The new generation
By: K S S Pillai
With a guilty conscience, I immediately agreed when my wife suggested we visit our friend Raju while returning home from shopping. Our son had, as usual, refused to accompany us and was busy with his smartphone when we left home. He did not care when we informed him that we would be late in returning home.
We used to visit our friends or receive them on holidays, but that is no longer true. Personal contact started plummeting years ago due to the advent of television, mobile phones, and social media.
Raju lived with his wife and son in a posh locality in the city. They were happy to meet us and exchange news about our friends, while their only son Joy, a 12th-standard student, smiled, gave us a perfunctory nod, and rushed to his room, looking at his smartphone frequently.
We had known him since birth, and he used to accompany his parents when they visited us on their scooter. He was then lean like his father and used to talk to us rarely as his command of our mother tongue was not strong. Visiting the family after a long interval, we were astonished at the growth of that boy. He was in half pants and a T-shirt, had become fatter and taller than his parents and spotted a moustache.
After a short while, a man on a motorbike wearing the uniform of a fast-food agency came and called out the boy’s name. Joy came out, took delivery of a packet, paid digitally and disappeared into the kitchen.
“My wife and I still like the Kerala food style, but Joy has slowly drifted away. He prefers oily and spicy food supplied by fast food agencies that have mushroomed in the city. He has also become habituated to chicken and other non-vegetarian foods,” Raju explained.
Perhaps seeing the expression on my face as it was a vegetarian family, he said the children now imitate their friends in several matters, including food, and do not like interference from elders. They did not want to impose their views on Joy, though they had explained a couple of times the benefits of homemade food. The boy has not taken his parents seriously and decided to follow his friends.
Like most city youngsters, he had become obese after consuming those dishes and leading a sedentary life. The parents were worried about his food habits, which included many added hormones and had asked their son to join a health club, where he goes regularly like his friends.
We had a lengthy discussion about how modern technology has affected the new generation. They cannot imagine a life without Wi-Fi which is essential for the working of all their gadgets. They have iPads and smartphones with numerous facilities like video calls, messages, and e-mails that have made personal contact unnecessary. They frequently assemble at expensive hotels to celebrate birthdays and other social events without the elders.
With easy connectivity with the entire world, their outlook on life has changed. They imitate foreign cultures, like leading a life away from their parents when they become financially independent, or their relationship with the other sex after viewing films made in different countries. They do not want to look after their aged parents, as is evident from the growing number of old age homes.
Children are considered a blessing from God and a symbol of hope for the future, though it is doubtful whether they can fulfil these aspirations. Unlike earlier generations, they can easily access information on any subject or famous personality in a jiffy.
Their education has also become much more expensive. Every city has numerous schools with names like ‘International School’, ‘Global School’, and ‘Public School’ not heard of in the past, with facilities like school buses, air-conditioned lecture halls, libraries with e-books, swimming pools and uniformed security guards with trained dogs.
It is debatable whether governments are paying enough attention to the youngsters who are expected to brighten the country’s future.
(The author is a retired professor of English. A regular contributor to ‘The Kashmir Vision’, his articles and short stories have appeared in several national and international publications)