Caught between Cultures

Kids these days are different. They're still biologically human, but no longer your typical Asian/Singaporean young people we were. This Youtube/TikTok/Netflix generation has grown up on content that is primarily Western, unlike the stuff we had when we were young. Even the American/British media we had was a lot more wholesome, and anything else would likely have been banned from the handful of TV channels we had.

In schools, the current generation has been taught to ask, challenge, speak up. It's the motto of the Z peeps - question everything, accept nothing!

Bad news. This results in children who don't follow instructions, talkback and are sometimes just plain disobedient. What have we done?!

One thing hasn't changed, kids still love fast food

Following instructions - Why listen to your elders when you can do you rationalise on your own? Gen Z has been taught to investigate, brainstorm (within your own grey matter if it's a solo project), come up with a list of possible options and then move forward. Real decisions based on hard facts. Your parents' instructions are obviously not even on your list of options and don't seem to have your best interest at heart.

Time - The hands on the clock (or pixels on the screen) are just a suggestion. Even though they are indirectly synchronised with 24 satellites orbiting the planet containing vibrating Cesium atoms having an error rate of 1 second in 100 million years, they don't think it matters. 5 or 10 minutes, sometimes an hour deviation off the pre-agreed time is still within the range of acceptable, apparently.

Talking back - This isn't being rude, it's just asking a question. Akin to putting your hand up in class to clarify - which is what we often encourage them to do. Why did the teacher say that? Why didn't you raise your hand and question or challenge? You cannot accept everything she says. They end up practising the same thing at home with us. Sigh. And the "because I'm your mum/dad and I say so" line no longer works. Instead, they have a response that goes "this rule does not make sense" and you need to quickly cobble something together in your parent brain which is just too tired to deal with this anymore.