Esquire's The War Against Youth

[Alma]

It's potent, I'll say that much. I happen to agree with a lot of it.

http://www.esquire.com/print-this/young-people-in-the-recession-0412?page=all

I suspect this passage will divide some:

"It's the dirty little secret of every middle-class person in their mid-thirties: Everybody's parents helped them out. Who do you think is paying for all those summer internships? How many new parents do you think actually have enough money for a Bugaboo stroller, let alone a down payment on a first home? And if you don't have a mom or dad who can help with ballet lessons for the kids or family vacations, God help you. America is becoming what it was founded to reject, what it has resisted throughout its history, a patronage society."

 

[dooley_womack1]

I didn't get ballet lessons.

 

[Brian]

Wasn't the agrarian system -- the kind that dominated the first two-thirds of America's history -- the definition of a patronage society?

 

[Alma]

Wasn't the agrarian system -- the kind that dominated the first two-thirds of America's history -- the definition of a patronage society?

You mean, as in someone was kind enough to buy the stuff you grew? Patrons to your crops? Maybe.

I would suggest the paragraph doesn't take into account slavery. Sadly, America took awhile before it fought strenuously enough against that.

When I think of patronage, I think of the plebes working hard enough to catch the admiration of a rich aristocracy, who then "invests" in their future. Art is produced in this way, or was, for centuries.

 

[Johnny Dangerously]

Does this have anything to do with the bean ballet?

 

[imjustagirl]

My parents have filed bankruptcy. I owe $20K in student loans. They put no money toward my house because they can't even afford to pay for their own. My mom is 62 and working two jobs.

They did buy me a car so I guess I have that going for me.

 

[deskslave]

I can only assume we'll have more posts like that one. However, the fact that it didn't happen to you doesn't negate the reality of the trend.

 

[imjustagirl]

I can only assume we'll have more posts like that one. However, the fact that it didn't happen to you doesn't negate the reality of the trend.

I wasn't trying to negate the reality of the trend. I was just saying it's foreign to me.

Why do people on this board consistently act like someone posting their personal tale means they're speaking for society? It's mind-bending to me.

 

[Brian]

Wasn't the agrarian system -- the kind that dominated the first two-thirds of America's history -- the definition of a patronage society?

You mean, as in someone was kind enough to buy the stuff you grew? Patrons to your crops? Maybe.

I would suggest the paragraph doesn't take into account slavery. Sadly, America took awhile before it fought strenuously enough against that.

When I think of patronage, I think of the plebes working hard enough to catch the admiration of a rich aristocracy, who then "invests" in their future. Art is produced in this way, or was, for centuries.

I guess what I was clumsily trying to get across was that society was built on the combination of slavery and farms that were usually handed down generation to generation.

I'm wondering if our notion that everyone 150 years ago built their life from scratch isn't ignoring that jobs, land and property were doled out from parents to children. Few people give their children a job, a home and property now. I think parents were more financially giving 150 years ago than they are now.

This sentence stuck out to me:

So we have children living with their parents after they have income, just like they did in the early parts of the twentieth century and before.

 

[BitterYoungMatador2]

Our student loan debt's piled.
Some of us have no child.
Depressed and in denial.
We are the youth gone wild
Better learn to dunk a ball.
If you want to retire at all.
This country's 'bout to fall.
We are the youth gone wild.

 

[deskslave]

I can only assume we'll have more posts like that one. However, the fact that it didn't happen to you doesn't negate the reality of the trend.

I wasn't trying to negate the reality of the trend. I was just saying it's foreign to me.

Why do people on this board consistently act like someone posting their personal tale means they're speaking for society? It's mind-bending to me.

Because people on this board consistently post their personal tale so as to speak for society. Which is similarly mind-bending.

 

[britwrit]

Wikipedia says that Stephen Marche, the author of the article, is Canadian.

Obviously this is just some foreigner gloating over an imaginary problem plaguing America.

 

[Starman]

Simply recasts the class battle along gerontological lines.

The youth of the 1% are doing just swimmingly.


He buys right into the Faux Noise/Koch Bros/ALEC talking point about Social Security being a "boondoggle," "unsustainable," "broke by 2036," yadda yadda blah blah. The same **** they've been shrieking since 1935. You can't latch onto the Crazy Train and retain any intellectual credibility.

 

[Boom_70]

This guy seems seems to have a chip on his shoulder about the "American class system". He had an article in December titled "American Class System" We are Not All Created Equal".
http://www.esquire.com/features/thousand-words-on-culture/american-class-system-0112

 

[imjustagirl]

I can only assume we'll have more posts like that one. However, the fact that it didn't happen to you doesn't negate the reality of the trend.

I wasn't trying to negate the reality of the trend. I was just saying it's foreign to me.

Why do people on this board consistently act like someone posting their personal tale means they're speaking for society? It's mind-bending to me.

Because people on this board consistently post their personal tale so as to speak for society. Which is similarly mind-bending.

I can think of three. So maybe assume those of us who don't, aren't.

 

[Azrael]

And yet business has never been better. Hmm.

www.economist.com/node/21551485?fsrc=scn/tw/te/ar/marginalimprovement

 

[Boom_70]

And yet business has never been better. Hmm.

www.economist.com/node/21551485?fsrc=scn/tw/te/ar/marginalimprovement

Not making the connection.

 

[deskslave]

I can only assume we'll have more posts like that one. However, the fact that it didn't happen to you doesn't negate the reality of the trend.

I wasn't trying to negate the reality of the trend. I was just saying it's foreign to me.

Why do people on this board consistently act like someone posting their personal tale means they're speaking for society? It's mind-bending to me.

Because people on this board consistently post their personal tale so as to speak for society. Which is similarly mind-bending.

I can think of three. So maybe assume those of us who don't, aren't.

I try not to keep track of who does what. It makes me feel slightly less of a saddo.

 

[imjustagirl]

I can only assume we'll have more posts like that one. However, the fact that it didn't happen to you doesn't negate the reality of the trend.

I wasn't trying to negate the reality of the trend. I was just saying it's foreign to me.

Why do people on this board consistently act like someone posting their personal tale means they're speaking for society? It's mind-bending to me.

Because people on this board consistently post their personal tale so as to speak for society. Which is similarly mind-bending.

I can think of three. So maybe assume those of us who don't, aren't.

I try not to keep track of who does what. It makes me feel slightly less of a saddo.

Hey, don't short yourself!

 

[Stitch]

Why worry about student loan debt? Seriously, with the income-based and income-contingent repayment plans, individual borrowers could alleviate much of their problems if they just educate themselves. Those with private student loans are screwed, though.