When the old fogey met thebright young things
ADVERTISING FEATURE WE sit and talk together, but a virtual lifetime separates us.
Yasmeen is 16 and Karina is 17, while I am 75. I can’t remember when I last conversed with someone this young. Even my granddaughters are in their 20s.
I confess it was a bit of a struggle because I’m the original “you tell the young people of today that, and they won’t believe you” old f**t.
But hey-ho, there must be some common ground. I ask if 16-yearolds should have the vote but Yasmeen doesn’t think the voting age should be dropped.
She says: “I don’t know very much about politics. There are so many stupid people of my age.” And much older, young lady!
But is my generation running the country well? Karina thinks not as young people are not represented properly.
She argues Swedish school strike leader
Greta Thunberg “represents us” and climate change is “more important than Brexit.”
As an oldie who thinks the pits should never have been closed and backs fracking under the right conditions, there’s not a lot I can say to that.
These bright sixth-form lasses from Longley Park College in Sheffield are also concerned about their generation’s lack of representation on television.
Yasmeen says: “They think the decisions are being made by an older generation – not theirs.” Yasmeen’s dad was in the Army but died when she was young, and Karina’s Lithuanian father is not in the country.
As the children of migrants, what do they think about the impact of immigration? “I think it’s quite good,” suggests Karina. “We have a lot more cultures now.”
Looking back down the wrong end of the telescope, they seem shocked I had to wait until I was 21 to vote and that 2016 was the second EU referendum, after we voted nearly two to one in 1975 to stay in the then Common Market.
It is disarming to see how young people come fresh to life.
They’re both sensitive people, “and with sensitivity comes understanding,” says Karina.
And where would they like to be in 10 years? We’re talking in the busy Daily Mirror newsroom, which appeals to them. Yasmeen says: “I’d like to write about mental health. It’s been neglected.”
Pretty soon my half-hour is up, and I ask them to ask me a question. Yasmeen asks: “What political party do you support?” That’s easy. I’m Labour, old Labour in fact, but not a Corbynista.
Karina asks what I think about today’s society. That’s harder but I believe the Thatcherite revolution atomised society, exalting individuality over collective identity.
Talking across almost 60 years of experience, it’s not easy to express this without sounding preachy at best and arrogant at worst.
But we must try. We can’t expect young people to respect us if we don’t respect them and listen to their views.
Schools should give students a chance to hear it from the old nag’s mouth, so to speak.