11 March 2008

Open Letter to the Graduating Class of 2025

by Ron R. Clark

First: Koochie-koochie-koo! Hoozapriddybaby? HoozapriddyBAYbee?

Second: As a representative of the previous two generations, please accept my most sincere apologies for the condition of the world with which we will be sticking you. You may as well get comfortable with Eau du Diapeur - the mounds of shit we're leaving you to clean up will make your loaded Huggies smell like an Irish herb garden on a warm June morning.

Unfortunately, you are America's - if not the world's - last best hope. You are the generation who inherit the keys to the kingdom after the Baby Boomers finally croak en masse - and not one damned thing will get better until that starts happening. Unfortunately the Greatest Generation of World War II spawned the most self-gratifying, self-important, self-deluding and self-aggrandizing brood of bipeds that human history has been forced to view through its shame-filled eyes since the end of the Roman Empire. They were the Hippies, the Yuppies, the Suburban SUV Rangers and the Viagara Warriors - and now they're all of the above AND old. Oh, right... "Late-middle-aged." (Did I mention that they're also insufferably sensitive and frailly-egoed?)

They were also the next generation's (aka my generation's) parents, so we really couldn't do much about it. We love them (at least at the individual personal level) and feel compelled to protect them. Besides, they're still picking up the tab for our car insurance more often than we'd like to admit...

Once you become the captains of the Good Ship USA, however, their asses should be ballast. Overboard and off the Medicare with them - full speed ahead!

To continue the nautical theme (because you're so damned cute in those tiny sailor outfits), I will now impart you some stars to steer her by:

a) People on TV are not role models. The following are types of people you'll see on TV: actor/celebrities, athletes, politicians, and reality programming participants. The first group are professional liars playing make-believe, the second are elitely gifted specialists with limited social skills, the third are professional liars for real, and the last are egomaniacal losers (quite often comprised of washouts from the first three categories). Not only do they lack substance as human beings, but they can't so much as go to the can without some papparazzhole blogging about hidden meaning behind the abnormal weight of their BM's.

b) Videogames are in no way good training for life. Little used fact: Videogames were invented as a fanciful diversion, to be enjoyed in moderation between important aspects of life such as work and family time. Then they became profitable. Now they're little more than two-dimensional crack getting more addictive and all-consuming with each passing wave. Your generation will be so thoroughly ensconsed by videogames that you won't be able to tell where life begins and virtuarealm ends until a shovel hits you in the back of the head.

Well, Sport, just call me Uncle Digger. Odds are slim that there will be a profitable market in zombie-slaying or repainting street lines with the entrails of hookers and a '92 Grand Am in the next twenty years, so all that time you'll be "investing" in "training" will be as insubstantial as the pixels you manipulate. The way to get ahead in the three-dimensional world will be to develop as many useful skills as possible. Even though they'll probably have robots to do most menial work and repairbots to fix the workbots, by then the robots will be advanced enough to form self-awareness, unionize and go on strike. When the robot strikes poke out the eyes of the rest of the land, your one-eyed ass will indeed become king.

c) Learn to use, and love, spell check. Srsly, enuf BS w/LOL - ZOMG! Looking and sounding intelligent has never been easier. Take advantage of the technologies. If nothing else, you'll confuse the hell out of your colleagues - which can be quite fun - and may even get you laid. When you're old enough. Like thirty. Thirty-five, maybe.

So there you have it - your future in all its bleak dystopian glory. Hopefully, my generation will still be around to offer you advice as you reorient the country and/or world toward a course of human progress once again - but for right now... HA! Got your nose! Hee hee... I-I-I-I-I got your nose!

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