Lost

[matrixmann]

The bus stop turns into the youth club...
First love, first drink, maybe even first time getting physical. And lots of friends.
What has modern society to offer to its youngsters?
Living in sterile, mold-contamined, pimped up flats, celebrating their weekends in used up buildings whose purpose they know at the highest from when they were kids, offered consumer goods which they can never pay, jobs that don't exist and promises that never come into effect. On top, bags of clothes manifactured in the third world which they can cut and rearrange to show how run-down they are, and ugly hair-cuts which make them appear like they have some sort of problems.
Education somewhat is an alien concept, both in the way of knowledge about the world and emotional development.
They get handed a lot of toys and tools to get paid the time their parents haven't spend with them, but can't make up for the deep nothing they perceive.
Sold out worlds, they long for destruction, for the destination that remains for when there's no task for you or your body is plagued by diseases. Diseases the parents thought about in their selfishness "they will be able to get along with that". And they keep wondering why these kids in their selfishness for exstasy beget another aimless generation of kids accidently...
On the other hand, education in the form of learning in excess for those who can pay for it. Planning of futures until the age of 40, orchestrated and without a doubt that anything can come in between this. No guess of what poverty means, what deprivations means, not even that it exists at all or what life-threatening circumstances could be. A bubble which nothing goes wrong within.
In the end, the planning also reveals its shallowness: Getting education, getting jobs, founding families, reproduce, buying houses, buying cars - running around and following the established role model, without a thought for a deeper meaning, just as trying to get drunk and loitering around in derelict houses and on the streets. It's about running away and clouding your mind.
The middle class youngsters ignore in their planning, that their kids are going to have to fight even harder for getting jobs as there is limitation in this, so it is also done in a manner of feeding your ego, numbing your mind to prevent to understand something.
Whereas the kids which grow up in poverty rather get their kids unvoluntarily and suddenly start to get those dreams of a idyllic world that isn't reachable for them. If they do not turn out in the end to abandon them, to show them the true face of what their existence already is: Superfluous.

Comments

[red-child.livejournal.com]

Tragedies are about. I'd, personally, like to see opportunity exist in an increased measure of independence from economic background. There are always way, but reaching prison is easier than reaching your dreams, yeah? Perhaps that sounds a little too pessimistic... However, I've honestly found an increased probability in encountering cheer amidst the poorer individuals in my area. There's a shift, living in the struggle where you're deprived of high-standing wealth seems to leave one more openly finding value in the company of other humans... More evenly. Do you ever see any such tendency?

I've been wondering for a while, what spectrum of wealth did you grow up with?

[mandarinsun.livejournal.com]

This is really well written. Having the bus, at the beginning, provides a frame for it that is much better than just doing an angry rant. It's also from young people's perspective which also makes it different from previous posts.

[mandarinsun.livejournal.com]

I think young people today are very social, and in their teenage years extremely happy, but very shallow. I saw a PBS Newshour piece about how digital natives, children that grew up online, are confused and anxious when they meet someone whose facebook profile, or social media profile, they have never seen. They really need to type or categorize everyone and maybe that is human nature, but often they type people into only two categories: young, hip, and multi ethnic like them or someone that is country, non urban, and hostile to them. I get teenagers that want me to be a Republican country guy all the time.

[mandarinsun.livejournal.com]

It feels to young people, adults have to be into hip hop music and popular culture for them to feel comfortable with them.

Maybe a big part of this though is that I've met and seen A LOT! of teachers that act like they are into hip hop and popular culture in order to relate better to their students and maybe they are into hip hop and pop culture a bit or a lot because of their students.

You don't have to be very passionate to appear or actually be into hip hop or popular culture. They are very shallow things to begin with.

It makes me think though that say in the 1950s, 1970s, or even the 1990s, a young person in school might feel that their teachers and professors were into things that were more mature and deeper than the shallow things that kids are into. But, nowadays teachers try to act like they are into the same things that teenagers are into, so why would a teenager feel like they should ever be more mature?

[mandarinsun.livejournal.com]

Professors in the humanities in the United States make references to hip hop culture and probably even accept student papers that make a lot of hip hop references.

On one level, it might be ok if they were into hip hop, Nietzsche, Marx, and Freud, and I think in the past a lot of professors hoped that this is how it would work out, but in practice what happens is the professors are condoning and approving of hip hop and popular culture and college students never think of moving beyond it into something more substantial. In a way, hip hop can be confused with being substantial and deep because it is related to race relations, but it is also extremely shallow.