Why isn't there a new Lost Generation?

[Shiendar]

In the 1920's in America, things were quickly changing. New music and new inventions were being discovered and put out quicker than many an American could rightly afford. New music, shocking fashions and a loud artistic community were on the rise. Glitz, glamor, get-rich-quick stories were all the rage and comerciallization was underway. A rather large amount of the young people and intellectuals were fustrated with the shallowness of the age... so they left for Europe.

These expatriots were called the 'Lost Generation'. Some of them found happiness. Some of them were as lost as before, some went on to do notable things.

Today, glitz, war, a mostly meaningless pop scene, terrible politicking and alot of disaffection is hitting today's youth and many intellectuals...

...so why are they NOT leaving en masse? Why do they stay?


The reasoning may vary, but as the world grew smaller because of the internet, the culture and economy made the world seem truely huge. Why go to Europe or anywhere else for that matter? It's just 'too far'. Intellectuals who feel disaffected don't leave, they just stew in their own malcontent and rant in magazine articles.

Psycologically, the world became America to many of them; the 'whatever' attitude of the 90's is still unfortunently with us. The disaffected also are mostly poor-they are too busy trying to survive on food stamps and scrounged bus tokens to leave. Why go and be poor elsewhere?

In others, it may be that they don't want to leave their families behind. Who knows? All I know is that the mass exodus I still expect is not happening and may never happen.

This outrages me, as I fit in with those too poor to afford to go away. Nobody whos stayed has wanted to make enough of a difference, even though they stay. Most of the people I speak to feel that they have no say and no effect on matters.

So why don't they leave? Are they so ignorant and naive to believe that America is the foremost in liberties? Maybe so.

...but until I leave, I must try to dealthe state of America, survive and keep hope alive. It's all I can do, until I become one of the new Lost Generation

[Angantyr]

Personally I feel it is partly to do with the fact that we have changed from the average person to being in a 3rd world situation to having the freedom to do what they like, but so much so they don't know what to do with it like a person coming out of prison who has been there for 20+ years. A lot of people think they know what they want (Which I believe is based on the next extreme) but they can't really know they want it till they've experianced it.

Down where I live it is small and boring, sure its very "pretty" as some people like to put it but basically this is my home and none of it is that great in my eyes, I am sure this can be said for a lot of those americans. I am getting a huge pay out in the next few years, which I can either put towards a house which means I will have my house paid off by the time I am 30 OR I can be like most people my age and do an OE experiance across Europe. I will more than likely pick the latter as I have quite a few friends scattered across there and I hope to end up in Norway and if I like it I will settle there with what I have left over. I don't give a flying shit about my family, they are scum to me.

[Georg Prime]

Here's best i feel about our generation..taken from Fight Club of course.

"We're the middle children of history, man. No purpose or place. We have no Great War. No Great Depression. Our Great War's a spiritual war... our Great Depression is our lives. We've all been raised on television to believe that one day we'd all be millionaires, and movie gods, and rock stars. But we won't. And we're slowly learning that fact. And we're very, very pissed off."

And honestly, i'm getting the hell out of America when i have the money and the chance. I've done a little traveling to Europe..been to France, Germany, Ireland. I was supposed to go there for 3 months in the summer of 07 but im lackin funds due to a few setbacks including having to bail a friend out of jail but i'm hoping by summer 08 i'll be back on track. Basically, i'd love to move to Europe and live there, though maybe Canada would be an easier choice?

[Casanova[OCAU]]

Its very simple really. America is the land of oppertunity. Sure its wasted in a large percentage of cases, but compare the opprutunity you have in America to make it big compared to any other country in the world, and trust me, in most fields, America will coem out near the top.

Take the position in India or Singapore. LOTS of overqualified engineers who are absolutly brilliant. But there just isnt the opperutunity or the financial backing provided by the government required to lift them off the ground, whereas in America, there is.. I guess thats the reason why my family and I moved to Australia as well.. because with my knowledge and skills, i'd only be the 'middle of the pack'.. whereas here, i can spread my wings a bit more and achieve what i knwo i'm capable of.. though for me, this path leads me to university and the good american universities charge far to grand a fee for me to afford.

[Anomaly]

There's no need for a 'lost generation' as you put it. As you say, most people can sit at home and be a disenfranchised american visiting Europe on some website.

At the same time, I think there's an important point thats being missed here. when those people left on mass in the 1920's, I'm sure they felt noticed, I'm sure they felt important...that history would stand to attention and declare 'these people left because they were sick of it!' So history has...but would history care if a bunch of people decided to leave america on mass now? Oh, the tabloids might, but then any time they can get someone to talk about a hurricane they'll put that on the front page.

Why are a lot of people that HAVe the ability to leave NOT leaving? Because no one will notice...no one will care. In fact a lot of people will probably say good riddance you dissatisfied lot. It's doubtful, on a lot of counts, that even their familiy will care over much. And I seriously doubt the American government would care...they've a hard enough time keeping people OUT of the country at the moment. I also doubt the Europian nations are waiting with open arms.

There are nations out htere with huge populations shifts from their people constantly trying to make it to america or europe. You never hear about that other than in the context of 'such and such' group of people are stealing our country out from under us...and thats the same on both sides of the Atlantic.

