Coping With Gen-Y

(via Syd O) A good article in Slate on how Generation-Y is having to re-evaluate all the things they were taught to expect:

Since twentysomethings are often accused of whining, let me say that the e-mails in my inbox don't do that. They are about scrambling to make sense of changed, and reduced, expectations and are not filled with self-pity, or at least not of the maudlin, unjustified sort. Generation Y has a pretty good argument for being the worst off right now. They may not have kids and significant family responsibilities and bills yet. But along with their school debt, they have a lot of loss to contend with as they peer forward into the uncertainty ahead.

... Last week I talked to a 26-year-old named Candice who lives in North Carolina. She'd written to say that she can't pay for therapy for her depression anymore because she has no job and absolutely no money. ("I have some spare change that I keep in a change purse in my dresser," she writes.) In August, Candice graduated from James Madison University with a master's degree in English. She is the first person in her immediate family to go to college. She wants to get a Ph.D. in literature and women's studies, to study the works of Margaret Atwood. But she can't afford to. Her parents, meanwhile, are having trouble understanding why she can't find work after months of searching. They're both ill and have to spend heavily for prescription medications. It is all an enormous, hopeless-feeling strain.

No wonder ... who in the world is Margaret Atwood? Cry me a river ... I love the humanities, but give me a break. Like Syd O said, it reminds me of Steve Carell in Little Miss Sunshine who's the 2nd most famous Proust scholar.