A speaker has criticised the habits and characters of young people today, describing them as irresponsible, unreliable, noisy and selfish. Write a reply, in the form of an essay, making clear whether you entirely disagree or whether you would support the criticism in any respect. You may perhaps like to point out the limitations of general criticisms. [Bear in mind that violent abuse of the critic would tend to support his argument rather than disprove it ].
The opprobrious (= reproachful) terms of the speaker – irresponsible, unreliable, noisy, selfish – strike, in the first instance, as a bit motivated (= originating in some motive) and invidious (= apt to excite ill feeling). They are, indeed, to summary (= easily summed up).
But the comment is a poser. The young people today – should we say, our angry young men (?) – are, indeed, a brash (=too forward) lot. But its brashness is a vice of the age. But if they had been so bad as to have been bundled out, the generation would have made no progress. But there is progress achieved and a large share of it is that of the young generation.
Our young talents have made their marks in various fields. In the army they have shown rare prowess and dedication; in science and technology the superior calibre of our young talents is being acknowledged by the masters; and in art, culture and other fields, too, we have excelled in our own ways. In the field of sports we have not only lost but have been relegated (= thrown back), for obvious reasons for which the young talents may not be solely responsible.
Thus, integrally, we do not lack in talents and our young generation does not deserve such a sweeping remark. But the remark, nevertheless, reflects a sentiment, a painful awareness that reflects some kind of disappointment of the speaker.
Today is an age that encourages mobility, quest outward and talent-based careers; sluggards and stay-at-homes shall fall into backwaters. It is a generation shift. The older generation, which is accustomed to the kinds of responsibilities which they shouldered in their youth, finds their progenies (= successors) lacking in those qualities. In the ‘gold rush’ today an expression that may symbolise ‘career-hunt mutatis mutandis (= a Latin phrase, meaning, with a slight alteration in meaning and significance) – the youth have no option but to catch up with time. They become irresponsible or seem to be so, to their duties. Often the couple serving abroad have little time to attend to their old, ailing parents. They house their parents comfortably; can do every other thing. But to look after them by personal presence becomes difficult.
In fact, the fluid state (= fast changing) is caused by a large-scale shift in the scale of values. Concepts of society and religion have suffered a landslide breakdown; family ties are snapping like weak twigs (= small tree branches); concepts of marriage, childbearing, and child-rearing look/appear to be perverse; living together, marrying- but child a botheration is boldly paraded by a large cross-section of our youth.
Naturally, in a generation brought up on such ideas, theories are bound to appear preposterous (= nearly absurd) to their older variety. In addition, the latest acquisition of the computer and internet has snapped the chain that tied talented young men to their primitive – or semi-primitive – climate for want of contact or information. Today the science of Information Technology works in tandem (= a kind of cooperation) with other advanced techniques. Naturally, larger and larger segments of this young population are in pursuit of this ‘gold rush’. Thus the barriers of old and moribund (= nearly dead) social familial and even moral norms are being thrown overboard. The Prometheus of Talent can no longer be chained – another Shelley today might have composed another Prometheus Unbound. (= a famous work of Percy Bysshe Shelley).
The charge of being noisy and selfish is also not unfounded. But again one has to say that it is the ‘vice’ of the age. The principal virtue of any young generation is to spearhead a movement and defy dead customs and morals. Now, if the youth today is noisy, the blame lies at the door of our rulers and the roots are these: large-scale unemployment, noisy politics and commerce. The misguided youth are, no doubt harnessed to the cause of politics or unemployment. They shout, and clamour because its impact sometimes yields the desired result; the positive effect makes a value (= something worth it) of it and it becomes a part of the work plan. In fact, when ‘Power’ becomes deaf such ‘nonviolent’ courses become imperative. The country’s youth and, students, in particular, have to bear the charge, as their spilling energy becomes the easiest prey to it. This noisiness that is an index (= sign) of a restive (= uneasy) temperament gradually overflows its banks like a river on spate. Once in his convocation address at the Benares Hindu University, Dr S. Radhakrishnan uttered, “I do not want my students to become the victims of slogans”. But when men at the helm of affairs deliberately force them to resort to slogans by doling out false promises? This ‘noisiness’ – an offspring of unemployment and politics in time, affects the households of guardians. What results is too obvious for anybody to miss.
As against the above scenario, we have the young generation, today, that has taken up the banner for social justice, education, freedom of the artist and many such philanthropic works. I mean the Non-governmental Organisations (NGOs).
‘Selfishness’ is a natural corollary of civilisation, today. The shift from an agrarian society to an industry and capitalistic economy is a shift from a cooperative and corporate (= all united into one body) culture to individualism. The recent computer and internet culture and the global economy are giving this individualist culture a new and fresh energy.
Naturally, the charges in question here are to be shared between the young generation and the compelling situations of the age. No doubt, the young as the forbears (= going before) of the future have to reconsider their behaviour. No civilization can survive by total defiance of tradition and the past, nor has it ever been so. A balanced historical intelligence alone can save us from such a disaster, and the onus (= responsibility) of it lies with the young generation.
