When the pandemic decimated ad revenue at newspapers around the country, I was one of dozens of employees at the St. Louis Post-Dispatch put on a two-week furlough. Shortly after, I joined the millions of people currently trying to access unemployment benefits.

I got worried when the phrase “issue on file” showed up on my online application. It was too early in the waiting game for me to feel anxious about whether I would see any money, but this was my first time navigating this state bureaucracy.

I tried calling one of the state unemployment offices three times. Once, I stayed on hold for two hours -- only for the call to mysteriously disconnect. Another time, I left a voicemail, but never heard back. Yet another time, I heard a recording that said the hold queue was full and to try back the next day.

More than 44 million people across the country have applied for state jobless benefits since mid-March. Several Facebook support groups have formed for those trying to get benefits. At a colleague’s suggestion, I joined such a group.

The one I picked already had nearly 1,200 members. Reading the posts felt like standing in a virtual line and listening to the horror stories of the people next to you.

I talked to Andrea Michel, 41, of Steelville, Missouri, who has been dealing with the system since March, when she was laid off from her job as a reservations agent for Hilton hotels. She tried to log into the state’s benefits application system, but her sign-in didn’t work. It took two weeks to reach someone to fix that hurdle. Then her claim was rejected, perhaps because she had switched jobs in February.

Every day, she would call and wait on hold to talk to someone. She calculated the time spent on these calls: In one week, she spent 19 hours on hold.

“There were days when I sat on the phone for six hours,” she said. She finally got approved and received payment for one week. The next week, the system said her claim had expired.

Back to the phones.

She needed to file additional paperwork. One rep told her it was a new quarter, so she needed to reapply. She asked about all the weeks of back pay she was owed, by then more than $4,800. One person told her she was out of luck; another said not to worry, she would receive it. One day, the system showed that her claim was being processed; another day, it said it was rejected.

Her family’s bills are piling up. Their landlord let them pay rent late since they had never been late before, she said. Her husband drives 91 miles each way to work at a factory in St. Louis, and the tires on his truck are bald. His overtime was cut when the pandemic hit.

“We’re depending on that money to get new tires because if those go, he can’t get to work,” she said. They have never been in such a financial hole before. In fact, they had some money saved before she lost her job, but those savings were used to pay for her 19-year-old son’s car and insurance once he got laid off.

“This week we weren’t able to buy any groceries at all,” she said. They had stocked up before the quarantine, so they aren’t out of food yet, but it’s running low.

She said the struggle to try to get benefits has her feeling anxious, stressed and helpless: “It’s heart-wrenching, because you don’t know if you will be able to pay your bills.”

She is battling the fear of the payments not coming at all: “Am I going to be able to recover? Will it wreck my credit? Will I have to go without food for a week because I had to pay my electric bill instead?”

Michel wrote her congressman, Jason Smith, asking for help. His office replied, saying they would forward her message to their liaison in the state department of labor.

“However, they are getting several hundred referrals just from state and federal legislators, so it’s taking a couple weeks before they reach out,” the email said. Heaven help you if you happened to change jobs shortly before getting laid off, or had an employer contest your claim.

Delores Rose, a spokeswoman for the Missouri Department of Labor and Industrial Relations, said benefits can be paid within 22 days after establishing a new claim or renewing an established claim, unless an issue is being investigated. She said an investigation can take, on average, another four to six weeks to be completed -- and that’s during “normal times.”

These aren’t normal times.

Meanwhile, the extra federal aid for pandemic assistance runs out at the end of July, and the Trump administration opposes extending it.

I eventually got the payment for the two weeks I filed for. Michel’s claim and back pay got approved a week after mine.

The first thing she did was pay the two months of rent they owe, and buy new tires for the truck.

The vast majority of young people have used social media to support the protests following the killing of George Floyd in police custody in Minneapolis. But some have posted photos of themselves kneeling on a friend’s neck and mocking the manner in which Floyd was killed -- the so-called #GeorgeFloydChallenge on TikTok, Snapchat and Instagram. (The images have since been removed from most sites.)

When I first heard about this phenomenon, I was stunned by how abnormal it seemed, and the deep level of racism it revealed. Teenagers often have lapses in judgment or make poor choices, but reenacting a man’s torture and killing for kicks? People who can laugh at someone being brutalized usually see the victim as less than human.

One student who posted such a video on Snapchat -- teens laughing while simulating choking each other, with one heard to say “I can’t breathe” -- was an incoming freshman at the University of Missouri. A copy of that video reached Mizzou officials, who released a statement.

“Given the similarity to the recent death of George Floyd in Minneapolis, the video is both shocking and disturbing,” wrote Mun Y. Choi, president of the UM System and interim chancellor at the University of Missouri. The university launched an investigation and told the student she would be suspended until it was complete. The student decided to withdraw, as did another girl in the video, an incoming Missouri State University student.

