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My 10 year old feels this way. His depiction of the future is far more pessimistic than mine was at his age, and the conditions under which I grew up were objec

My 10 year old feels this way. His depiction of the future is far more pessimistic than mine was at his age, and the conditions under which I grew up were objectively worse compared to his present circumstances (he has his own room, multiple electronic devices, gaming consoles, etc. etc., typical middle-class). There seems to be a persistent message saying “buckle your belts, things are going to get worse” across all social groups, from school to friends to popular media. There seems to be concerted effort to prepare these kids to expect less than previous generations. Parents can only do so much to block these influences.

Apocryphon 5y ago
Even getting past climate change gloom, present economic situations don’t inspire much confidence. College admissions seem much more stringent than they were a decade or two ago, never mind the rising tuitions, the debt obligations, and so on. Housing prices continue to climb. A lot has happened since the Great Recession.
- 0des 5y ago
  You realize this has been going on for at least a century, right? At one point we literally confiscated all of the gold by order of government. Whether the overton window is shifting or not, this stuff has been going on since time immemorial.
  - imtringued 5y ago
    Except in ancient egypt and for a short period when Bracteates were used as currency. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bracteate#Early_medieval_bracteates https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bracteate#Early_medieval_bract...
  - Apocryphon 5y ago
    I’m talking about specifically concerns that the youth would have. And the Overton Window does not refer to things getting worse, nor does it mean things were inevitably getting worse for an American audience until living memory. Certainly ‘90s kids can point at a solid decade of optimism, until it all abruptly ended. To children growing up today, this must all feel like a step back compared to those earlier eras. The reference to the end of the gold standard is a complete non sequitur.
    - fuzzfactor 5y ago
      Globally shocking threats of all kinds which you are powerless to adequately cope with are well, globally shocking. And some generations are more affected and/or more sensitive, or even more numerous with the shock spread out further. The threat of further shock can have quite a dampening effect. For a great many boomers when they were young men struggling to stay in college before student loans became widespread, otherwise facing being drafted for Vietnam service, it was not as comfortable as people sometimes imagine. Nuclear proliferation was ongoing their whole lives with threats only increasing from a baseline higher than what most living people have had to endure now. It wasn't only the young men who couldn't be so sure anything would be here when 1970 came around. Or if they would reach that milestone themselves regardless. You could just feel that things were going to get worse before they got better. Good catch about the gold standard ending in 1971, of course it wouldn't have been possible if gold hadn't been confiscated in 1933, basically two generations earlier. How did they get away with saying the confiscation was a "continuation" of the gold standard (after the "necessary devaluation of the dollar" was accomplished) anyway? These were both global financial shocks to two different and separate generations each of whose members had various vulnerabilities. A lot of the gloom preceding, then manifesting with, events like this, or worse world wars, has got a lot of similarity to the way some people feel worsening insecurity for the future right now.
ryandrake 5y ago
I mean, we've been hearing crisis warnings for decades. When I was a kid, it was acid rain, then styrofoam cups, smog, leaded gasoline, ozone holes. Each, it was promised, would surely destroy the environment for good. And when one didn't cause Armageddon, the next one would definitely destroy the environment any day now. Today, it's climate change, next decade maybe something else. It's the same song, just a different verse. Somehow, my generation mostly escaped the pessimism the next ones somehow got. Not sure what changed--maybe the persuasion tactics are more mature and effective these days, or they're just starting kids on it younger, I don't know.
- imtringued 5y ago
  If it's not a big deal then do something about it.
- schimmy_changa 5y ago
  Ha - those examples are all environmental nightmares that were dealt with because of “songs” that accurately explained the danger we were in as a society. See: Y2K as a non-environmental example. Agree that it’s the same song and somehow the generations feel it differently … maybe because they really are the first generation to have lower life expectancy compared to their parents. Or maybe because climate change is so much harder than acid rain due to the full-civilizational scale of it…
- Apocryphon 5y ago
  Well, it definitely feels hotter. And those massive wildfires don't help.
goodpoint 5y ago
> There seems to be concerted effort to prepare these kids to expect less than previous generations. There is no concerned effort. It is reality. > Parents can only do so much to block these influences. Maybe parents should not be in denial and block reality.

