THE SCIENCE OF LIKE

It’s easy to see that like communication skills are like important, ‘cause like we need them like everyday. So like it’s important that we like focus on like increasing our abilities in like that area.

Now doesn’t that sound completely idiotic? If I typed my entire article this way, no one would read on. If we would not put up with such a low level of communication in an article, why then would we put up with it in everyday conversation?

Not only have we put up with such an insulting form of communication, we have caused it to flourish. Larger than that weathered old oak that towers over Grandma’s home, is a lack of anything dynamic that hovers over America’s youth today. Whether it’s at a top tier Boarding School on the East Coast, or at a top tier Business School in the Mid-West, stupidity rather than excellence is what a majority of students strive for (speaking of which, you should have seen my first draft). Our perpetual desire to be idiots is not something we are born with, instead it is something that, through the popularization of vapid Anna Nicole media, we have created to cover up a much deeper issue: a lack of self confidence.

Students, both collegiate and non collegiate, choose to speak with their heads titled toward the ground and to insert “like” after every word because they have no desire to sound intelligent. The saturation of “like” into the economic speech market represents an increasing lack of self-confidence. For instance, “When the Fed cuts the rate, interest payments will fall,” is a powerful and affirmative statement; however, students today when in lecture would opt for, “Like when the Fed like cuts the rate, like the interest payments like fall.” Do you see the difference? The insertion of “like” into an otherwise powerful and confident statement turns it into a withering and frail question. Instead of telling his professor the answer, the student is subtly asking, “Well did the interest go down?” This lack of self-confidence found within the youth is a crack in the overall slab of granite that is the United States, and as many of you are aware, such a deep and massive crack renders any slab (no matter how beautiful) worthless.

Buried even deeper within the word “like,” is my generation’s fear of being in charge. While we immensely enjoyed sitting at our commencement ceremonies, we are terrified in leaving them. We want our entire life to be one big charge, to perpetually be called “Tomorrow’s generation.” Well, tomorrow is here: commencements are over and convocations have begun. As more and more students begin to realize that the world is in their hands, the more frequently they begin to revert back into their shell of like interrogatives. The reason this generation strives for stupidity is because they want to be treated like children rather than accept the responsibility of being an adult. Adults have problems (my family), adults have bills, and more importantly adults have to take action. Freshman business majors horse around in their first year business course because they are cowards. These individuals are petrified by the prospect of being a business student and accepting responsibility for their actions, so instead they revert to behaving like little children. While every country and every generation have their people who never grow up, America is being overwhelmed by them. It’s a simple formula, when the speak nots out number the speaks, you’re in a boatload of trouble.

What is it that separated Socrates, Thomas Jefferson, Abraham Lincoln, and John F. Kennedy from the other men of their time? It’s not that they were intelligent, everyone’s intelligent, it’s that these men had the ability to convey and impose their intelligence on others. This, ladies and gentlemen, is confidence. There have been trillions of men and women who have had brilliant ideas and theories; however, there are merely tens of these trillions who spoke up and will forever be remembered. I am not saying that every college or high school student in America is an idiot, in fact I think the exact opposite, but rather I am saying that this generation’s brilliance will be buried in its lack of self confidence.

If we could personify future America: give her lips and give her the ability to speak, what would she say? Well, I don’t think she’d say anything, I believe it would be more of a scream with some tears interwoven. What reduces future America to a menopausal soccer mom? Her death. The future of America will no longer continue to be dynamic unless WE change how we communicate. I challenge all of you who have read this article to encourage yourselves, your students, your peers, and your children to have confidence and eliminate “like” from their dialogue. Do we want the next Barbra Walters to say, “Mr. President, could you like explain the current economic status of like our world? Like explain to us what’s going down?” I should hope not.