| May 2012 | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| S | M | T | W | T | F | S |
| 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | ||
| 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 |
| 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 |
| 20 | 21 | 22 | 23 | 24 | 25 | 26 |
| 27 | 28 | 29 | 30 | 31 | ||
There have been a couple of pieces in the past few days about the seeming overabundance of useless young males in our society. This is an article in The Washington Post by an academic who notes the trend as a problem in teaching that needs to be solved (true). This is from National Review Online, which responds to the first piece in a knee jerk “it’s the Feminist’s fault” diatribe (also true).
I have been monitoring this trend for some time. These surplus young men are mostly middle class. They are the origin of the stereotype of the grown guy who lives in his parent’s basement and spends his days playing video games. They don’t go to college, although it is available to them. If they work at all it is in some ephemeral profession such as “future rock star.” Although their parents have raised them as “too good to flip burgers” the truth is that they are nearly unemployable, because holding a job means showing up on time and not sleeping all day. They are adrift and aimless in a society with more opportunities than have ever existed in history. Many people just dismiss them as lazy bums (frequently true), but having been raised with no responsibilities they are unprepared to accept any. The Baby Boomers are regarded as the most spoiled generation in American history, but that isn’t true anymore. Compared to their children, the Boomers are Puritans.
Because I look at things from a skewed view (from the big picture, if you like) I see the problem as one of nature.
Here in America in the late 20th and early 21st century we’re seeing something that has never happened before. A combination of medical advances and lack of warfare have given us an un-culled herd of people, a kind of devolution, if you will.
Childhood diseases (measles, mumps, rubella, diphtheria, others) have been all but eliminated through vaccination, as have most other diseases that used to kill significant portions of the population (smallpox, polio etc.).
The last war to significantly reduce to male population in America was World War II.
So if you take away child mortality, most adult diseases and war what do you get?
A whole lot of useless young males sitting in their parent’s basement playing video games - that’s what.
Old Ma Nature is trying, though. Although HIV has not been the herd-reducer it could have been (still talking about America here), She’s busy cooking up new micro-brews for catastrophic readjustment.
Bird flu, anyone?
Do I sound callous? Not as callous as nature.
