High school class of 1974 here. We loved the sex, drugs, and rock and roll of the 60s, but we also were keenly aware of the impermanance of the hedonistic lifestyles of Jimi Hendrix and Jim Morrison.
High school class of 2020 here. We wish we could have the life our boomer forefathers did, but their life was so hedonistic, they destroyed ours by proxy.
Interesting. Can you give some examples of how boomers were more hedonistic than earlier/later generations, and how that destroyed your life? I'd be particularly interested to see how you feel boomers compare to your own generation with regard to hedonism?
I'm wondering if young people are really less hedonistic now, or if the types of hedonistic activies people engage in have just changed? Would you consider doomscrolling to be a form of hedonism, for example?
Boomer era hedonism is built upon the assumption that "this is the way the world works, and always will work", and as such, with so much affluence and wealth, they were essentially nudged to create a cultural boom via drugs, sex, and rock and roll, which won over the youth of the time against the intellectual Communists of Russia.
But as a result, the sexual revolution brought about a great "romance famine", wherein the modern day has everything to favor different people to stay separate. The specific reasons of which vary between the sexes, but point is that both have more to gain by staying single. Therefore there is significantly less sex taking place in my generation.
Not only that, but screen addiction, political polarization, mass inequality, the prices of everything keeps getting much higher. Our Dollars are also worth much less than that of the Boomer era. This means we have to work much more for less pay, and less value for each Dollar.
The Hedonism of our times is more solitary, more lonely, arguably more self-destructive, but that's because we feel as though we have little to lose.
This comes into spending more on food, more expensive tea and coffee (since Alcohol is still more expensive than that). Gambling, gacha games, prediction markets. Pornography, chatbots, social media, anything to kill the emotional apathy. As for drugs, that's just Xanax, anti-anxiety medications that are abused, as well as weed and opiates to "slow" down the world since it goes by so fast. Vapes, Codeine (Purple Drank), carts, etc.
All of these forms of Hedonism are inherently very insular, and lonely, rather than going clubbing, Woodstock, going for Joyrides with friends, or even having sex.
blendo · · focus · HN ↗
Huarache1 · · focus · HN ↗
freetime2 · · focus · HN ↗
I'm wondering if young people are really less hedonistic now, or if the types of hedonistic activies people engage in have just changed? Would you consider doomscrolling to be a form of hedonism, for example?
Huarache1 · · focus · HN ↗
But as a result, the sexual revolution brought about a great "romance famine", wherein the modern day has everything to favor different people to stay separate. The specific reasons of which vary between the sexes, but point is that both have more to gain by staying single. Therefore there is significantly less sex taking place in my generation.
Not only that, but screen addiction, political polarization, mass inequality, the prices of everything keeps getting much higher. Our Dollars are also worth much less than that of the Boomer era. This means we have to work much more for less pay, and less value for each Dollar.
The Hedonism of our times is more solitary, more lonely, arguably more self-destructive, but that's because we feel as though we have little to lose.
This comes into spending more on food, more expensive tea and coffee (since Alcohol is still more expensive than that). Gambling, gacha games, prediction markets. Pornography, chatbots, social media, anything to kill the emotional apathy. As for drugs, that's just Xanax, anti-anxiety medications that are abused, as well as weed and opiates to "slow" down the world since it goes by so fast. Vapes, Codeine (Purple Drank), carts, etc.
All of these forms of Hedonism are inherently very insular, and lonely, rather than going clubbing, Woodstock, going for Joyrides with friends, or even having sex.