Generation Gap

Generation Gap- A term that has become so cliche that it is almost redundant now. It used to imply the difference of opinion between the members of two different generations. Parents and kids to be precise. Now it has grown between siblings and cousins more than three years apart! I guess it is another appendage of the rapid world we live in.
But it makes me think of how it all began. What the wisdom of the elders refused to understand, the flexibility of the young ones was willing to give a shot. What the elders considered the ‘right’ thing, the young ones discarded as redundant. It spanned from things like clothes, beliefs, politics to jobs, and what is acceptable morally. Generally, each generation refused to shift their stand or try to understand the point of view of the other.
Where the parents labeled the youth as immoral, irresponsible, brash, and arrogant, the young thought that the seniors were too laid back, didn’t know how to get things done efficiently and were hung up on things of no consequences.
I think both were right in their own way.
There were places where the young needed to slow down and even pump up on the morals. But they sure were right in venturing into waters never trodden in the past, about being fearless and courageous enough to challenge the status quo. I think the challenging often grated on the nerves of the elders but if they’d take a moment and reflect, they’d have known places where change was required.
Similarly the elders were wrong in a lot of ways and in more cases than one if only they’d have set their egos aside and objectively looked at the situation, they’d have seen that there was indeed a flaw in the status quo.
That was as far as the story was so far.
But taking a look at the generation after me makes my heart quake. So many of them have fallen prey to the niceties of technology and have become so passive. My generation was rash but at least there was some active force in us. There was kinetic energy that was up to something. I don’t see it in the kids today. They are stuck to technology and treating it more like a necessary life support system rather than an extension to enable work. It is a worrisome scenario. It scares me helpless to wonder what young people will be 50 years from now. But then again, I wonder what different am I doing? Isn’t it something every generation has done? Will what looks like doom to me actually turn out to be our salvation once the gauze of time is wrapped around it? who knows... only time can tell...

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