“And so we get our generational battle and our false divides. It's not necessarily because there is an actual generational battle, but rather it's because we have spent so much time talking about a generational battle that it has created something of a generational battle. And the impact of this is very real, both internally and externally. Quickly to touch upon them both, what Karla's study revealed was an entire generation believing something about themselves that is not true.” - Jason Feifer
The Climate Problem We Can Solve Now
Build For Tomorrow Podcast
February 25, 2022
“Many things changed in the early 2010s. Some have suggested that the cause of worsening mental health could be the economic insecurity that followed the 2008 global financial crisis. But why this would hit younger teen girls the hardest is unclear. Besides, the American economy improved steadily in the years after 2011, while teen mental health deteriorated steadily. Some have suggested that the 9/11 attacks, school shootings, or other news events turned young Americans into “generation disaster.”
Jonathan Haidt
The Atlantic
November 21, 2021
“In the wake of the 20th anniversary of the attacks of September 11, 2001, it’s worth noting that many current emerging adults (ages 18 to 29) have no direct memories of that day. However, the attacks and all of the subsequent societal changes shaped the broader environment they grew up in, and for many, those societal conditions have generated concerns about themselves and their communities experiencing additional disasters….”
The Post 9/11 Generation’s Safety Perceptions
The Academic Minute
November 15, 2021
“Karla Vermeulen's Generation Disaster: Coming of Age Post-9/11 is a starting place to mend the new generation gap.”
Why Millennials and Gen Z Hate Boomers
ReasonTV Video
October 13, 2021
“In an era of mounting generational hostility, Karla Vermeulen is an essential mediator between older and younger Americans and her book, Generation Disaster, is a rich, empathetic portrait of a group too often simply—and wrongly—dismissed as weak, lazy, and entitled.”
Karla Vermeulen: Inside the Mind of 'Generation Disaster'
The Reason Interview with Nick Gillespie
September 29, 2021
“A serious and fascinating look at people who were born between about 1990 and 2002… and what is it like to grow up in a world the backdrop is the immediate aftermath of the 9/11 bombings and the War on Terror, and then you have things like the financial crisis, you have Covid, you have constant fear of school shootings and having to go through school shooting drills despite the virtual impossibility of that happening at anybody's school, what does it mean to constantly be told that the planet is about to boil in its own juices, etc. …. Generation Disaster really digs into that, and what's great about it is that it's built around a number of sources in the psychological and sociological literature, but also surveys and interactions with people from that age cohort describing how they feel about things - their emotional state and how that translates into things like anxiety and depression. So I highly recommend Generation Disaster: Coming of Age Post-9/11 by Karla Vermeulen.”
Nick Gillespie's weekly media recommendation
Reason Roundtable Podcast (starting at minute 55:17)
September 20, 2021
“Generation Disaster is and is not a book about 9/11 itself. It’s about trauma, and how that shapes us — as kids, as parents, as a community. And amidst the memorializations of this week, I think that’s something worth sitting with.”
Meet Generation Disaster
Anne Helen Petersen - Culture Study Substack
September 9, 2021
“I think what's so valuable about her work is that for me as someone who's so interested in history, it's almost like she gives us a little bit of a fast forward, because for better or for worse, when you are still memorializing an event that millions and millions of people were present for that becomes the dominant perspective. It is, as it should be. The victim's families are dominant in the conversation. The decision makers at the time are dominant in the conversation. Those of us who lived through the event, even if we weren't directly affected like those perspectives take dominance. And I think what's so valuable about what she's doing here is saying, like, remember that right now in 2021, there are lots of people alive who have no memory of this event, who weren't even born yet now participating in our government and our democracy. And I just think that that is incredibly important.”
Divided by Disaster
Pantsuit Politics Podcast
September 14, 2021
“I was fascinated by your research diving into the way that the challenges my generation and Generation Z have faced in our young adulthood have shaped us for the long term.”
The Trendline with Kristen Soltis Anderson
SiriusXM Radio - POTUS Political Channel
October 9, 2021
“You’ve identified something I think is unique, and worth studying and talking about…. Since the World Trade Towers fell, if you were 10 years old when that happened, everything that happened since, with fairly rapid occurrence – there was this war, there was this hurricane, there was this disaster that killed a bunch of people, climate change, discussion about how the world’s going to end in 10 years if we don’t do something – it has really been negativity in what we’re talking about…. It’s been almost relentless for a young person growing up.
”
Generation Disaster
WCLO Radio - Your Talk Show with Tim Bremel
October 8, 2021
“It seems like you've offered us a little bit of a roadmap. I was struck when you said we know what helps people's mental health and that is each other’s support. Yes. We know that we need each other. We… all need to be affirmed instead of, you know, constantly going through a judgement, people need to have their feelings affirmed.”
“Post-Traumatic Growth” with Dr. Karla Vermeulen
Pantsuit Politics Podcast
March 16, 2021