Other universities have revoked admission for students posting similar content. It’s important to send an unequivocal message that this behavior is unacceptable, especially when schools and universities have a history of minimizing racist acts.

But what could prompt adolescents to showcase these kinds of depraved posts in the first place?

Johnnetta Cole, a therapist based in suburban St. Louis, said young people who have witnessed adults in positions of leadership -- from teachers to parents to political leaders -- making racist comments or jokes and escaping any consequences may internalize the message that this behavior is acceptable. Others may be reacting to the change they see happening in society.

“I believe that although young people are leading this movement (for justice), we still have some teenagers and young people who are fearful of change,” she said.

This can lead to acting out in drastic ways.

Rachel Morris, a licensed professional counselor and anger resolution therapist in Houston, primarily works with teens and adolescents. She said that students of color have often had conversations with their parents about how to manage situations in which they might be treated badly because of the color of their skin, or have experienced discrimination. Students who have never had these conversations or experiences may lack empathy for those who have.

“If they have not experienced that trauma, they may not understand the seriousness of it,” Morris said. She said racist posts can also be attention-seeking behavior: They will get immediate responses, and even negative attention is attention.

Both Morris and Cole said social and environmental factors are exacerbated by teens’ underdeveloped brains. Kristen Craren, a therapist based in Clayton, Missouri, agreed that brain immaturity likely plays a role. But if there are other red flags in the adolescent’s behavior -- social struggles, violence towards others or pets -- it’s worth talking to a therapist, she said.

“If they don’t understand that what they did was wrong, I would definitely suggest therapy,” Morris added. Craren suggests vetting the therapist before making an appointment to make sure they share the parent’s values and political beliefs.

Attitudes towards others are influenced by what a young person sees and hears at home, and in the community of adults and peers around them.

Cole recalls a racist incident two years ago, when her daughter was a senior in high school. A student asked a classmate to prom by holding a sign that said: “If I was black, I’d be picking cotton, but I’m white, so I’m picking you for prom.”

The same racist sign had made the rounds in schools across the country. Some schools prohibited the student in question from attending prom; Cole’s daughter’s district did not disclose how that student was disciplined.

Regardless of the way school leaders chose to respond, their actions sent a message to more than the student involved.

They spoke loudly to the entire school.

Dear Class of 2020,

By now you’ve heard celebrities, politicians and activists tell you how your generation -- full of promise and potential -- will help fix the disastrous mess we’re in.

“This is your generation’s world to shape,” former President Barack Obama said during a televised commencement address. He cited the country’s deep-rooted problems, such as economic inequality, systemic racism and health care disparities.

You’ve been charged with changing the world, rebuilding the country, rising to the occasion, healing divides and demanding better.

No pressure or anything.

I also believe in your ability to be the generation that will transform our world for the better. Every young person I’ve met gives me that sense of hope. But just as much as congratulating and wanting to inspire you, adults in this country owe you an apology. Several, in fact. We have failed you in significant ways. So, let me apologize on behalf of all of us:

I’m sorry we subjected you to horrific school shootings and traumatic shooter drills from the time you were too young to even understand this depravity. We allowed this to continue despite knowing that improving gun laws and policies would save your lives. It’s an unforgivable disgrace that your government continues to value gun manufacturers above your lives and security. I hate that you’ve grown up in such a violent culture and country, especially when we know there are ways to make it less so.

I’m sorry we did not do a better job protecting your privacy, personal data and security from tech companies who have used it to become exceedingly rich. European countries have taken this issue far more seriously than we have. The technology that has permeated your life since birth has also exploited and exposed you to things we should have protected you from.

I’m sorry that we haven’t taken seriously the threat of climate change and the ways it will affect your future. I don’t blame you for thinking that adults who deny and ignore the world’s scientists are blithering idiots.

I’m sorry you’ve come of age seeing videos of black people being brutalized and killed by the police. I’m ashamed that we haven’t fought harder for reforms to make this country safer and more fair for people of color. The fact that black and brown people still face worse treatment by schools, employers and the law is a stain on the generations that precede you.

I’m sorry that most of you will have to take on greater debt to attend college than any of us did. I’ll never understand why adults who themselves benefited from more affordable higher education would think it’s OK for you to mortgage your futures just to get a degree.

You are old enough to know how unfair this world can be. It was our job to try to make it a little more fair, but we’ve done the opposite. We’ve made it better for the wealthy and privileged, and harder for everyone else. Because of this, you’ve seen us stressed, working longer hours and distracted too often.

You’re entering young adulthood during a pandemic that our government’s inaction made far worse than it should have been, along with widespread civil unrest, more division than most of us can remember and a tanked economy. We are giving you a weakened democracy and civil society.

You deserve so much better than this.

I hope this moment forces adults to confront how selfishly we’ve behaved. Once upon a time, when we were your age, we also dreamed of making the world a better place. I’m sorry we’ve fallen short so far.

Our one redemption may be that we’ve raised a generation who will do better.