My kids are the same. Not alarmed at all but aware. They’re like what else is new? This has been life for them for a long time. My oldest lives in NYC and she wasn’t irate about anything until Trump took over the Kennedy center.
My son is 21 and just entering law school. Yesterday he sent me a message saying "Thanks for teaching me empathy".
I've never been more proud. The kids are alright!
My first year daughter is studying international relations. I “radicalized” her. She’s been watching me struggle with being intentionally quiet. I understands why but also told me she’s finding her voice and can’t wait for us to raise them together. The time is coming. Soon
Glad to read that cause i don't have any college age (or high school) kids to hang out with and I'm very worried about them. My almost 40-year old kid and her friends are FREAKING OUT! (Many of them are in LGBTQ community.) I'm devastated at what is happening to our country but try to reassure her..
I work at a college as a career counselor and our next generation is amazing. Hard working, and although their anxiety is sky high, they still aim to make the world better…it gives me hope …every day damn!
The one thing that gives me hope is the innate resilience of kids. Now if they decide to become an opposition to authoritarianism, they will kick ass. It’s always the youth who do it. We middle angers and up really can’t do effective street activism. Maybe legal, journalistic, but not street.
Thank you!! As the mom of a college kid, I think they are awesome. I’m so tired of hearing that that are entitled & lazy. They are young adults that went through years of chaos & uncertainty in their very formative years. They are also kind, empathetic and the most accepting generation yet.
Yes! I was just saying that the other day. I work with some wonderfully kind, compassionate, knowledgeable, introspective college age kids. I'm glad I'm not the only one who noticed.
Echo the many responses here. *Evergreen survival technique: good find the good. Likely not a fluke, that my cis daughters’ circles at school, work, social include lots of POC, 1st and 2nd gen Americans, and LGBQT+. They be mingling and making merry as only the young ever have.
Your anecdotal experience with “some college kids” doesn’t account for the fact that a significant number of “the kids” are reading at a 3rd grade level when they are pushed across the stage to collect their high school diplomas.
Like what? It’s the truth. Don’t hide from the reality because it skews your narrative. It’s no coincidence that the most important endorsements in the 2024 election were made on podcasts most widely consumed by college aged males.
If I were to be generous for a moment, that person isn't being a contrary ass so much as (anxiously) reflecting the fear a lot of people have around social media addiction and literacy. A lot of the kids are more than alright, and a lot aren't, and not just in the usual inequality-induced way
Sure, there are plenty of kids doing good work out there. I work with many of them. But No Child Left Behind was a real thing and its ripple is only now being fully experienced. Ignoring it doesn’t make it less true and underestimating the power of stupid people is how we got here in the 1st place
You're not allowed to believe in any sort of future with these fucking people.
You can't believe your eyes and ears and lived experience only that they think there's no future due to doomscrolling.
Hey shitstain, discounting someone's lived experience with anecdotal data is not being "real" its being a cunt. Go outside and see how the kids are doing. They are our future and what the fuck does posting this shit to someone who does actual education do to forward the fight? fucking nothing.
No need for name calling. I work with this demographic extensively. Some of them are doing great and I am very proud to know them. An equal number of them are not doing well and struggle with basic communication. Go look up literacy rates amongst high school seniors and get back to me.
The descent into fascism will be swift and merciless when people like you do not extend a helping hand to people across the aisle who may suddenly wanna change their mind. Also, you kinda have to be positive when you’re a revolutionary. Unless you want to be Robespierre.
Im constantly having to remind myself that I really enjoy the majority of uni students I work with - its tough to remember sometimes cause the terrible ones take up so much more of my time and energy
If you meet a younger person that isn't alright,it IS (at least partially) your responsibility to help them. That's the way society is supposed to work, teach them, don't judge them.
Yes they are. We cannot imagine the goodness they will create. They are our future and we must give them every advantage. To fail them is to fail ourselves.
They're young and impressionable and facing things we couldn't begin to comprehend. Did you make mistakes when you were young? They will figure it out.
