In the disoriented landscape of our time, perhaps no fracture is more emotionally charged than the one between generations. Behind the clamor of public debate, beneath the seemingly endless cycles of outrage and misunderstanding, there lies a profound shift in the way the self is experienced and the past is remembered. The child looks to the parent, the student to the teacher, the young to the old—not with reverence, but suspicion. This is not merely a cultural trend; it is a metaphysical wound.
A Culture of Blame
Within the rise of trauma discourse, social justice narratives, and therapeutic language, we encounter a world where suffering is increasingly explained through the language of harm and responsibility. “Who did this to me?” becomes a central question. Institutions, traditions, older generations—all come under scrutiny. It is no longer simply that the past is flawed. It is accused. There is a growing tendency to view inherited values, beliefs, and customs not as incomplete understandings, but as violence.
This orientation toward blame creates a fundamental distortion. It seeks healing by dividing the world into victims and perpetrators, often along generational lines. The past is made into the cause of the present’s pain, and the solution becomes one of repudiation: out with the old, in with the new. This mode of thinking promises liberation—but delivers alienation. The young become cut off not only from their elders, but from their own roots.
Trauma and the Disappearance of the Eternal
Trauma, as it is now commonly understood, becomes not a wound that may point to depth, but a permanent identity. Entire worldviews are now formed around it. Yet when suffering becomes foundational to identity, and when healing is defined as erasing or correcting the past, the eternal structure of Being is obscured.
In truth, what has been—appears. And because it appears, it cannot not be. This includes every trauma, every injustice, every difficult inheritance. The attempt to rewrite, undo, or invalidate what has already appeared is metaphysically impossible. What we call healing must therefore begin not with correction, but with recognition. Not by escaping the past, but by understanding that even our wounds belong to the eternal unfolding of Being.
Victimhood and the Erosion of Dialogue
As blame becomes central to identity, the space for genuine dialogue collapses. To question the prevailing narrative is often seen as violence itself. Emotional reaction replaces rational inquiry. In public discourse, nuance disappears, and debate is reduced to slogans, outrage, and moral condemnation. This cultural erosion is not accidental—it is the symptom of a deeper forgetting.
The more one insists that others are responsible for one’s pain, the more one denies the ontological ground of one’s existence. Language, which once pointed to meaning, now becomes a weapon or a shield. Words lose precision, logic gives way to emotionalism, and the ability to engage in shared understanding dissolves. This too is a reflection of the broader nihilism that pervades modernity: the loss of the eternal reference point that once gave thought its clarity and depth.
Toward a Deeper Accountability
The metaphysical structure of Being allows no blame. It allows truth. And truth is that everything that is, appears—and it appears necessarily. To understand this is not to excuse injustice or to ignore pain. It is to see that no healing can come from rejection. Healing begins with seeing that one’s life, including its most difficult moments, is not a mistake or a violation—but a necessary appearance within the whole.
This view requires a new kind of strength—not the strength to fight others, but the strength to relinquish resentment. It invites the possibility of real dialogue—not as agreement, but as recognition. The generational rupture, when seen in this light, is not a problem to be solved, but a moment in the revealing of what is. Its pain, its anger, even its confusion—all belong. And because they belong, they can be seen.
In the next article, we turn to the collapse of continuity in the age of the image. When narrative dissolves into fragment, and memory becomes a scroll of isolated impressions, how can generations even speak to one another? Can eternity be glimpsed in a world of distraction?
It Is What It Is 
Leave a comment