Strawberry Generation

Those Taiwanese born in the 1980s, considered by their elders and the establishment to be fragile (like the fruit), insubordinate, and unwilling to endure hardship.

The Taiwan News said that the Strawberry Generation “grew up in an environment without war and political persecution, with less poverty and easy access to information. This generation feels free to abandon tradition and takes education and freedom for granted.”

In 2007, The Taipei Times discussed the effect of the Strawberry Generation on the country’s food supply:

As the nation continues along its seemingly never-ending path of development-at-all-costs, few people give a second thought to who will be growing rice or picking bananas once the current crop of increasingly elderly farmers call it a day. … How the nation will cope in 20 or even 10 years after many of these elderly farmers have passed away is an extremely important question, because the ‘strawberry generation’ of well-educated, privileged youngsters are unwilling to toil among the muck and flies to eke out a living.

However, United Press International Asia recently reported divisions within the increasingly politicized Strawberry Generation, noting that “opposing groups of students calling themselves ‘Wild Strawberries’ and ‘Little Blueberries’ have been facing off in cities across the island.” The Wild Strawberries launched a series of sit-in protests against Taiwan’s handling of an official visitation from China; in turn, the Little Blueberries accused them of being manipulated by the opposition Democratic Progressive Party.