True, but then what about racism and misogyny is difficult to understand? One side has the morality of a gutter sink and the other side just happens to be a Black woman, it’s not wonky policy proposals we’re talking about here
My Gen z niece came to me after the election and asked if I would start taking her with me to BJJ and teach her how to shoot.
She is the kind of person who is decidedly NOT into that kind of stuff. It was like a survival thing. Broke my fucking heart in ways that I can't even begin to describe.
The comfort of the boomer and Gen X generations is why we have what we have now. Millennials and younger have gone through a lot of shit...but ultimately it has made millennials into better people than our parents and older siblings.
Born into a booming economy, reaped those benefits throughout childhood, and were for the most part already established in the workplace by the 2007 recession.
Maybe you peraonally had a rough life, but the majority of Gen X lived in relative comfort compared to later generations.
Did you just yada yada post 2007?? 😆 And have you seen the coming retirement crisis for genx? Alarming percentage with no more than $200 thousand or less saved. Genx had been just as ravaged by Reaganism and neoliberalism as the generations that followed.
I work with high school seniors and they were talking about how they would want their politics to work differently. I got the thrill of telling them they were describing democratic socialism. Pure joy when they realized that they didn't know what socialism actually was and it wasn't scary.
They're my hope amidst this darkest timeline with year 13 in hs social studies (everything is on fire teaching civics right now 🙃). Today, one asked to sew a hole in one of my stuffed animal llamas, and another student gifted paperweights he made for me, and I desperately needed this, goodness.
They really are! Hard working but not subservient. In tune both internally and externally. The young women? Don’t give AF about kowtowing to male expectations. With EEO and a vibrator, you gonna need to measure up like never before! The fellas are finding their way too
I've got four teenage nieces and goddaughters and a cousin (uncle's second family) in college and they're all more together than I've been at any time in my life.
It’s tragic how many well-intentioned young Americans don’t vote because they semi-consciously associate voting with old people, and/or with “weird” student-government or activist types at their school.
All of us need to exercise the right to vote regardless of our views. Doing research to inform yourself is critical instead of just voting because you like their physical appearance.
They grew up with the uncertainty of gun violence in school and then the pandemic. They live these peaceful lives living, accepting, and supporting each other - shopping at thrift stores, enjoying music, doing puzzles! We should all be more like them.
My grandchildren (17, 15, 8) are just amazing, and fierce. But, we live in Massachusetts where the battle for education, human rights, and democracy has already been (mostly) won.
Yeah, my parents’ generation had sock hops and young families, mine did disco dancing, then there was the coffee meetup and salons, but this new generation is out protesting and teaching human rights and civics to the rest of us.
I spent last weekend in a lft organizing retreat for an org with several 70+ folks who started as anti Vietnam War activists. It was a joy to hear from them and know that some of that generation are alright too
Comments
One of my husbands business partners also shot a text over about Vance....
When I was that age, I didn't get involved in any of that stuff... I was living my life, dating, hustling at my job..
These kids are more plugged in than I was, and I think that's GOOD!
I've never been more proud. The kids are alright!
- Epstein's best friend
A TON of greatness and hope in this gen
Remember, half the country didn't want this. America isn't going to die because of one shitty president.
It's gonna be rough. But we will come through this stronger.
You can't believe your eyes and ears and lived experience only that they think there's no future due to doomscrolling.
I raise a crisp salute
She is the kind of person who is decidedly NOT into that kind of stuff. It was like a survival thing. Broke my fucking heart in ways that I can't even begin to describe.
The comfort of the boomer and Gen X generations is why we have what we have now. Millennials and younger have gone through a lot of shit...but ultimately it has made millennials into better people than our parents and older siblings.
I have hope for the future.
Maybe you peraonally had a rough life, but the majority of Gen X lived in relative comfort compared to later generations.
Maybe if more of Gen X had gotten off their asses and voted in the 90s (lowest youth voter turnout in history) we could have staved some of this off.
Used to just be "the".
😔
It gives me a lot of hope.
That's what I've found in life.