what’s wrong with lying? serious question.

Every time I think “the kids are alright” the kids go and disappoint me by being shitty, and every time I’m down on the youth they go and do something that makes me say “the kids are alright.” In conclusion, the kids are how they’ve always been: young, trying to learn, and making mistakes along the way that they will hopefully learn from. Some are shitty and will likely grow up to be shitheads, some are solid people who will hopefully understand themselves better as they learn and grow, some are shitheads who will grow up to be better, and some are sadly at their best now and will get worse and more reactionary as they grow. Same as it ever was.

edit: I will say, as part of the cohort that I guess preceded this current one, kids are dealing with a lot more today that we really only got a taste of when I was a kid. I never had to form an opinion on Andrew Tate when I was 15 years old. We had bro science bullshit and toxic gym culture, but it was not on the level that I see today. A less politicized daily life, which I guess one could criticize since it was an extremely apolitical “end of history” era, but that was probably better for our mental health than the post-2016 chaos that only gets worse each year. We didn’t have to make sense of a mass disabling pandemic in the ninth grade. Social media was a damaging presence, but it was not everywhere like it is today. Being extremely online was uncommon also, at least to the degree people are today. So I think there are some real issues that have gotten worse over the years that might make those who deal with teens feel like they’re “worse” or more annoying, but to blame the kids for that is some boomer logic. The kids didn’t cause the Covid pandemic, the kids didn’t ask their parents to raise them on social media, or start promoting white supremacy on twitter. Any issue with the kids is an issue with us, you can’t blame a group of people who have no experience or understanding, and who’s brains are not even fully formed yet, for the issues in society.

Unlimited genocide on the first world

Imma be honest, the only reason I learned anything in school was because of homework

I do think teachers often give too much of it though, with little thought given to how much homework kids are getting from other classes

I once pledged allegiance to my neighbor’s flag on a saturday when I was in kindergarten

Happy Tree Friends. I first want to say I never enjoyed this shit, but in college I went to this dude’s apartment with my roommate to smoke weed, and we’re just sitting there sort of fucked up, and he goes “wanna watch Happy Tree Friends?” Neither me nor my roommate had heard of it, so he puts it on, and goddamn why the fuck anyone would want to watch that shit, much less watch that shit stoned, is beyond me. Immediate vibe killer.

Of course my roommate and our friend were literally laughing out loud, and I’m sitting there stoned reevaluating my friendship with these people (probably a good thing in hindsight). And these were dudes in college, I think we were sophomores and he was a senior. The humor is like kindergarten-tier, like those are the “kill Barney” jokes an obnoxious 5 year old boy makes. I never thought those jokes were funny then, but it’s one thing for an immature child to make an edgy joke like that, it’s another thing for a graduating senior to consider the same edgy non-joke that only exists for shock value and nothing else, made over and over ad infinitum across numerous videos, is the height of humor. “Oh you guys are gonna like this one, he dies in a crazy way in a second. Oh! Did you see that?” Dude was rewatching videos he had already seen.

Needless to say I stopped hanging out with these people.

the season in either 2016 or 2017 I remember a lot of people, including leftists, were trying to tell me was super progressive and a biting critique of society. It’s the only season of South Park I ever watched, because my roommate at the time wanted to (who of course loved it since he later evolved into a right-wing shithead) and yeah, there was like one pretty good story line about gentrification, there rest was just shitty South Park shenanigans

damn and I was thinking of rewatching this one

Robot Chicken is literally just a “kill Barney” joke stretched out to 15 minutes and told by adults instead of obnoxious kindergartners. Never liked that show. Happy Tree Friends-tier humor, just absolute bottom of the barrel.

I have real and visceral anger towards South Park and also Family Guy and Call of Duty, which was the unholy trinity of what middle school boys were into when I was in middle school. There’s a lot I fault my mom for in my upbringing, but one thing I am very glad she did in hindsight was not allow me to watch those shows, cause lord knows I wanted to. Those shows were so ubiquitous in those years though that I can’t help but feel I picked up some bad messaging from them just through osmosis because most of my friends were into them. The first I ever learned of climate change was through my friends telling me it wasn’t real because that’s what they heard on South Park and then showing me the Al Gore manbearpig clip. I don’t think society has yet had a reckoning with how damaging those shows were.

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no. I’ve met people with tons of money that are better people than some, and who I could tolerate being around or maybe even hanging out with for a bit, but never anyone that I would consider a “good” person in an absolute sense.

edit: damn people in here know people with tons of money. For me “tons of money” is making more than 100k a year.

My read on it has been even the people that care don’t care that much. No one’s political predictions went anywhere. Trump won in 2016 and everything continued to get worse, then Biden won in 2020 and everything continued to get worse. It gets harder and harder for both sides to cope so I think they just don’t care.

