I find it a bit too convenient when people blame capitalism or families for what we're seeing in young people. Capitalism has been around a long time. Dysfunctional families even longer. But technology of the sort most of us are addicted to and can't live without... It's almost twenty years old now and that's when, in my experience as a teacher, we've seen kids change. I sometimes think we like to say "It's complicated" or "It's capitalism" because it gives us a comfortable distance from the real problem we've all allowed to happen. It's tech, folks. It's our silos, our 24/7 entertainment, our cracked-out brains, our next fix on our phones, and the resulting dehumanizing and self-aggrandizement and inflated sense of Self that it creates. Fuck everyone, whispers our phones. The only opinion, the only needs, the only wants that matter are our own. That, folks, is when we lose our empathy.