[sQL_inject]

Save this comment for the future: comparison is the thief of joy, and in our connected world, comparison is inescapable.

Young people are berated with constant comparison, whether it be beauty standards, financial success (across generations), or romance.

One day we'll study this period and affirm that globalization, hyper addictive media and pornography come with dark sides.

[xeromal]

It really does seem as simple as that. I grew up dirt poor in rural appalachia but we were all poor so I didn't care. Really had a good life and it helped shaped my perspective on what matters even though I make good money now.

[bradlys]

Weird. I grew up in a similar environment. I didn’t enjoy it at all. Maybe the rampant violent alcoholism and meth just isn’t my thing. Of course, it had other major issues.

[jajko]

Bingo, nr 1 reason why older generations now don't grok younger these days. There were always similar scenarios, lets be honest this ain't unique situation generally, despite many trying to claim otherwise, certainly for me and my peers say 25 years ago situation looked almost exactly the same, we just didn't expect to have a great life immediately but work it off gradually.

Heck, my first net salary after university (proper CS title) working 100% as Java software dev was what, cca 350-400$ a month? I could afford almost nothing and that was fine and expected. I don't think I need to calculate how many tens of times my salary went up till this day while still doing Java dev. Yet young folks who start are immediately pissed off they only get very high and not ridiculous amounts right out of school, complaining they can't buy some central housing. Buy?!? As said huge disconnect across generations.

[cayleyh]

This is related to the evaporation of "free time", socializing irl, and hobbies that I've observed vs. my pre-cellphone/pre-internet youth & young adulthood. Not having social media, work emails & slack, and all the group chats enforced periods of quietness, boredom, and being alone. You went out and socialized and did things in public more often just because you were bored and you couldn't just doomscroll and share memes with the group chat. The overall increase in baseline cognitive social load that is entirely digital and interruptive (notifications!!!) instead of planned irl activities just seems to add to general stress levels and decrease baseline mental wellness.

[keybored]

I’ll save it as the ultimate “just be positive” slogan as the world gets worse and worse.

Young adults got tossed into Covid lockdown as teens and higher education students. They worry about climate change. Wars have always happened but now with Ukraine it’s happening in proximity to the West. The second Trump administration is much worse than the first. The old “getting a better life than your parents” isn’t looking great, in fact it’s trending downward.

That people are perhaps more toxically “tuned in” to what everyone else is doing is just the cherry on top of objective reality.

[renewiltord]

Yes, exactly. It's why everyone is obsessed with 'inequality' these days. They all have a better life than my childhood was and I was happy then and I'm happy now. The difference is that I'm not always looking in the other guy's bowl to see if he has more than me.

[logicchains]

That's victim blaming, to suggest the problem is that young people are comparing themselves to their parents' generation, rather than the problem being that their parents' generation has made the world worse for their children.

[jader201]

I don't think the parent comment is passing blame on a particular generation -- they're simply blaming the state of the era we're living in, and the tools that are available to all of us, including the younger generation that has (always had) less self discipline to moderate their behavior and addition to these tools.

[fullshark]

They are comparing their lives to completely phony ones on the internet and finding it wanting. The no. 1 job they aspire to is influencer, because they see it as the ideal life, cause it's painted as such.

[thomassmith65]

Globalization was fantastic actually. America is only a few weeks away now from discovering how wrongheaded complaints about it were.

The actual problem is inequality, but inequality in right/libertarian thought is supposed to be good. So they * reached for a more comfortable explanation involving 'the other': globalists!

* 'they' is a discourse smell, so I will cite some examples: Glenn Beck, Pat Buchanan, Alex Jones, Steve Bannon, Viktor Orban, etc.

It has been annoying, for almost two decades, to witness the success of anti-globalization propaganda.

Economic inequality surely is contributing to depression in young people. Exposure to wonderful people, products, opportunities and ideas from all around the globe is not.

[Jensson]

> Economic inequality surely is contributing to depression in young people. Exposure to wonderful people, products, opportunities and ideas from all around the globe is not.

Those two are linked though, exposure to competition from all around the world is the problem you are talking about. You can't have both these opportunities and avoid competition.

I do think this freedom is a good thing, but I also understand it leads to inequality. That is why globalism was typically a right wing position since it helps the rich.