I think asking is good, and this may be worth getting into for other reasons - but know that this is a one way trip.
I’d suggest starting with the things that helped me unfuck my shit (partially, anyway!). First, if you haven’t already, check out Kurzgesagt’s Optimistic Nihilism video. If you find that interesting, continue on to absurdist philosophy, especially Camus (Sisyphus, Stranger) and Sartre (Nausea). After that, existentialism - I think I’d probably start with Man’s Search for Meaning by Viktor Frankl.
Once you begin to get a feel for these ideas, I think a high-level reevaluation of deeply held beliefs and how you perceive the world around you becomes inevitable.
In terms of your question and what you are seeing, I believe these trends represent a larger collective awakening. Not a miracle, but something borne out of necessity: for anyone brave enough to take their head out of the sand for thirty seconds, environmental concerns alone are completely fucking overwhelming, and obviously that’s just a start.
I do take solace in this development, though. Somehow, even without actively studying philosophy, teens today (and even younger!) appear to have, to a degree, an intuitive understanding of these concepts. That’s wild! When I was in high school in the late 90s, genuinely thinking for yourself wasn’t tolerated the way it is today. Sure, there were punks and goths and whatever, but for anyone who dared to question the paradox of asserting one’s uniqueness through group affiliation, the road was much bumpier than it seems to be today.
I actually had to remind one of my children at around 10 years of age that she should be careful telling her peers things like “god isn’t real and nothing really matters” … admittedly she was raised in a “we always respect people with different beliefs even if we find it difficult to respect their beliefs” home, so the “god isn’t real” part wasn’t a surprise, but she found existentialism on her own.
Consider the complexity of the humour in memes today - I think a lot of older folks dismiss it as vapid and banal, and while some definitely lands there, the baseline tends to include a lot more irony, sarcasm, and even elements of these more abstract philosophical ideas in ways that older generations tend to struggle with. At first glance it appears completely nonsensical, but upon superficial understanding it quickly becomes “antisocial” and offensive: how dare you find camaraderie in joking about suicide, and do you really think the collapse of civilization would be a good thing? This is more than gallows humour.
And perhaps your comment was more flippant than my initial interpretation and this will just come across as obtuse and condescending - I hope not, as that is definitely not my intent. If it was sincere and you are just beginning down this path, I hope my perspective makes a difference for you. I suspect it is obvious, but my own experience with this was not pleasant; it took me many years to find my way through and feel ok about continuing, in the broadest sense. With a bit of discipline and thoughtfulness, I think you should be able to mitigate the psychological risks inherent in exploring some of the more fundamentally challenging implications of nihilism.
I think asking is good, and this may be worth getting into for other reasons - but know that this is a one way trip.
I’d suggest starting with the things that helped me unfuck my shit (partially, anyway!). First, if you haven’t already, check out Kurzgesagt’s Optimistic Nihilism video. If you find that interesting, continue on to absurdist philosophy, especially Camus (Sisyphus, Stranger) and Sartre (Nausea). After that, existentialism - I think I’d probably start with Man’s Search for Meaning by Viktor Frankl.
Once you begin to get a feel for these ideas, I think a high-level reevaluation of deeply held beliefs and how you perceive the world around you becomes inevitable.
In terms of your question and what you are seeing, I believe these trends represent a larger collective awakening. Not a miracle, but something borne out of necessity: for anyone brave enough to take their head out of the sand for thirty seconds, environmental concerns alone are completely fucking overwhelming, and obviously that’s just a start.
I do take solace in this development, though. Somehow, even without actively studying philosophy, teens today (and even younger!) appear to have, to a degree, an intuitive understanding of these concepts. That’s wild! When I was in high school in the late 90s, genuinely thinking for yourself wasn’t tolerated the way it is today. Sure, there were punks and goths and whatever, but for anyone who dared to question the paradox of asserting one’s uniqueness through group affiliation, the road was much bumpier than it seems to be today.
I actually had to remind one of my children at around 10 years of age that she should be careful telling her peers things like “god isn’t real and nothing really matters” … admittedly she was raised in a “we always respect people with different beliefs even if we find it difficult to respect their beliefs” home, so the “god isn’t real” part wasn’t a surprise, but she found existentialism on her own.
Consider the complexity of the humour in memes today - I think a lot of older folks dismiss it as vapid and banal, and while some definitely lands there, the baseline tends to include a lot more irony, sarcasm, and even elements of these more abstract philosophical ideas in ways that older generations tend to struggle with. At first glance it appears completely nonsensical, but upon superficial understanding it quickly becomes “antisocial” and offensive: how dare you find camaraderie in joking about suicide, and do you really think the collapse of civilization would be a good thing? This is more than gallows humour.
And perhaps your comment was more flippant than my initial interpretation and this will just come across as obtuse and condescending - I hope not, as that is definitely not my intent. If it was sincere and you are just beginning down this path, I hope my perspective makes a difference for you. I suspect it is obvious, but my own experience with this was not pleasant; it took me many years to find my way through and feel ok about continuing, in the broadest sense. With a bit of discipline and thoughtfulness, I think you should be able to mitigate the psychological risks inherent in exploring some of the more fundamentally challenging implications of nihilism.