Saturday 23 January 2016

meaning - What does “'Avoid plastics' in commencement speeches" mean?

Today’s (May 12) New York Times carries an article written by Arthur Brooks, the president of the American Enterprise Institute under the title, “How to avoid commencement clichés”.



The author says:




“When I asked my 20-something colleagues (about commencement speech),
they warned me that, while this might sound great to a baby boomer at
the podium, to a millennial audience it’s just product advice. It
sounds more or less like the famous unsolicited counsel in the 1967
movie “The Graduate,” in which a middle-aged businessman told the
young Ben Braddock: “I just want to say one word to you. Just one
word. Plastics.”



So here’s my advice for anyone asked to give a commencement speech:
Avoid plastics; put purpose ahead of product; emphasize sanctification
and service. Also, keep it under 30 minutes.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/05/12/opinion/how-to-avoid-commencement-cliches




.



I can associate the word “plastics” only with (1) synthetic resins, (2) credit card as a noun, (3) elastic, flexible as an adjective, and with no moral significance.



What does “plastics” that was dubbed as a cliché here mean?

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