When I was a kid (dedicated to Ken Decker)

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When I was a kid,

We had something called "drive-in movies". Now we have something called drive-by shootings.

A "home invasion" meant your house had termites, not that it was being plundered by murderous thugs.

A "car jack" meant something to fix a flat tire, not confiscation of one's vehicle at gunpoint.

We used to enjoy stimulating recreation at day care and zoos, not be shot with automatic rifles.

When a person lost money, or a spouse, or a job, they killed themselves, not the whole office.

Afternoon TV was "ABC After School special", not Jerry Springer's "I'm balling my lesbian Mom"

Morning radio programs featured news and religious programs, not Howard Stern fart smelling contests.

Guns were used by people hunting wild animals, not by wild animals hunting people.

Gangs were composed of friends, not accomplices.

The stock market was fueled by dividends, not manic speculation.

When a company lost money, its share price went down, not up.

Gold was the standard of wealth, not a "barbaric relic"

Disobedient kids were treated with punishment, not amphetamines.

A high school was a place you earned a degree, not engaged in sex rings.

Fashion models were depicted as glamorous women, not emancipated, addicted to heroin, or having sex with animals.

Kids were expelled from school when they were disrespectful to adults, not when they were caught with a Tylenol.

Intimate sex was discussed by adults in private, not by juveniles on nearly every primetime TV show.

People went to church to converse with God, not to the medicine cabinet to swallow a Prozac.

Evening entertainment was "Archie Bunker" and "Hawaii 5-0", not actual videos of people being maimed, raped, shot, assaulted, cut open, beaten, and killed.

We found shark's teeth on the beach, not syringes.

Professional athletes were good role models, not multi-millionaires.

Pornography was "out of reach of children", not at their fingertips.

Babies were born fat and happy, not addicted to crack and diseased with AIDS.

Am I an eternal pessimist that sees the glass half empty? Perhaps. But as I see it, the above trends are "warning signs" of an ominous future for America, particularly if and when we enter a extended period of financial turmoil. Ken on the other hand, just doesn't believe that there will ultimately be a price to pay for this change of lifestyle. He thinks life is good because the stock market is skyrocketing with "irrational exuberance", funny money is cheap, and many of us are getting rich. Because our unemployment is low and we all now have cell phones, he reasons, we must be a healthy society. The underlying problems we have are real. We dodged the y2k bullet, but there are many others facing us, maybe more subtle but just as severe.

Ken thinks "market forces" will solve the world's environmental problems. I hope he is right. But the question is, will they solve our societal problems as well?

-- (@ .), April 27, 2000

Answers

It's bad. But if you talk to people who were alive a long, long time ago, there were really bad things going on then too. They just didn't talk about it. I know a lady over 95 years old who talked for the first time about a boy who sexually molested several children around her. Her mother knew what he was up to and simply didn't allow him in her yard or near her children. No one reported it or talked about it. That boy probably didn't stop what he was doing. Domestic violence was undefined, but very common and hushed up. Children were abandoned into orphanage care. Alcoholics and their families were allowed to sink into starvation-level poverty. I've heard many horror stories from respectable elderly women about being molested by male relatives serially with other girls in their families. NO ONE talked about it then. Men beat their wives to death and went on to marry again. People died of simple infections. Handicapped children were hidden away. Non-whites were given lesser or no educations.

Look in the Bible and see nearly every problem a human being can have. What's different about TODAY is the nearly-instant speed with which news -- bad news -- is transmitted. It's bad, sure. I don't think it's that much different from previous eras. You just hear about more of it, and you hear about it nearly as it happens, and the picture changes constantly. It's information overload. What you have to do is grab the good parts and use them to work on the bad parts.

Singapore doesn't have a lot of the problems you mentioned...and they aren't 'free' either. I'm not ready to trade several freedoms I take for granted just to avoid seeing trash on the streets. For now I'd rather pick up the trash and teach kids why it shouldn't be thrown there in the first place. Take what good you get and make more of it.

-- helen (home@the.farm), April 27, 2000.


Helen, I MUST agree. If this is the poster once known as 'a', we've already had this discussion on TB2000 and he already KNOWS how I feel. If it isn't 'a', I can't imagine why a new poster would be calling out Ken in this way.

-- Anita (Anita_S3@hotmail.com), April 27, 2000.

When I was a kid...

Thousands of kids died or were crippled every year by polio. There was no Dr. Salk.

Most men died in their 50s and 60s. There were no heart drugs. By-pass operations were a distant dream.

Battered wives had little or no recourse.

Blacks drank from separate water fountains, couldn't join unions, and couldn't vote.

The only black on the Yankees payroll was the janitor.

A Jew could not get a job at GM, duPont, Ford, Texaco, US Steel or any bank in the country.

And so on.

----------------------

God Bless Today's America

-- (retard@but.happy), April 28, 2000.


Human nature is the same now as it was 50, 100, 200, 500, 1000 plus years ago. This simply does not change. Technologies change how we live. Perceptions change. What is considered acceptable changes. Human nature remains constant.

Good beer is always welcome, by the wise, in any time period.

-- Outta beer (East of the smoke stack@usa.here), April 28, 2000.


When I was a Kid Richard Nixon was president.

-- nuff said (///@???...), April 28, 2000.


Don't forget Vietnam, Kent State, Disco, the energy crisis, and runaway inflation.

-- (hmm@hmm.hmm), April 28, 2000.

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