To think that Children of the Blitz should be required viewing in these ridiculous times?

Ok so where is your study proving the Silent Generation is less stable than Gen Z?

But you didn’t meet all of them. Your post is the creation of the “compositional fallacy ”—you basically ignore contrary evidence and simply prefer to believe your mere acquaintance and the carefully managed image of popular figures is the reality.

Yes, my measure of success is managing to really live a life outside of your trauma, not living in it and in/out of various therapies and facilities for life. My measure of success is being able to make a contribution despite the odds. They did it, so well done to them.

Let’s not pretend their entire generation were alcoholics and mentally unstable because they weren’t. They were the strongest, calmest people I have ever met.

Does anyone actually think watching a documentary is going to teach resilience?

Resilience is taught through appropriate support through difficulties, where a child sees and feel how they can develop on from mistakes and difficult situations. Resilience, like emotional regulation and many other things people complain no young adult has, comes through supported experience.

Documents and books can be used to help discuss the topic, but in themselves aren't going to teach those skills and I think it's unreasonable to treat both young people like they just need a documentary or those who went through WW2 like a tool to dismiss young people with by twisting their experiences. They weren't fabulously stoic, there was a lot of self-medicating going on.

People have always committed suicide and been institutionalised. Better 5% of the population is very unhappy, and 95% are content, than all being miserable together.

I don't think 95% of people were content during WW2 - or ever.

Deaths by suicide during the war was largely around conscripts on all sides where refusal would also have meant death, and in some places, it was known policy to not help anyone attempting suicide. Germany was particularly vocal on that, at times someone could be killed for helping someone else.

The cases of deaths by suicide spiked severely near the end of the war across Europe. The writings and reports link it strongly linked to fear, not misery.

Simplifying suicide to being 'very unhappy' or miserable shows a great and risky misunderstanding - there are many often interlinked causes to cause a death by suicide.

You can be content and still believe the world or your loved ones would be better off without you or that death is the best option available. In fact, signs of sudden raised contentment is linked to a significantly higher likelihood of suicide.

the consequences of intergenerational trauma.
Is this the latest 'therapy speak' for the phenomenon previously known as life ??

If by 'latest' you mean a concept that's been used since the 1960s, which - as a pp said - was often from studying those who went through WW2 and how their reaction to what they went through was passed onto their children who never experienced the war. We've had studies involving the grandchildren of Holocaust survivors, Blitz survivors and more that continue to show certain changes caused by such situations down to an epigenetic level.

We even have animal studies showing high stress to the point of trauma can be passed down sometimes several generations reacting to something that they've never experienced.

We have all this, but when we try to apply that understanding to people today, it gets dismissed as 'therapy speak'. Yes, horrific experiences has always been part of life, but understanding a part of why thing have developed as they have.

more pointing out that the result should have been a traumatised generation unable to work or raise a family (look at how many are not working for MH today), yet somehow it didn’t.

Except it did - those who didn't largely died off due to the consequences of homelessness, addiction, being institutionalised and more before we started calling them the 'Silent Generation' or had much respect & largely been erased because it fits the narrative better if we act like people just moved on after the war.

There was also a lot of proactive support to get returning men into work and people into homes after World War 2 after the horrible consequences of mass unemployment and homelessness after World War 1. Governments and businesses worked together on that as part of trying to rebuild stability. That was a big part of the 'somehow'.

That kind of support for young people has been gutted over the last couple of decades, and for young people who've been the victims of severe violence, the help today is basically giving them pills until the side effects get too much & then telling them to take less.

Strong agree @GloiredeDijon

My parents lived through the war and the rationing and shortages which continued into the 1950s. My father lost his father in the war. I couldn’t see the effect of this throughout his life.

My other grandfather fought in both wars.

i too have wondered about the claims made for the difficulties of young people today in comparison with the experiences and resilience of my parents and grandparents. And I despair that one in five young people is not in work or education and is instead on benefits. I’ll be working till I’m 70 and hopefully beyond that age, goddess willing. Young people have so much to play for - this world is rich in opportunities.

