Kids These Days: Human Capital and the Making of Millennials

This book was kind of a downer about Millennials written by an unhappy Millennial. The book defines the Millennial generation as the group of Americans born between 1980 and 2000 (now 28 to 38). Our book club consists of Baby Boomers (1946-1965) and late Silent Generation. The author, Malcolm Harris, is a self described communist and editor at The New Inquiry.
The book takes the reader through childhood, college, and work to describe the life and times of the generation. He addresses law enforcement, reward systems, and consequential generational behavior. Oddly the overall behavior of Millennials is better than one would expect given their age and prior generation roll models. Despite the dangers of social media and easy access to drugs and porn, drug and sexual abuse are down in the overall group (particularly when discounting for use of marijuana). He portrays the generation as victims suffering "intellectual degradation" that is overly "managed in the workplace."
The author has a point that the generation is inheriting significant problems of inequality, debt, and environmental damage. It will be up to his generation to tackle these critical issues and I hope there are individuals that will be up to the challenge. The author comes across as overtly cynical and his "seven signs of the bad future" paint a bleak picture. Hopefully a tactic including a combination of "buy it", "vote it", "give it", "protest it", and "put it down" will help guide the generation towards constructive change and positive solutions.

Waking up White

Bob's book was an interesting choice of a woman's take on the very sensitive issue of racism. Wikipedia states that "racism" has evolved from a believe in the unique differences in races of humans (ie. genetics) to a modern definition of the practice of racial discrimination. A recent poll asked if our president was a racist and 49 percent said yes and 46 percent said no, mostly along party lines. The truth is we are probably all racist to a certain degree. On the other hand, the current administration practices and supports white supremacy and empowers racial discrimination.
The female author is more sensitive to the nuances of racism than us typical males. She points out that women use webs instead of ladders and are better collaborating than competing. She states that a bullying situation has a bully, a victim, and bystanders. The bystanders have an important role in curbing the bad behavior. She expresses that we need to go beyond tolerance to engagement and solidarity.
Although she lost me a few times by being a touch over-sensitive, she expresses a view that is currently underrepresented in America today.