I'm just leaving this link here so I can find it again in case I want to weave a bit of it into my discussion of the "is this all there is" idea about life and work and relate it back to the new book I'm reading: Whatever Happened to Generation X?.
Coupla pull quotes, though, before I go back to Pomodoros (so I can get research reading done):
"In Darke’s opinion, Generation Xers should be on a mission to provide a
“bridge” between millennials & boomers, especially now that it has
largely gone from being anti-establishment to being part of it.
Generation X can play a healing role and help promote tolerance"
How about "No." We're working pretty darn hard, a lot of us. Some of us are sandwiched between aging parents (some of whom are Boomers) and kids. Some of us are worriedly scanning our 401Ks or 457Bs or whatever for hope that we'll be able to survive once we retire (because a lot of us assume Social Security will be gone by the time we retire). How about Boomers and Millennials try to build that bridge themselves, if they think they need it?
Because, as Douglas Coupland (he who wrote about Gen X all those years ago) notes: " “Conceptually, Gen X went from being the bash-it-with-a-stick piñata
generation to being the serious generation that is heir to the greatest
generation – my parents’. Boomers haven’t changed a bit. In as much as
there is a Gen X, it’s paying for school bills for their kids and
nursing care for their parents. There’s not much free time to be either
pro or anti-establishment. They’re too busy working themselves into the
grave.”
Mmmm-hmmm. We're TIRED.
And more Coupland, because it's a little shade, and I can't resist seeing him throw a little shade: "I will say that pretty much everything they say about millennials is
what they said about X except that millennials seem unable to cope when
things don’t go their way.”
Okay, yeah. Not all Millennials, that's for sure. But I admit I am laughing because I have seen enough people in that age range like that. (Or like the guy who once showed up to the campus nurse's office and didn't have his ID, and didn't want to walk back to the dorm* and get it, and tried to get the receptionist to look up his student ID number using Campus Connect except he couldn't remember the number of the class he was taking ("It's like....a Psychology class?") and I think finally something else happened that led the receptionist to comment, after he left, "It wasn't like his arms or legs were broken or anything," commenting on his sheer helplessness)
*Essentially: across the street from the office.
2 comments:
I'm sort of nervous about saying this because it's probably considered not politically correct but I honestly think one of the main reasons millennials are the way they are is because they all went to day care. Yeah, I know, day care is necessary for most people and most kids who go to day care are just fine but if from the time of your earliest memories you spent the majority of your awake time away from what we used to think of as a normal family setting and in something more like a school setting instead, that's bound to affect what kind of person you grow up to be and your outlook on life.
I've long believed the necessity of two incomes per household has had more to do with societal decline than anything else.
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