[RG73]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('lotrfan55345', 'Y')ou should all watch the movie "Mean Girls" to see what teenage American life is like.

[PolestaR]

If you think about western society as it is now, it has given a *LOT* more people the ability to be 19th century equivelant (if not more) kings and queens.

[Vexed]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'W')hy are younger Americans so miserable?

[SHiFTY]

I'm not a yank, but as a recentish addition to the workforce, it was like being hit by a baseball bat- once you graduate its supposed to be management, Lexuses and Armani suits all the way- instead it's unemployment, finally a crappy job and then terrible housing and overdue bills. WTF? No-one ever told me about this!

The other thing which depresses me is housing- Even on the average wage, I cannot afford a house in any way, shape or form; and they keep going up each year! So I save all my spare money and go on holidays

I only know one of my peer group who is able to afford a house. The rest are like me, free floating, never able to put down roots even if we wanted to.

[rogerhb]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('SHiFTY', 'I') only know one of my peer group who is able to afford a house. The rest are like me, free floating, never able to put down roots even if we wanted to.

[Wildwell]

Join the club! Everyone I know is like that too. To my mind people should be less worried about running cars and more about undermining anyone under 35 in the housing department. Don’t worry about population folks because nobody can afford to breed. The government’s answer is to bring in a load of immigrants, which lowers the wages even more as they’re quite happy to work for £4 an hour and send it home – a relative fortune. This of course all at the expense of the future, and, as it turns out votes: With 25% of the electorate threatening to vote BNP.

As for university, most people are being sold a porker. In recent poll school kids of around 11 were asked what the future would be like. Apparently they envisage of future of people being taught lessons on celebrities and everyone will blast around on jet packs. You can’t blame the kids, they are people sold stuff that is completely unobtainable for the vast majority of people, perhaps a capitalists wet dream somewhere along the line. When they end up stacking shelves in Tescos after their 3 (soon to be reduced to 2) years media studies degree, and renting a small room in Dudley it must come as an awful shock.

It’s the non-stop advertising that generates much of this, and no doubt a proportion of crime too, perhaps coupled with being lavished with cheap Chinese goods as kids, then a sudden plunge into the real world. In fact if I hear that woman on the recent McDonald’s ad go ‘I want, I want, I want’, one more time I shall explode. It’s bad enough the kids doing it! I’m going permanently to Burger King now for repayment of the most unsophicated ad ever.

Just take a moment and step back and listen to all the crappy ads, and music which have become normalised…I have a list of ads that irritate the hell out of me.

[whereagles]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('highlander', 'b')oomers like me should be depressed when we think about our wasting of our childrens inheritance.

[thor]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('SHiFTY', ' ')once you graduate its supposed to be management, Lexuses and Armani suits all the way- instead it's unemployment, finally a crappy job and then terrible housing and overdue bills. WTF? No-one ever told me about this!

[Wildwell]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('rogerhb', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('SHiFTY', 'I') only know one of my peer group who is able to afford a house. The rest are like me, free floating, never able to put down roots even if we wanted to.

[whereagles]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('thor', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('SHiFTY', ' ')once you graduate its supposed to be management, Lexuses and Armani suits all the way- instead it's unemployment, finally a crappy job and then terrible housing and overdue bills. WTF? No-one ever told me about this!

[Gil-Galad]

Young Americans unhappy - possibly
Because they are obese
They are not allowed to have sex - the religious right tells them it is evil
They are not allowed to drink until they are 21
Because, as others rightly say, a teenager does not fit in unless they have the right trainers, Ipod, mobile phone, etc.
I am glad I am old!

[crapattack]

There is a generation between the boomers and their kids, the true Gen x-ers. Being one, I truly feel like I'm part of a forgotten generation. I was always just two or three years out to qualify for the "youth" grants that came onstream as the boomers kids started maturing and I was too young to surf the boomer wave. We are a generation of overeducated skeptical career flippers who pretty much saw the pointlessness of the rat race. The younger folks I work with all seem to have bought the 'party line' and are rapidly striving for all the marketers want them to strive for without seeing the bullshit. It's sad and I think they feel a lot of pressure to live up to something. There's no real connectedness to anything, it's empty consumerism - all about the toys. They seem vacant, adrift.

We had the bomb but they have the treats of PO, CC, enironmental toxicity and Pandemic. They've just never really had a chance to have a worry-free existence. For us the bomb was just something that would stike and wipe everything out real quick-like, but it wasn't a certainty - and that's the kicker with PO and CC, it's gonna happen, it's just as a matter of time. My parents were born into an age of optomism and promise. All you needed was ingenuity and a good work ethic and you and your cohort could be or do anything. My grandparents and my parents changed the world to be sure, and helped screw it up. To be born into a fu*ked up world and know that not much is going to stop it going downhill from there has gotta just depress the hell out of you. Why not just watch a DVD. No wonder they're just trying to self medicate and get all the creature comforts they can before the plug get's pulled. Of course not all young folks are doing this. Many are working like dogs, having babies, buying houses - trying to have the life their parents promised them. Too bad it's all on credit - borrowed money and borrowed time.

