Generational Dumbing Down
- Madhukar Dama
- Aug 30
- 11 min read
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🌿 Prologue
Not long ago, in most Indian homes, children grew up with mud on their feet, smoke in their hair, and stories in their ears. They knew how to fetch water from a well, how to light a chulha, how to tell a sparrow from a bulbul, and how to sit through the Ramayana without fidgeting. Life was hard, but skills were many.
Within two or three generations, that India is gone. Food comes in packets, stories in reels, water in taps, and wisdom in Google searches. We have become literate but not capable, connected but not rooted, modern but fragile. What our grandparents held in their hands and heads as everyday knowledge is now slipping out of reach for their grandchildren. This is the real dumbing down — not in test scores alone, but in the loss of lived intelligence.
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🕰 Generational Dumbing Down of Life Skills in India
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1. Grandparents’ Generation (Born ~1930s–1950s)
(Mostly rural / small towns)
Food & farming: Almost every family grew some food — rice, millets, pulses, vegetables. Seed saving, bullock ploughing, water storage in ponds was common knowledge.
Cooking: Everyone ate home-cooked meals on firewood/kerosene stoves. Mothers and grandmothers knew 100+ recipes, seasonal pickles, papads, and natural preservation.
Health: Home remedies (tulsi, turmeric, neem, castor oil, ajwain water) were first line of defence. Village vaidyas/hakims/daayans supported childbirth and simple ailments.
Daily duties: Children fetched water from wells, collected firewood, cleaned, helped in fields, fed cows/goats. Responsibility came early.
Physical resilience: Walking 5–10 km daily was normal. Squatting, carrying loads, working in sun kept bodies naturally fit.
Cultural literacy: Folk songs, Ramayana stories, proverbs, and riddles were memorised. Elders narrated histories at night.
Practical repair: Men and boys repaired tools, cycles, lanterns; women stitched, wove, or recycled clothes.
Nature sense: Farmers read clouds, winds, and bird calls to predict rain.
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2. Parents’ Generation (Born ~1960s–1980s)
(Rural roots, but many moved to towns for jobs/education)
Food habits shifting: Packaged biscuits, Maggi, soft drinks entered homes. Still, most households cooked full meals daily.
Farming knowledge thinning: Many left villages, but still had some touch with harvests, sowing, seasonal rhythms during holidays.
Health: Clinic/hospital became first stop, though home remedies still lingered. ORS at home replaced the traditional buttermilk or rice kanji cure.
Daily duties: Children in towns did fewer chores — maybe helping with groceries or cleaning, but not heavy work.
Education focus: Parents stressed studies and white-collar careers; practical crafts were seen as “menial.”
Physical activity: Cycling to school, outdoor games, PT in schools kept some fitness intact.
Cultural life: TV entered homes; joint storytelling weakened. Memory of folk wisdom reduced, but still known through grandparents.
Repairs: Tailors, electricians, cycle shops became the norm — DIY slowly disappearing.
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3. Current Young Adults (Born ~1990s–2010s)
(Urban middle/majority + aspirational rural youth)
Food: Dependent on Swiggy/Zomato, instant noodles, frozen parathas. Many do not know how to cook dal, rice, or roti properly.
Agrarian disconnect: Majority have never planted or harvested anything. Villages themselves are cash-crop focused; kitchen gardens rare.
Health: Every cold, fever, stomach ache → clinic, pill, or Google search. No trust in turmeric milk or neem water.
Daily duties: Many enter college without knowing how to wash clothes, sweep floors, or manage gas stove. Domestic help fills gap.
Physical: Sedentary lifestyle; gyms for a few, but majority face obesity, poor posture, vitamin D deficiency.
Cultural: Storytelling dead; replaced by reels, memes, Marvel/DC. Language loss: weaker in mother tongue, think only in English/Hinglish.
Memory & navigation: No one remembers phone numbers, addresses, or directions — GPS is god.
DIY skills gone: Can’t stitch a button, can’t repair a cycle puncture.
Nature literacy: Don’t know crop seasons, bird names, or even where milk comes from beyond “packet.”
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4. Emerging Children (Born ~2020s onward)
(Raised with smart devices, AI, instant services)
Food: Weaning itself outsourced to packaged cerelac, baby food pouches. Growing up with microwave, Swiggy, and frozen packs.
