Friday, November 22, 2019

Youth in the grip of depression and suicide




Ved Prakash Bhardwaj
The generation born in the last decade of the last century and the first decade of this century has become an adult today. A generation that has started giving new dreams a new color. This generation is called the 'I' generation. This generation is autism but takes every kind of risk for development, is also creating a new society. There are caste and religion in this society but now it is only an identity rather than some kind of social formula. This society today basically resides in cities, but its effect is beginning to take place in rural areas. Of course, this is due to consumerism and marketization. Many of its benefits are visible or shown to us, but in the recent past, many such problems have also started appearing in this young generation which can be called a great threat to the future. The most worrying problems are the increasing depression and suicidal tendencies among the youth. There were disappointments even in the life of the previous generation, yet it was not disillusioned with life, but in the ‘I’ generation, disillusionment with life has a dangerous level. Such facts are coming out today that 25 percent of the youth have a problem of depression and they are taking steps like suicide then this should be taken care of.
According to recent research conducted in England, this generation is constantly falling victim to depression. According to it, the cause of depression and consequent suicide is rising unemployment. According to the World Health Organization's Mental Health 2016 report, 25 percent of men in India, who are between 16 and 29 years of age, commit suicide? This report cannot be believed as there is no such large number of suicide cases.  The basis of the report is that the organization studied around ten thousand youth. (Dainik Hindustan, 19 November 2019, New Delhi). In any society of the world, including India, we can see how the tendency of suicide among youth is increasing. If we combine the results of the assessment of his character with increasing suicide and depression among the youth, the reason is hidden in the establishments of the 'I' generation.
This, which is the autism tendency of 'I', is not something new. This is the natural character of humans. This 'I' tendency took the man to new heights of development. It took him to those areas of knowledge which were once just imagination. There was also a time when we were given importance ‘we’ instead of ‘I’. If 'we' is the basis of sociality, then 'I' can be seen in personal development and hence many times there are conflicts between ‘we’ and ‘I’. This conflict occurs in the lives of most people and the 'I' often wins in that confrontation. This 'I' is more effective in the young generation. Autism gives priority to personal desires and enterprise of their fulfillment. The biggest problem is not only higher autisms and ambition but less commitment to fulfill her ambitions also. This is why the image of that generation is portrayed as an irresponsible and lazy type of youth, but recently the media attention has been particularly attracted to these youth. There are two reasons for this. One is that today this youth is at the forefront of the highest use of media; especially it uses digital media the most. Secondly, this youth is also the largest and influential consumer in the whole world; a consumer class that is far ahead of previous generations in terms of spending. 

In any market, we can see that most of the buyers are young including students and young couples. Unemployed also part of that consumer class, those with partial employment and those with high paid jobs. Image of the young generation in the market has become such that this gets addicted to blowing money. It is not fair to claim that this is a common or unanimous position. Even today, the number of such youths is not in the phase of struggle to lead a life. Not only is the number of such youths in India, but their number is also higher in other countries also. It also has no fewer dreams and aspirations, and this is the big problem of him and society. The deep gap between dream and reality eventually leads this class into the darkness of depression.

The problem of depression is not only among the youth who are struggling with scarcity of resources but also those who have sufficient resources. It is another matter that the cause of their depression is different. But, this is the generation that suffers from depression the most compared to the previous generations. They are the children of a rapidly changing global society and, unlike their parents and grandparents, is undergoing a transition from being an adult to an adult. Along with facing many challenges of change and development, they are also changing themselves according to the increasing demands of the modern period. These changes are very fast which does not allow them to freeze. Our time is changing rapidly. The pace of life has also accelerated due to rapid technological development and having a profound impact on life. The psychological pressure on this generation is greater than the earlier generation because more competition has increased in all parts of life than opportunities. This has a direct impact on his behavior and philosophy of life.

This century originates from the womb of the last century, which has been witness to rapid changes, even many unexpected changes also. The last century had witnessed so many critical changes and crises in front of ideology, and witnesses the collapse of their, which has never happened before. After the booming of hopes and disappointments, there have been situations in which some kind of ideological foundation is unable to stand. The old political and social institutions have almost collapsed or those which have survived are also looking like ruins. In such a situation, words like stability and ideological commitment seem meaningless due to the impact of immediacy on life.

