Views: 1175 In response to huffington post "Generation Y are Yuppies"
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In response to this article: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/wait-but-why/generation-y-unhappy_b_3930620.html
I would like to start this blog by saying that I am myself a yuppie (or if you didn't read the article, I am a generation Y). There are a lot of biases present in the blog post on huffington post by anonymous, and it got me to thinking about some of the greater points within the article. This is a bit out of the norm for my blog, but I see League of Legends as an extension of real life as opposed to the reverse and for most people, that means considering your life in relation to how you the play the game.
Now, I will be the first to tell you that this has nothing to do with League of Legends, but as it relates directly to the world we live in, it indirectly effects how each one of us plays the game. I come from a humble upbringing and have worked hard for most of my life (not just my adult life). I remember waking up early every morning as a child, worrying about what kind of day the family was going to have. We used to all pitch in and do a route for the local paper to try to get by. You see, my family income was just above government assistance levels, but far below what we actually needed. I have had a hard life all the way up until highschool, and continue to struggle to this day. Hard work and determination, I have always been told, will eventually pay off and get you the life that you want and deserve.
Now, this isn't meant to be a pity post, but rather I figured if I was going to give you my dissertation on the matter, I may as well give you a bit of background information about me. You see, the dream life that most of us Y generation envisioned for ourselves doesn't exist. Even if you are fortunate enough to be reading this blog post, you still have your #firstworldproblems. Outside of that, you have real suffering going on all over the world and this includes yourself in most cases. Even if you wouldn't call it "suffering," we are all doomed to the same fate of eventual pain and death. It's part of being mortal and something you should come to terms with early on in your life.
Now to the point of this blog: "The dream is gone." No longer do I expect that through hard work and determination I will eventually have the life that I want, because I'm too busy struggling with these inflated expenses and flawed infrastructure of the past generation. We were all told growing up that there would be job security and a prosperous life for us all when we were young (admittedly, it is not wrong to feel this way and it's quite good to be optimistic in this harsh world), but today, that simply is not the truth.
A teacher of mine in the 6th grade pointed out to us children at the time of how hard he expected us to have it. He saw potential in all of us, yet he didn't shield us from the harsh reality that is life. Presumably, he himself, thought that he was immune to our future woes with inflation getting worse and the average income staying relatively low. I am here to tell you today that he was not living a perfect life, but he did try his best and deserved to feel comfortable. I'm not sure how he's doing now, but I do know that he got divorced and lost his job(s) at some point and probably teaches somewhere else now.
The point is that the blog post on huffingtonpost is wrong. It's clearly written by a baby-boomer and brings with it all of the biases of his/her generation. The idea that generation Y is unhappy because we think we are all so *******ed special is insulting. We were told growing up that we would be ok. It's natural for parents and other adults to give children a sense of well-being in an attempt to give them an enjoyable childhood. Reality is quite different than what people are able to predict, however, and is ridden with hardship and uncertainty.
If you have any questions about uncertainty, look no further than League of Legends pro gamers. They are probably the most scared they have ever been in their life, because of uncertainty. What happens to the people that put it all on the line for a "career" in esports and end up wasting 3-5 years of their life they could have been doing something more productive? You never hear about failure because it's all around you. Where is the story in that? Surely, most of these pros/semi-pros would say "any time that you enjoy yourself is not wasted,"(which I tend to agree with) but the truth is that we have all been lied to.
Now I don't want to go into League of Legends too deeply, as this is not my intention, but I will say even to the pro gamers that have "made it," they are still as uncertain as a bunch of highschoolers. Noone ever truly grows up. You still have the same emotional and physical needs as when you were/are in high school when you grow older. There is, however, one added negative to the whole equation: now, you have to do it all yourself. Realizing that some of your peers will never grow up and continue to make bad decisions their entire life, is quite empowering. You owe it to yourself to do one of two things: either accept your fate, or try your hardest every day to make your life better and the lives of those around you better.
It all comes down to subjectivity once again. Who decides who's happy? How does one achieve happiness, and why do so many unhappy people blog about being happy? It's all an illusion, a clever facade, if you will. You owe it to yourself to be happy with whatever you have. We all glorify our own existence because that's what makes us happy. What sense does it make to be unhappy about things that you can't change? It's better to work for what you believe in and try your hardest.
There's a lot of talk about "a secure career," versus "a fulfilling career" and the idea that you can't have both is ludicrous. Most people say you should try to go for a secure career to obtain fulfillment, while the others say a fulfilling career will offer you happiness and therefore security. The semantics of this back and forth are largely subjective, so what you should do to wade through all of this ******** is to remember to do one thing: "take responsibility for your own existence."
You have to work hard every day of your life and be productive with your free time. Enjoying your time counts as being productive, though. Don't ever let anyone tell you that you are wasting your time if you feel strongly enough doing something. Don't let anyone tell you you can't do something, but know the probability of success and be honest with yourself. Find a way to be happy, because life is too short to go around griping all the time. Baby-boomers lives have skewed our perception of reality. How is one person qualified to pass judgment on another person? You can never pass judgment on someone else, because you are different people. You have no idea what that person has gone through and what they continue to go through on a daily basis, all to try to make themselves happy or make a better life for themselves.
