I'm nearing forty and I have a sneaky suspicion it's a weird cultural thing. A bit like the Romans lamenting the fall of their culture right at the start of their golden age and they never stopped doing that. Always looking back saying shit sucks now and how in the old days everything centered on competence and morality. Men were actual men back then. That sort of thing. Some parts of it might have made a tad kind of sense, but a lot of it was baloney.
I suspect we're becoming more realistic now about the nature of our civilization. There won't be any riding of laser-shooting cybernetic unicorns and we have to come to terms with that. There's adulting to do now. We have some climate issues and we have to deal with wealth inequality and finding and maintaining proper forms of government (worldwide). The laser-shooting unicorns have become the "maybe we can sort of survive as a species" and we need that. We always needed that, but we were too busy watching Terminator and playing GTA.
I'm not convinced it's all bad. Maybe some societal existential depression is called for and perhaps we'll awaken from our funk with some fresh ideas.
I suspect we're becoming more realistic now about the nature of our civilization. There won't be any riding of laser-shooting cybernetic unicorns and we have to come to terms with that. There's adulting to do now. We have some climate issues and we have to deal with wealth inequality and finding and maintaining proper forms of government (worldwide). The laser-shooting unicorns have become the "maybe we can sort of survive as a species" and we need that. We always needed that, but we were too busy watching Terminator and playing GTA.
I'm not convinced it's all bad. Maybe some societal existential depression is called for and perhaps we'll awaken from our funk with some fresh ideas.