.
Fair enough. Perhaps then I should have said the internet has made it more convenient and given us far greater ease of access to others.
Night Hunter
Banned
I know I'm late, but another Woody Harrelson link for emphasis
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PLZGMcwi758
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PLZGMcwi758
First of all it's not always the Plato quote that's used. You can find quotes like that throughout history. Second, nobody with common sense claims there are no differences, of course there are differences. It's the complaining that society is "going under" because of those differences that makes it sound stupid.
The Technomancer
card-carrying scientician
Oh I agree. I think you can absolutely identify differences across generations. But the stuff the guy in this article is ranting about are literally the same stuff the Plato quote complains about: the kids are lazy, the kids are spoiled, the kids are whiny.
Absolutely agreed, no argument here. I think there are two sorts of Plato-esque complaints that are not legitimate:
1) Things which aren't really changes but which seem like changes to an individual person because age has changed their perpsctive. When you're a kid yourself, kids don't seem whiny; once you're a grown up, kids often do. This is just the difference of perspective, rather than an actual change of the world around you. It's like thinking that countertops are too tall when you're 4 years old, growing up, and thinking "These countertops are too short. Back in my day, countertops were much taller!"
2) Things which do change but which aren't necessarily bad. Let's say today's youngest generation really is more sensitive than the previous ones. Okay. Is that bad? Is being sensitive an inherently bad thing, or is it just different? Today's music is different from yesterday's music. Okay. Is that bad?
Coriolanus
Banned
You'd be quite correct on that. It is considered one of the reasons that the Tea Party managed to become such a political force. Theory goes that every community always had their fair share of cray superrightwing people, but with the internet they actually managed to organize and put some weight behind the numbers.
Same could be said of stormfront, that police officer's site, and many others.
It is no coincidence that I am picking far right examples, btw.
hardcastlemccormick
Banned
Even if you disagree with my assessment (which I still continue to stand behind 100%), then treat it as an example.
Ellis wants to point out the differences and judge them. Maybe differences don't have to be bad. Maybe they can be good. Or neither.
Necromanti
Member
It's true. Look at all the people who get offended when they notice that the things they say aren't beyond criticism (or ironically cry censorship when someone else dares exercise their freedom of speech), or the whole "#gamergate" movement where some individuals pretend to be offended by the current state of games journalism while having ignored the real issues all along (until a woman happens to be tangentially involved, of course). However, that's not limited to millennials. People are reactionary creatures.
DoktorEvil
Banned
I am.
But is this a unique trait among millennials, or just the nature of social media in general?
My own experiences with social media lead me toward the latter, as I've seen Gen X-ers and Boomers similarly wall themselves off from criticism and carve out spaces where they will rarely if ever be challenged on their views. The main difference being they also get to use the age defense, wherein they can deflect any disagreement with "I'm xyz years old so you can't tell me shit."
This I agree with, but again I think that's a result of age; young people always think they have the world all figured out. Speaking as a 25 year old guy, it took a lot for me to finally just accept that I don't know shit. lol
The age defense is a simple and easy way to discredit an argument. You can't argue against someone who claims experience is their be all to understanding the world.
As far as the jack of all trades, masters of none statement, I can only say being 24 years old that I am always surprised at the amount of information I have to parse and create value judgments on in a connected world. Being exposed to technologies like wikipedia create a lot of noise and no focus. What encyclopedias fail to neglect is the grey moral areas not covered in reference books. That always comes with age and experience.
It's very much a difference of understand and communication between gen to gen.
And look at all the shit we ended up inheriting from that generation.
Brawly Likes to Brawl
Member
Its easy to bitch about children because they aren't old enough to break into your echo chamber and tell you that you're full of shit.
Mammoth Jones
Member
And millennials will do the same fucking thing.
And the generation after will bitch at them too.
What I've picked up from all this is that the generation gaps are getting smaller. Those easily defined borders that people like to place younger generations in are getting very cloudy. So BEE is shooting at a target that is hard to even define and comes off as presumptuous.
Just my off the cuff observation that probably doesn't add to the conversation.