Life is about struggle and a lot of baby-boomers themselves are finding out that life is harder than they expected. It's never easy to say goodbye to someone that dies, but with each death there comes new life, and the cycle is complete. Forget overpopulation for a second and just think about how far we have come. We have really really big problems in the world today, and noone has the answers.
Let us reflect on our mistakes, and make better choices for the future. Not for the sake of ourselves, but for the sake of our children, so that they may become enlightened as well as happy. Generation Y doesn't have an entitlement issue, it's the baby-boomer generation that has the entitlement issue. If you don't feel special at the end of the day, that's your fault. That's your problem.
We all have to work hard in life and while some may have it easier than others, time wasted lamenting over what you don't have will only serve you to that end. I may never "make it," but I'll be damned if I don't give it my best shot. And **** all of you baby boomers out there that think it's unrealistic to be a unicorn atop a bed of flowers and grass. Better than being an entitled P.O.S. that thinks they are better than everyone. We might all think we are unicorns, but at least we give our peers the benefit of the doubt that they have the potential to be that unicorn they want to be.
P.S. For the record, I think that the person that wrote that blog is right about a few things. For example: the advice at the bottom for Generation Y is quite good, but the way the information is presented is flat out wrong. For every thing they have right, they have two things wrong. It's people like that, that will overgeneralize and tell people they aren't special. "Well ya know what? **** you, you damned baby-boomer *****, and **** your entitlement issues." The world is harder than you could ever imagine, but life IS SPECIAL. Don't let some entitled prick tell you otherwise. You can be anything you want to be and you will, as long as you work hard and take responsibility for your own life, you will never fail. We may not have the same opportunities as our mothers and fathers, but I'll be damned if we don't give it one hell of a shot. Life is cruel enough without worrying about other people. Keep your Generation Y comments to yourself next time, anonymous. You see, it's not the fact that our expectations have become so inflated that we are disappointed with reality, it's the fact that we have the same expectations you had when you were growing up, but not nearly as much opportunity.
P.P.S. I hope this blog post has had the desired effect. If you want to be a ****ing unicorn, then you are going to be a ****ing unicorn and no deluded grass eating baby-boomer is going to tell you that you aren't special, because we are all special. The amount of biases in that blog post made me feel strongly enough to write out a response. It's flat out wrong to overgeneralize such a complex subject and throw in a few graphs/infographics and call it a blog. I have more integrity than that, and I would hope most of you do too. Thanks for reading and have a wonderful day.
I would like to start this blog by saying that I am myself a yuppie (or if you didn't read the article, I am a generation Y). There are a lot of biases present in the blog post on huffington post by anonymous, and it got me to thinking about some of the greater points within the article. This is a bit out of the norm for my blog, but I see League of Legends as an extension of real life as opposed to the reverse and for most people, that means considering your life in relation to how you the play the game.
Now, I will be the first to tell you that this has nothing to do with League of Legends, but as it relates directly to the world we live in, it indirectly effects how each one of us plays the game. I come from a humble upbringing and have worked hard for most of my life (not just my adult life). I remember waking up early every morning as a child, worrying about what kind of day the family was going to have. We used to all pitch in and do a route for the local paper to try to get by. You see, my family income was just above government assistance levels, but far below what we actually needed. I have had a hard life all the way up until highschool, and continue to struggle to this day. Hard work and determination, I have always been told, will eventually pay off and get you the life that you want and deserve.
Now, this isn't meant to be a pity post, but rather I figured if I was going to give you my dissertation on the matter, I may as well give you a bit of background information about me. You see, the dream life that most of us Y generation envisioned for ourselves doesn't exist. Even if you are fortunate enough to be reading this blog post, you still have your #firstworldproblems. Outside of that, you have real suffering going on all over the world and this includes yourself in most cases. Even if you wouldn't call it "suffering," we are all doomed to the same fate of eventual pain and death. It's part of being mortal and something you should come to terms with early on in your life.
Now to the point of this blog: "The dream is gone." No longer do I expect that through hard work and determination I will eventually have the life that I want, because I'm too busy struggling with these inflated expenses and flawed infrastructure of the past generation. We were all told growing up that there would be job security and a prosperous life for us all when we were young (admittedly, it is not wrong to feel this way and it's quite good to be optimistic in this harsh world), but today, that simply is not the truth.
A teacher of mine in the 6th grade pointed out to us children at the time of how hard he expected us to have it. He saw potential in all of us, yet he didn't shield us from the harsh reality that is life. Presumably, he himself, thought that he was immune to our future woes with inflation getting worse and the average income staying relatively low. I am here to tell you today that he was not living a perfect life, but he did try his best and deserved to feel comfortable. I'm not sure how he's doing now, but I do know that he got divorced and lost his job(s) at some point and probably teaches somewhere else now.
