We do exist, but after this why bother?

Luckyfour You can listen to him making the speech by clicking on the link notentirelyallthere has put on the thread. You will get the whole picture then.

I didn't hear the original speech but from what MOnica has said it sounds ridiculous. I'm sick and tired of people saying it's older people's fault we are in this Brexit mess. Most of the people I know voted to remain as did we. Our grandson (just turned 18) voted remain and one daughter and son-in-law voted to stay, the other voted remain.

I wonder what has happened to society - is this the first era in history where we all seemed to have sat back and calmly accept YOUNGER people's right and ability to dictate to and educate older people? Everything I have read about anthropology suggests that the older normally lead the younger and shape THEIR attitudes. We certainly live in interesting times.

I read somewhere that Megan writes his speeches but to be fair how many times have I heard the younger generation called snowflakes and so on. I think up to a point its true.

I see nothing wrong in his words.... By the way...if someone else had said this would you be mentioning it?

Actually I think I might have misread your post pa. Still, I am happy to be a pleb. Reckon they have all the fun.

It's good enough for me paddyanne. I'm a pleb! Yippee!!!

"When I was a boy of 14, my father was so ignorant I could hardly stand to have the old man around. But when I got to be 21, I was astonished at how much the old man had learned in seven years". Mark Twain.

why would anyone be interested in what this overprivileged man has to say.He hasn't lived a life any of us could recognise,his using a helicopter to go to Birmingham instead of a train when he's pushing green issues is just another of his hypocritical actions ...what he's really saying it MIGHT be good enough for the plebs but dont expect me to do it too !

MOnica Your analysis infers most older people in Scotland must be highly educated. There will be dancing in the streets!

Here we go again. Royal knocking. It’s times like these that I feel like unsubscribing from GN.

There are very few people either in industry or management of some form or other who do not use speech writers (probably not Donald Trump) but they all have the opportunity to tweak what they are saying.

Notentirelyallhere I agree with a great deal of what you have said, and I think that perhaps Prince Harry's speech has been taken out of context and misquoted by members of the press who are very happy to have a poke at Harry and Meghan, and use every excuse to do so. There are many things happening such as climate change, tax dodging,corporate greed,running down of all essential services such as health,education, security and we should all be concerned, irrespective of our age/generation, but I understand why a younger generation may feel that some of our generation just do not care. Sadly, one only has to read some of the threads on here to see that some still believe that the answer to the housing price crisis is for young families to simply do without take away coffee and hey presto, problem solved! Things have changed, the days of staying with a company and working your way up, of two way loyalty between employee and employer have all but disappeared, vulgar and greedy people like Phillip Green and Mike Ashley run the high street and are able to cheat people out of decent contracts and their pensions, is it any wonder that some of our childrens' generation think we have made a mess of things?

I am no royalist, but I think the Royal Family have an increasingly difficult job to do, they can't walk away, they're supposed to be neutral but must be privy to the deepest and probably alarming national secrets that none of us know. Harry and his brother are young men who need a role in the world. Their father got into trouble for 'meddling' as it was called in the past and he has gone on to do some useful things (it costs me to say that!!!). I don't think I have a right to criticise public figures whose real life I have no understanding of nor do I think it is right to expect two young men to become poodles opening bazaars and little else!
It is SO nice to have a balanced discussion with people and not descend into some of the slanging matches that one occasionally sees! I was wondering this morning, before I came and took a peek at this thread, whether to ask those who are so angry with what Harry said, to become speech writers for an hour and to post what they think he 'should' have said, not just 'don't single out older people', but how might he have motivated young people in a way that they could hear and find acceptable. The floor is yours!

The OP took this entirely out of context and just made it into something that it obviously wasn't. Shame.

I have just watched the video of him making the speech (thanks for the link notentirelyallthere ).

He wasn't slagging off the older generation at all. He was speaking to the young people in a way they will understand. Every word he said was true. Well done him. I think that video should be shown in every school in the country.

Just what I was thinking Anniebach

Yes, Annie.

He is out of his depth

I think its a cheek to specify the older generation as seeming not to care.
The exact same thoughts could be applied to the very privileged, which would include Harry and co.

‘ to think outside the box’ that’s enough for me

Well when someone says You may find yourself frustrated with the older generation when it seems they don’t care. Is quite specific. I quite agree with your analysis of the problem of not caring being a societal problem not a generational one. But that is not what he said.

I worry about the indifference of so many older people to the casual ageism of everyday life, shown in speeches like this and the i interview, we are just casually left out, not mentioned

Personally, I thought Prince Harry's speech was a nice woolly cuddly warm speech full of all the right words and simplistic ideas, but sadly lacking in substance. All mother love and apple pie.

It is a pity he and his wife do not put their words into action and actually restructure their lives and practice what they preach. That would do more to achieve all the things he talked about than anything else.

notentirelyallhere I find a great deal I agree with in your post. I worry for the younger generations and I didn't take the speech as a slur aimed at the elderly, but rather a recognition that MANY people have their heads in the sand when it comes to vital issues eg climate change. The "I'm all right, Jack" mentality is certainly not confined to people over a certain age, and I didn't feel that he was saying that. To use the old 70's feminist phrase, it seems to me that some "consciousness raising" needs to happen in so many areas of society. My 92 year old grandmother is one of the most astute, forward thinking people I know but my husband, a generation younger, doesn't give a fig about recycling, reducing emissions etc. So let's not generalise. Wisdom/ignorance can occur in people of any age!

Having gone and looked in detail at the speech in question, for instance here:

www.townandcountrymag.com/society/tradition/a26708102/prince-harry-we-day-speech-transcript-2019/

I think pulling out a sentence from a MOTIVATIONAL speech and using that as a straw man to get excited about and refute is rather missing the point.

Yes, there have been campaigns throughout the later 20th century, I assume by this is meant campaigns to make the world a safer, healthier, more peaceful place but hello, are you listening,??? because the world is in a worse place than would have been imaginable 30 years ago. Action is needed now and young people need support and encouragement. As Harry says climate change is the biggest challenge of all, never mind inequality, poverty, rampant corporate behaviour, tax evasion, political corruption, wars, fake news, cyber crime, the resurgence of Russia, political tensions in the Far East between China and Japan, anti nuclear treaties are being torn up and limited nuclear war is being imagined, the scramble for territory and influence as the ice melts at the North Pole and access to oil and free passage becomes critical. Massive changes are happening now, stop looking backwards, the world is in a mess. Whether or not you think you or the UK are in any way responsible is actually irrelevant to the scale of the crisis facing us. If I were young I would be very depressed as studies show the young are and that is what the speech in question was attempting to address in a highly relevant situation.

I do think that he needs a few lessons in 20th century history and the campaigns that ordinary people carried out both here and other countries.

The people on here with their numerous properties and foreign holidays who worry about dipping into their savings are not typical really.
- really?
numerous properties? I doubt many on here have numerous properties
Most young people I know go on far more foreign holidays than we do or ever have.

There are also many on here who are struggling Lily!