The New Generations

Freedom, opportunities, and information are some features of this modern society. Clearly, humans are now having a very different life compared to the past. Along with this well-developed world, people get more chances to express how they think, do what they want, and love who they love. Especially young people, they become more independent and are capable of living their own lives. However, while society provides people a lot of benefits, it actually makes their lives even more complex at the same time by leaving them pressures and confusions of who they really are. In her essay, “Selections from Hard to Get:Twenty-Something Women and the Paradox of Sexual Freedom,” Leslie Bell mentions that while in this new-in between developmental period American twenty-something women have more freedom and opportunities about their sexual lives than previous generations, they are struggling with the paradoxes of their relationships and desires. Bell suggests that social expectations and culture guidelines, which are conventions of female sexuality and stereotypes of being a good girl, prevent these young women from pursuing their sexual desires and limiting their relationships with men. However, even these women have chosen the way they live and what kind of sexual life they want in order to be bad girls to break those old rules, they ended with losing their identities. In general, female sexuality is impacted more by establishing a women’s identity rather than clinging on

As students, freshmen come into high school knowing that they are hated by every upperclassmen in the school, with the exception of some friends and possibly family. The freshmen don’t understand why they are disliked, and most of the upperclassmen can’t tell you why they despise the freshmen, except for some unproved responses such as: “They’re annoying”, or “They’re so immature”. This sequence occurs every year. As the freshmen turn into upperclassmen, they too develop a hate for the incoming freshmen. This relationship is common on a larger scale as well; older generations view the younger generations as annoying, dumb, and immature. Dealing with three generations today, we have the omniscient Baby Boomers (1946-1964), impious

An example of anguish and suffering due to ‘white’ policy laws, was the attempted genocide era also known as ‘the stolen generation’ which lasted for decades (Krieken 2009).The stolen generation era was a “systematic annihilation for Aboriginal cultural identity” (Krieken 2009, p. 297) because children were forcibly taken from their families to institutional facilities that were either run by charitable or religious organizations with the intention of ‘civilizing’ them so they can integrate into white Australian society (Krieken 2009). The Australian government commissioners believed that ‘breeding mixed blood’ Aborigines with white settles will eventually lead to the “colour being bred out of them” (McCarthy 2000, para. 3) whilst those who

The first major liability of the United States was that no one had ever established a

They can now have careers, wait to marry — or not get married at all — and have families later in life. As a whole, young adults are getting married later and later in life. Hymowitz claims that this has “delayed a stable sense of identity, … mystified courtship … and … [made young adults] doubt the very meaning of marriage” (480). This adds to the murkiness of mens’ social role. With the old caveats that defined manhood gone, pre-adult males are not sure of their place and where they fit in (480).

Millenials is the name given to the generation who reached adulthood around the turn of the 21st century, they were born during 1975 and 1995 which was the Cold War era. The millennial is given the nickname as the television or digital age. The popularity of television boomed in their time was a result of the Space Race and America's curiosity of what would have been called the impossible. In the 1940's there was only a few tv's but in the-the 1970's the amount of tv's surged to four million plus. The Millenials grew up in a society when the social norm was for an individual to watch tv five hours a day. The United States victory was largely contributed to great communication technology. An example was in the Civil War when President Lincoln would command the military thousands of miles away. What strengthened the Millenial ideology is communication and getting full

“I have studies! I have statistics!” (par. 20) claims Joel Stein, a regular contributor for the TIME magazine. In “The New Greatest Generation: Why Millennials Will Save Us All,” Stein writes about the millennials, people born between 1980 and 2000. Using a very clever gimmick, he points out the unfavorable features of millennials at the beginning of his article, just to create a stronger rebuttal afterwards. He claims that the “millennials’ self-involvement is more a continuation of a trend than a revolutionary break from previous generations… [and] they’ve just mutated to adapt to their environment” (Stein par. 14). By utilizing rhetorical devices and various writing approaches, Joel Stein attempts to persuade the older generations to reconsider their opinion of millennials and presents his claim that the millennials inherited their characteristics from previous generations and have adapted to their environment.

In the article, “The New Greatest Generation: Why Millennials Will Save Us All,” by Joan Stein, Stein expresses his views through a complex game of mind control. He captures his audience, the older generations, in the beginning of the article by writing what they want to hear, then switches to the difficult truth, and finally tells the audience that it doesn't matter about what he has to say, but by how they view change. His claim, “So, yes, we have all that data about narcissism and laziness and entitlement. But a generation's greatness isn't determined by data; it's determined by how they react to the challenges that befall them,” (Stein 34) shows just how much he wants to show his audience the difficult truth, and makes them feel bad about being mean to the millennials.