I wish they were more like my grandfathers, both of whom treated their circumstances as adventures, opportunities, and the chance to serve others.

Great post @TightlyLacedCorset. I relate so much

Haven't seen it but I'm not sure about the stoic thing. Many incredibly brave people showed amazing resilience but I've no doubt many would if it happened again now. However i believe people suffered much more than we think. The UK media and gov was a propaganda machine showing only one version of brave strong Britons. This is just my speculation. I suspect many 'brave' young men became traumatised adults who drank heavily, many 'resilient' children became emotionally disregulated and co dependent as adults, many 'strong' women became cold and distant etc etc. War damages much more than one generation.

They were traumatized though . Contemporary accounts, language like shell shock, neurotic, anxious, and suicidal describe this phenomenon. My great grandmother would be periodically institutionalized. People emigrated to escspe. Drank to escape. Abandoned children and wives to escape.

So is that it? Your measure of success is marriage, children, work? Later marriage or no marriage for this current generation is the sign of their lack of fitness? Is it the two parent marriages, difficulty of divorce, lack of contraception, illegal abortion that you are mourning? The magdalene laundries? Because you need to include them.

this is completely ahistorical and out of context. 1st of all the masses of male deaths i 1st and 2nd world war created a glut of single women or women who married defensively as they were thrown out of the workforce and could no longer earn wartime wages. 2nd if all the rising welfare state made childrearing snd housing more available while the postwar economic boom also lifted many while currently brexit has crushed britain.

‘twas ever thus, I believe.

An older Gen Z friend was complaining to me about how her generation is characterised and was surprised to hear that Gen X got many of the same criticisms back in the day. She was amazed to hear that they called us the “slacker generation”! We compared notes and a lot of the things people say/said were almost exactly the same.

(Edited to clarify that I was empathising with her, not telling her to get over it because Gen X had it too 😂)

I don’t think anyone is romanticising the war or evacuation, more pointing out that the result should have been a traumatised generation unable to work or raise a family (look at how many are not working for MH today), yet somehow it didn’t.

I’m certain they had a ton of bottled up trauma but ultimately the country continued to be successful as necessity meant they HAD to work, had to marry in many cases, and had to move on. Wallowing was not a choice. And given the Silent Generation are the most respected in the country, and among the most pragmatic, optimistic and balanced people I’ve ever had the privilege of knowing, did that neccessity help them? Are we doing it wrong today by encouraging too much introspection and ‘self care’?

The olds have been wailing about the young since that guy ordered the rude children to be eaten by bears in the bible and also dince Socrates. So twas ever thus. But, seriously, look at sailing to byzantium? Yeats is just annoyed the old get no respect.

Sailing to Byzantium

W. B. Yeats
1865 –
1939
That is no country for old men. The young
In one another’s arms, birds in the trees
—Those dying generations—at their song,
The salmon-falls, the mackerel-crowded seas,
Fish, flesh, or fowl, commend all summer long
Whatever is begotten, born, and dies.
Caught in that sensual music all neglect
Monuments of unageing intellect.
An aged man is but a paltry thing,
A tattered coat upon a stick, unless
Soul clap its hands and sing, and louder sing
For every tatter in its mortal dress,
Nor is there singing school but studying
Monuments of its own magnificence;
And therefore I have sailed the seas and come
To the holy city of Byzantium.
O sages standing in God’s holy fire
As in the gold mosaic of a wall,
Come from the holy fire, perne in a gyre,
And be the singing-masters of my soul.
Consume my heart away; sick with desire
And fastened to a dying animal
It knows not what it is; and gather me
Into the artifice of eternity.
Once out of nature I shall never take
My bodily form from any natural thing,
But such a form as Grecian goldsmiths make
Of hammered gold and gold enamelling
To keep a drowsy Emperor awake;
Or set upon a golden bough to sing
To lords and ladies of Byzantium
Of what is past, or passing, or to come.