Nature disconnect total: Many children never climb trees, walk in mud, or play in open fields. Childhood is screens + apartments.
Chores: Machines and maids do everything — children grow with zero household responsibility.
Social skills: Play is digital, attention spans shorter; difficulty in making eye contact, waiting patiently, or solving fights face-to-face.
Health: Immunity weaker, allergies more common. No experiential knowledge of herbs/spices for healing.
Learning style: Dependent on AI tutors, YouTube lessons — memory, recitation, patience for slow learning are absent.
Fragility: Cannot tolerate discomfort — heat, hunger, boredom — because everything is instantly provided.
If system breaks: Power cut, network shutdown, supply chain crisis → this generation will be the most helpless in Indian history.
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📉 The Indian Generational Pattern
Grandparents: Farmers + storytellers + survivalists.
Parents: Semi-urban migrants balancing tradition and modernity.
Current youth: Educated but disconnected, screen-centric, low in practical life skills.
Children now: Growing up in complete system dependency, most fragile in survival terms.
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👉 In India, this isn’t just “modernization.” It is a rapid severing of knowledge chains: from seed to plate, from story to memory, from hand skill to machine dependency.
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🌑 Epilogue
The decline is not just nostalgia — it is a survival question. When the power goes out, when water runs dry, when apps stop working, when systems collapse, who will remember how to cook without gas, drink without bottles, cure without pills, live without machines?
Generational dumbing down is India’s unspoken crisis. We are building a future where millions know how to swipe a screen but not how to light a fire; how to order food but not how to cook rice; how to pass exams but not how to survive. Unless we reconnect the broken chain of skills, India’s next generation will inherit education without wisdom, convenience without competence, and freedom without resilience.
Morning Lessons with Madhukar: Generational Dumbing Down
Characters:
1. Madhukar – Host, off-grid homestead owner near Yelmadagi; passionate about life skills, traditional knowledge, and self-reliance.
2. Father (Mr. Rao) – From Bijapur; curious, reflective, concerned about his children’s detachment from practical life skills.
3. Mother (Mrs. Rao) – Observant, nurturing; wants her family to reconnect with the earth and traditional wisdom.
4. Child (Aarav, ~10 years old) – Enthusiastic, playful, digitally savvy, but inexperienced with practical life skills like cooking, gardening, and handling fire.
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Reason for the Visit:
The Rao family visits Madhukar’s off-grid homestead to experience a morning of hands-on life skills and reconnect with practical living, motivated by Madhukar’s writings and talks about generational dumbing down in Indian families. They want to understand how modern conveniences have replaced essential skills and to expose their child to real-life learning, self-reliance, and mindful living.
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Scene: Early morning mist blankets Madhukar’s off-grid homestead near Yelmadagi. The sun peeks over distant hills. Chickens cluck and a few cows moo in the background.
Madhukar: “Good morning! You arrived early — just in time to catch the first light dancing on the vegetables.”
Father (from Bijapur): “It’s beautiful. We could see the mist rolling over the hills and felt… something different here already.”
Madhukar: “Yes. That ‘different’ is life before screens, before packets, before convenience replaced curiosity.”
Mother: “We’ve heard you speak about generational dumbing down. Can you show us what you mean?”
Madhukar: “Of course! Let’s start with the simplest test: hands in the soil. Come, pick some bittergourd.”
Child (excited): “Can we eat them too?”
Madhukar: “Yes, but you must earn the bite. Hands in the soil, wash them properly, feel the plant, understand it.”
Father (kneeling to help): “My son has never dug in earth this way. Usually, he scrolls through games on the phone.”
Madhukar: “Exactly the point. We are losing touch with the earth, generation by generation. Hands that never touch soil forget patience, observation, even taste.”
The family digs gently, picking a few bittergourds. Madhukar shows them how to examine the leaves for pests, how to prune stems, and how to select the right fruit.
Mother: “Even this small act feels… alive. Something I haven’t felt in years.”
Madhukar: “See? Life skills are not in the classroom. They are in the sweat, the smell, the texture of things. My grandmother knew every leaf; she could tell when a crop needed water by touching the soil. My parents kept a balance between tradition and convenience. We… we are forgetting.”
