Generalisations are good, aren’t they?
“They (Young people) have exalted notions, because they have not been humbled by life or learned its necessary limitations; moreover, their hopeful disposition makes them think themselves equal to great things – and that means they have exalted notions. They would always rather do noble deeds than useful ones: Their lives are regulated more by feelings than reasoning – all their mistakes are in the direction of doing things excessively and vehemently. They overdo everything – they love too much, hate too much, and the same with everything else. (Aristotle).”
Think about it for a moment, how often have you heard the expression that kids today are difficult, distracted, blame it on too much screen time, TikTok, social media and that surliness when asked to put the phone down, ‘listen to me’…
Yes, kids today are difficult. They are far too distracted, distant, cannot communicate effectively, the music they listen to – is that really music or just noise? They argue, talk back, don’t listen.
But is that any different than when we were kids?
My mum loved… loved… the Doris day song ‘How much is that doggy in the window’. It was the first English language song she sang. My dad had lots of funny Dutch ditties to entertain us with.
They hated the music I listened to. The early days of Rock’n roll with Little Richard, Chuck Berry, Elvis Presley, and then the Beatles and Rolling Stones. And the way I dressed, rebelled against the silly rules I had to live with. So not Aussie, which is what I wanted to be, not tied down by the religious rules of Holland we had left, like no beach on Sunday, that was ‘the Lord’s Day’, (but somehow if it was a real stinking hot one, we could all get in the car and drive down to Port Beach for a cooling swim).
Broadway Stomp with Johnny Young and the Pretenders (I think,) heading down with my Latvian friend Andris and getting home in the small hours of the morning. It really upset my father, he waited up for me and was angry that I was the reason he was tired and grumpy the next day.
I tried to remind him that I didn’t need him to wait up for me, I had a door key.
It seemed like I was not listening to my parents, not growing up as they would have liked me to... a migrant kid learning to live both as an Aussie and as part of my immigrant family led to the occasional clash of cultures.
Apparently I was a difficult kid. Just like Andris was, just like so many of my school mates were.
Are kids more difficult today?
Life is ‘different’ today, music is different, delivered differently, Spotify, music videos, the language… and can you really call that music? And the screen time, playing games, such violence, and the hours spent playing online. And the phones, always on the phone. Endless messages. It was so different in my day... Or was it? I do remember hours on the landline talking with a girlfriend, others waiting to use the phone, ’aren’t you finished yet, do you ever run out of things to say?’ Oh young love.
A young man who is not particularly sociable at the best of times, tends to be a bit self-isolating, has played Fortnite for the last few years, and his mother was criticised by another parent at their school for allowing it.
He and and his family moved away for a year, to a regional centre and had to attend a new school, establish new connections. He continued to play Fortnight but also developed his music skills, spent more time playing his guitar, formed his own band. No one in his family knew about the band until he had to confess that it was band practice which a kept him at school late one day. ‘Oh and by the way, we are performing on Friday at the school gym. You can come if you like.’
I remember talking with the young man about a birthday present a few years back. What should I get him, or perhaps a more pertinent question, what ambitious project is he saving for? At that time it was an amplifier for his guitars. He has since had another birthday or two, and with Christmas coming up, having turned 16, his current savings goal is for a car. I guess a new toy of somekind, a boardgame for example may not be the most desired gift, but a contribution to his savings goal is more than welcome.
So are kids more difficult today or is the generalisation a convenient means of actually not talking with, or engaging with kids? Or maybe instead of standing in judgement, consider what life was like when we were kids. What troubles did we get into, not just me, but those around me, school mates, work mates.
I recall a conversation by the beach a little while ago: A man was cleaning graffiti from a picnic area. He was in his sixties and started bemoaning the fact that graffiti was everywhere, he cannot remember it like this, this bad. We talked for a while, about growing up, raising families, that sort of stuff and I told him about the new shopping centre which was built just over the river from where I lived in the 1980s. The walk to the centre, about a kilometre, was across a footbridge over the river and a through a tunnel under the main road, coming up near the entrance to the shops. A very short time after the tunnel had been completed, about a thousand spray cans of paint had been used to ‘decorate’ the tunnel. Bus shelters carried similar ‘tags’.
Kids and cans of spray paint. Then and now. I guess the sense that graffiti is worse today than it was when the man was younger has a bit to do with it being his current job to clean it up, so his awareness level is a bit higher than it may have been before.
Why do we (some of us) consider all kids to be more difficult today? Could it be a convenient generalisation to confirm that my generation, our generation, was just the best generation ever?
Generalisation is how we become dismissive of others.
Whenever we use the term ‘all’ when considering some sort of critique of people, should we not ask a deeper question, like explore why are we so ready to generalise? To consider whether the generalisation is really a means of not thinking about an individual person, able to dismiss them because they are whatever generalisation I/we conveniently apply to them?
And then it is good to consider memory, the memories we cherish, those amazing times we had growing up. How real are they or are they really a sugarcoated version of the lives we lived, the angst we caused our parents to suffer?
The convenience of generalising, making sweeping comments about any particular group of people is a lazy way of not caring, and not really getting to know the people we are making those comments about as individuals.
