Entitled to Smack You in the Face, Maybe….

[(sample)...But he's stickin' you, and taking all your money....]
“Gimme the loot! Gimme the loot!...”

Over the past several weeks, I have heard several TV and other media personalities refer to the current generation of 20-somethings as the “entitlement generation.” I will say that again. The generation above us is now referring to us, in public, as the damned “entitlement generation.” Can you believe this shit?

I have realized that the phrase “entitlement generation” is now one among an ever-increasing group of phrases that give me a knee-jerk reaction of instant anger, along with others such as “Future Interests in Real Property,” “Built Ford Tough,” “Pro-Choice,” and “Great J.Lo song.” It pisses me off to no end that people aged 35-55 or so not only think of us as the “entitlement generation,” but are spreading this garbage out into the universe. I mean, if you really think about it, we are doing a hell of a lot better than those assholes in the generation above us, especially considering all of the crap they’ve dumped on us and are depending on us to fix.

Speaking of which, can you believe how hard it is to be a 20-something human being these days? I mean, there is no flipping way that our generation is the “entitlement generation,” the generation of people who just think that the world owes them something for being alive. However, if you look at the world that the generation above us has handed us, and how large of a shithole we would be in if every generation was as bad as the one before us, maybe we 20-somethings are not so wrong in asking “what’s in it for me”?

Let’s take a look at what they’ve given us:

1. A ridiculously unfair and impossible-to-justify spike in college and graduation school tuition. Today’s rates of post-secondary school education are ridiculously high and do not come close to matching the slow rise in salaries attributable to growth and inflation. For our parents, it cost them $2000 to go to college for all four years, and at that time many firms hired college students at an entry-level position while they were still in school, allowing them to move up a few rungs at graduation (Which brings me to another point, that you could actually get a family-sustaining job with a college degree, discussed later.). If you were one of the few who went to graduate school, more cheap tuition awaited you. The average law student in the 80s graduated law school with a TOTAL of $4000-$5000 in student loans, which was like one-sixth of their first-year’s salary. The average law student today graduates with over $50,000 of debt (although I’ve seen as high as $120,000), equal to the average lawyer’s entire first-year’s salary, or more. And, the government has just raised the interest rate on student loans over 1.5%, making our predecessor generation even richer at our expense.

2. What’s worse, this money is paying for less as colleges and universities, run by, you’ve guessed it, NOT anyone in the “entitlement generation,” have not kept up with the needs of today’s employers, and serve as more like a “13th through 16th grade” for students, without the colorful and entertaining mix of mystery meat school lunches, pep rallies, prom, fist fights, and dudes who live in trailers. We’re totally getting screwed with that.

3. Furthermore, if you’re lucky enough to get out of school, you step into a world where we’re getting the shit taxed out of us. Witness the increase in property, sales, income, and gas taxes, also not matching the rise in our salaries. What’s it all going to pay for? Well, I don’t know how much you may need Medicare or Prescription Drugs, but my needs are fairly low in that department. Except for Zoloft when I get my student loan bill, and then Vicodin after I punch the wall after getting my credit card bill. And Prozac after I see how much in taxes are taken out of my salary. And Viagra when I need that “extra lift.” Juuuuust playin’, everybody.

4. And since we’re always “out partying” and seeking “instant gratification,” you know we can’t have helped but miss the introduction and/or spread of incurable sexual diseases like AIDS and herpes, made popular by, you guessed it, that responsible and wonderful generation of people before us. Thanks for the genital warts, Baby Boomers!

5. Finally, this sick ethos of a lack of personal responsibility. It’s bad enough that our predecessors had to blame their moms, dads, brothers, sisters, bosses, the opposite sex, the opposite race, their pet parakeets, 3 Catholic Priests, and Milli Vanilli for all of their problems, but now they’re blaming their kids, too? Unbelievable!

And what hypocrites these people are! They’re the ones who are whining about not getting their social security payments at the same rate of inflation from the government that they’re “entitled to.” It’s not our fault that our parents’ parents screwed like jackrabbits in the 1950s. Maybe if the generation before us paid their child support payments, planned for their own retirements themselves, and actually took parenting seriously, we wouldn’t have these problems. And, as for us, maybe if we weren’t looking at 30 years of paying off all of these loans, credit cards, and other charges that accompany affording to live in a world of inflation and ever-increasing interest rates, we could solve their problems, too.

If you add all this up, and more, it’s no wonder people talk about a “quarter-life crisis” in people of our age these days. Now, don’t get me wrong, it’s not all these of problems so much. Every generation leaves problems, even big ones, for the next generation to fix. But if you take the way older people have crapped on the world by creating these ridiculously huge problems and footing us with the bill, and couple that with their absolute, unflinching, and hypocritical arrogance in giving society the suggestion that we’re the deadbeats, and you’re about as close to my sense of outrage as I can describe in words.

I’d write more, but I’m taking a well-needed break. After all, I deserve it.