The Apathy of My Generation
“Apathy is the glove in which evil slips its hand.” – Bodie Thoene
If you have read many of my pieces or followed me on Twitter for even a short time, you’re well aware that I believe the vast majority of the problems America is experiencing are rooted firmly in the growth of liberalism and the declination of traditional American values. Although liberalism is rampant and raging, another issue is just as paramount to the destructive edge of the cliff upon which our country is teetering – the apathy of my generation.
Those who wish America ill, who strive to change her through “progressive” legislation and an amoral society have done and are doing immense damage to the prosperous hopes of this great nation and tarnishing the treasured history of her fought and died-for values.
These destructors, however, would not be allowed to even entertain the notion of a fundamental changing of America’s cherished guard without the unspoken approval of a dissenting body who is largely too apathetic to obtain truthful information and from it bellow a resounding statement of informed intent.
This intent – that of resolute traditional Americanism – and this allowance – granted by those who sit quietly by while the fighters on the left win the war – are indicative of a people group wholly entrenched in the assuredness of easy life and who take being American and her God-blessed freedoms for granted.
The issue, this apathy, finds itself most at home in a teenage and young adult generation, my generation, who have never had to work to be American (or work at anything much at all, for that matter). We’ve never had a Great Depression, a WWII, or any major uniting adversity. We’ve had it easy, and it’s showing.
My generation is one of laptops and relative morality, not farm chores and personal responsibility.
Humans want to fight for something. It’s ingrained in our being. And when nothing inherently noble is apparent, it becomes easy and may seem right to create, often out of thin air, a “righteous” rationale for being, and being American. This synthetic purpose is a prevailing reason for why we are witnessing an entitled and faux-victimized generation flooding the streets of our cities with a twisted understanding of equality and fairness. People long for purpose, and a generation of indiscriminate enablement empowers them to fight for disillusioned aspirations straight out of Moore’s Utopia. Their goals are not just, and subsequently not American.
This apathy takes two forms: The first is a lack of motivation to become properly informed of facts sans spin. The second is a lack of impetus to turn that information into an effective furthering of traditional American values and an effort to squelch anti-American liberal progressivism and the revisionist history that precedes it.
It isn’t the ill-intentioned minority that represents America’s greatest inner threat, but a silent majority of passive enablers who are either too lazy or too engaged elsewhere to take a stand.
It isn’t evil politicians that bode the most danger to the financial and societal future of America, but a generation of adults who behave like children and care not what happens next.
This problem starts in the home. It is there where the origins of entitlement and victimization begin developing. Broken families and absent morals allow Americans to grow up expecting (from the almighty government) freedom, security, even a job and “free” health care. The oft-preached “social justice” is generally used as a overarching excuse to tolerate anyone and anything, regardless of principles and ethics.
My generation, especially, expects to be granted these uniquely American advantages instead of being appropriately grateful for those who worked and fought so hard to ensure them.
Advantages should be earned, not doled out on a silver platter of expectancy.
This attitude of self-entitlement can continue to shift basic American principles for only so long before being American is no longer considered a blessing, but a predetermined warrant to demand whatever one desires.
I believe we are currently witnessing the comeuppance of this disposition; demonstrated by a massively extended federal government of liberal elites toting a narcissistic superiority complex coupled with the Occupy movement and that which it represents.
This culture of demand and take, instead of earn and offer, precedes both the moral and economic fall of even the strongest nation. No empire can withstand the many relying on the few. Our American empire is no exception.
True ignorance is hard changed, and pure evil hardly ever changed. It is the apathy of the decent that must be eradicated and replaced with informed activism.
America as we know it hangs in the balance.
There are a couple of things I take issue with in this article:
First, do you really think that people who disagree with you politically “wish America ill”? That’s your starting point? If you want to have a dialogue or change a mind, don’t start off sounding like your headgear is made of foil. Second, awareness of a history–a full history–is not dishonor. Whitewashing history is significantly more disrespectful.
Your third paragraph, you again call people who disagree with you politically “destructors,” which, again, c’mon. You realize that the reason Obama was elected in the first place was because the Republicans were CRAZY for 8 years. It was not apathy that elected Obama, it was relief.
Also, what is this “Traditional Americanism” that is under attack? I’m 33. I don’t know what America you are nostalgic for, but I haven’t seen a significant shift in what my day to day life is like.
Your implication that you have had it easy…that may be your personal story, but I think it’s pretty arrogant to suggest that your story reflects an entire generation. And when you talk about apathy…sorry, but, guy, same as it ever was. Do you think teenagers in the 80s were politically active? And that was when St. Reagan was in office.
I am deeply disturbed by your idea that Americans have to agree with you or are somehow Unamerican. This doesn’t seem like the thoughts of someone who seeks out facts sans spin, but someone who steeps themselves in an extreme right wing agenda. Your understanding of people who come from an impoverished background is certainly fascinating in its complexity.
I want to make a quick point since you brought up the “sense of entitlement” and the Occupy movement specifically. I was not an Occupier since I have a job and I hate camping. But I did sympathize with a lot of their points, especially the growing income disparity between classes (which apparently should never be discusses). I bring this up because on this site there was a mini freakout when Hostess went out of business and the writers blamed the unions and this same sort of Unamerican blah blah blah. What was never mentioned was that the CEO of Hostess had given himself a 300% raise, which is just as much a problem of entitlement, if not more, don’t you think?
