Our potential generation

Mark Bauerlein, an Emory English professor published a book called "The Dumbest Generation", accusing anyone under 30 to be dumb and can not be trusted. The professor stated that Digital Age stupefies our generation by affecting our skills of communication.

To an extent, the professor got his point. Nowadays, in America, 35% of students going to 9th grade can not make it to 12th grade. Part of this generation really spent more of their time going on internet, chatting, playing rather than reading books, news or learning new things. Spending hours in front of the screens does not only affect health, but our communication skills. Teenagers tends to be more quick temper and their minds turn "numb" after spending ages on the internet, as they have less contact with the outside world.

Kind of harsh, but shockingly, according to a survey commissioned by Common Core, a group that promotes the liberal arts in public schools, 25 percent of their focus group of 17-year-olds was under the impression that Columbus discovered America sometime after 1750. Many adults would find these information alarming how American teenagers nowadays do not even know their country’s basic history.

Based on the 2008 Latest Edition of Did You Know version 3.0, the information from the meeting in Rome, 1 out of 8 couples married in the U.S. in 2006 met online. This really shows how internet affects our communication and penetrates through our society.

Continuing with the video, the information surprises me that within merely 6 minutes of the video clip, 694,000 songs were downloaded illegally off the internet. I guess internet allows people to do things they were not allowed to do before and affects their intellectual standard, but without it, I wonder how life would be!

Of course, to an extent, the professor is right part of this generation is stupefied. But may I correct him that only because they have used the technology INCORRECTLY. Not all kids are stupid, not all kids use internet for playing games, chatting. A large party of this generation also uses the internet for studying, to read online, besides entertaining.

Also, should the professor also considers twice before stating in the book that school environment is too soft, giving young people adults little adaptation to the environment after 30s. But isn’t it the teachers’ fault?

Parents and teachers complain that the kids are not as “bright” as what they have expected. They use limited vocabulary while the English language has 540000 words, 5 times more compared to Shakespearian time, spell improperly simple words, and use slang due to instant messaging on the internet and hand phones. But again, before criticizing the kids shouldn’t they blame themselves for failing to guide young people to use internet for good educational purpose since the kids are too young to understand by themselves?

This generation is not the dumbest, nor any other generation. The previous generation discovers something that had not been initially known before. According to the Did You Know video clip mentioned above, the amount of new technical information is doubling every 2 years, showing us that the human race is getting smarter and more intellectual days by days and the next generation will be smarter.