I belong to a generation that is painfully caught between the old and the new; something of a cusp. I hold values that my forefathers held, yet I am also facing the pressure of adapting to the modern generation of today, which is not easy. It is not because I am rigid, but because I don't see where it will ultimately lead me towards.
The generation of the present and future are advancing towards a lifestyle that knows how to use everything but does not understand the value of anything. Information is data rather than knowledge. And science, to them, is a subject rather than a curiosity.
My early days as a boy were spent differently though.
1. Selecting a TV channel was simple. There was only one. I watched every program without bias or choice.
2. I read comics and novels with equal fervour, no matter how much I aged.
3. I ate food together with the family. We all talked. We shared not just the food but also the thoughts and affection across the table.
4. In exams, I never set myself a target to lose not more than two marks out of 100. I rather aimed to not score two marks out of 100. The aim was to keep the head above the water. One thing I realized long back was - all that you will ever learn in life can never be contained within the pages of the textbook. So I cultivated the habit to observe life and nature around me.
5. My sister was only 4 years old when I was 13. Yet I played every possible game I could think of with her, getting right down to her age and mentality. Thus, the child inside me was always alive.
6. Rajni and Kamal were just actors. Instead, my dad was my hero. My mom was the most beautiful woman in the world. And to me, a hero was always a good guy, who never hurt anyone and was always kind to people.
7. Edison and Einstien were my role models because of how they fought over odds and acheived greatness in their fields, not because they looked cool and had flamboyant lifestyles.
8. Computer time was strictly rationed. The simple, floppy-based 2D games that I played actually got me thinking more creatively than only entertaining me. The games were constructive and did not involve massacring onscreen game characters with blood and gore.
9. I believed in heaven and hell, and that every sin I did would lead me to hell. I really shivered at that thought.
10. I carried a childish curiosity in everything that touched my life. I didn't assume anything nor tried to be something that I was not.
11. I never tried to rush through life, rather let every age go through its part.
12. I believed in true love and chivalry (I still do). The innocence stayed on for a long time. I did not believe I needed money and beauty to fall in love and be loved by a girl.
13. I let life lead my way all along. But that was a lot of fun, because the child in me always looked forward to the 'what next' without ever getting disappointed. Many times, there wasn't much money in hand, but when I got it, I felt like the richest man on earth.
14. There were no instalments and EMIs. There were no debit cards, credit cards, and ATMs. You had to save up money for everything, which meant one had to plan things way ahead. I had to go to the bank to draw money which was a tedious process. So I was really careful about how much I drew and how long I kept it in hand.
But the generation of today is so different. They have so many choices in everything. Desires are expanding and the values are shrinking. Today a gun wielding hero on screen who speaks fancy dialogues and shoots ten people in the blink of an eye are heroes. The release date of the favourite hero' movie is remembered more well than the birth date of family members. Postcards are non-existent. In fact, English vocabulary is becoming smaller and colloquial but less respectful. Husbands and wives wish each other happy anniversaries over Facebook. People have become comfortable interacting as virtual entities in social sites. There is hardly any time for the world around us, no time to smell the flowers, or provide stray animals with water. The children today already know who Sunny Leone is but do not know who G.D.Naidu or S.Radhakrishnan or M.S.Swaminathan was. Celebrating Valentine's Day has become fashionable today but no one remembers Mother's Day or Father's Day. Parents are quieter; children are louder. Parents consider it an embarrassment to talk about their financial difficulties to children. Children demand anything and everything they want, without learning how to earn something. Families have gone on from being nuclear to atomic. Every individual is a family on his own. Enrolling an old parent in the old-age home is easier and cheaper than getting a young kid admitted in LKG in school.
In short, we are building a generation of technologically advanced, busy dimwits who are arrogant enough to believe that they are going to make this world a better place with their current attitude towards life.
No comments:
Post a Comment