Yes, as far as youth culture is concerned, this decade (do we call it the 2000s, or does that refer to the whole century/millennium?) has just got it going on. And I think it has to do with the 20-year cycles of cultural trends: we are living an updated, new-and-improved version of the best decade in human history, the 1980s!

Alex P. Keaton is back with a vengeance, but this time he has some cool, some nonchalance, to go with the ambition and self-discipline. He has a sense of purpose beyond going to Wall Street and voting Republican. He's less manic, more sure of himself in a world that is less sure of itself.

We've all seen the same statistics popping up in increasingly incredulous articles: teenage pregnancy and drug use have long been in decline; the median age for first experiences with sex and alcohol is climbing; church attendance is up; juvenile delinquency is down. What in the name of Haley Joel Osment is going on?

Well, it seems that this successor cohort to the "Children of the 80s" (a more accurate descriptor than lumping us with people who are already in their 40s) simply sees less of a need to rebel against society. Life is pretty darn good when you've grown up during the most prosperous time in the most prosperous country ever.

At the same time, 9/11 served as a formative experience that focused Gen Yers in a way that those of us whose high school and college years were spent in the aimlessness of the "end of history" after the end of the Cold War. I see it in the changes that have taken place at my alma maters and, more importantly, I see it in the attitudes and worldviews of those who would have been my peers but for accidents of birth.

Posted by Ryan S. on Thursday, March 09, 2006 at 11:34 PM | Permalink |