Gen Y Speaks Out!

“Many people of the older generation, think we young people don’t have the right stuff. Here’s why THEY ARE ALL WRONG!”

1. “You know there’s a big difference between what you know and what you don’t know. But you don’t care about closing the gap.”
   

   Youth Speak: The universe is too vast a place for us to know everything about it. And you may think we don’t know anything. But WE know things that YOU don’t.

2. “You need hand-holding all the time. At the same time, you also need someone standing behind you with a whip in their hand.”
   

   Youth Speak: Don’t overreact. Everyone needs a little push every now and then. And if you don’t do it, then who will?

3. “You would rather sleep or watch mindless TV than read a book.”
   

   Youth Speak: We read. We read Ken Follett, Meg Cabot, and what not. It’s not our fault you don’t consider them George Orwell and Jane Austen. But they’re books to us.

   As for all that mindless TV, if we don’t watch it, your next accusation will be that we are ill-equipped to handle our short films.

4. “You don’t ‘do’. You only keep saying, ‘I am trying.”
   

   Youth Speak: Do you remember teaching us, “Try and try till you succeed”?

   And you need to have a little faith, for when we say we are trying, we ARE trying.

5. “You have no interest in knowing what’s happening around you. You don’t even read the newspapers or watch television news.”
   

   Youth Speak: Newspapers and television news are not the be-all and end-all of everything. Sometimes even their credibility is questionable.

   We are Generation Y for a reason. We have alternative sources which give us in-depth and easy-to-access news: primarily the ever-expanding internet. And don’t forget, news is now mobile.

6. “You lack empathy. You don’t know what it is to be in other people’s shoes.”
   

   Youth Speak: In primary school, who asked us to score higher than Lakshmi Aunty’s daughter? In high school, who pushed us into studying for countless “competitive” exams? Remember, uska beta tho engineer ban gaya? In college, who told us we have to aim for the most lucrative jobs?

   It’s a little too late to ask us to empathise.

7. “You give up too easily. It’s very difficult to reconcile to your defeatist attitude.” 
   

   Youth Speak: Not true. When we find that one thing we want to do, I’m sure we’ll aim to cross over the horizon trying o perfect ourselves.

   And yes, we are less willing to try too hard with the things we’re compelled to do (read: assignments).

8. “You are a menace on the roads with your two-wheeler. You don’t appear to know the rules of the road, you are unaware of the right-of-way concept, you weave dangerously in and out of traffic, you ride on pavements, you blithely disregard one-way signs… you even violate the helmet rule.” 
   

   Youth Speak: Do you want us to be in time for class or not? Or do you have a solution for Bangalore’s traffic problem? No? We thought as much. Drive and let drive.

9. “You use Facebook primarily as a platform to vent. You are continually complaining about work, or carping about clients, or whining about a minor ailment.” 
   

   Youth Speak: Have you seen Social Network? Facebook was invented to vent our feelings.

10. “You know smoking is hazardous to your health and passive smoking is bad for the people around you. Even so, you take pleasure in lighting up — it’s maddening, and baffling to the people who care about you.” 
    

    Youth Speak: You were young once. Surely you remember the soothing mix of excitement and calm that came over your mind and body when you lit up… once upon a time? Let us learn (whatever it is that we have to learn) from experience.

11. “You complain about ‘lack of time’ when it comes to tasks you are assigned. But you always seem to find time to do things you like.”
    

    Youth Speak: “Tasks we are assigned” vs. “Things we like”. Guilty as charged!

12. “You don’t push yourself. You prefer to wait for things to happen instead of choosing to make things happen yourself.”
    

    Youth Speak: We make two short films, a music video, two documentaries, two news bulletins, one chat show, one radio documentary, an ad pitch, an ad film, a PR pitch, a digital medial management pitch and write our dissertation, all in a few months. If only we could sit around and wait for our films to make themselves.

13. “You appear to have a goal in mind regarding your career. But you don’t make any effort to achieve that goal.”
    

    Youth Speak: I want to be a journalist. But you ask me to make a short film and a music video and a documentary and an ad-pitch and an ad-film and a radio documentary… I can go on.

    I want to be a journalist, find me time to work towards my goal.

14. “You don’t take our advice seriously.”
    

    Youth Speak: We may seem careless and foolish now. But don’t think we’re not listening to what you’re saying. For there will come a time when circumstances will force us to rely on the knowledge we learned from the wise people who guided us during our formative years. This knowledge will help us make the right choices; choices even about life and death.

Reprinted from The Chronicle, a newspaper produced by students of Commits Institute of Journalism and Mass Communication, Bangalore

God Created Fathers

God created fathers to protect us when we are small,To fix things that we might break, and catch us when we fall God knew we need someone so strong and so gentle Someone to take pride in our dreams and help make them real Someone who’d teach us to be brave, and listen to our fears Who’d be there when we need a friend and guide us through the years To offer that big bear hug we can come home to Yes, God created fathers to depend on all life through.