Do all generations think theirs is best?

1. 93

   peeplesposted 8 years ago

   Do all generations think theirs is best?
   
   It seems that every generation thinks all new generations are worse off. Worse music, worse behavior, more "entitlement", worse manners, worse parents, etc. Is this just the way it is? Do we all (collectively)  eventually just think our time was the best time?

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2. 84

   gmwilliamsposted 8 years ago

   
   
   Of course, the average person in his/her particular generation believes that HIS/HER GENERATION is the best, the ultimate.  H/she believes that his/her generation has the BEST music, fashion, lingo, & characteristics.  H/she oftentimes decries OLDER generations for being in nowhere land, unknowledgeable, unhip, uncool, & totally old fogeyish while proclaiming that the YOUNGER generations have it way or too easy, too crazy or radical in terms of fashion, music, lingo & characteristics.  Each generation has & will ALWAYS believe that h/she is the ubergeneration so to speak & all others simply DO NOT fit the bill so to speak!  This insightful question brings to mind the song, "What's The Matter With Kids Today" in the movie & musical Bye, Bye Birdie.

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      peeplesposted 8 years agoin reply to this

      This certainly seems true. I've heard it for a while, and as I get older I find myself thinking the younger kids are clueless! Thanks for your thoughts Grace!

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3. 78

   dashingscorpioposted 8 years ago

   
   
   In most instances people feel like the next generation or future generations are not as bright or responsible as theirs was!
   Having said that there are lots of people who feel they were born in the wrong era or wish they could go back in time to a prior era.
   Oddly enough most of us didn't appreciate the era we grew up in until we saw it had ended and realized the future would not resemble it.

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      peeplesposted 8 years agoin reply to this

      Very true. It takes some reflection to appreciate what we had or experienced in our own generation. Thanks!

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4. 67

   Christy Mariaposted 8 years ago

   Personally, I don't think that all generations think that theirs is the best of them all. In the generation I grew up with I complained about all of the people (90s babies). I thought the people in my generation listened to "crap" music and had horrible moral obligations and therefore participated in criminalizing tasks. I always thought the decisions that most of the people in my generation made were wrong ones. I preferred to talk to people who were a couple of years older than I was because they seemed more mature to me. I do not think the issue is really a generation issue, but rather a socialization issue. I think it just depends on how someone was raised and who they chose to socialize with that ultimately made them decide how to act and what their likes were.

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      peeplesposted 8 years agoin reply to this

      Good point. Who we surround ourselves with can certainly change our perspective.

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5. 66

   WordCrafter09posted 8 years ago

   In many ways I don't think much of my own generation.  As with most generations, many people and much of the generation's "line of thinking", my generation (Baby Boomer - I call myself, "second wave Boomer") was a big improvement over a lot of things in earlier generations.  My parents weren't perfect any more than any parent can ever be, considering that each individual child is always different and always the other part of the equation.  Still, my parents did a really good job of helping me understand many of the dynamics that can happen with any number of things that (at the time) went on in/with families.  Many other people of my generation probably had similar parents.
   
   Many (it became clear once I grew up in a generation that was so effective at denigrating "all things/people old" ("Don't trust anyone over thirty," for example) had not had parents who'd been as good at putting a realistic perspective of things.  Then, too, many of my parents' generation didn't want to be "looked down on" by younger people, so they joined them.  Maybe that generation (WWII) just weren't very confident in what they did right when faced (at least in the case of working class people) with a younger generation of generally better educated people than their own.  My parents were mature when we were born - mature enough to be flexible with regard to more "modern" thinking but secure enough not to worry about being "cool".
   
   Based on what I've seen of my own generation, however, I think too many grew up thinking they'd be better than parents, with "better" amounting to having better education and/or jobs.  The 60's involved a lot of throwing out babies with bath water - probably, I suppose, because so many of my generation lacked ability to recognize babies from bath water.
   
   So many in my generation (at least when we reached young adulthood) were such a bunch of arrogant know-it-alls about everything in life, what was cool, and what was "enlightened" or "grown-up"....   good luck to any individual who dared to not-buy "everything new" hook, line, and sinker.
   
   My generation ushered in all kinds of things that were new and good and better; but it also made a big mess of a lot of things too.  A couple of generations in now, we're seeing a whole lot of the good (but also horrible) results that have roots with my generation (so many of whom, to this day, follow the pack without even thinking it through).

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   1. 93

      peeplesposted 8 years agoin reply to this

      It's nice to be able to see the faults along with the positives. I am not sure I've reached an age to be able to fully analyze my own generation, but we also come with a long line of faults which I'm sure will be seen more as our children age.

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6. 46

   Ericdierkerposted 8 years ago

   This question is a great one because it deals with that horrible question we all ask "If God were so good why would God let such bad things happen" You can see where I am going. The great generation before me fought and by all accounts won WWII. Who the heck can measure up to that? My generation late late baby boomers have kicked some horrendous butts in medicine and technology. This current 30 somethings are quietly kicking some major butt in getting back to real. My health I owe to them. Priorities I owe to them. My generation has failed miserably at containing terrorism. My children will do better along with some serious dents in cancer and alcoholism and addiction. They will break the sound barrier of inheritance of genetics into a better world. They will not be fossil fuel dependent though they will choose to still use it.
   Music is cool and manners are cool -- for old folks, get over it!
   If bad sh-- did not happen there would not be a clear line and definition for good and evil. These twenty somethings are ahead of the curve. My environment and nature will only get better. Globalization will no longer eradicate culture but will begin and honest respect for others. My grandpappy was the greatest generation as his was before that with the Civil war. My dad helped "cure" Polio. Yet my sons, twenty years apart will cure apathy and lake of benevolence. It is all good and each generation will meet the hurdle and leap over it with a clumsiness of a new bride. Bless us for having generations we could have been designed to last too long.

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