[grabby]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Zardoz', 'T')his is the first generation in the history of the U.S. who will not have it better than their parents. Think of the significance of that.

[grabby]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Gil-Galad', 'Y')oung Americans unhappy - possibly
Because they are obese
They are not allowed to have sex - the religious right tells them it is evil
They are not allowed to drink until they are 21
Because, as others rightly say, a teenager does not fit in unless they have the right trainers, Ipod, mobile phone, etc.
I am glad I am old!

[Lighthouse]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('grabby', '
')
... Is it GET TOGETHER with friends LISTEN TO MUSIC, SMOKE SOME WEED, have sex with whomever, and drink beer and go home?...

[Kez]

I think the main problem is that everyone is so busy, both parents are working just to make ends meet. There is little to no downtime where a parent can just chill out with their kids.

If this is the case for even 10% of the kids, then those kids will learn all their behavior from t.v., games, etc., then spread that behavior to the other kids. Kids learn from other kids almost immediately. I've seen kids run around karate chopping and jumping all over, and I know that their family didn't even have a t.v. or computer in the house, and someone was always at home with them. They learned that from the brief time they are with the other kids who spend all day watching cartoons.

[Cynus]

I'm going to throw in the point that suburbia itself is partly to blame. The alientation from your neighbors and community, the ugliness, the homogeny, the traffic, the strip malls, the parking lots, the endless concrete landscape. There's just a more or less unconscious acknowledgment that it is all just plain wothless and sucks ass. Nobody can have any pride or love of their community when it is all so ugly and cheap. Living in a society which you know has no real value other than cheapness and convienence breeds cynicism and irony. Anyone living in such a society that you yourself can not value is going to end up anxious and more or less depressed.

[grabby]

Dear Friends, Thank you.

Sometimes it takes a 2x4 on the head to see what I am like, I always did "little things" for my children bought them this and that made them pay half etc etc allowance,

We have come up to a Large two story house, toys, quads Rhino trailer, camper pickup everything you want, boat shoot we live on a lake,
We had two motor homes and the Diesel pusher, developed recurrent engine problems, we eventually got our money back from a Lemon Law, But we learned things are just more trouble then they are worth.
When we bought these toys, they did not make us happy, In fact the only time we waere happy was the day we bought it and the day we sold it.
, in fact my wife dreaded coming back from trips cause of all the cleaning and work and I had to wax buy a tarp and all the time I could have spent with children, was spent in polishing toys.

But you know what? God is good. Not the religious right God, no, the loving one who cares about people, and helps you to change and give up being bad, the one who helps us stop pushing people around..

He is taking care of our children, my children got the right message somehow, consumerism is vanity.


This morning, I read this whole post, and it hit me as truth, This post is mostly truth and I wanted to read it to them so I called them up.

And after reading the posts, they said, Dad, I don't want these toys anymore, I think we need to live more simply. I was amazed.
Can we sell the toys and trailer ? We only need one car and we need to learn to just go do things, not buy things...

I was for the first time speachless, I just said Thank God.

We are very busy, now, with polishong our toys for sale.
our toys, we are HAPPY.
I am happy.
We are already planing how to sell these timewasters whatever we can get for it, and what we cant sell we will give to those who have befrieneded us, with a warning, "Things don't make you happy"

We are not going to be slaves to a society that makes you become just another number or part of a large syste. I want to be an american, freedom from all this garbage.

Anyway, we are all laughing and like its the best day...
I'll let you know how it is coming maybe,

just want to thank you, mand, you guys did some good today.
Thank you very much!

(With respect to those who think they are here alone, hope you find peace)

Our Life is meant to relate, and help others
evrything else is just selfish and will make you un happy. in the end.

[TheSupplyGuy]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', '
')I am an Amrikan. Old fashioned German work stock, what this country was built on.
This is untrue. Everyone has sex and no one thinks it is wrong.
Its normal. They are taught to mastterbate in highschool for releaf

[Falconoffury]

When I was a teenager, about 5-8 years ago, my mother was really pressuring me to be successful. She wanted me to graduate high school with honors and join some ritzy college. I thought about the meaning of success, and I chose to define success as a modest life of peace and happiness. I challenged her with these ideas, and it took years, but she grudgingly accepted my views. People just don't sit back and ask themselves what they want out of life.