When respect goes missing

Chris Northover PHOTO/FILE

Sometimes I despair of Gen Y.

Well, it's not just despair - in truth, it bounces from despair to depression, to deep depression, then back to blind optimism for the time it takes for my humour to swing back to despair.

Soon these tykes will be our doctors, lawyers, teachers and police. They have been called the "me" generation - while others mutter they must be the "stuff you" generation.

Their minds seem to work a lot quicker than most of my generation when we were that age. They have been brought up with television and computer games all moving at the speed of light. They master new technology easily and have created for themselves a whole new reality - but a reality with about as much sincerity and relevance as a reality TV show set on a desert island.

They seem to have also created a new level of arrogance.

I once asked a young bloke what he was playing on his computer and, quick as a skateboard turn, he told me that he wouldn't waste his time explaining because I "couldn't possibly understand".

I was obviously born half a century too soon for his liking.

Most complaints I hear are that this generation has no respect. A concept which, with their reported 15-second attention spans, they couldn't possibly understand either.

My generation was brought up by people who had gone through a cruel war, preceded by a harrowing depression - they were scary people. We learned to respect them for reasons not all to do with physical violence if we didn't.

But they did demand respect - and usually got it. The question is: Are the parents of Gen Y children demanding respect from them?

Our society is based on respect for one another. It's a mutual thing - you can't play a team sport without it and you certainly can't relate to a boss, co-worker or lover unless you respect them.

Judging by the undisciplined little marvels they send along to our schools, many parents clearly aren't playing the game. I wonder at the strength and tenacity that teachers must possess to even stay in their classrooms for five days a week let alone produce a product worthy of admission to further education or a job.

I have even noticed that the parents of one 16-year-old Hastings boy have taken his school to court because he was suspended from school for "repeatedly choosing to ignore the rules", including refusing to have his hair "off his collar and out of his eyes".

Presumably there was an "attitude problem" going on as well.

I wonder if this is typical - encouraging a child to break the rules by supporting his resolutely anti-social behaviour - and I wonder who is driving the child's actions, the child or his parents. Who are the real brats and are the "anti-smacking" brigade looking on with approval?

Not that I am suggesting that smacking or any other form of violence is the only way to achieve respect, but it seems that in so many cases the kind of lily-livered parenting we see is not encouraging our children to become worthy members of society.

Chris Northover is a Wanganui-based former corporate lawyer.