Remember the song? Remember the semi famous quote from an Egyptian pyramid complaining about the adolescents of that time? Read remarkably like an article in a modern paper! Remember your parents saying that? And what can we say about the kids today?
Most of us will point out some sloppy dress habits, forgetting that it is only the few rather than the majority, but the few make noise so they are heard and seen. We complain about drug use - all the while forgetting about our generation and the rampant drug use of that time. How many entertainers of a certain age do we hear boasting, yes, boasting, of how little they remember of the 60's and 70's and do we not all laugh along with them in a knowing manner?
We complain about their lack of seriousness, of their at times wild behavior, of careless driving, of rowdy behavior in subways and on buses, at parades and wherever they congregate. We complain at their hangouts but who does not remember hanging out at a candy store (remember those?) or at small music/record store which would play the music on a loudspeaker. Remember those and remember - beyond the TV and radio and the home record player there was no other way to hear that music and who had money for buying records and for shows?! Not me. Not my friends. So we all had hangouts.
And wow, what we did on the campuses of the time when we went to college. Riots and sit ins, lie ins, teach ins and what not. We demanded the right to actually walk on the grass at school and whoa! even plop down and sit there on a beautiful sunny day. And wait a minute - remember that little conflict called the War in Vietnam, that war that was telecast right into our homes, where people sat watching it while they ate dinner? Yup, that one, the one where guys were being drafted and how well I remember how Gerry and I held our breath for the time when he was 1A.
And going back one can see the same in prior generations. My parents generation fought the war, bravely, sacrificing much, even unto death, but before the war? OMG, they did the wild dances to crazy music - and then complained when their kids did the same with rock and roll and we complain with the music genres of today.
So what has changed? Has it gotten worse? Better? Will it ever change? All I know is what I have seen with the kids of today.
Are they a tad spoiled? Yes, but so were our kids; it is just that there are so many more complicated and expensive items to spoil them with and believe it or not, without them these kids will be left behind in a vast and changing world.
Do they play differently, recreate differently? Yes, but I remember my parents giving me the standard lecture how we were spoiled with so many options and why do we not play more outside as they did. Huh! I was outside morning till night, weather permitting and sometimes even if not! So it seems that each generation appears to be both the same and different from the generations on either side, does it not?
So why this posting? I know that there are kids who do wrong, who act irresponsibly, are hurtful and harmful to themselves and others but so were many of us at times. But our misdeeds were obliterated by time not enshrined forever in the new media, the Internet. These poor kids are chased and haunted by their stupid years and I feel for them. They are pressured as well, taking a zillion courses, volunteering, several activities - all to impress the colleges so they can gain entrance and then be indebted to private sources and the government for the rest of their lives! It ain't easy being a kid today.
Nor are we doing a great job of being role models for them. We have let the world deteriorate, using its resources as if they would never run out, polluted its waterways and even the seas. We are watching our lands shrink, fall back into the oceans, are still chasing nuclear weapons all around and cannot get our heads wrapped around a solution to the violence of the day, to the proliferation of guns, assault weapons finding their way into places they should not be. We have left them a world where people blow themselves up for the joy and privilege of taking others with them. We have created a world where bulletproof backpacks are now a quality to be evaluated when purchasing one for school.
What is the matter with kids today? Well, whatever is the matter with us is the answer. Somehow I got myself involved in this year's campaigns and began, as of yesterday, to work as a volunteer for voter registration. I am happy to report that most people seem to be already registered and vehement about voting this year. Great! But the point is that when we went to meet them yesterday and get the papers and orientation, Gerry and I walked right past them. We were looking for an older person, even perhaps one in the thirties but this group we dismissed as just kids, all involved with their laptops. Well, guess what! Gerry and I are the honorary grandparents of this group of young, delicious kids, earnest, determined to make a difference, willing to work hard for what they believe in, trying to make the world a better place.
And I realized that there are many more good kids out there. I see that same idealism, that zeal, that why not attitude in my older grandchildren and in these kids. I should really call them young adults and in many ways they behaved better than many in our generation. Believe me on that!!
So what is the matter with kids today? Not much in a permanent manner. As did we and our parents before us and going back down the generations, kids will always be different from their parents, will look at the world with a mixed view from their own eyes and the visions they have learned from their parents. It is natural. It is normal. And, if they are a bit more cynical at times - well, why not? Look what we have handed them!
So we teach them how to handle an intrusion into their school, how to hide and behave if caught in the open. They weigh those bulletproof backpacks. They weigh the role models of the adults, the nastiness of the campaigns this year, the Balkanization of America and they ponder.
What is done can never be undone. We can only hope that these good kids will meet with success, not turn cynical and disillusioned as they penetrate more of the world and as it penetrates their lives. We can even hope and pray that our generation turns itself around, at least a tad, and sets a better example for them. So what is the matter with kids today? Mostly us.
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