Were being really shitty to Gen Z. I really feel for them. Then they have to be punched down on and have to hear about how non-resilient they are.

Where does it come from? Why is there so much bitterness towards the young?

I'm early Gen X From the past I remember:

We had no central heating.

Single paned glass that got wringing wet in winter, damp in the walls.

Freezing cold pipes that froze solid so that there was no water.

I might be the last generation to remember a standing water pump/tap being in use for people in the street to collect when water ran out.

We used to buy the propane gas from a man who would pass by on the street with a truck.

My parents could only afford to heat one room at a time and I had to wash in a big metal basin gas heater.

Having to sometimes put cardboard in my shoes because the soles were worn down.

But also:

We could play as children outside all day far into the evening and go in and out of neighbours houses with your friends with no one worried about us.

Your neighbours knew who you were, and who your parents were (and could complain to) and they talked to you like normal human beings and would sometimes invite you in for a sandwich and cake.

It was rude to pass someone and not say good morning to them. Most people said good morning

If I got locked out for some reason, no probs. Go to almost any neighbour on the street and sit it out till mum or dad comes back.

We walked to school and went to parks, libraries, swimming and took buses by ourselves. No anxiety about being attacked.

You ran out of something you pop across to a neighbour and next time you shop, you give it back.

You knew the local shopkeepers. If you ran out of money and payday was next week,they would let you take a few things until you could pay it back. Cheques were accepted in supermarkets so same principle, you could buy stuff before it cleared

We went to church most Sundays. You felt part of a community and were told about your responsibility to a higher authority and your neighbours. You often saw your neighbours and their families at the church. You knew the vicar/priest

Social security was far more accessible. It was possible to get emergency funds on the day. You'd have to wait around in the office for hours but you could get it.

There were community laundries on Estates. Even in private laundries if you had money you could drop off your washing, pay the laundress, go shopping and come and pick it up again all done and folded.

Informal childcare was common. Many women stayed at home. You could ask a neighbour or a family friend to have your child for you without paying your entire salary. One-to-one child care was more common.

Sundays were genuine days of rest. The shops were not open. There weren't as many cars on the road so it was relatively peaceful (and dull and dragging) but you could spend family time.

Entertainment had a place, there were only three TV channels then 4.

Local charity was better. Youth centres and church funded outings were more plentiful.

You could leave school at 16 and get a job. You could walk into a business premises and ask for work, speak to a supervisor and be given a chance. Working your way up from a runner/tea maker/dogsbody in even elite professions was common. You did not need a degree.

Grants were given for higher education. My aunt has 2 degrees and didn't pay a penny for either.

Social housing was more plentiful.

There's a lot more that made for a less anxiety prone society. Even in the midst of hardships, it was often a shared experience. Today it's much, much more individualised. It's the result of the hyper individualised pull your own socks up mentality. The pace of life has also gotten much faster. Community has mostly gone from cities.

I watched my children apply for jobs. It's absolutely shit. Three, even four, stages of job interview, plus psychometric or maths and English testing. Having to sometimes travel so far they needed to use travel lodge overnight just to attend the 'group task observation testing' round of the interview process, getting assessed on their performance...and still not getting the job and that's with university degrees also. One of mine had a first and it still took her 2 years to get a job in her field at graduate level, and she still cannot afford to leave home and rent because there are no social housing for young people and private rents are just not in the realm of reality in our area.

That was not my experience after leaving school at all.

Were being really shitty to Gen Z. I really feel for them. Then they have to be punched down on and have to hear about how non-resilient they are.

Young people have been criticised by older people since forever.

I absolutely hate how the war is romanticised in this country. It was an awful time. It's not like people had a choice about it - does that mean they were resilient? History is littered with terrible times that people got through because there wasn't an alternative.

