tanteI wonder if this trend of "Kidults" (as in adults buying toys or having other very "child-like" hobbies and preferences) is fueled by how little pathways to joy we leave to adults so many revert back to when Ninja Turtles made them happy.
If you actually like toys or Cartoons or whatever, go apeshit. (I also love me some Invader Zim and other things). But It feels a bit regressive when the only path to joy is leading backwards and not in the present or the future.
Iker@tante It's a weird thing. There's versions of this that I do find problematic. Like the "girl math", "I'm just a girl" self-infantilizing things that kind of end up feeling like internalized misogyny. And in general, not just for specific gender identities, there's a lot of apathy and "I'm too unintelligent to understand" (substituting unintelligent for an ableist word), "it's not that deep", "I need an adult (even though I am myself an adult)", and other similar phrases that come from younger generations. I think some of this arrested development stems from the fact that "adulthood" has been defined by material things: owning housing, a car, not being in debt, starting a family. Socially and culturally, we have not taken the steps to disentangle those things that were taught to us. It's uncomfortable work, figuring out what adult self-actualization looks like when what we were promised was our future is something unattainable for a majority of the people who this was sold to. And that's kind of the thing, it was already a very privileged white-leaning view of things; plenty of folks who are marginalized have already had to confront the fact that they won't be able to access those things, most likely. Or they were born into social circumstances that don't view those specific things as THE pathway to adulthood because they were never sold the capitalistic dream of what adulthood looks like. I think in part the brand of nihilism that has been popularized in Europe and the USA (and the other so-called first-world countries) stems from this. Not that other parts of the world are immune, but their particular brand differs somewhat. Finding ways to redefine adulthood, that can include traditionally "childish" activities, but don't give in to infantilization, and also embrace neurodivergence and disability, is going to be very important for the future.
@tante I also think this is part of what fuels the apathy of even more "progressive" leaning people. "The system is at fault, not me, I can't do anything about it". I do tend to analyze problems in a systemic fashion because blaming individuals who did not choose the systems they live under is not particularly useful, and it's crucial to understand WHY things are the way they are to be able to improve. But at the same time, pretending to be helpless, to be "just a little guy", to refuse to engage with reality because it is messy and uncomfortable and painful is preventing us from reaching any kind of meaningful goals. When no one feels like they can take responsibility for things, a lot of things end up falling between the cracks, or more importantly, they just never get built or never happen. It destroys hope and it further feeds the sense of helplessness that permeates so much of first-world white culture. I can also tie it to how people talk about and think about elections, with so many people wanting unwavering and unquestioning allegiance to the "less bad" candidate, blocking any sense of being able to ask for better, to DEMAND better because we deserve it. They want someone who can make them forget about the horrors, not be the ones undoing the cause of the horrors and engaging with the question of how best to do that actively.