They walk to the kitchen garden. Madhukar points to tomato plants, basil, curry leaves.
Madhukar: “Let’s make breakfast. But not from packets. We’ll use whatever we’ve picked. You’ll cook over the chulha.”
Father (hesitant): “Over firewood? I’m afraid of burning the kitchen down!”
Madhukar: (laughing) “Then you’ll learn quickly. Modern hands forget fire, but fire teaches respect, patience, timing. Skills die if we hide from them.”
Child (placing a small tomato on the stove): “It smells different from the kitchen at home. Alive.”
Madhukar: “Alive, yes. Alive and honest. The city gives you perfection in plastic; the earth gives you imperfection in truth. You see the difference?”
They start cooking together — bittergourd slices fried in coconut oil, dal simmering over the wood fire, rice steaming in a clay pot. Madhukar explains:
Madhukar: “Cooking is not just food. It’s measurement, observation, patience. It’s mathematics, chemistry, biology — all alive. Generations that lose this lose connection to reality.”
Mother: “It’s joyful though. We are laughing, learning, and eating together. I feel… awake in a way I’ve forgotten.”
Madhukar: “Joy is part of the cure. Hands, hearts, and minds — all active. Today your child learns more than any app can teach.”
After breakfast, Madhukar leads them to the well:
Madhukar: “Let’s fetch water. Simple task? Not at all. Children used to measure weight, balance, effort — skills we take for granted. Your child’s muscles and mind need these experiences.”
Child (struggling but laughing): “It’s heavy! Why did nobody tell me water could weigh so much?”
Madhukar: “Because we forget, slowly, step by step, generation by generation. Convenience hides strength, screens hide curiosity.”
They fill the pots and carry them back together. Madhukar points to a compost pit:
Madhukar: “Look at this. Waste is not waste; it’s food for soil, for next season. Most children today throw everything away. Generational dumbing down is not only in what they can’t do — it’s in what they no longer respect.”
Father: “This is… an eye-opener. We came here to see your homestead. We leave seeing what we’ve lost — and how we can begin to get it back.”
Madhukar: “Exactly. And every morning like this, every seed planted, every dish cooked from scratch, every story told — it stitches back the chain broken by screens and convenience.”
Child (smiling, holding a spoon of bittergourd): “I want to learn everything. Can we do this every day?”
Madhukar: (laughing) “Start with today. One step, one skill, one bite at a time. That’s how you fight the dumbing down.”
The family laughs, eats, and wanders the homestead — touching soil, feeling leaves, smelling firewood, hearing the wind through trees. A quiet joy settles over the morning, alive, rich, and deliberate — the antidote to a world slowly forgetting how to live.
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Generational Dumbing Down
– The Epic Poem
I. Grandparents’ Generation (~1930s–1950s)
I see them first thing in the dawn,
grandmother bending over the chulha,
hands blackened with soot and turmeric,
grinding masala on the stone slab,
knowing how much chili will last till Diwali,
how much jaggery to press for Holi sweets,
how to pick neem leaves before the monsoon,
how to save seeds from last year’s bajra and jowar.
Grandfather waits with the bullock cart,
plough strapped, oxen lowing in the courtyard,
he knows the soil by smell, the rain by wind,
he knows which clouds will break and which will wander,
he knows how to mend a fence with bamboo,
how to tie a rope tight enough to hold water pots on the head.
Children run barefoot in the courtyard,
scraping mud between their toes,
chasing sparrows,
fetching water from the well with brass mugs,
learning the weight of responsibility in each drop.
Stories hang thick in the air,
Ramayana at night, Mahabharata whispered by candlelight,
the songs of Krishna on Sankranti morning,
the proverbs of elders teaching patience and cunning.
They remember festivals not as Instagram posts
but as the smell of rice frying in ghee,
the sound of dholak in the evening,
the taste of sesame laddus pressed by tiny palms.
They know first aid from tulsi, haldi, castor oil, ajwain water.
They know how to stitch torn dhotis, mend torn sarees,
repair the cycle, sharpen the sickle,
tie the thatch roof so it doesn’t leak.
Life is hard. But they are capable.
Every day, they live, and they survive.