Talking with an acquaintance who is supervisor on a FIFO minesite recently, I was told how ‘stupid’ the Irish immigrants coming onto the site were; didn’t listen, seemed to know better than the supervisor how to do the tasks at hand but somehow managed to find themselves in some kind of bother, a bogged vehicle when they had been warned to stay away from that area because of the recent rain. But when asked if it was only the Irish who did that, he had to admit that quite a few ‘newbies’ got things wrong, didn’t follow instructions… Not just the Irish, even some dinki-di Aussies didn’t follow instructions sometimes.
So could it be that the good old Irish jokes, which marked them as being a little bit silly, or not quite as bright as the rest of humanity (in parts of Europe the same ‘jokes’ are used to denigrate Polish people, similarly there have been jokes about Jews, about any group different than ‘us’ or ‘me’) are just convenient generalisations so that those people can be categorised, not thought too deeply about, and allowing an excuse for when they didn’t get it ‘right’ and so can be more easily dismissed and overlooked in future situations?
Even used as a means to justify killing millions, as in the Nazi genocide.
Or taking sides at a time of conflict, such as in the Middle East, where Islamists must be terrorists, the fear of what the incoming government of Syria means for minorities, the various Islamic sects, the Christians who are Syrian. Or the willingness to see all Palestinians as Hamas terrorists, or even when considering Hamas as a terrorist organisation, failing to think what circumstances has led to their resistance to, hostility toward, Israel.
Or in considering women who claim to be victims of rape to being less than truthful. Passing judgement on the clothes they wear, ‘look at that mini skirt, she’s asking for it’, or that they accepted the drink… that was spiked, I mean what the heck were they doing in that bar, club, venue, party, if not ‘asking for it’? Aren’t they very much the types of comments made about Brittany Higgins when she accused Bruce Lehrmann of raping her?
And what were the excuses offered by the fifty men who raped the comatosed Gisele Pelicot in the recent rape trial in France? That it could not have been rape because her husband (implying that he owned his wife) approved, encouraged, even filmed the sexual intercourse and filed the footage into his computer.
Generalisations can be convenient and they have been used to avoid really understanding people for a very long time and a means of avoiding responsibility for the damage caused. They are also used in politics, eg Labor are apparently poor economic managers.
From the dismissiveness of young people, to the marginalisation of people based on gender, ethnicity, religion, politics or any other mark of differentiation, generalisations allow for not understanding people, and that leads to conflict from family breakdowns, where children are fought with over their choice of music or just their youthful exuberance, to criminalising people based on race or poverty, or justify genocide because of ethnicity or religion or whatever marker is chosen.
How easily generalisation degenerates into discrimination, marginalisation and even hatred was so easily demonstrated in the ‘Blue eye, Brown eye’ exercise by Jane Elliot, a teacher in Iowa, fifty years ago.
It doesn’t take much.
But it takes effort to really get to know people, to take time to listen and empathise, but it is well worth the effort.
Also by Bert Hetebry: As the Gaza genocide continues, it cannot be a happy 2025
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Back in the 1980s the then Leader of the SA Opposition John Olsen was telling a group of us at a formal dinner that during his wanderings – getting out to mingle with the public – he was talking to a lady who he learned was 85.
He asked her; “What was it like in your day?”
She glared back at him and replied; “Young man, these are my days.”
It absolutely floored him.
Aristotle seems to have forgotten that he was young once, and that at that time the then older generations were saying exactly the same thing about him and his contemporaries.
The only murderer of my acquaintance (well, the only one of which I’m sure) was racist to the core; his rationalisation was that the two men he killed, who had earlier killed his pregnant wife, were black. But you don’t focus on that particular aspect of a person with whom you’ve had a negative experience, without there already being an ingrained prejudice.
Generalisations can be useful in a limited way, but it’s always important to remember that there is no rule that lacks exceptions and that rules based on limited experience and knowledge are more likely to be faulty.
People are people, take each individual as you find them.
Except fascists, of course. And Collingwood supporters …
Oh yes, I know about Collingwood supporters, I once had a son in law who played for them. The marriage was very short. But then I do have a very good friend who is a Collingwood supporter…. so maybe it was the groom, not the fact he played for Collingwood that was the issue.
As for fascists…. watching the film ‘Prosecuting Evil (It’s available on ABC iview) it is amazing how ‘following orders’ can cover a multitude of sins.
I trust you had an enjoyable Christmas leefe, and look forward to a new year full of the promise of good things.
Bert.
Agree wholeheartedly with your last sentence, leefe. Might I add Crows supporters?
Ironically, John Olsen – who I referred to in my first comment – I believe is on the Crows board.
Listening, absorbing, cogitating and then commenting is a fine process, given time. In the modern rush, exchanges often take on the form of contest, a sort of ‘like’ / ‘not like’ fait accompli most often lacking nuance. Or there’s the blather, a rush to unload.
I suspect this is a generalization, but seeing we’re at it, generally I like to slow it down, but still at times find myself generalizing.
Whatever!
Yes, so do I find myself generalising Clakka.
It’s quite a convenient thing to do now and again.