Back in 2020 my vote blue no matter who friend would always send me long texts like “look, I understand where you’re coming from, but Biden is the most progressive presidential candidate in history if you look at his platform. Also, look at the alternative!” I haven’t heard a peep from him or any of my friends. Not even the Trump people seem to really be talking about the election ime

I’m dreading 2024.

But honestly, this years campaign season seems so subdued compared to previous years. Idk, maybe that’s just because I myself am tired it just seems like everyone else is. Or maybe I’ve just successfully ignored it this year. But in 2015 and 2019 it was unavoidable, this year it’s felt very quiet.

I can’t stop laughing at the pledge of allegiance was going HARD. Perfect characterization. Was the person yelling it or something? I’m imagining like a bass boosted pledge of allegiance, or someone throwing in adlibs.

yeah as I say this is something I did when I liked the owners. Seems like you’ve had a tough relationship with the owners. Thought it might be something to try since you felt guilty, but if you don’t want to, then honestly do not feel guilty about leaving. A job is a job, you don’t owe these people anything, especially if they’ve ignored their business themselves. Part of running a business is dealing with turnover, if they can’t deal with you leaving then that’s on them.

I once had to quit a job where I really liked the owners. At the end of the day it’s your life, and this is just a job. I liked them though, and it was a very small operation. I was also quitting with no plans for what I’d do next, so I told them I’d stay on until they found someone to replace me. Took them like a month or two to find someone and get them ready to start. Maybe you’re able to do something like this. Although I had other reasons that I had to quit at the time that weren’t just I hate the job or I found a better job so idk.

September two years ago I was taking a walk by my old school before the school year had started, and I saw the football team gearing up for the season. The coach thought they were slacking with their suicides, so he gets them all in a line and starts yelling at them about 9/11. Some dude he didn’t even know but went to school with had died in the towers I guess. Still sad of course. But it’s been 20 years, everyone on the team was born after 9/11, no one even knows this guy who died (the coach didn’t even really either), and his central thesis (the rant went on for like 10 minutes, you could hear him quite a ways away he was yelling so loud) was that “those people in the towers died so that you could stand on this field today.” I hadn’t really heard that sort of rhetoric since 2011 when Osama died, about the arab terrorist threat at the door and only the brave men and women in the US military can protect us. Brought back memories of my middle school peers wanting to “carpet bomb the middle east,” the racist jokes that came from South Park, Family Guy, and all the shitty stand up comics from around that time, the constant “support our troops” and “never forget” stuff. In 2011 I was in high school and all the jocks and other chuddy people brought American flags to school and just skipped class to stand on the cafeteria tables chanting pro-America slogans after Osama died.

So I think most people are just reacting to the way it’s been bludgeoned to death for years, was used to justify really horrible domestic and international policies, and how insufferable most Americans were and are when it comes to 9/11. If someone was to say “hey my dad died in the towers” I doubt most people here would say ha well he deserved it. But 9/11 has moved from just being a tragic event to being a cultural touchstone associated with really horrible things.

tbh probably just incoherent American politics.

Also I think this post is partially directed at the Ukraine War. The right has been trying to brand themselves as anti-interventionists for years, and they’re on hard anti-interventionist footing anyways right now wrt to Ukraine. Bring up China and Mexico and that anti-interventionism drops away.

It’s also the national bourgeoisie opposing wars waged on behalf of the haute bourgeoisie I guess.

My resentment towards sports comes from being good at sports as a kid, so I got a ton of pressure from a bunch of boomer dads, sucking any fun that once existed out of sports for me. I nonetheless kept playing sports until middle school (because I was scared of my dads reaction if I didn’t want to play sports anymore) when the pressure started coming from my peers in addition to my parents and coaches. There was so much pressure on us to be good at sports that kids would thrown tantrums and get in fights if they lost a pickup basketball game. If I wanted to goof off a bit or just not try so hard just playing pickup basketball I’d have a couple of my “friends” start yelling at me giving me shit for trying to have a little fun. The atmosphere around sports was so toxic, I remember the fights and the arguments when some of us made the school basketball team and others didn’t. By 7th grade I had enough of an independent streak (and was sick enough of my “friends”) that I quit baseball tryouts halfway through. My dad didn’t speak to me for like 2 months after that.

I wish I had stuck with sports I really do (and I wish I didn’t quit just to do drugs all day in high school) but when everyone around you is a toxic asshole who sucks all the fun out of it it’s hard to. I like competition, but when you have kids breaking down crying and throwing tantrums when they lose a simple pickup game I think it’s gone too far. Sports culture is extremely sick in the United States and “sportsball” is a cringe term, but sports culture deserves most of the hate it gets.