Young people today have it tough, and just like in the past they'll get through it - because there isn't an alternative. But they'll probably have to work more years, earn less, spend more on housing, have reduced social mobility, reduced life expectancy etc. It's not great and we should as a society be looking at what we can do to help.

My Grandad was an evacuee, he was also orphaned by the end of the war. He said during lockdown that he thinks the experiences children were going through at the time were worse than what he went through.

I don't know if I would agree, but it was interesting to hear.

Yes this is romanticised in books about children being separated from their parents and going to a lovely English countryside to be safe.

The actual evidence is that children separated from their parents during the war did worse than those who were not. Children who did not understand their fathers because their fathers had been damaged by fighting both physically and mentally. Mothers who had to pick up the pieces when the man never came back. To pretend this is all stoicism without real cost is to deny that war traumatises all people in it. It defies what we instinctively know as parents.

I'm not missing the point, I just dont agree and that is allowed 🙄

I have 3 resilient teens who practice gratitude and their friends are also resilient and lovely young people, you seem fixated on a stereotype that I, and many others on this thread, don't relate to.

My Mum was post war generation and her attitude was she put up with shit so anyone can, which is not healthy. She survived sure but had deep seated, undiagnosed mh issues which massively affected me as a child and to some extent still do now.

Hats off to people who survive and thrive after deep trauma because its not easy and admire it. My point is today's problems are different but still hard - unemployment and hard to access entry level jobs, high housing costs, lack of rental accommodation and mortgage access in some areas, crippling student debt...and yes mh issues not because there are more but because it is now acceptable to talk about and seek support for those, which i personally think is a good thing.

It was very moving. Those children and their families went through so much.

So not about teaching young people about history, but more being a stick to beat them with and call them ridiculous... right.

Why is living through a war and putting up with all these restrictions the bar young people have to be compared to? It's ridiculous.

Someone upthread lobbed the usual mumsnet contempt at “therapy speak” and the idea of intergenerational trauma. Its funny that this should come up in a discussion of Children of the Blitz. Because it was English psychologists and sociologist who came up with ground breaking theories such as attachment and child psychology based on their work with children sent away from home or instituionalized during the war. Look up the work of Winnicott, Ainslie, and Bowlby and you will see powerful testimony and early documentary footage of how scarring these separations were for these children. We watched this footage in University and it is heartbreaking.

I would suggest also watching 7 Up and the following series where British children are interviewed every 7 years about their hopes and dreams. That will also give you more than a sound bite’s understanding of how class and race and family style affect children’s emotional growth.

I’m glad your kids are brilliant but unless you work with this age group then you don’t see the full picture. I work in HE and I do see some very capable young people but I would say that at least half of the ones I work with are lacking in resilience, have far too much done for them, very little common sense etc. I think it’s a combination of social media, a ridiculous education system that values results over skills and critical thinking, and being generally molly coddled by their parents.

This country builds a lot of myths about the war which seemed to gloss over the basic issue which is that people lived in a state of fear, which nobody was sure was going to end. The state dictated nearly everything you did, from what you ate to what you wore, if you saw your father, or if your mother went out to work, to when you could go out at night. People were glad when it ended for a reason! They found ways to cope as people do, but they didn’t romanticise it, that was state propaganda, which some people now claim as fact, and a good thing.

Young people have it hard because of the world we have made. Easy to skip the last 80 years and forget that bit.

Is the OP unaware that there are many children in the UK and worldwide who are living through “the blitz” right now? Gaza, Ukraine, Yemen, Tibet, the Uighers in China? How lovely that they will have the chance, if they live, to learn stoicism.

It wasn't that easy to buy a house back then. There was more social housing, though. Many members of the "sainted" generations that preceded the boomers were against mass immigration. My grandfather, a boy soldier of World War One, I won't repeat what he said about the council estate that they built on the edge of his village in the 1970s.