Offenders have taken over

In the developed world, like in Germany, a new phenomenon can be observed. Young people/students/pupils are staying home more often than previous generations due to psychological problems. Teachers and lecturers are confronted with a wide variety of diagnoses of mental challenges that former generations had never heard of or were diagnosed with.

In Europe, democracies established their fundamentals from the 1950s until 1976/1994, during which smaller interest groups emerged, seeking to have their interests heard and implemented. After World War II in Germany, § 175 did not allow any sexual contact between men, and § 218 forbade abortion. As German society progressed and its basics were addressed, interest groups turned to the streets to make their voices heard. Gradually, their concerns were legally addressed and became common practise in society.

My generation (born 1959) grew up being punished physically in different ways by our parents and relatives, while teachers and kindergartners also punished generations before. Due to a lack of modern technology, we had to interact person-to-person rather than through a technical device. The confrontation with others taught us to stand up for our rights in front of others, fight back when needed, accept that not every action of our peers was intentionally bad but an impulse of the moment, a momentary foolishness and when confronted, discussed, settled and forgotten by an honest apology. In African societies, a slap by parents and teachers is still an acceptable means of education, even to walk in church around the section reserved for children with a stick as a warning sign to stay disciplined is seen by Africans as acceptable. They send their children back to Africa when the temptations and lifestyle of the Western World do not discipline them.

White societies, on the contrary, see this as an outdated and punishable offence by parents and other authorities like teachers and kindergardeners. Children in Germany have a legal right to file a complaint with the police against their parents for possibly violating their rights by punishing them as a means of disciplinary education. Social workers will visit the respective families to advise and counsel the parents, or in extreme and repeated cases, take the child away. In Africa, the bar is much higher for such an intervention, and the generations which lived through two world wars have never seen anything like that.

Social media has set standards for the young generation, which portrays an unreal world. Values come to teenagers which would never have come to them in a person-to-person scenario. The laws regulate the latest human behaviour, and lecturers and teachers alike sleep with the law book under their pillow, which they carry during lessons with them to avoid any offence against the rules known by students much better than they themselves are aware of.

Jokes about the weaknesses of men and women, of blondes or people from certain regions, which my generation laughed about and saw as teasing each other, a reason to tease back, are today seen by the young generation as utterly unacceptable and punishable morally and legally. Common sense is no longer accepted, and the fact that every human is different, with strengths and weaknesses, not a ChatGPT robot standing before them, flawless and heartless, speaking words everyone speaks, is what they want. The mistakes they make are what they do not see, like the piece of wood the bible teaches us about. It is remarkable to observe young people of today how cruel in words they talk about each other in small groups, scared to be heard and judged. Honesty is hard to find.

The older German generation that felt physical punishment, looking back, does not see much wrong with what their parents did to them. They respect time has changed and refrain from punishing their children the same way. The trend is clear, common sense is subsidised by the law books when people interact.