Socrates

The difference between generations never end, since Socrates... - Essay School is over, you are getting married. Your child is born, you try to raise him/ her in the best way according to your own aspirations and expectations. You want him/ her to go to the best schools, get a good education, do sports, play a musical instrument, piano, violin, guitar, enjoy life, and live a healthy and happy life. You want your child to have the things that you have worked hard for all your life and cannot reach. You want him/her to speak a few foreign languages. Then your child grows up, leaves home, goes to study abroad, leaves your home, city, lives in other environments, is affected by the habits of those environments, eats differently, dresses differently, behaves differently. Your son gets married, leaves the house, lives in another city in another house with another person, enters his wife’s home kitchen and clothing lifestyle. He is in the environment of his wife -in the environments that his wife likes. He eats the food she makes. He breaks away from you, you get together for short evenings, lunches, and holidays for a few days from time to time, you see that old boy has gone, a completely different person has come. He likes another music instead of opera or classical music, even TV-radio channels are different. His interests are different. The book, magazine, newspaper we read is different, the news we follow is different. You want him to eat healthy, he buys and eats things that are not your preference. You want him to wear nice clothes that fit his body, to be well-groomed and handsome. He wears whatever he finds in the morning, and goes to work that way. We can't go to the opera together. You mention on politics, the environment, daily news, he doesn't know about any of them. His world is different than yours. It is the principle of doing the opposite of everything you say. If he doesn't know what to do about a subject, he waits for your advice and does the just opposite of your advice. Everyone at home is a Ankara TED school graduate, except for me. The education quality of the TED school has been tried and tested for years. He objects for schooling your grandchild. He hurts here and there, has a fever, gags, "my son, see a proper specialist doctor", you say, "don't worry about it, I've seen a doctor, I'm taking my medication", he says. I used to go to my parents' house, because our cities were different, I would stay with them for a few days on the weekend. I drank my mother's soup in the morning. As privilaged children of the Republic, they had immutable rules in their homes. What Newspaper to read was certain, breakfast was certain, what to eat for dinner was certain, yogurt or lentil soup, plenty of salad, vegetables, leeks, spinach, chicken, fish or meatballs, fruit, my mother would put on her apron and cook slowly in the kitchen, sometimes I would go into the kitchen to help my mother, legumes I would peel, make salad, cut bread, chop onions. Then I went hiking and fishing with my father. I would talk to them for hours on current local and world news. At home, only TRT3 ckassical music FM was listened to on the radio and a few certain TV channels were watched. In the morning, I would shave and take a shower. No matter how much I grow up, I always wanted to remain their child, to be protected by them. Now my kids don't want such things. Internet games are addictive, they play Battlestar Galactica non-stop, they read the news on Twitter, Facebook, and eat fast food - junk food - tantuni wrap kokoreç that you will never eat. They drink cola instead of ayran. Starbucks coffee instead of brewed Turkish tea. They don't read newspapers, magazines or books. They do not read anything that is not on the iPhone iPad PC screen. They use iPhone iPad 24/7, they can't stop looking at the screen. Shaving in the morning and dressing properly is not a big deal for them. It's normal for everyone to walk around with a stubble and ripped jeans. All of these are normal, it is not necessary to think the same things, to vote for the same political party. But we can still ride a bike together, take a walk, play blackgammon, go to a concert, go swimming, jogging, go fishing together. We can talk and discuss current issues. Even Socrates complained about the difference and ignorance of youth in his own time in 450 BC. Nothing much has changed in 2500 years. Ankara 24 September 2022