TUESDAY, lskj vu
LAILY TAR HEEL,
r
r;
Younger Gene
Why haven't we heard from today's youth?
IN TIME, this week, appears "The Younger
Generation". . . a major report on the na
tion's silent, cryptic youth. The following are
excerpts:
Youth today is waiting for the hand of fate to
fall on ithoulders, meanwhile working fairly
hard and saying almost nothing. Hie most
startling fact about the younger generation is
its silence ... It does not issue manifestos,
make speeches or carry posters. It has been
called the "Silent Generation?'
But what does the silence mean? .What, if
anything, does it hide? Or are youth's elders
merely hard of hearing?
But youth is taking its upsetting uncertainties
with extraordinary calm. When the U. S. be
gan to realize how deeply it had committed
itself in Korea, youngsters of draft age" had a
bad case of jitters; but all reports agree that
they nave since settled down to studying or
working for as long as they can. The majority
seem to think that war with Russia is inevi
table sooner or later, but they feel that they
will survive it. r
Hardly anyone wants to go into the Army;
there is little enthusiasm for the military life,
no enthusiasm for war. Youngsters do not talk
like heroes; they admit freely that tfeey will try
to stay out of the draft as long as they can. But
there is none of the systematized and senti
mentalized antiwar feeling of the 10s. Pacifism
has-been almost nonexistent since World War
II; so are Oxford Oaths.
But youth's ambitions have shrunk. Few
youngsters today want to mine diamonds in
South Africa, ranch in Paraguay, climb Mount
Everest, find a cure for cancer, sail around
the world, or build an industrial empire. Some
would like to own a small independent busi
ness, but most want a good job with a big
firm, and with it, a kind of suburban idyll.
The younger generation can still raise helL
The significant thing is not that it does, but
how it goes about doing it. Most of today's
youngsters never seem to lose their heads;
.-even when they let themselves go, an alarm
clock seems to be ticking away at the back of
their minds; it goes off sooner or later, and
sends them back to school, to work, or to war.
The younger generation seems to drink less.
"There is nothing clarion or inglorious
any more about getting etewed," J&ys one
college professor. Whether youth is more or
less promiscuous than it used to be is a mat
ter of disagreement.
Fact is that it is less showy about sex As
a whole, it is more sober and conservative, but
in individual cases, e.g., the recent dope scan
dals , it makes Flaming Youth look like amateurs.
Educators across the U. S. complain that
young people" seem to have no militant be
liefs. They do not speak out for anything.
Professors who used to enjoy baiting students
by outrageously praising child labor or damn
ing Shelley now find that they cannot get a rise
out of the docile note-takers in their classes.
But God (whoever or whatever they understand
by that word) has once more become a factor
in; the younger generation's thoughts. The old
argument of religion v. science is subsiding; a
system wsch does not make room for both
makes little sense to today's younger genera
tion. It is no longer shockingly unfashionable
to discuss God.
---
Young people do not feel cheated. And
they do not blame anyone. Before this gen
eration, "they were always to blame. It was
a standard prewar feeling that "they" had let
them down. But this generation puts the blame
on life as a whole, not on parents, politicians,
cartels, etc
Says a TIME correspondent in Boston: You
cannot say of them, Youth WiU Be Served,
became the phrase suggests a voracious strik
ing out from security, wealth and stabiUty, The
best you can say for this younger generation 2,
'Youth Will Serve: "
With reports on subjects l2c this-
and on subjects growing even more directly
out of the headlines TIME each week attracts
1,600,000 of America's alert, most intelligent,
most influential families , . . the families who
do the most planning, recommending and
buying in the horns anckout.
Every week, these people are America's
largest audience of best customers.
Every week they take TIME to: get it
Straight. - . . "
f ' ;TIMF t-C
The WcoMy Novsmagasino
Copyright 1951, TIME, Inc.
PAGE THREE
3
U
y
a
S,
I
Id
r
er
ic
i i ;
t ,
J. . i
;
: : i .
, ! i M
i .i- I : , . : ,