I had this thought a couple days ago and thought I should write about it. Then I thought about it again on my hike today and thought I should do this post. Then I landed on a Reddit post that was related to this idea and I just stopped and opened up Live Writer. The problem at hand is kids these days. They don’t know shit. They are failing basic lessons in school and have no desire to learn. They can’t spell, they can’t do simple math, they can’t communicate. Say what you want about elementary and high school being nothing more than a training ground for work slaves, but fuck, you have to start somewhere.
Let me address that other point first, since I’ve mentioned some tangent and I have to get it out before continuing… I have some different thoughts about how school should be done, but if pressed, I would probably say it’s really the parents job, but you know, parents aren’t parenting much these days. My thoughts are that you need to expose children to as many different activities, hobbies, and professions as possible. You never know what is going to catch fire, and when that fire is lit, the child will motivate themselves. Of course, you have to teach the work slave basics, because everyone needs some basic skills to get by in life, as well as in work. Calculus, probably not. Addition, subtraction, and multiplication, definitely.
So anyway, my thoughts over the last couple days are that kids don’t want to learn and you can’t convince them to learn. They don’t see the point. Why learn math when you carry a calculator? Why learn to write when everything is typed and voice to text exists? Why learn when anything you don’t know about is a simple Internet question away? And once you do know, why bother retaining it? It’s always available for recall in an instant. These are actually kind of reasonable arguments. And at a certain level, I don’t have a problem with them, because I don’t know advanced math and I don’t know any details about old history and I’ve done just fine in my life.
The problem I see is, when you are absent of any skill or knowledge, what value are you? And man, that sounds cruel. it sounds exactly like what the conservatives that I despise are constantly harping on – if you don’t bring value to an employer as a work slave, why should you even be considered as a work slave? Why should you even be allowed to exist in society? And that’s probably a little exaggerated, but nowadays, not by much. So to flip the problem around and try to find an answer before defining a problem, let’s ask the kids, what do you want to do? What do you want to be?
The answer you get will probably be "I don’t know", which now makes me glad that I addressed my tangential thought early. In my day, we used to have vocational centers that would actually assist you in finding a career, but my small experience with my local office was pure bullshit. I was only evaluated for jobs that were in my local area, which were shit factory jobs. And looking at my grades, I was excluded from any white-collar careers, not that there were any in my area. How did I break away from this trap and become the successful person I am now? It was a connection.
I’ve said in previous posts that it’s not what you know, it’s who you know. And that’s been a saying forever, with people that feel they are being held down envious of the ones that skyrocket because of a connection. But you know what, there’s no secret force keeping you from finding a connection that can elevate or even jump start your career. The only force stopping you is you. (OOOoooo, Mr. Motivation dropping truth bombs, here!)
Ridiculously pretentious statements aside, consider the success rate of graduates from top-tier colleges. Sure, they might have gotten really good grades, but somehow, even dropouts succeed. They are surrounded by excellent people and those excellent people know other excellent people. It’s a gold mine of possibilities to meet someone who can help you get what you want. "But I can’t get into a top-tier college." I hear the youth saying. Well, duh, if you can’t do simple math, you can’t. But maybe you don’t need to. Maybe you have some skill or knowledge that makes you highly valuable to someone who is very smart or well-connected. But if you can’t even present the basics of skills and intelligence, will they even give you a chance? You kind of have to be in their circle to begin with, and those people aren’t going to associate with someone who can’t do simple math.
So to wrap this up, it’s not only what you know that can determine success, but everything that you do know has value if you can make your case that it has value. And it’s not only who you know, because if you don’t have any value to them, those people are not obligated to help you in any way.
So, young people, you might have been failed in your early years by not being exposed to careers or interests that could have inspired you to become an expert in the field despite not knowing how to make change for a $20. But if you’re not able to make change at a register, you’re never going to get the chance to interact with anyone who might be able to change your life. You have to know something to get ahead in life, and you have to show that you know something in order to connect with the right people who can make that happen. If you can’t demonstrate the basics, you might never get a chance to demonstrate you are that missing piece they need.
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