I'm not leaving my home because I like it here. As horrible as people keep telling me it is, I have traveled to Europe and really, things aren't that different over there aside from the fact you can't get a decent steak and for some reason fast food is given gourmet prices. I wouldn't mind living there, but I don't need to.

Besides, I'm not the type to run away from my problems.

[Georg Prime]

I definitely don't see people wanting to leave in mass numbers, that's for sure. My reasons are less about "hating america" and more about exploring the world really. It's not that i couldn't live here, i really could. Maybe i'm just sick of living in the big city but my recent stay in Ireland made me realize how cool it would be.

Most people there walked everywhere they went, the town was small enough that you could get almost anywhere either by walking or by bus and this wasn't the second largest city in Irleand! There aren't 5 fast food places on one street like there are here, infact there wasn't really much fastfood in the entire city.. I felt so lazy coming back here when instead of walking for half an hour to an hour or so to get my food, any fast food i could want is within 5-10 minutes driving. Obesity certainly isn't a problem there

Anywayz, yea i don't mind living here. But there is so much going on here i don't agree with. Maybe in some places in Europe it's not that much better? I guess i'm not the kind of person to eat much fast food or steak, and some of the cuisine there..like in France, is amazing. Europe just attracts me because it's a place of such history and culture, i feel like our culture is the "money and fast food culture". I think it'd be a beautiful place to live, but that's just a dream of mine. I certainly would if i had the money to do so though. I have some family that lives in Paris at the moment.

I feel like there is just a better attitude towards things in a lot of the places i've been to in Europe. I feel like they have a much better music scene there, when you look at magazines there you don't see Britney Spears or stupid pop acts on the cover, that is something I like.

I really wouldn't be running away from any problems, i'm just somebody who loves traveling and seeing and experiencing new things.

Maybe it'd be better if i just lived on my own little tropical island or something?

[Nin`]

[Lucifer] Great question. It occurs to me to wonder why there should be another "lost generation" at all? Each generation is unique.

"Lost Generation
From Wikipedia, your friend and free encyclopedia

Lost Generation is traditionally attributed to Gertrude Stein[1] and was then popularized by Ernest Hemingway in the epigraph to his novel The Sun Also Rises, and his memoir A Moveable Feast. It refers to a group of American literary notables who lived in Paris and other parts of Europe from the time period which saw the end of World War I to the beginning of the Great Depression. Significant members included Ernest Hemingway, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Ezra Pound, Sherwood Anderson, Waldo Peirce, John Dos Passos, and T. S. Eliot.

More generally, the term is used for the generation of young people coming of age in the United States during and shortly after World War I. For this reason, the generation is sometimes known as the World War I Generation. In Europe, they are most often known as the Generation of 1914, named after the year World War I began. In France, the country in which many expatriates settled, they are called the Génération du Feu, the Generation of Fire. Broadly, the term is often used to refer to the younger literary modernists.

William Strauss and Neil Howe in their book Generations list this generation's birth years as 1883 to 1900. Their typical grandparents were the Gilded Generation; their parents were the Progressive Generation and Missionary Generation. Their children were the G.I. Generation and Silent Generation; their typical grandchildren were Baby boomers [citation needed].

This generation is currently the oldest extant generation in the world."

[Lucifer] It seems that each generation cannot but create its own zeitgeist. It may be that circumstances occur which appear similar to historical sets of circumstances but inevitably there will be important differences too. Whatever the circumstances, I weyken that one should attempt to live "authentically".

A good link to the following text:

"Thus the norm of authenticity refers to a kind of "transparency" with regard to my situation, a recognition that I am a being who can be responsible for who I am. In choosing in light of this norm I can be said to recover myself from alienation, from my absorption in the anonymous "one-self" that characterizes me in my everyday engagement in the world. Authenticity thus indicates a certain kind of integrity — not that of a pre-given whole, an identity waiting to be discovered, but that of a project to which I can either commit myself (and thus "become" what it entails) or else simply occupy for a time, inauthentically drifting in and out of various affairs."

Lucifer

[Govinda]

Originally Posted by Anthiena

So why don't they leave? Are they so ignorant and naive to believe that America is the foremost in liberties? Maybe so.

...but until I leave, I must try to dealthe state of America, survive and keep hope alive. It's all I can do, until I become one of the new Lost Generation

I live in Britain.
We have as many poor as you. We have 20% of the world's CCTV cameras. We're about the be electronically tagged with DNA-specific ID cards. We're also set to lose many of our major cities when the waters rise.
The rest of Europe really isn't very different; i've been all over and seen it. The governments lie. Peace protests are organised and then massively ignored.
The world is as the world looks; one stinking mess of people who couldn't care less. It's about to become a very controlled and watched, a very wet and war-torn mess, yes, but it's the same everywhere from what I can gather.
Don't blame you for wanting to get out of America though. Your fundamentalist Christians and your Endtimers really do scare the ****ing life out of me. Come here to the UK if you want a toned-down version of where you already are, but be reminded that I saw on the news today that we in the UK have our personal privacy invaded more than you in the US do; we're on a par with Russia, and you're on a par with Germany, in terms of surveillance.
Your weather's also about a million times better than ours. My American boyfriend, who moved here a few years back, moans about it all the time.

Maybe they're not leaving because they can see that there's nothing different, useful or even fruitful awaiting them across the pond. I don't know though; i'm not American.