Paul B.A. Holland's column "Generation must prove importance" (SN 6/13) was an impressive hodgepodge of cloying clichés and conservative propaganda masking itself as the humble voice of a generation. Contrary to current conservative opinion, the truly un-American thing to do would be to let it slink away unanswered.

First, as a member of his demographic "in the shadows of the ivory towers," I do not agree with his characterization of my generation. We are not a generation of idealism but of apathy, with "The Daily Show" as our window to the world when we want a quick, ironic chuckle. We are the Lost Generation with no more poets.

We have a war, but we do not have a generation. Outside of idle ideological chatter about imperialism and justification in college town coffeehouses and expletives at the gas pump, Iraq is not our war.

Others our age may be "dying half a world away," but Iraq, like most wars in history, is a rich man's war and poor man's fight, and the strings of our young idealistic hearts pull more for abstract ideals like equal rights and reproductive freedom than for the dying lower-middle class who, in fact, signed up for it.

Holland rattles off "nuclear missiles, smallpox, anthrax, ricin, al-Qaida, dirty bombs, chemical attacks, hijacks, jihad, and weapons of mass destruction" as the vocabulary of our generation, yet somehow this alleged threat to national security does not provoke such a sense of fear and urgency to deter our complaints about long lines and three-ounce plastic bottles at airport security.

Holland is correct that we are living in a turbulent time, with problems exacerbated as a result of globalization - but the true challenge of our generation is not how to save the world, but how to reinnervate our inclination to try.

Jennifer Burstein
French and history senior