By John Shirley
I'm disgusted with the
young. It's not because so many of them abandoned rock'n'roll for
hip-hop, with its (not always, but often) misogyny and advocacy of
brutal violence and greed -- they're entitled to piss off older people,
just like I did. I liked punk rock, it was pretty damn nihilistic and
"unconstructive" and those extremes are necessary, culturally. So it
isn't that.
And it's not about their
fascination with games like Grand Theft Auto, even though you can get
points by beating innocent people to death in it and even though it's
innately psychopathic: when I was young I liked horror stories and I
wrote bizarre and brutal and megalomanical fiction, like Dracula In
Love, which was really over the top. So it's not that.
No...I'm not disgusted with
the young because they're so narcissistically fascinated with the
possibilities of fame; I'm not disgusted with them just because they're
convinced that you're not truly real if you're not on TV, so convinced
of this that they're willing to act like the people in The Magic
Christian, swimming through vats of shit to get to money: to leap
headlong into Fear Factor and The Apprentice. So what if they eagerly
sit at the Donald's feet to learn how to demean, dehumanize, demoralize,
and downsize anyone who gets in their way; so what if they're
downright giddy with the desire to learn from the people in the show The
Casino how to become less human, more manipulative, more selfish, more
effectively greedy...
I'm not even disgusted
with their doglike snout-to-the-ass ball-licking engagement with
onanistic entertainment systems to the point of looking for consoles
they can play everywhere, everywhere, everywhere; nor even the eager way
they're embracing televisions in cars; I'm not so terribly disgusted
with the the happy Web-prancing flocks of Wired mag cyberpunkettes
mindlessly delighting in the Internet and the latest software and never
talking about the environmental destruction caused by the computer
industry...
I'm not even all that
disgusted with the young for their irresponsible Bumfight videos and
their idiotic binge drinking and for letting that Girls Gone Wild
asshole film them and for thinking that films of people getting their
heads sawed off in Iraq are "tight"...
It's not so much that I'm
disgusted with their eager coupling with the notion of Attention Deficit
Disorder (which is for most people an illusion) or their unconcerned
capitulation to having chat-room attention spans; or their rejection of
long thoughts and complex ideas...or their tendency to use beaches for
ashtrays and to throw trash on the ground within four feet of a trash
can...
I resist being disgusted
with their having become cellphone-cyborgs, with their gossipy little
world of parties and whining till their Dad buys them a car; with their
taking "X" and speed and casually smoking salvia and smoking pot before
class and partying on 'shrooms and insisting that this "recreational"
idiocy is somehow an important exercise of freedom...
I do not allow myself to be
disgusted with their turning away from books...
It'd be hypocrisy to be
disgusted with those things. Because the baby boomers and Gen X made the
young the way they are -- We created the systems they're caught
up in and the goods they're consuming so indiscriminately. We trained
them, by example, to use the world for a dungheap. We created the world
of haste they're hastening to take part in... And we engage in much of it
ourselves.
But you know what we did do
that 18-and-over young people didn't do? We voted in the election.
We didn't register to vote
because it was cool to do that for a day, and then not show up at the
polls because Latisha was having a party.
We showed up at the polls.
And we voted.
It turns out that many of
the young, though often registered, didn't show up. More did than in
previous years, it's true -- but many others didn't. They didn't give a
damn. They were too busy licking their own balls and sniffing each
other's rectums. They really don't understand the issues and they don't
care if they don't understand. It would take too much work to understand
the issues. It's even too much work to show up at the voting booth and
vote on the advice of others. So they simply didn't show up. They're too
shallow and narcissistic, too "busy."
And that's why... that's
really why...
THAT is why I'm disgusted
with the young.