Being Gen-Z feels like showing up to the party 4 hours after everyone left.
The American dream is dead. Trump said that at the RNC when I was like 10 years old and it's gotten worse every year since. It's frustrating because everyone knows it's bad but there's still so little sympathy. It seems like all that's left of America is this vague idea that you have to work yourself to death so you can buy things. That's literally all we have left that unites us. Working and trying to buy groceries.
What is this country without prosperity?
My generation is trying to figure this out and we're not coming up with much inspiring stuff. With the benefit of hindsight, no one likes the direction our ancestors chose to take. The suburbs that gave our great grandparents the dream of homeownership left us isolated and friendless as kids, sealed up behind a TV screen so our parents could feel like we're safe. The constant economic stimulus that kept our economy growing throughout the 20th century is now like a noose around the neck of anyone who has to buy things regularly in order to survive (aka everyone). The cost of living is brutal and probably not going down unless the economy actually shrinks for a while. We've transitioned from a labor economy to an ownership economy as boomers retired and invested their savings in real estate and the stock market. It no longer pays to work. College is useless. Our society is overly bureaucratized and discrimination against white people and men is openly celebrated. Anyone who doesn't fit into DEI HR culture is effectively banned from participating in the mainstream economy.
No one is happy. Liberals aren't happy. Conservatives aren't happy. Men and women are at each other's throats but equally miserable for different reasons. We have no culture, no third spaces to meet people and forge lasting relationships. Most people are single, lonely and completely disgusted by one another. Everyone I know is mentally ill to some degree. It's really bad. I don't think older people fully understand the caliber of people who will inherit this world.
I think the negativity will only stop when the direction of our civilization completely changes. There's no making our current trajectory work, under any circumstances.
CONSTANT GROWTH IS NOT SUSTAINABLE. Constant change, constant agitation is not normal. It's not normal for every generation to die in a world that's completely unrecognizable from the one they were born into. It's not normal that our pattern of life is constantly being messed with for the sake of theoretical progress. It's not normal to feel like you're on the clock 24/7, constantly surveilled, constantly accounted for. The feeling that time is speeding up, that every moment needs to be filled with some meaningless distraction. THIS IS NOT NORMAL. This is not healthy. Our birthrates are falling off because this world is not appropriate for human beings to live in.
Consumerism has to die. Liberalism (in the classical and modern sense) needs to be retired. Even rationality in the sense we know of today has to go. Inefficiency is what makes life home for human beings.
I don't want to hear people call this idealistic nonsense when our culture is visibly dying before our eyes. The status quo and the 20th century frame of reference has been discredited, as hard as that is for some people to accept. Change is our only option and it's inevitable at this point.
Conservatives will have to articulate a vision of our future that goes beyond capitalist consumerism or else we're going to become a third world communist shithole. New ideas are needed. We have to drastically expand our minds beyond what we've been conditioned to believe, or humanity is truly doomed.
Rant over.
This country had a civil war once. They sent young people like you off to die. The great depression left people starving. Every generation has hard times. Study, adapt, persevere and thrive.
I think a world where people my age die at their own hand because the world around them is meaningless is more sad than a world where young people die in a war for their country. Our problem is not material right now, it's far deeper. We're not used to addressing the problems that are overwhelming our society today.
“I think the negativity will only stop when the direction of our civilization completely changes.”
This statement really caught my attention - if you flip it, it might help the disempowerment you’re feeling - i.e., the direction of our civilization will completely change when the negativity stops.
You CAN make a difference.
I get it, I honestly do get it....
But you must understand and Comprehend, this whole mess isn't because of Capitalism, but is happening in Spite of Capitalism....
Gen X grew up hardwired into Capitalism, and we love it, and we know how to make it Work FOR us, and how it can be used by Individuals as well as Groups so Everyone shares in the Prosperity.....
And yes, we have been heavily Infiltrated, all the way to the point that the Criminals are destroying us from Within, as well as from without....
But be of good cheer, things are going to turn around, it's a 40 year Pendulum swing, it swings for 20 years from Center to the Left and back to center, then 20 years to the Right and back to center....
Gen X and a few others who helped, have been working diligently to stop the pendulum just a bit to the Right of Center, and by all accounts, it seems to be working....
IT has been moving from Left to Right, at some ever growing speed now for about Four Years, and is close to passing the center Point and moving Right, and the more Momentum we can give it, the better, as we MUST, make it stick, and get stuck to the Right for as long as possible....
Once it gets to Center and starts to move further to the Right, you'll see there will be more abundance for everyone....
I think capitalism and communism are two different approaches to the same end goal of a post-scarcity utopia where there's nothing to live or die for. Markets are natural and have existed forever but "capitalism" is a very specific ideological framework that lends itself to the world we have today for better or worse.
I hate to sound like the Socialists and Communists, but we don't have Good and Effective Capitalism today....
There's way too much Regulation by the Fed Govt, and with that comes more of a Socialist form of Market....
Yes, we do need Some Regulations, but not the garbage we have accumulated in the last 100+ years....
Some of these Regs make good sense in the direction of Public Safety, but many are just Red Tape to make the Businesses slower and have them operate in a handicapped manner, all while paying large sums just to get some stupid permit that shouldn't exist, or should be part of an all encompassing Permit....
So, No, we do not have Capitalism at all, and at best, we have the nearly full on installment of Socialism....
Dude, the world we exist in - with all its relative comfort, safety, abundance - is 100% specifically BECAUSE of capitalism.
The negative aspects of today’s world & society - and of course there are a lot - is specifically because of communism / Marxism, and ever-expanding government.
Though I do think companies like Microsoft, Apple & google are WAY too big & need to be shattered into a thousand pieces & scattered to the wind
"I think a world where people my age die at their own hand because the world around them is meaningless is more sad than a world where young people die in a war for their country." I think a country that has become a place where those are the only two options is a country that sucks. BTW, most "war"s (ours, more recent...even "covid") aren't for "their" (our) country, e.g. the Ukraine/Russia conflict is about an entity (shhhhh) or entities outside of Russia that want(s) control of, access to, AND any riches derived from, every square inch of every resource (including human capital, not including useless eaters, of course) on the planet.
Spiritual war. Death is death.
This war destroys your psyche. Not minimizing but we all need some sort of support. It’s different for each on.