Bauerlein's book, "The Dumbet Generation" I believe is completely stereotypical. I know so many very intelligent people around my age and some that are not so bright from the generation before. I'm not saying anyone is dumb or not intelligent, but this generation knows many things the generations before does not know and vice versa. Just because some people don't know the answers to questions right away, for example in the clip "jaywalking" does not mean they are dumb. I saw a few people that were clearly over the age of 30 and did not know the answers. Some people need time to think about things, where others can just think of something right off the top of their head, but whose to say those people are dumb?
I like how we were given the quiz in class as a deminstration and i know some people including myself did not feel to confident about the second part, but it does not mean that if you didn't know the answers you are "dumb". After we were told what the answers were, many people realized they in fact knew the answers, but couldn't think of them at the moment. Bauerlein said, "This generation is lazy and trys to find the easy way out" he acts like there was no lazy people in the generation before. Yes, i do agree with him on one thing that our lives or as he says our bedrooms are a "media center", but that is what we are use to. I know many people who are very wrapped up in the media and technology and many others who are not. I believe it is just because we grew up around the media and adapted to it so quick that we are just use to living our life around it.
I agree that the video clip from 'Jaywalking' didn't help Bauerlien's point. There was no certain common characteristic that separated the people who did know the answers from those who didn't. No generation, gender, or age did better than the next. It is impossible to accurately generalize an entire generation.
ReplyDeleteI liked the quiz in class too! It made me laugh and realize what we know best. But I agree that many of us recognized the answers once we were told. The "Jaywalking" clip totally proved that people just forget things or don't know it because it wasnt really important in their time growing up.
ReplyDeleteI like how you pointed out that just because someone doesn't know the answer to the question right away does not mean they are dumb, and I know some people who are in the generation before me that don't know nearly the amount of information I do. Although that may be true, that could also mean that the information is just stored away because it hasn't been used since some people's early 20s. I find that interesting because we can hear a bunch of information and store it in or brains, but once it is ignored, is it completely gone? The generation before us may very well know all that we know, it could just be ignored, and they just have to give us time to learn it all.
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