Friday, August 27, 2010
Questioning What Our Parents Believe
Throughout Dr. Twenge's book Generation Me, she seldomly mentions religion. She does not supply a specific section to discuss religion. She speaks of Generation Me as being very narcissitic which would explain why she didn't include a section on religion in her book. According to her, Generation Me is able to make what we want to happen into reality, with no help from a superior being. In her opinion, we don't need to have faith in something we cannot see because we hold our on destiny. I understand that many Generation Me'ers don't practice a religion, but I don't believe that Generation Me thinks that it is incapable of hoping and keeping faith in something. I think this Generation Me is more focused on trying to find the truth, and with there being so many world religions, it is almost impossible to believe in a religion based on the truth. Generation Me is not incapable of putting their trust in someone else's hands, but they are more skeptical about it than past generations have been. They are more likely to embrace a religion that is completely opposite of what their parents were taught. I think Dr. Twenge should have included a section on religion in her book because even though less of Generation Me is practicing a religion, they are still deeply affected by it. Every day we are bombarded with commercials saying "... and I'm a Mormon" or news about the Ground Zero mosque. Generation Me cannot be told what to believe ,when it comes to religion, but that does not mean we are incapable of believing in something. Dr. Twenge should have given Generation Me some credit and included a section entitled "Questioning What Our Parents Believe." Because of all the world religions, Generation Me has more options than ever when deciding on a religion.
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I completely agree with you when you say "I understand that many Generation Me'ers don't practice a religion, but I don't believe that Generation Me thinks that it is incapable of hoping and keeping faith in something. I think this Generation Me is more focused on trying to find the truth, and with there being so many world religions, it is almost impossible to believe in a religion based on the truth." I do believe that with all the possible faiths and religions out there, one might be afraid to conform to one, or one might have questions that can't be answered. Gen Me's aren't incapable of having faith, they're just confused or too busy to try to find the truth in something intangible to begin with. With so many options it only makes decisions harder, where as in past generations no one would go outside the norm for there to even be other options. This just says our generation is more out going, curious, but cautious.
ReplyDeleteI think the top post has several good points. The top post says, "According to her (Twenge), Generation Me is able to make what we want to happen into reality, with no help from a superior being. In her opinion, we don't need to have faith in something we cannot see because we hold our own destiny." This is a good quote to bring up because in a sense, we are our own superior beings, and that’s why, I think, we hold our own destinies. It’s also harder for Generation Me’ers to pick or choose a religion because we have so many options. So why not choose ourselves? .. Especially since, like Twenge continuously points out, we are the most narcissistic generation yet.
ReplyDeleteI agree that globalization has resulted in religious options expanding exponentially and that the skepticism of GenMe towards life has cause a different attitude towards Religion. Fifty years ago our grandparents didn't have the option to google Hinduism and decide that indeed Hinduism is the right religion for me because I need to learn to except my life through the belief in more lives to come if I search out enlightenment through the circumstances that I have been born into. I think that GenMe too often looks at the negative and because of frequent corruption within organized religion they often opt out but the ideas of the religions have helped to form GenMe's undestanding of life even if they don't pay church dues.
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