Hey Kid,
I'm going to break this up into multiple posts - every time I try to post anything of length, I get banned (they think I'm posting a website's contents)

I'm 52 years old, never married (serial monogamist) and a college professor. I'm what you'd call a GenX person. I was playing with Legos while the Hippies/Boomers had their fun. As a prof, I see the generations come and go. It's funny, you tune in and can tell the subtle and not-so-subtle changes in the youth.

What you say is true, and your reasoning as to how it came to be is pretty much spot-on. But there's something more insidious that your parents' follies to include in the blame! (and of course, it contains a CONSPIRACY!)

Fundamentally, you are pointing at feminism. I'd have to say that Feminism is a project that suffered failure from its own success - or excess.

Here's what I mean; Back in the 60's women wanted to no longer be treated as 'second class citizens'; equal opportunity, pay, status. Well, seemed like a good idea. Unfortunately, this got mixed with radical feminism (Hate Men), and created a great deal of polarity. That part aside, women DID get the opportunities, became obsessed with the newfound opportunities (and why not? It's like a new toy) to the detriment of their thousands of years of evolution to a different role. In other words, they became 'Maternally Retarded' by a societal upheaval that had taken on exaggerated, reactive proportions. Women were desperate to 'prove themselves' with this newfound status - and understandably; who wants to be given the rights and status of men, and then FAIL? It was, to them, a mission.