Due to changes in the cultural landscape, the sexual revolution, women's movements and the establishment of a consumption-based economy in place of a knowledge-based economy, the gap between the time of passing high school and the role of the adult has been reduced. The standard of adult status i.e. economic freedom, permanent job, and family life has changed. Although these standards are different in all cultures, while on the one hand, it has already been widely studied in developed countries, research work on it is just beginning in India. In India, the social and cultural environment began to change with the beginning of the boom in the information technology sector in the 1990s. The storm of information technology, consumerism, mass culture and fusion of culture, disillusionment with politics and ideology destroyed old values ​​and establishments with one stroke. Like in the US, this trend was more visible in the upper and middle-class urban population and in India too. Indian rural society is either shielding itself from the changes that usually take place or the pace of its impact has been relatively slow, but the changes have happened more rapidly in urban society. The reason for this has been the access to information systems and education to urban society. This is the reason why this trend is becoming more pronounced in the younger generation born in the millennium and because of freedom in education, high paid jobs, and love and marriage. This also had an impact on rural societies even though it was late as the requirements of market expansion due to the expansion and liberalization of telecoms began to transform rural societies into a larger and potentially consumer society. One of the reasons for this has been that due to the limited opportunities for development, youth in rural areas started moving to cities in search of better opportunities. As a result, the social movement started increasing. When the youth went to back the villages with urban experience, they become the changing force to their rural society. Media expansion played an important role in that. Due to changes in social and cultural flows, the grip of the caste-system is also gradually weakening and a new chapter is starting in India.
In the first decade of this millennium, the process of transformation started in middle-class Indian families is multifaceted, whose impact is visible in all sectors of society, education, economy, politics. The adult generation of India is facing many difficult challenges due to globalization, urbanization and the desire to play a decisive role in it as a part of the changing social environment. This has led to a radical change in the experiences of undergoing the transition to adulthood.

The greatest criterion of the adult stage in every culture is freedom of decision which includes economic, social, political freedom as well as a sense of authority over better living conditions. This freedom spirit of the youth was used by the market as a weapon and included them in the 'earn and spend' competition. The definition of happiness and comfort is not mental, it has become physical. The joy of life is in the consumption of things. Consumption of goods is the authenticity of one's being. As a consumer, freedom of consumption was so emphasized that the consumption of something became a different kind of subordination. It is a new kind of slavery of goods that we do not recognize. Freedom to eat outside the home, self-sufficiency of the use of new equipment, freedom from family and social bonds, freedom to live on their own, etc., brought the youth on such a path, on which all the paths were closed in front of them in case of little trouble. Begin to appear. There is no doubt that in this millennium, youth across the world played an important role in establishing democratic values ​​in many countries. He has also played a role in political changes in India.
In the Indian social structure, the family has replaced the individual. The meaning of freedom of the person has been very limited. There are often many reasons involved in decisions taken due to their choice, especially family obligations and society's expectations dominate the lives of people. This is the reason why earlier youth in India could not make independent decisions. Even today, this situation has not changed much. Even after this, the aspiration of independent decision is increasing among the youth in urban areas. It has had an impact on family and social structure. An institution called family has started to weaken due to this. The weakening of families has started to have an impact on social organization. However, some good results have also come to the fore, such as the breakdown of the bonds of caste and society, but the scattering caused by it has led to isolation, which is a major cause of depression among the youth. Due to the weak base of family and society in urban life, even the slightest adverse circumstances push the youth into the darkness of despair.

References:
1.    India today, January 31, 2005
2.    Hindi daily Hindustan, 19 November 2019
3.    Live-in relationships: An ethical and a moral dilemma? Mohit chhibber, Aditya Singh, International Journal of Applied Research 2015; 1(8): 74-77
4.    Suicide in Young Adults: Depression, Addiction Are Primary Contributors, https://www.originsrecovery.com/suicide-young-adults-addiction-awareness-recovery/, December 4, 2017
5.    More young adults are depressed and thinking of suicide, study says, Brett Molina, USA TODAY, March 15, 2019

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