Ugh, this sort of shit is so predictable.
Parents need to do a far better job in helping young adults understand that the money spent on education needs to be able to be recouped in the form of a real job on the other side. Parents would also do well to explain the importance of hard work, personal responsibility, vision, personal sacrifice and minimizing the sense of entitlement.
Look, people younger than 30 aren’t a different species. Young people want stuff to work. They want good jobs and to get paid well or at least fairly for them, they want some sense of security (in no small part because they’ve watched what has happened to their parents without it) and they want the freedom to figure out their personal lives as they see fit. This shit isn’t complicated. They want what we all wanted, what we maybe all still want. And they’re scared, like we were, that they won’t get it.
Bitterness toward them and their supposedly unrealistic expectations has nothing to do with those expectations and everything to do with people who, having gotten the shit kicked out of them by life, have decided to turn their anger on anyone who hasn’t had all hope of bettter beaten out of them with a hammer. And you know what? This chuckling condescension, this “wait till you get out in the real world, kid,” isn’t actually a plan or any kind of assistance whatsoever. It’s not even advice. It’s just smug therapy for the person saying it.
A.