OK, inspired by this current thread – "what’s wrong with me? " and a recent thread from someone chastized by the WalMart clerk from acting like a child by riding in the shopping cart (later raked over the coals by practically all the SDMB posters to the thread) …
Is there an upsurge in current teenagers/young adults(?) acting like spoiled, arrogant, selfish, whiny brats in desparate need of growing up, or is it cyclical where some in every generation whines, but the Internet just exposes us to more of it today?
Am I jaded because I’ve seen several threads along this line because I’m sensitized to it? I see it almost daily in interactions with life in general - you know, those folks who think the world revolves around them. Yeah, yeah, as I said, the’ve always been there to some degree.
But do you think their numbers are increasing? Come to think of it, would the (air | road | postal | yadda, yadda) rage be an observation of such behavior?
FWIW, until recently we have a generation that really has never experienced economic upheavel, war, internal political crisis, etc., the way those who lived through WWII, Vietnam, the 60s, riots, Nixon, 70s oil shocks, yadda, yadda.
Now with September 11, corporate scandals, a queasy stock market, a dubious presidential election (and president?), a weird jobs/unemployment outlook, a potential war with Iraq (with seemingly disasterous consequences at home and abroad), are many unable to deal with it all?
In recalling my youth, I don’t remember the level I see today. Of course, the memory may be bad, or my world at the time did not expose me to it, or maybe, it just wasn’t at the level I see today. I mean, even some children act like God’s gift to the world and display an attitude that a generation ago (a bit further back?) a swift kick up the backside or Lava soap in the mouth would have cured.
(Oh, the horror to discipline a child these days! With all this self-awareness discipline occurring today “you cannot use a red pencil anymore to correct a child’s spelling errors because it doesn’t give positive reinforecent”-ilk, along with this apparent upsurge in shitty attitudes/behaviors, are these issues related or merely coincidence, along with the general decline in taking responsibility for one’s behaviors?)