As for younger generations not understanding the sacrifice of those who came before, I don’t agree with that premise. For Veterans Day last year I went to a local high school assembly where kids from three schools performed patriotic songs. There were two guest speakers afterwards, the Attorney General of our state (who is now running for Governor as a Republican) and a state senator (also a Republican) both of whom made overt political statements to that captive audience. I know that Republicans love to politicize patriotism, but I kind of think that to use an occasion like that to score political points kind of shows what their version of patriotism really is.
Wow! You hit it square on!! I have been researching this theory on the current generation and it fits perfectly. My theory goes hand-and-hand with yours, that a generation without a defined purpose chooses exactly what you have defined.
This generation claims to have so many problems (ADD, Bullying, Bi-Polar, Etc. Etc. Etc.) when I attest that if their purpose was to gather food, work for freedom, think to stay alive, then the problems they spend so much time feeding while doing nothing would be MUTE…
KUDOS Brady! You’re proof that many of our Nation’s brightest are not wizened old men. I’m from the teletype & record player age & find your views encouraging. You have learned to listen & think rather than join the “wine & brie” crowd. Which is much much easier that thinking for yourself & accepting personal responsibility rather than goverment ‘entitlements’.
“Apathy” might well be the most dangerous of the “enemy within.”
If a reader is of the ‘live & let live’ persuasion or perhaps “:nothing I acan do about it” sense, I urge you to accept the responsibility becoming informed…& not by what CNN reports..,.learn for your own self the FACTS. Knowledge is the best protection available & trust me, it doesn’t hurt abit.
Like Kyle, I look forward to hearing more from you Brady.
People who are living on government entitlements generally don’t consume wine and brie. Those are cultural signifiers of success and affluence. And by the way, they are pretty great together.
Jon, If you will note, ‘wine & brie’ was used as a label to identify a particular ‘culture’ or… ‘attitude’ of entitlement, as opposed to someone that has grown up & assumes responsibilities as obviously Brady has….’wine & brie’ people are content(expect) to just sit & be waited on while others cook & serve.I do hope this will clarify for you & others that may not have understood the expression. …People like Brady will be the ones that help keep our Country as it shold be.
Thanks for posting this, Brady. Hope to run into your work on CDN more often.
The problem is the drift away from our Christian roots. If you go to some of the oldest small towns in New England. The center of town is not a government building. It is a church. When you have a nation that cares less and less about God, pretty soon you have a Godless nation. Jesus said. “A nation divided against itself can not stand.” This nation is divided in many ways and it is looking like it will not stand, between lack of morals, debt and apathy it is going down.
Im part of your generation, and firmly Independent. I am glad to see that the ultra conservative, no compromising, regressive mind set like you display here and on your Twitter is slowly dying out. You are in a very small minority among the educated youth. But, keep up God’s fight, haha… Im sure you’ll make a huge difference.
I’m also a part of his generation. I think that the apathy of our generation is slightly overstated actually. I believe the apathy largely resided in our parents generation. There is a saying that goes around in theirs and my grandparents generations that if you’re a conservative at 20 you have no heart, and if a liberal at 50 you have no brains. This, actually, refers to a statistically provable phenomenon where the average person becomes more conservative as they get older.
I believe it is too early to judge the apathy of our generation, although I believe that our apathy is ending quicker then it normally would. While a lot of them are showing an invariable amount of what I consider ignorance on the foreign policy front because of the lack of major wars that are perceived as a threat to us and because of media coverage of those that do exist along with the understandable blowback from young military men exhausted from wars fought with inherently flawed rules of engagements. They, however, are often more extreme in the area of limiting government power then the average older conservative is.
Of course, this paradigm is only entrenched because of the entrenchment of the promotion of marxist sentiments and policies through the guise of progressive “forward thinking” intelligentsia in our “government reeducation camps” also known as public schools and university professors.
I can assure you, if we go down this road enough, everyone will end up a conservative out of necessity, but it will likely be too late at that point. There is a difference between compromise between John Adams and Thomas Jefferson, and compromise between Thomas Jefferson and the English Crown. I fully believe the founders would find this government just as injurious and unjust as the one they fought a revolution to separate themselves from.
If everyone applied themselves and actually voted…It may be an entirely different story. Fact is, liberal young people rarely vote in my experience.
“As an 18-year-old, it sounded like a good fit to me, and the school really sold it,” said Ms. Griffith, a marketing major. “I knew a private school would cost a lot of money. But when I graduate, I’m going to owe like $900 a month. No one told me that.”
Darling Phil, this is your ‘educated youth’- $120,000 in debt for a Marketing Degree to land a $30,000 per year job selling your generation that Hollywood Hollow Man crap.
For the rest of your life you will be indentured servents to stupidity arrogantly void of self-respect, self-responsibilty and commonsense. Life for you and your generation will be so miserable you will one day be on bended knee praying God’s forgiveness and the gentleman He is, He will forgive.
Right, so no one should go to college, and we should just rely on god to run the world. Perfect! Also, please see my comment below.
Phil, You can bet Brady will make a difference !! Will you???..don’t worry, We Christians pray for the uninformed & irresponsible daily & will include you
Im 26 and own 2 growing businesses. I am going to be hiring at least 10 people this year, to well paying, salaried positions. So please, keep sitting there telling me that you will pray and make a difference; while I work hard to provided a livelihood for 30-40 people. Please, keep calling me uninformed and irresponsible… I have investors looking to purchase one of the businesses which would make me a self made millionaire, and each employee would each get a six figure bonus. I MUST be irresponsible and uninformed, yes? I appreciate the offer to pray for me, but I kindly ask you donate to a charity, or do an act of kindness in my name instead. That will do far more good.