Clint Eastwood is on the cover of December’s GQ Magazine, which proclaims him “Badass of the Year.” Among other interesting topics, Eastwood expressed his disdain for today’s generation. “The guys who won World War II and that whole generation have disappeared, and now we have a bunch of teenage twits.”
First of all, Clint Eastwood gets to say whatever he wants; I certainly won’t argue with him. Second of all, that’s an unfair remark to teens, who cannot be so glibly and simply categorized. Third of all, I kind of see his point. It seems like the news has been so full of pettiness, with people taking personal shots at media and political figures, focusing more on appearance than substantive issues. Culturally, we’ve developed a society of entitlement, where our every whim is expected to be satisfied. And it’s true: this sort of behavior is somewhat common in teenagers, but there are ways to manage this.
My son and I have a statement we use when working on projects, or trying new things that may be challenging to him. I say “How do we succeed?” and he says “Hard work!” And that is perhaps the most important thing you can promote in your child. Stay away as much as you can from telling your child she’s so cute, or so smart, or so talented. History is full of failures who leaned too hard on the expectation of their talent to succeed for them. Hard work, on the other hand — which is in a great part what Eastwood references when he mentions the Greatest Generation — will always provide results. Hard work plus intelligence, hard work plus attractiveness, hard work plus talent — these things are what lead to success, and ultimately, a generation of people who do great things for society as a whole, and not just for themselves.
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