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Y is Generation Y the saddest generation?

According to a report released in Canberra on 25 September, the health and wellbeing of Australians aged around 25 years and under have been declining over the last 20 years.

This is largely due to lifestyle diseases caused by obesity, stress and other mental health issues, according to report author Richard Eckersley, a founding director of Australia21 and a visiting fellow at the National Centre for Epidemiology and Population Health at The Australian National University.

Mr Eckersley says that factors contributing to the decline in mental health among young people include family conflict and breakdown, education and work pressures, media and technological impacts, dietary changes and environmental pollution. He says that cultural intangibles, such as excessive materialism and individualism, are also a problem.

Read the full story here.

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she_be_cool said:

7/10/2008 6:12:17 PM

How sad that all the "progress" we've made in modern society, instead of leading us forward, is leading us away from community and family, and giving us a lifestyle that makes us and our children stressed, unhappy and unhealthy.
It reminds me of this wise poem by the Dalai Lama called "The Paradox of Our Age".

Today...

We have bigger houses and smaller families

More convenience, but less time

We have degrees, but less sense

More knowledge, but less judgement.

More experts, but more problems.

More medicine, but less healthiness.

We have been all the way to the moon and back, but have trouble crossing the street to meet the new neighbour.

We built more computers to hold more information to produce more copies than ever, but have less communication.

We have become long on quantity, but short on quality.

These are times of fast foods, and slow digestion;

Tall man and short character;

Steep profits, and shallow relationships.

It is a time when there is much in the window, and nothing in the room.

- The XIVth Dalai Lama

medic_11 said:

24/10/2008 12:38:08 PM

I think generation Y has lost it's sense of identity. With the increasing pressures of success, beauty, wealth, health and education people are striving to achieve a lot more than they actually require to be happy. These unachievable expectations will only lead to disappointment. The average person feels unsatisfied because there is always something else they need or want, it's a never ending cycle of fulfilling present standards and fads. If people can look beyond this material based society there might be a chance for real happiness after all.