Beat Generation Response (for Core)

Learning about the Beat generation is interesting to me, because the more I learn, the more I think I am a reincarnation of that generation. By that I mean I think my personality, my struggles, my teenage angst that grows from an unknown source, all that correlate with those who grew up with the threat of the atom bomb, who watched their friends get drafted to Vietnam, and saw violence in their streets. They observed the previous generation promising life and success and modesty and censorship as the remedies for happiness. They knew they could not trust those promises, because those promises produced the senseless violence that pervaded their lives. They were without role models, without instruction about how to live, without a leader to show them the way home. So they set out on a journey, with On The Road as their Bible and Bob Dylan as their voice, that they hoped would end at a purpose for their lives, a purpose that was deep and worthy and emotional and real.

I think my generation is a sedated version of the Beat generation. My generation has been raised in a world where technology is prevalent, where instant communication and information and validation can be found at the tips of a keyboard. We don't know any other world, just like the beats didn't know a world without wars and violence. However, I don't think we care enough to search for another way. Yes, we hate the emptiness that barges in when we turn off the music and sit in silence, but we can always turn the music back on. We hate the loneliness we feel whenever we are alone, but we can always get online and simulate conversations and emotions and intimacy through social networking institutions. The beat generation turned to sex and drugs (among other things) in search of identity and direction--we don't turn anywhere, because we don't have to realize that we have no direction. We don't have to lie awake at night, wondering about this feeling of heaviness that doesn't go away--we don't have to wonder because, instead, we can go online and find something to divert our attention. Moments that usually define peoples' courses of action, moments that stand out in one's memory years later, have been stolen by the flickering of a television screen.

Our generation can learn from the Beat generation, because we are in a similar predicament. We have been handed a lifestyle that is doing more harm than good. And once we stir from our sleep, we're going to need some direction. Hopefully we can learn from their mistakes.