From 1946-1964 there was a sudden growth in population known as the baby boomers. There was a rise of the younger generation that skyrocketed and made a large population of the United States. “Tom Hayden and Students For a Democratic Society” from The Movements of The New Left: A Brief History With Documents and “Young Americans For Freedom” from The Rise of Conservatism in America have many similarities and differences. Both articles aim to get the voices from the younger generation (at the time) to stand up for their rights and beliefs. They were going to be the change in the generation to come. They were in it together, but from the two articles the perspectives were different. Both groups were looking for their voices to be heard and influential

Building an identity often involves forming a unique personality that abides by the need for affiliation, which is a sense of belonging within a community. Thus, sociocultural norms often dictate how a person ought to act, while at the same time discouraging out of the box mental processes. This leads to citizens assimilating to the culture in place, which leads to a socially determined state of normality. Leslie Bell explores the need for affiliation concept by examining female sexual activity in her book, “Selections from Hard to Get: Twenty-Something Women and the Paradox of Sexual Freedom.” In her book she details the lives of females who struggle to build a sexual identity because of their newfound freedom in their early to mid-twenties. The conflict stems from male created social expectations that act as pathway for women to follow. Quite simply, women are faced with choosing either celibacy or hooking up. This leads into Martha Stout’s essay, “When I woke up Tuesday Morning it Was Friday”, where she discusses mental health, and the impact of traumatic experiences. Furthermore, the author focuses on the ability humans have to disassociate, or withdraw from reality, and argues that because so many people use this tactic, then perhaps the idea of normalcy needs to be questioned. This connects back to Leslie Bell, where she argues that women need to liberate themselves from the black and white, either or, patterns of thinking to progress in society. In other words, Bell

“Barely half of the 15-to 26-year-olds queried agreed that “paying attention to government and politics” is important to good citizenship, and only two-thirds considered voting a meaningful act. While 64 percent knew the name of the latest “American Idol,” only 10 percent could identify the speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives. Only one-third knew which party controlled the state legislature, and only 40 percent knew which party controlled Congress.” – Bauerlein, Mark. The Dumbest Generation. Penguin Grove: New York, 2008. Print.

“Each generation goes further than the generation preceding it because it stands on the shoulders of that generation. You will have opportunities beyond anything we’ve known.”-Ronald Reagan.

Attitudes towards different issues in society are adopted depending on the prevailing beliefs in such a society. Every trending issue in a society helps shape the attitudes that people develop and greatly influences their behavior. There is no question that every society has a prejudged perception and possible reaction to any event that may occur within the realm of the society. This prejudgment and reaction is often informed by the various experiences that the society may have undergone through in the earlier instances of occurrence of specific events. Leslie Bell, the author of “Selections from Hard to Get: Twenty-Something Women and the Paradox of Sexual Freedom,” largely focuses on female sexuality detailing the often confusing situations

Between 1910-1970, Indigenous children were forcibly removed from their family and community as the result of the Government’s belief in the black inferiority and white superiority. The children affected by the government issued child removal policies were known as the Stolen Generation. These children were raised rejecting their own heritage and forbidden to speak their traditional language while under the care of their adoptive white family or institutions. The forcible removal of these children impacted not only the indigenous people but also the culture itself. Many of the Stolen Generations suffered physical, mental and sexual abuse and received very low level of education; while the culture itself is disrupted and lost.

My grandfather was an excessively organized and thrifty man who liked to repurpose what others threw away. He used to clean used paint cans to leave them gleaming. Sometimes remains of paint in the cans were still fresh and they were relatively easy to clean. On the contrary, if the cans were old and the paint on them was dry, my grandfather had to use some solvent and a lot of old rags. My grandfather spent many hours working on that activity. When the cans were perfectly clean, he used them to store screws, nails, nuts and bolts properly organized in his garage. Being thrifty and organized were characteristics in people of my grandfather’s generation; however, some of the things that they did seemed absurd to me at that time. In the same way, it is probably that my daughters find it senseless some things that I and people of my generation do. Nevertheless, it is not about judging one generation to the other. We need to understand that no generation is better or worse than another: simply, our behavior is different depending on the times and circumstances. Respecting each other and learning from our differences, we will be able to live in harmony as a big multigenerational family.