In the face of age

[shawn]

in the face of age
here is the sentence:
The world is going to damnation because of young 'uns flying in the face of age.

what does it mean?

[Alan]

The meaning is a little obscure to me without knowing the full context. The first part means that the world is going downhill very quickly or being condemned with the younger generation behaving like this. These younger ones are resisting/opposing/disregarding old age. I think I could explain it better by knowing other sentences before or after.
_________________
English as a Second Language
You can read my ESL story Phrasal Verbs/hold

[shawn]

Thank you very much Alan!

The scene is from the movie "The Night of the Hunter (1955)". Very old movie, some of the language from it is really hard to understand.

The context is a murderer, who is a Preacher, wanted to kill two kids. But the two kids escaped, so he hired some guys to help him catch the kids. That's what he said to those guys he hired:

An ungrateful child is an abomination before the eyes of God. The world is going to damnation because of young 'uns flying in the face of age.

What I don't understand is the phrase "in the face of age". Is it an idiom? what does it mean?

[Alan]

This really means in defiance of. If there is a convention in society to behave in a certain way and someone does something shocking that upsets all those who accept the convention then that person flies in the face of convention. In a way it's like making a rude sign at convention.
_________________
English as a Foreign Language
You can read my EFL story Phrasal Verbs/go

[shawn]

got it!!
Thanks again!