The point is that the blog post on huffingtonpost is wrong. It's clearly written by a baby-boomer and brings with it all of the biases of his/her generation. The idea that generation Y is unhappy because we think we are all so *******ed special is insulting. We were told growing up that we would be ok. It's natural for parents and other adults to give children a sense of well-being in an attempt to give them an enjoyable childhood. Reality is quite different than what people are able to predict, however, and is ridden with hardship and uncertainty.
If you have any questions about uncertainty, look no further than League of Legends pro gamers. They are probably the most scared they have ever been in their life, because of uncertainty. What happens to the people that put it all on the line for a "career" in esports and end up wasting 3-5 years of their life they could have been doing something more productive? You never hear about failure because it's all around you. Where is the story in that? Surely, most of these pros/semi-pros would say "any time that you enjoy yourself is not wasted,"(which I tend to agree with) but the truth is that we have all been lied to.
Now I don't want to go into League of Legends too deeply, as this is not my intention, but I will say even to the pro gamers that have "made it," they are still as uncertain as a bunch of highschoolers. Noone ever truly grows up. You still have the same emotional and physical needs as when you were/are in high school when you grow older. There is, however, one added negative to the whole equation: now, you have to do it all yourself. Realizing that some of your peers will never grow up and continue to make bad decisions their entire life, is quite empowering. You owe it to yourself to do one of two things: either accept your fate, or try your hardest every day to make your life better and the lives of those around you better.
It all comes down to subjectivity once again. Who decides who's happy? How does one achieve happiness, and why do so many unhappy people blog about being happy? It's all an illusion, a clever facade, if you will. You owe it to yourself to be happy with whatever you have. We all glorify our own existence because that's what makes us happy. What sense does it make to be unhappy about things that you can't change? It's better to work for what you believe in and try your hardest.
There's a lot of talk about "a secure career," versus "a fulfilling career" and the idea that you can't have both is ludicrous. Most people say you should try to go for a secure career to obtain fulfillment, while the others say a fulfilling career will offer you happiness and therefore security. The semantics of this back and forth are largely subjective, so what you should do to wade through all of this ******** is to remember to do one thing: "take responsibility for your own existence."
You have to work hard every day of your life and be productive with your free time. Enjoying your time counts as being productive, though. Don't ever let anyone tell you that you are wasting your time if you feel strongly enough doing something. Don't let anyone tell you you can't do something, but know the probability of success and be honest with yourself. Find a way to be happy, because life is too short to go around griping all the time. Baby-boomers lives have skewed our perception of reality. How is one person qualified to pass judgment on another person? You can never pass judgment on someone else, because you are different people. You have no idea what that person has gone through and what they continue to go through on a daily basis, all to try to make themselves happy or make a better life for themselves.
Life is about struggle and a lot of baby-boomers themselves are finding out that life is harder than they expected. It's never easy to say goodbye to someone that dies, but with each death there comes new life, and the cycle is complete. Forget overpopulation for a second and just think about how far we have come. We have really really big problems in the world today, and noone has the answers.
Let us reflect on our mistakes, and make better choices for the future. Not for the sake of ourselves, but for the sake of our children, so that they may become enlightened as well as happy. Generation Y doesn't have an entitlement issue, it's the baby-boomer generation that has the entitlement issue. If you don't feel special at the end of the day, that's your fault. That's your problem.
We all have to work hard in life and while some may have it easier than others, time wasted lamenting over what you don't have will only serve you to that end. I may never "make it," but I'll be damned if I don't give it my best shot. And **** all of you baby boomers out there that think it's unrealistic to be a unicorn atop a bed of flowers and grass. Better than being an entitled P.O.S. that thinks they are better than everyone. We might all think we are unicorns, but at least we give our peers the benefit of the doubt that they have the potential to be that unicorn they want to be.
P.S. For the record, I think that the person that wrote that blog is right about a few things. For example: the advice at the bottom for Generation Y is quite good, but the way the information is presented is flat out wrong. For every thing they have right, they have two things wrong. It's people like that, that will overgeneralize and tell people they aren't special. "Well ya know what? **** you, you damned baby-boomer *****, and **** your entitlement issues." The world is harder than you could ever imagine, but life IS SPECIAL. Don't let some entitled prick tell you otherwise. You can be anything you want to be and you will, as long as you work hard and take responsibility for your own life, you will never fail. We may not have the same opportunities as our mothers and fathers, but I'll be damned if we don't give it one hell of a shot. Life is cruel enough without worrying about other people. Keep your Generation Y comments to yourself next time, anonymous. You see, it's not the fact that our expectations have become so inflated that we are disappointed with reality, it's the fact that we have the same expectations you had when you were growing up, but not nearly as much opportunity.
P.P.S. I hope this blog post has had the desired effect. If you want to be a ****ing unicorn, then you are going to be a ****ing unicorn and no deluded grass eating baby-boomer is going to tell you that you aren't special, because we are all special. The amount of biases in that blog post made me feel strongly enough to write out a response. It's flat out wrong to overgeneralize such a complex subject and throw in a few graphs/infographics and call it a blog. I have more integrity than that, and I would hope most of you do too. Thanks for reading and have a wonderful day.
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