Recently I had a discussion with a former professor about the change in generations. We were trying to figure out why each new class seems more and more insular. With every new group of students, each year the self involvement and sense of entitlement seems to grow. No I am only 26 years old. I look at people my age and I am not impressed either. In no way is my generation, not the one that came before us a selfless band of martyrs that rose to greatness in a difficult time, but they were capable of the simplest acts of self sufficiency.
As a T.A. at a community college as well as a regular consistently visiting alumna of another university, I witness selfishness more regularly then I care too. It is an interesting form of selfishness. It is selfishness paired with a complete lack of work ethic. The culture seems to be loosing all aspects of accountability or drive. It is a well you do it for me kind of selfishness, a truly sad state of affairs. It is a society that wants everything and doesn't expect to have to do anything to get it and sadly my contemporaries don't even feel the need to show up on time or at all for that matter.
The students I see when I work in the college ceramic studio are extremely lazy. Many don't take advantage of the service, number one, and can't understand why they fail. The ones that do show up tend to leave the studio wrecked. I am not sure if they expect me to clean up after them or what. Clay is left in the sink and often the water left running for minutes at full blast, while they walk off and do something else.
I've pondered what the cause of such selfish apathy is. The generation after mine is only 3 to 4 years younger. It doesn't seem like a huge time period, but as I think back to my childhood I remember how important a year's difference made. Even today there is a huge difference between a 7 and 10 year old. Ultimately I feel it is technology that has increased selfishness. Technology to me is the major difference between my generation and younger ones, the way I see it my generation was the last one before the huge exponential technological explosion that we are still engrained in. technology was and still to my mind, a privilege. Sure I had a computer as a kid, but I only used it to type up reports. I didn't have internet in my home until I was 18, the same goes with a cell phone.
That means that those younger then me came of age with the world at their fingertips. Now when you can have almost anything you want during your formative years, how does that not breed selfishness? Being able to talk to anyone at anytime, see anything at any time and so on, everything coming to you and you not having to do a thing for it, but turn on the computer. So yes I believe we are definitely becoming more selfish.