AIBU to think we are currently raising the most dull generation yet??

[Rosaofthevalley]

I have my own children who thankfully have a wide range of interests but they are increasingly finding it harder to actually communicate with other kids. I understand we all have different interests but I actually don’t know how to guide them through this.

I’m around a wide range of kids, schools, clubs, long term friends children, newer ones etc and it seems that an alarming amount of them have NO interests, like zero! Conversations usually revolve around phones, YouTube, TikTok, video games but they have no real world interests. This is if they look up long enough to hold a conversation with each other.

As a millennial myself I think as a generation we are seriously failing our kids. There are so many more behavioural issues, concentration and communication are at an all time low.
My friends who are still in teaching are pulling their hair out at the amount of crowd control needed on top of teaching (I left teaching 10yrs ago and definitely saw the start of a decline but nothing like now.)

I think they’re bored, but without the skills or imagination needed to combat boredom. Surely I can’t be the only one who thinks this??

From my experience the current teens of today are pretty switched on, and certainly opinionated about near enough everything.

I compare myself to my children and their friends at that age and can't believe how much more in tune with the world.

I have my own children who thankfully have a wide range of interests

Good for you, 🥇

Teens today have TikTok opinions, on all the trending buzzy topics, they think they know it all because all the answers are at their fingertips in the form of Google.

Wait until they’re in their 20s.

I agree.

But I don't think I had any strong opinions on things like climate change, lgbtq rights, abortion rights at 15. If I did I didn't feel confident sharing them.

It's a start.

At 15 I was drinking scrumpy in a field, not googling our local MPs voting record on Palestine.

Yes. People have always complained about the generation below them. In 1790 someone wrote "The free access which many young people have to romances, novels, and plays has poisoned the mind and corrupted the morals of many a promising youth; and prevented others from improving their minds in useful knowledge. Parents take care to feed their children with wholesome diet; and yet how unconcerned about the provision for the mind, whether they are furnished with salutary food, or with trash, chaff, or poison?"

So this is what I’m seeing.

Im not describing my kids as perfect or as being the perfect parent at all. And if it’s a question of how I can help my kids interact better then I’m all for that too.
However, they have no interest in screens at all. (Something I’m happy to continue) They’re generally playing, outside, baking just normal stuff or so I thought. Their clubs are great and whilst at the clubs the other children are too but it’s like the minute it finishes they go into mute/phone in hand mode.

My friends don’t have a single good thing to say about their children having phones. They literally lament having got them them. But they still got them them 🤷🏼‍♀️

Does anyone actually think I’m so glad I bought them a switch/iPad/phone it’s been the making of them??

Not in my experience. I'm a teacher and I can't believe the range of extracurricular stuff my students do.

You’re literally mentioning the children I’m describing.

Perhaps it’s bad luck but my eldest daughters year are exactly as your last description.

Communication issues I agree about, but that does not make them the most dull generation ever.

After all, none of them are in Coldplay.

Even worse society is brainwashing them all into thinking they all have to agree, they're not allowed to hold an opinion unless it's the right one, they're not allowed to make jokes, have banter, have a personality, have uniqueness, have any fun.

I totally agree with this post and am quite sure the only ones disagreeing are those whose own kids do nothing but sitting on their phones or gaming consoles.

I disagree and I already mentioned the many things my children do and it isn’t only play on their tablet. It doesn’t have to be an either/or situation. OP and your experience doesn’t negate others just because it is different from other posters and our environments.

No one has yet to explain why gaming is seen as such a bad thing and frowned upon compared to other hobbies, considering gaming can be and have a social aspect to it, involves rules/directions, research, memory retention, and other skills.

I agree with some that it could be down to income and what parents can afford as well as how much time parents have to engage with their children.

However, they have no interest in screens at all. (Something I’m happy to continue) They’re generally playing, outside, baking just normal stuff or so I thought.

Do you mind saying what age your children are?

Dull seems a slight cruel description from someone who used to work in education.

Mine are only primary age so perhaps I'm not in a position to comment yet but none of the kids seem dull - in fact they have way more hobbies than I ever had!

I think each generation has it's own challenges!

DS's interests were commented on at his first secondary parent's evening and his Art teacher was thrilled that he's into Warhammer, and not solely into gaming like many of the boys he teaches.
Every report and parents evening DS has always had comments about his curiosty and general knowledge. A lot of this is to do with his autistic attention to detail, but he likes a lot of historical, geographical and scientific knowledge and is keen to share it.

This does not win him many friends, nor does he care. At primary it was gaming that he did make friendships over. At present he's not socially motivated.

I wouldn't like gaming to be a sole interest, but it's not a total void either. Depending on the game there can be planning, strategy and life knowledge. It's often surprised me how much general knowledge they've got from games like Minecraft. The redeeming point of Fortnite is a bit of musical culture- it nearly compensates for the shouting and inane slang.

The sports and activities my DCs do don't particularly make them interesting. There's not that much to chat about swimming lengths, but it at least keeps them fit. Scouting is better for life experience. For DS1, these are things I inflict upon him. DS2 gets fired up by running and events that he's done. It's more places they've been, things they've done and knowledge they've gained.

