Hardship education nowadays faces criticism, as many older people seem to misunderstand the younger generation.
Generally speaking, older folks think today's Post-90s and Post-00s are the "honey pot generation" who cannot endure hardship. They often preach to the young using stories of how much they suffered in their youth.
I disagree with this perspective as a Post-90s kid, especially one from a rural background. I feel I'm qualified to refute such claims.
Let me introduce my situation first. Born in 1998 and raised in a village, I attended village elementary school. My parents worked away from home since I was 2-3. My grandma raised me until grade 4-5 before I had a falling out with my parents and grandma. Then I lived alone and went to school.
Many say the young nowadays have better material conditions. For me and many rural youths, that's not necessarily true compared to previous generations.
For example, around age 4-5, we were extremely poor. No meat, and even no salt at home - we relied on preserved veggies for flavor. When we finished rice, I had to dig up yams left in fields after harvest. For a while we didn't even have matches or lighters to cook. I had to borrow fire from neighbors. This lasted half a year.
I walked 2 hours on mountain roads to get to elementary school, carrying rice. Before switching to a central school, I did farm work and grazed cattle before going to school.
How about the Post-60s/70s generation, aka our parents' generation? Their rural childhoods were similar to ours - no major differences in food and clothing shortages. I don't think they suffered much more than us. Though poor, they could eat and helped with farm work before growing up.
Us Post-90s, especially rural youths, how did we live?
In my village, there were two situations:
Parents remained in the village. As children, we dropped out of middle school to work and send money home when parents were broke. The small tile-roofed houses were built with our money. Can you say our parents' generation suffered more than us?
Parents worked away from home. We studied on their money but over 50% still dropped out of middle/high school to work and bought flats in the county seat. Again, how did our parents suffer more when we all did migrant work?
Cases like my family where kids went to university normally are rare. As I analyzed above, our material conditions were similar but we faced greater life pressures.
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Of course the cities were different - most urban youths now rely on their parents for down payments while paying mortgages themselves for decades, which is the reality for most.
But the crux remains the tremendous stress in life compared to our parents' youth. It's incomparable.
So in summary, each generation faces its own difficulties.
If so, then the older generations have no right to use hardship education to teach us.
Fundamentally, hardship education is wrong.
And the so-called suffering refers merely to lacking food and clothing and doing farm work in their childhood.
Today's youths could certainly endure those environments. We are not afraid of hardship.
I'm not comparing my suffering with my grandparents' generation. Theirs was true destitution and misery.
But compared to my parents' generation, who suffered more?
Eating meat once in months but assured of basic food versus today's 996...which is more suffering?
My father now cares for my grandma, farms a bit, and raises pigs - playing cards when free.
Meanwhile, I work 996, not daring to spend, to buy a house.
Once my dad called saying how hard he works at home. I was unhappy.
His bit of work on 1-2 mu of land and pigs - haven't I done farm work before? Compared to my work until 3am for a project deadline, who suffers more?
Of course I don't work until 2-3am daily, only when very busy.
But undoubtedly, my life pressure is much greater than my parents' time.
In their youth, just peddling for 2 years allowed building a house in the village. But now? Impossible. Just the down payment takes years, with decades of mortgage.
Like my parents, why did they end up with no savings? Because they invested blindly, like opening shops in the 2000s. Back then peddling brought good income, far better than working in factories.
But reckless investments lost their decades of savings. This was caused by lack of investment sense.
In terms of pressure, only when I was in university with multiple siblings and tuition to pay was it highly stressful for those few years. After we graduated, there was no pressure.
With so many college graduates among us siblings, there's no worry about elderly care either.
Whereas in their youth, they didn't have the kind of pressure we face now.
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In conclusion:
It's often said today's youths cannot endure hardship because they haven't suffered. That's because the environment doesn't require suffering. Humans adapt well.
I suffered far more than my peers in childhood but I detest hardship education the most.
The view that suffering leads to success is fundamentally wrong.
The meaning of suffering isn't to later reminisce sweetly after becoming successful, or to condescend to others about the young not suffering nowadays.
Suffering is just suffering, unwillingly endured when there's no choice. Hardship is hardship.
Using hardship to educate others is a twisted value.
old farmer working in rice paddy
My perspective is that the older generation should understand that each era's context is different. Forcing their values and experiences onto today's youths is unreasonable. We should move towards more open-minded discussions across generations.