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What Is Corrupting Contemporary Youth in the USA? Essay

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According to prevailing dialogues in the media, politics, and society, the everyday

life of emerging parts of contemporary youth is increasingly unstable, violent, and

corrupt. These discussions proclaims that the status-quo of youth today is marked by a

pervasive moral and social corruption which includes; drug and alcohol abuse,

uninhibited sexual lifestyle, materialism, crumbling morals and increasing

criminalization.

The youth is viewed by older generations as a self-absorbed, cantankerous and

malcontent group, contentedly hooked on cult celebrity, parent handouts, the internet,

video and computer games, and drugs. Indeed, it’s not hard to miss, in such discussion

demeaning names used to classify …show more content…

We could then be

able to deduce if the shift from the ideals occurred from the youth, or from society.

Perhaps a reformation in the moral parameters may have occurred with each generation.

Socrates, in Plato's Apology, before the Greek assembly, states that society is

incapable of educating the youth. He gives an example of the horse, “.........But suppose I ask you a question: Would you say that this also holds true in the case of horses? Does one man do them harm and all the world good? Is not the exact opposite of this true? One man is able to do them good, or at least not many; - the trainer of horses, that is to say, does them good, and others who have to do with them rather injure them? Is not that true, Meletus, of horses, or any other animals? Yes, certainly..........” Socrates explains only the horse trainer is the only person that can train a horse, This is the horse trainer specialty. Any other person would not be able to train because he or she has no prior knowledge or experience with horse training. Hence society is not better equipped to the train the youth. Socrates effectively upends the dynamics of the argument; while society blame the youth for being the cause in the shift from the moral ideals. Socrates indicates that this isn't the case, in fact society is cause of the shift. The youth are merely portraying the virtues society extols.
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