Thursday, February 24, 2011

Bliss

Below is an essay I write for my school newspaper my senior year in high. 'Twas never published though since I was giving a bad impression on the school. I have no idea what they were talking about. Take a read for yourself and see if you can spot just what the fuck they were talking about.



All generations have some signifying attribute. For the 60’s, it was love, the 70’s had hippies, the 80’s, dance clubs and Reagan, the 90’s, grunge and angst; since the first decade of this new millennium is now rounding its final year, what distinguishable trait have we crafted in the sands of time? By us I mean the children of the 90’s.
To the media, we have gained quite the reputation.  Now known as “The Reset Generation,” teens from the ages 13-18 have been given this name because we rely on simple measures to fix complex situations. In essence, we’re lazy. Not necessarily lazy, but with representatives such as the Jonas Brothers and Miley Cyrus, I can’t help but point out the fact that we’re completely under spoken. The youth’s wants and even needs aren’t being represented and if they are then they’re through corporate mouthpieces. More often than not it seems our decisions are being crafted by what others deem best for us. Now this can be applied to all generations, but with the 60’s and 70’s at least people stood up and made an attempt to be recognized for their ideologies. These days the only real people in our age group who are even contributing to anything are Disney characters, made to look like a given image by some power backed conglomerate that is only attempting to gain our attention for their own profit. This mentality is in full recognition of the current zeitgeist of this country, which we shouldn’t just fall on our knees and bask in the ambiance of. This business of brainwashing is nothing new to us as Americans. It is sad though since in retaliation to this sort of company manipulation we instead buy in to the MTV’s and the complete garbage that plagues our radio. Instead of throwing our money to some at least respectable venture we bow down to the ones we feel we have to like. These programs are of course the ones which companies pay millions upon billions of dollars to “motivate” us to like.  By motivate I mean shove down our throats until we are forced to walk away from the presented media outlet or just accept the fact that our current culture can barely be deemed as anything but a waste of time.
The lackadaisical look on life that many teenagers seem to have can be supported by the facts that our generation spends more and more time developing health problems through constant television watching and junk food consumption. To actually invoke some sort of change around us, don’t you feel that we as a group of youths should take a stand? But for what. It seems that prior to the mid 90’s, the world around us actually impacted teenagers lives. In fact thirty years ago, a person around the ages of teenage years could be forced to take up arms and fight for his country. That or you could be intelligent enough not to die for some unknown cause and flee to Canada.
I use this reference to the Vietnam War as an attempt to contrast, and not necessarily defend the laziness of my generation. Nonetheless the times have definitely gotten easier for youths. These days it seems overprotective parents and blatantly immature TV teenagers are the only ones who seem to modify the stance we apparently seem to have on everyday life, which is that we just don’t care. Not only do we not care but by constantly using words such as “gay,” “retarded,” and all other obscenities to the English language we are presenting a stance on our blatant stupidity. It cannot be argued that the way one is perceived is by the way he or she presents themselves, deriving mostly from the language one uses on an everyday basis. The ever diminishing vocabulary of the average teenager most likely is from the ditzy attitude possessed by the few lucky youths presented in the limelight. This and the fact that book reading is now a cause deemed only for nerds. Which seems quite ironic when many of the sources of entertainment nowadays are being re-represented from past writings since Hollywood is only producing whatever they feel will make a quick buck. With no one reading, all of these written stories go untold. But this argument is that of another threshold entirely.
It’s not that we don’t care. It’s that we haven’t been shown any reason to care. What purpose can we, a youth bound by the morals and so called establishment which have been pressed upon us since birth, attempt to gain any sort of individualism for ourselves? This defense again doesn’t really follow through either since parents and guardians have constantly been attempting to look out for our best interests by sheltering and protecting us from corruption and atrocities that litter the world. In schools teens seem to be required to fill out forms for nearly every possible scenario. Teen nowadays could simply rebel by just attempting to live what they view as a fulfilling life. There was a time when teenagers were actually treated like adults in the public school realm. Nowadays one can’t even walk through the hallways of a high school without being critiqued for every little tidbit of clothing, attitude, or even mindset. When people start getting written up for things such as kissing or moving around the lunch room, well one cannot help but call all this nonsense hypocrisy. There was a time in this nation when teenagers in high school were expected to attend class, and if they didn’t than that was their loss. Not only this but things such as smoking lounges, parking permits, and fights where just to be expected. Now all of these things either do not exist, are difficult if not impossible to get a hold of, or punishable by expulsion. The fact that the adults who are now in control got to experience these very same freedoms just described makes one ponder just the mentality of our current parents, teachers, principals, congress men, and even president. They say that they are looking out for our best interests, but sometimes are best interests are reached by giving us actual responsibility. Not just mimicking or creating some strange scenario where we feel we have power but in reality the adult has a tight grip on the whole situation. To be perfectly honest with you I feel this is what the main root problem of this laziness is in our generation. Our current adults (at least the ones in power) have led us on this power game in which we are the mice and they hold the cheese. If we even show any thought of independence punishment is surely dealt out.   
 Again, this perspective can easily be defended, as long as you’re not on the receiving end of being treated like an infant. This sort of grip can be explained by pointing out that the world around us, for the most part, has some way been programmed to focus on almost every negative situation and to prevent such events from happening. This source of fear seems to come from the mass paranoia which many now live with daily from the falling economy, massive wars being held over seas, and daily violence and sex being portrayed in the media. This argument can be made for any generation, but each year violence steadily rises and with this comes an unheard of coverage of such macabre. The key player in this new ordinance in which teenagers have been labeled as larger and more literate children has seemed to be special interest groups. When kids are being programmed to go out and literally become a number in the grand scheme of commerce, the world of greed and influence tends to overplay the media and art which takes actual talent to create. Commerce isn’t a measurement of talent more like manipulation and verbosity. 
The best argument I can make for our generation is this: We can’t change others, so work on changing yourself. In this overhyped world of drama and reality TV shows, our focus has been situated on some of the pettiest subjects of all time. When more teenagers care about the VMA’s or American Idol than actually taking the time to learn about Mexico’s new drug laws, the ongoing turmoil in Afghanistan, Iraq, and every other country who we don’t deem law abiding, than we are taking the ignorance and bigotry of this country and multiplying it tenfold. Stupidity is a hot commodity in this age of recession; but just like the recession it’s the cause of great downfalls. If our generation doesn’t step up and take note of the progress we are going to have to make in coming years, then the days of egotistical self proclaimed greatness of the USA is going to be a thing of the past. Try not to be to blissful.

WHORES

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