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II. Parents’ Generation (~1960s–1980s)
I see them in cemented homes,
half of the mud gone, half of the earth paved over,
a pressure cooker hissing on the stove,
a black-and-white TV flickering in the corner.
The children write letters in ink,
learning multiplication tables,
their hands less black, their nails cleaner,
they still play cricket in dusty streets,
ride bicycles to school,
yet they carry fewer chores, fewer responsibilities.
The mother keeps a steel tumbler ready for buttermilk,
yet a tin of Maggi waits on the shelf,
a box of biscuits, a tin of Horlicks,
the first whispers of convenience enter the home.
Fathers cycle to work, carrying groceries,
learning accounts from ledger books,
counting cash, balancing coins,
but learning less of the soil, less of the kitchen garden.
Festivals arrive with lights,
Diwali with electric bulbs strung along terraces,
Holi with synthetic colors,
Makar Sankranti kites flying over concrete courtyards.
The smells and sounds are still there,
but thinner, quieter, less lived in.
They still remember to grind spices by hand,
to mend clothes,
but they also call the electrician,
buy ready-made sweets,
teach children the ABCs of a white-collar world
while forgetting the ABCs of earth, of survival, of self-reliance.
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III. Current Young Adults (~1990s–2010s)
I see them slouched in apartments,
laptops warm on laps, smartphones buzzing endlessly,
instant noodles steaming in bowls,
gym bags lying unused,
TVs blaring cartoons for the children.
The smell of firewood is a memory,
ghee simmering on the stove replaced by microwaves,
dal cooked from packets of pre-mixed spices.
They scroll through Instagram, watch YouTube tutorials,
learn knowledge from screens,
forget knowledge from hands and soil.
The children play indoors,
never chasing the crow or running in the mud,
they grow up without the weight of water on their heads,
without the rhythm of sowing or harvesting.
Festivals are digital,
lights on phones, colors in apps,
food bought ready-made from stores,
rituals glanced over, hurried, half-hearted.
Repair skills are gone:
cycle punctured? Call the shop.
Stitch torn shirt? Call the tailor.
Fix fuse? Call the electrician.
All taught once by parents, now outsourced, forgotten.
Health: first-aid knowledge lost.
Turmeric, tulsi, ajwain, coriander seeds —
names known but not trusted.
Doctors, hospitals, pills — the first line of life.
They know how to swipe, click, order, pay,
but they do not know how to knead dough,
how to plough, how to mend, how to survive without convenience.
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IV. Emerging Children (~2020s onward)
I see them glowing in apartments,
faces lit by tablets and phones,
surrounded by robotic vacuums, AI assistants,
milk in packets, food in pouches.
They do not know the smell of soil,
do not touch firewood,
do not carry water in brass mugs,
do not hear the stories under the flicker of a lamp.
Their play is digital,
their attention fragmented,
their fingers swipe faster than their hands can work,
their eyes scan pixels instead of leaves.
Festivals are lights on screens,
food is convenience,
rituals are videos.
They are fragile, soft, dependent,
a generation born with everything given,
without earning it,
without learning the rhythm of survival.
When the power fails,
when the water stops,
when the delivery boy doesn’t come,
what will they know?
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V. The Slow Rant – Observations Across Generations
We have lost things slowly,
like water seeping through fingers,
like smoke rising from a chulha
into a sky that doesn’t remember fire.
The staircase of life skills melts
generation by generation:
solid stone at the bottom,
cement in the middle,
glass and tile above,
pixels and light at the top.
We are literate but not capable,
educated but not resilient,
connected but not rooted.
We do not know the weight of responsibility,
the smell of earth after rain,
the taste of food we made with our hands,
the strength it takes to survive without help.
And yet —
I remember the smell of jaggery fried in ghee,
the sound of the flute on Sankranti mornings,
the taste of bajra roti,
the thump of the bullock cart on a mud road,
the feel of water in brass mugs,
the songs my grandmother hummed,
the laughter of children running barefoot in the fields.
We are losing it all.
Step by step, generation by generation,
a drop at a time.
But words remain.
I write to curse, to remember, to warn:
Teach them fire. Teach them soil. Teach them water.
Teach them how to cook, to grow, to fix, to heal.
Teach them what it means to survive.
Or else —
they will inherit only glow, plastic, and helplessness,
a world that gives everything,
but teaches nothing.
