Mark Bauerlein and other adults would argue that we are dumber than their generation or that technology is making us stupid. A teen might argue the opposite for naught but the purpose of disagreement, it gives us a feeling of individuality and independence, but I’d like to raise a few real points to the issue. There are definitely things about our generation that are leading to the decline of intelligence but I don’t ultimately agree with Bauerlein’s theories.
Adults argue that youth is prone to mob psychology because the brains of youth don’t yet have the capacity to think for themselves. If someone told a group of middle schoolers to burn a church down because it’s a new fad, they would do it with little question. (nz.answers.yahoo.com) Now of course this example is an exaggeration but the point still applies. Another point from an adult would be that youth has a declining capacity for displaying a complete thought. Kids in this generation are encouraged that seeming simple is cool, intelligence is for nerds and stupidity is a luxury reserved for athletes and pot heads. (www.boston.com) Finally, media is affecting the level of violence and disrespect in youth. When kids play violent video games like Grand Theft Auto and Call of Duty, they get the idea that it’s okay to shoot up their school or rob a convenience store. (nz.answers.yahoo.com) Adult views and teen views differ widely.
In Mark Bauerlein’s book, The Dumbest Generation, he seems to arrogantly demand our generation work to benefit his generation, not ours. I understand why our generation would seem dumber than his, but his is generally technologically inept. I could debate, discuss and rant about everything that is wrong with our society today but this is an essay simply debating whether we are the dumbest generation or not. While it is true that our generation is generally more disrespectful, I don’t think the parents or our developing brains are entirely to blame. Parents raise us until we are old enough to hang out with friends outside of the house, after that we are raised by society. This, in part, is to blame for year after year of children being more disrespectful, stupid and slutty. I think because they grow up with the slightly more intelligent, courteous and decent generation coupled with the mentality that parents are lame and they need to be unlike older people to be cool, this makes them stray farther and farther from the decency of previous generations, which in turn makes them more and more annoying to ours (nz.answers.yahoo.com). Our generation has gotten lazier and lazier as well, an example is the overuse of the same words like “fail”, “love”, “amazing”, “omg”, “gay”, etc. We make little attempt to add range to our vocabulary and just keep saying the same old words over and over. Some would argue that we have even gotten lazy enough to lack the desire of intelligence. Well I disagree, but not entirely. Our generation is encouraged more that stupidity is better than intelligence. (www.boston.com)