From incipient fascism to crazy weather, we’re f**ked

Whether any or all of these apocalypses come to pass is almost irrelevant, at least to my point here. We Xers were promised -- promised -- as kids that jet packs and flying cars and all sorts of cool futuristic goodies would be everyday toys by the time we grew up, certainly by that magical year of 2000. Not only has that failed to come to pass, but our culture has shifted from one of optimism for the glorious, shining future to one of impending cataclysm of one type or another.

In my gloom-and-doom surfing, I discovered Karavans: Social Entrepreneurship & Economic Survival as the World Enters Energy Descent. The blogger there is feeling the same disappointment I am:

If you're over 40, you may have noticed that for very the first time in your lifetime there's a definite lack of optimism about the future, both for our country and the world as a whole. People growing up in the 1950s and 60s were bombarded with stories about how bright everyone's future was going to be. Remember The Jetsons? That's what I'm talking about. Flying cars. Affordable space travel. The elimination of disease. Everyone believed that things would just continue to get better and better.

Except you don’t have to be over 40 to feel this.

Another site I stumbled across is deconsumption, which features a pretty good summary of the state of the generational friction between Xers and Boomers (whom, I suppose, we should blame for the lack of jet packs and all):

I’ve been pondering the idea of revolution in our society, and it seems to me that one aspect of that would indeed appear to be “generational": more specifically, a growing friction between the “Baby Boomer” and “Gen-X” ideologies and worldviews. Now that the leading-edge members of the Gen-X generation are approaching “middle-age”, over the next decade they will be slowly and increasingly challenging the Boomers for the reigns of leadership. And I believe that this is going to be an uneasy transition, because--on a generational level--Boomers really disrespect Gen-X, and Gen-X hates the Boomers....

“Hate” is too strong a word, but still...

(A warning: the deconsumption writer seems to believe in astrology, which is precisely the kind of antiscientific thinking that got us into so many of the messes we find ourselves in today.)

The deconsumption blogger mentions William Strauss and Neil Howe’s The Fourth Turning, which I can’t recommend enough if you plan on living in the world over the next quarter century. And the authors’ site dedicated to generational issues features a pretty active forum, where I found some intriguing speculation about the shape of the fourth turning (the next 20 years):

From 2010-2019 USA is a state of Martial Law Authority: elections are allowed, but much like in the Civil War there is suspension of Habeas Corpus & economy suffers due to controlled movement in Martial Law time. Protesters are dealt with immediately (sent to a camp or shot if considered dangerous). As a result of the Martial Law Authority & a large cadre of Mexican Immigrants attempting to start a new nation that includes California, New Mexico, Arizona, & Texas, a low-level civil war in USA erupts around 2011-2015. This attempt isn't successful, but human rights issues & internal fighting emerge quickly to be a challenge to the USA's existence as if the outer global turmoil wasn't enough.

The point isn’t that these things will definitely happen, but that things of a similar tenor are likely to happen. Whatever transpires, it’ll be Xers left holding the bag, which will not be made of some futuristic fabric that keeps itself clean or repairs small tears with nanotech tailoring.