Just my off the cuff observation that probably doesn't add to the conversation.
But here's the thing though, societies do "go under" from those differences. The Athenians, Spartans, Romans, Mongols did see changes in how their younger generations behaved after they gained their significant wealth from conquest. The wealthier a society gets, the younger generations will become more "spoiled" and "lazy". I don't think spoiled and lazy are the right words, but in case of the Romans, they had more access to wealth and didn't have to fight the wars anymore because they could have the provincials do it. Ultimately that led to Rome no longer being the political focus of the empire. So you could characterize that as spoiled and lazy but I think there's more to it than that. It usally doesn't take a generation for a society to collapse but subsequent changes over time will do so.
I think the great growth in wealth in the US during 1950s and 1960s certainly affected how the boomers came to be and how they shaped society that we're all working with right now. A society focused on the bottom line and profitability for profitability sake.
1. I definitely agree with this.
2. The question you have to ask is "what's objectively bad". I know I'm going back to ancient history again - but if the old generation thought that a good virtue of being a politician/leader was to expand an empire and maintain rigid order among all ranks of society and the subsequent generations wanted to relax that, how do you determine what's bad or what's not? If the rigid order and emphasize on empire expansion was what led to your dominance is that not a good thing for the culture/society? You can also argue that conquests of other peoples and the rigid order makes life bad for those conquered and those that live in the new society.
So I don't think we should outright dismiss anybody that complains about the younger generation but they'd have to be articulate about it and how that may lead to a worse off society. Not just using the "lazy, entitled, spoiled" line.
I'm pretty sure The Odyssey contains a line stating that the next generation will always be worse than its predecessor, so I'm guessing people have always been like that.
Well except that the Boomers were responsible for the worst economic crash since 1929. It'll be impressive if we manage to top that.
teruterubozu
Member
oh the follies of using generalizations to battle generalizations.
More complicated than that..... if anyone is really interested in this topic and broadening your perspective across generations & cycles I suggest reading this book. It was written in 1997 as a preface for Millennials. As a Gen-X'er, I'm waiting to see the turning of the post Millenials.
Generational Theory
The Fourth Turning
Strauss and Howe will change the way you see the world--and your place in it. In The Fourth Turning, they apply their generational theories to the cycles of history and locate America in the middle of an unraveling period, on the brink of a crisis. How you prepare for this crisis--the Fourth Turning--is intimately connected to the mood and attitude of your particular generation. Are you one of the can-do "GI generation," who triumphed in the last crisis? Do you belong to the mediating "Silent Majority," who enjoyed the 1950s High? Do you fall into the "awakened" Boomer category of the 1970s and 1980s, or are you a Gen-Xer struggling to adapt to our splintering world? Whatever your stage of life, The Fourth Turning offers bold predictions about how all of us can prepare, individually and collectively, for America's next rendezvous with destiny.
POWERSPHERE
Member
Perhaps he does get them, and is outlining the differences between them and earlier generations.
Mammoth Jones
Member
Yes, every single fucking one of them is responsible for that....
Side question: is someone born in 1980 considered a millennial?
robotzombie
Member
read naruto
Tatsumaki Senpuukyaku!
Member
Given what Bret Easton Ellis thought of his own generation its not really shocking that he hates the next generation as well.
Generation X
As a 40 year old I'm shocked to see how much shit younger people get.
1. You have the lowest drug use, teen pregnancy, and violent crime rate in decades.
2. You are better educated than everyone before you
3. You have poorer job prospects than any group in decades
4. You have the highest student loan debt in history.
Anyone tells you your entitled can fuck right off. You kids rock and don't let anyone tell you any different.
1. You have the lowest drug use, teen pregnancy, and violent crime rate in decades.
2. You are better educated than everyone before you
3. You have poorer job prospects than any group in decades
4. You have the highest student loan debt in history.
Anyone tells you your entitled can fuck right off. You kids rock and don't let anyone tell you any different.
Oh, they finally got their own name instead of piggy backing off the Generation X stuff with Y. Seems like an original identity is the least of their problems though.
They won't have sex with you because you said that.
jk
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