It is time for ‘us’ to stop trying to create the world we want for ‘the youth,’ ask them to forgive us, and then do whatever they ask so we might help them right our wrongs.
14 June 2023 | James Porteous | Clipper Media News
Recently I ran across two articles purporting to solve the ‘mystery’ as to why ‘the youth’ have largely given up on consuming ‘the news.’
What the publications are actually debating is: ‘How do we get the young money-eyes back on traditional media’ and ‘How do we stop ‘foreign’ media from ‘stealing’ profits from Facebook and Twitter?’
Young people are abandoning news websites – new research reveals scale of challenge to media
Sharp decline in appetite for news in recent years, Reuters Institute says
The articles are largely the same old same old but it did set me to ponder the notion that young people around the world are basically ‘dropping out’ as we used to say.
As you may know, much of the world is currently in a state of shock after having accidentally discovered that the future of our world rests in the hands of ‘the youth.’
You may have seen these young people. They are eating in restaurants and driving cars and renting or buying homes. Many are not heavily invested in the merchants of death or the stock exchange so we might not see them on the news very often.
Many are now living in the shadow of the so-called ‘cost of living crisis.’ Media pundits take great joy in telling them (and us) that they will have to work harder and longer because they have never known the cost of this ‘inflation’ living.
They are shocked to discover that, were it not for their credit cards, they would not be living and eating in their cars.
So we are starting to see the start of a rebellion. Not just in the streets but by dropping out of the sickly demands that are expected of them.
They are coming to realize that they will have to pay the cost of all the crap that is taking place today, including covid and war debts that, in our current state of governing, will remain their burden for most of their lives.
In the US, their government has decided to ‘opt-out’ of student-debt reduction in the name of printing $4 trillion dollars over the next few years in the name of electing -or re-electing another feckless government intent of carrying on regardless.
In China the young are deciding in increasing numbers that they do not want to spend the next 50 years on the traditional treadmill.
Their work-week is called 9-9-6 (9:00 AM to 9:00 PM six days a week) and -much like in the West- they have come to realize that they will not be the ones who profit from this endless work. So they are rebelling, in the only way they can.
The “lying flat” movement calls on young workers and professionals, including the middle-class Chinese who are to be the engine of Xi Jinping’s Xi Jinping’s domestic boom, to opt out of the struggle for workplace success, and to reject the promise of consumer fulfilment. For some, “lying flat” promises release from the crush of life and work in a fast-paced society and technology sector where competition is unrelenting. For China’s leadership, however, this movement of passive resistance to the national drive for development is a worrying trend—a threat to ambition at a time when Xi Jinping has made grand ambition the zeitgeist of his so-called “New Era.”
The ‘lying flat’ movement standing in the way of China’s innovation drive
They, like their counterparts around the world, are beginning to fully understand that power really is money and money is power. And they are wondering: if they do not ‘inherit’ wealth, how will they ever survive?
One of the other things the youth are doing is to stop having children. Some are thinking they will simply ‘defer’ offspring until the economy ‘settles down,’ but they will learn, as many of us did, that the ‘economy’ is little more than a series of corrective measures meant to fill (or refill) the coffers of those who really do not need more money than they already have.
So that clock will keep ticking no matter what they decide and by the time they wonder if they should dive into the child pool it might be too late.
For them and us.
So WE NEED TO UNDERSTAND: Everything in the world now revolves around ‘the youth.’
We may still believe we are at the helm but there is no reason -rational or otherwise- to suggest they will allow us to keep fucking up their world with our wars, consumerism, air pollution and greed.
It is no longer enough to ‘offer’ them a piece of the pie. They can take whatever they want and we can only thank our lucky stars that their beliefs and desires for a better world remain the only reasons they have not tossed us into the bin.
But how long can we expect them to look the other way? Do we really think they will casually support World War III or allow the continuation of the corporate pollution that has been the bane of our existence for decades?
Would we do that? Would we roll over and literally die?
Well, we have done that, but they will not.
It is time to stop trying to create the world we want for them. We have had our opportunities to join the adult sandbox but we risked everything in order to spend our entire lives maximizing profits for someone else.
It is no longer a question of how we can band together to ‘control’ young people. We literally owe it to future generations to admit that we have royally fucked up, ask them to forgive us, and then do whatever they ask so we might help them right our wrongs.
James Porteous | Clipper Media News
You Can’t Blame the Youth: Peter Tosh
[Chorus]
You can’t blame the youth
You can’t fool the youth
You can’t blame the youth of today
You can’t fool the youth
[Chorus]
[Verse 2]
You teach the youth about Christopher Columbus
And you said he was a very great man
You teach the youth about Marco Polo
And you said he was a very great man
You teach the youth about the Pirate Hawkins
And you said he was a very great man
You teach the youth about the Pirate Morgan
And you said he was a very great man
[Chorus]
[Verse 3]
All these great men were doin’
Robbin’, a rapin’, kidnappin’ and killin’
So called great men were doin’
Robbin’, rapin’, kidnappin’
[Chorus]
[Verse 4]
When every Christmas come
You buy the youth a pretty toy gun
When every Christmas come
You buy the youth a fancy toy gun
[Chorus]
[Chorus]
[Outro]
Don’t blame them
Not their fault
