new york times essay contest

i liked the winning "why college matters" essay, but many, many others did not. (check out the comments)

But what do we really stand for? Like a true postmodern generation we refuse to weave together an overarching narrative to our own political consciousness, to present a cast of inspirational or revolutionary characters on our public stage, or to define a specific philosophy. We are a story seemingly without direction or theme, structure or meaning–a generation defined negatively against what came before us. When Al Gore once said “It’s the combination of narcissism and nihilism that really defines postmodernism,” he might as well have been echoing his entire generation’s critique of our own. We are a generation for whom even revolution seems trite, and therefore as fair a target for bland imitation as anything else. We are the generation of the Che Guevara tee-shirt.

the genius of the essay is that by criticizing it, you also are playing into its premise. that by responding, you are as reactionary and "post-everything" as the author says we are.
some of the comments/criticisms are bizarre (the post-modern/liberal one, comes to mind), but i do agree that the end was "weak." while i don't think we're all quite as hopeless as past generations believe us to be, i'm not convinced we're mounting our armchair revolutions either. his optimism is credibility-busting. i guess i'll believe it when i see it.
and to all the critics who say this kid doesn't have the answers to "where is this generation going and what is it’s focus"—all i say is, that's sort of the point. we don't have one direction, and we don't have one path. but it doesn't mean we're going nowhere.