Apocryphon 5y ago

Even getting past climate change gloom, present economic situations don’t inspire much confidence. College admissions seem much more stringent than they were a decade or two ago, never mind the rising tuitions, the debt obligations, and so on. Housing prices continue to climb. A lot has happened since the Great Recession.

0des 5y ago
You realize this has been going on for at least a century, right? At one point we literally confiscated all of the gold by order of government. Whether the overton window is shifting or not, this stuff has been going on since time immemorial.
- imtringued 5y ago
  Except in ancient egypt and for a short period when Bracteates were used as currency. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bracteate#Early_medieval_bracteates https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bracteate#Early_medieval_bract...
- Apocryphon 5y ago
  I’m talking about specifically concerns that the youth would have. And the Overton Window does not refer to things getting worse, nor does it mean things were inevitably getting worse for an American audience until living memory. Certainly ‘90s kids can point at a solid decade of optimism, until it all abruptly ended. To children growing up today, this must all feel like a step back compared to those earlier eras. The reference to the end of the gold standard is a complete non sequitur.
  - fuzzfactor 5y ago
    Globally shocking threats of all kinds which you are powerless to adequately cope with are well, globally shocking. And some generations are more affected and/or more sensitive, or even more numerous with the shock spread out further. The threat of further shock can have quite a dampening effect. For a great many boomers when they were young men struggling to stay in college before student loans became widespread, otherwise facing being drafted for Vietnam service, it was not as comfortable as people sometimes imagine. Nuclear proliferation was ongoing their whole lives with threats only increasing from a baseline higher than what most living people have had to endure now. It wasn't only the young men who couldn't be so sure anything would be here when 1970 came around. Or if they would reach that milestone themselves regardless. You could just feel that things were going to get worse before they got better. Good catch about the gold standard ending in 1971, of course it wouldn't have been possible if gold hadn't been confiscated in 1933, basically two generations earlier. How did they get away with saying the confiscation was a "continuation" of the gold standard (after the "necessary devaluation of the dollar" was accomplished) anyway? These were both global financial shocks to two different and separate generations each of whose members had various vulnerabilities. A lot of the gloom preceding, then manifesting with, events like this, or worse world wars, has got a lot of similarity to the way some people feel worsening insecurity for the future right now.

ryandrake 5y ago

I mean, we've been hearing crisis warnings for decades. When I was a kid, it was acid rain, then styrofoam cups, smog, leaded gasoline, ozone holes. Each, it was promised, would surely destroy the environment for good. And when one didn't cause Armageddon, the next one would definitely destroy the environment any day now. Today, it's climate change, next decade maybe something else. It's the same song, just a different verse. Somehow, my generation mostly escaped the pessimism the next ones somehow got. Not sure what changed--maybe the persuasion tactics are more mature and effective these days, or they're just starting kids on it younger, I don't know.

imtringued 5y ago
If it's not a big deal then do something about it.
schimmy_changa 5y ago
Ha - those examples are all environmental nightmares that were dealt with because of “songs” that accurately explained the danger we were in as a society. See: Y2K as a non-environmental example. Agree that it’s the same song and somehow the generations feel it differently … maybe because they really are the first generation to have lower life expectancy compared to their parents. Or maybe because climate change is so much harder than acid rain due to the full-civilizational scale of it…
Apocryphon 5y ago
Well, it definitely feels hotter. And those massive wildfires don't help.

goodpoint 5y ago

> There seems to be concerted effort to prepare these kids to expect less than previous generations. There is no concerned effort. It is reality. > Parents can only do so much to block these influences. Maybe parents should not be in denial and block reality.