Apologies in Advance

I want to apologize to generations X, Y, and Z, millennials, and to all future generations, for leaving the world in so much worse shape than when we inherited it. I’m sorry.

My generation had high hopes at one point. We were going to end war, protect the environment, and maybe even add some compassion to the Capitalist system that was growing increasingly indifferent to human needs. We really had good intentions.

But we got busy. We had to finish school. Then we had to move out of our parents’ houses, and that meant finding a job of some kind. Then, unexpectedly, that turned into a thing of itself. Jobs turned into careers. Income turned into assets. And somehow, we started to want some of that comfort that we used to put down the previous generation for.

We still wanted peace and a wholesome environment and all that, but now we thought maybe we could earn enough to give money to these good causes. Better yet, maybe we could invest in good causes, so we’d make money off other peoples’ good deed doing. Nothing wrong with that, right?

But somehow, it all got screwed up. Somehow all these good deed doers we were investing in didn’t manage to save the world as we intended. Sure, they made progress. They learned about and studied global warming, but they didn’t manage to convince everybody. They developed new technologies for education, and even new cures for diseases, but those are never-ending jobs. They even championed policies and politicians who backed all the right stuff, but we see where that led.

So, I guess the bottom line is, on behalf of my generation, I’m sorry.