Neither are readers, and not for the want of trying. I've made some gains with audio books for DS2. They get a lot from youtube and Newsround. Not all screen content is bad.

As young children, screen time was CBeebies. They were in school before we got smart phones and tablets and are about the last of that cohort. Their play was mainly trains, construction toys, vehicles, dens, sticks. Going out involved a lot of babble. Of course this still goes on, but there is also a not insignificant number of young children who have heavily screen-based lives which is a new phenomenen in this form. At least CBeebies was varied, designed and vetted content.

I've worked with thousands of young people in the past 20 years in different contexts. Some are naturally more interesting than others. There has been a general shift of attention span in less than a decade and general knowledge. Young people are the product of their environment. Where they've been dulled by a world that's very screen-based, risk averse, corporate, regimented (school curriculum) and financially restricted, that's not their creation. As a parent, it can be tough parenting within those parameters. My two are lucky to be in a better position than average, but it's still hard to resist external influence.

I've never regretted giving my dc free access to screens. They've always self-regulated well, have a variety of interests, and we don't fight about it. I absolutely understand that this is luck and it doesn't work out this way for everyone.

I do wonder if your dc being anti-phones is maybe more about a desire to say what you want them to say. Screens have a huge appeal and it's pretty unusual for dc to not enjoy them at all.

I enjoy using my phone, I assume you do too as you are on mn.

They’re 6-11

I think people have misinterpreted ‘interests’ to mean hobbies.
There are an awful lot of children who have no interests outside of organised activities. If your child has 27 organised hobbies but sits on a screen for any free time, yes I would describe that as lacking in imagination.

We offered my eldest a phone for secondary but she declined due to seeing what seems to have happened to those around her once they’ve got one. In her words they’ve all become ‘dull’.

If the home entertainment on offer nowadays was available when we were all kids our childhoods would have looked very different.

I pastied this from someone above. A lady who read tons of books because apart from choir and homework , nothing else was there available after school. If the internet existed when I was in secondary, I probably would still use it for reading things and still people would say this was boring and I lived a dull teenagehood

I think tech can be used very creatively.

I think it's a little narrow minded to describe the entirety of what can do done with tech as dull - my kids write stories, do graphic art, play role-playing games with friends, loads of stuff that's creative and they find interesting. It isn't all staring at tiktok.

It must be hard for your dd if she's struggling to fit in with friends, and I imagine it's fairly unusual at secondary age to dislike all tech. I hope you manage to help her find some dc with similar interests.

@Rosaofthevalley

Does anyone actually think I’m so glad I bought them a switch/iPad/phone it’s been the making of them??

I'm pretty sure my best friend does. Her now 20 year old is acing uni and has already designed games that have been picked up by a major. He's making more money than his parents and they are both professionals.

He was always head in a screen.

I'd encourage your DD to try to find common ground with her peers otherwise there may be a long, lonely road ahead. While exceptionalism is greatly to be admired in adults who can do what they like, go where they please and search out like-minded people, it strikes me as something of a burden in the under 18s who are usually confined to a somewhat narrower path.

A lot of the primary kids I teach - year 6 - seem to spend hours out on their bikes playing. Or they have clubs.

Our kids 8-14 have a range of hobbies including sports and yes video games. I think yabu though in your conversation expectations. It's completely normal for kids to talk a lot about one thing, and yes sometimes that obsession of the moment is Minecraft, but sometimes it's 'venomous snakes' or some random thing. My eldest has mild social anxiety, they can talk to their peers and adults that they know but sometimes struggle to keep a conversation going. That doesn't make them dull, and practice makes perfect so we try to support by suggesting topics or sticking to familiar subjects.

Yabu as your post comes across that you've done a great job with your kids but others haven't which is judgey imo

None of the 18-20 year olds had phones? I was that age 20+ years ago and we all had phones at school/uni. Do you mean they weren’t allowed them in school?

I think it depends on the kid as well. I was born in 93, so no screens really until secondary school. I loved reading, writing stories, and imaginative play with teddies as a kid. I was animal obsessed and forever making animal fact files. As I got into secondary, I never played sports and was only into video games really, and just generally loafing around with mates watching Disney/YouTube. I did still like reading though.

As an adult, I still don't play sports. I still love video games, I go to a board game group, play DnD, crochet, and love to paint.

I have two nieces who aren't interested in screens (their screen time isn't super restricted or anything) and would rather be running around or playing football. I have a nephew who would play Fortnite all day if he could.

There are a lot of adults whose only hobby is coming home and watching Netflix. My hobbies are all indoor hobbies, and I can't talk to the average adult about video games and definitely not table top board games lol.

In my era when the internet was becoming popular, our worlds revolved around MSN, Bebo, etc. Kids just enjoy what's popular at the time, typically. I feel like in your 20's you develop a truer sense of your interests.

I do agree though screen time has removed a lot of imaginative play from children. I was still obsessed with TY beanies aged 11! They all had their own social circles and elaborate back stories/romances, etc.

100% agree op. Added to the dullness is a complete lack of SOH. No banter because everyone is too scared of saying something wrong. Everyone looks the same too. It’s like millions of clones!😆