Every generation thought the next one was ruined. Somehow the world keeps getting raised by them.

Complaints about the young are a permanent feature, and they have been wrong every time so far. Each wave of adults looks at new habits and new manners and concludes standards have collapsed. Then that supposedly ruined generation ends up running hospitals and raising children. The pattern says more about how age reads unfamiliarity than about anybody’s character.

When somebody tells you your generation is lost, you do not have to argue. Ask what they were accused of at your age, which usually ends the lecture. Then keep an eye on how you talk about whoever comes after you.