An Open Letter to Millennials and Generation Xers
Dear Millennials and Generation Xers:
I understand that you believe you are getting a bad rap from us Baby Boomers. That we portray you as naïve, whining a lot, and doing little. It is true that no generalization applies to everyone, and there are undoubtedly many young Americans who are outstanding. It is wise to “cast the log out of one’s own eye before seeking to cast the sliver out of another’s,” to paraphrase Christ, but if we must be flawless to address problems that we see in others, none of us would make any progress. So, I would like to point out some serious issues related to the attitudes of many young Americans, maybe even you.
It has been said that thinking is the hardest work there is to do and that is why so few do it. But it is precisely there that I will be taking you for the next few minutes. I am asking you to think in ways you may have never thought before.
We have received reports concerning Millennials that are quite troubling to some of us who have been around awhile. I have heard, for example that about 50 percent of Millennials and those younger believe that we live in the most stressful times ever. Really? Only one who has not lived long and is unaware of what people throughout history have endured could think such a thing.
A hundred years ago, for example, life expectancy for most Americans was under fifty years, and it was not uncommon for a mother to lose more than one baby at birth. The average daily wage across the country was under a dollar a day, and most people owned only a couple of changes of clothes. It was common that children at a young age worked many hours weekly, and their families might not have survived had they not done so. Many children did not finish high school, and only about one in fifty went on to college.
An older gentleman I knew many years ago spoke of the logging industry in the Northwest at the turn of the last Century where one logging operation averaged one fatality per day but never slowed down because there was a line of men blocks long waiting desperately for work. Dying young was so common people hardly thought about it.
Vaccines are a modern reality. In 1900 children were dying by the thousands in from Smallpox, Measles, Diphtheria and Pertussis. My grandmother lost a brother at 18 to a ruptured appendix and two young sisters to the 1918 Flu. She lost one of her own children shortly after giving birth.
If you went anywhere, you walked or rode a horse. Cars were rare. A person today travels as far in a year as a person a century ago would travel in his lifetime! That was life in the U.S. a hundred years ago.
I also hear that a high percentage of you favor socialism over capitalism. Again, you would do well to do some reading. It is said that “ignorance is bliss.” If true, such bliss is momentary. In reality there is no premium on ignorance and no excuse for it considering the easy access to information today.
The object that Leftists hold up for your admiration, some kind of egalitarian socialist utopia, does not and will not ever exist apart from God’s direct intervention. Study history and you will discover that what has generally been the norm throughout human history was grinding poverty and suffering for virtually everyone under the heel of a despot. Wealth and comforts were exclusive to the powerful few who governed for their own pleasure. This all due to man’s sinfulness (You don’t hear that term often, but it explains much. Read more, especially the Bible).
There is no economic system that works perfectly for everyone. Why would you so foolishly believe that after 6000 years of powerful men exploiting everyone else, there would suddenly appear a new economic system whereby the masses have all they need or want, and all are exquisitely happy with no governmental exploitation or corruption? Sorry, not going to happen! Your favored economic theory is just another example of greedy men concocting a system where they oppress the masses and live in opulence themselves. Every socialist/progressive/communist country ever established has followed this recipe: power and wealth for the few, oppression and poverty for the rest. (Maybe you plan on being one of the oppressors?)
Yes, capitalism has also been exploited by some, but it at least holds out the possibility for the common folk, with character and hard work, to rise out of their poverty to enjoy a piece of the pie. Most of America’s millionaires are first generation wealthy. America’s brand of capitalism, as it has expanded over the world in the last 50-75 years, has lifted more people out of poverty, has provided more leisure time and individual liberties than all other economic systems of history combined. The generosity of the American people due to its Christian heritage and economic system has gifted poorer nations countless billions of dollars. If you care to investigate you will find that the socialist/communist countries struggle to feed their own people, and “give” gifts (read bribes) only to gain advantage for the elite.
Is it true that many of you believe America should end? Have you really thought about what that would mean? Nations, especially those as large and as influential as America, do not just “go away.” The end of America would almost certainly be accompanied by tremendous suffering and death. Do you believe you would escape unscathed? What of your family and friends?
We have great enemies such as China and Russia. How will they act if they see America truly weakened? Both of those nations have recent histories of brutality to their own people. China reportedly has over a million Muslims held as slaves, and Russia has embarked on an unprovoked war killing thousands. Even today thousands languish in China’s prisons for simply resisting the oppressive hand of the government. In every instance where governments have achieved the level of power necessary to institute socialism the leaders have slaughtered their own citizens.
Have you not read of what Stalin, Hitler, Castro and others did to those who helped them achieve power? Purges are the norm for socialist regimes. Do you really want that here?
As long as fallen people are in charge there will be nothing even approximating a utopia. America has been the greatest blessing to mankind of any nation in the last 2000 years, resisting oppression elsewhere, and seeking to correct its own failures at home. Perfect, no, but beneficial in more ways than one can say! The greatest blessing of America has been its allowing for Christians to do the gracious work of Christ for over four hundred years; and the good that genuine Christians have done is a mere foretaste of what Christ’s Kingdom will be like when He decides it is time for His personal rule!
The fact that young people are free to protest, wreak damage, scream their opinions in the face of the police, and then go home to sleep at night is adequate evidence that we do not live in an oppressive society. But that would require the hard work called thinking, I suppose!
It is time for Americans to wake up!
A simple fool is someone who is ignorant of the consequences of his actions and unwittingly hurts himself and others by his unwise choices. An evil fool is someone who doesn’t care who he hurts by his actions because he only thinks of himself.
If you hate America and embrace socialism, which kind of fool are you?
