I don't think I can concur that it's getting worse.
There are, in fact, appalling things that are ongoing,
sort of symptomology of the pandemic of violence
prevalent in our society.
But every generation seems to have sort of horizontal
thinking. They can see no further than what was on
the horizon during their lifetime.
It wasn't easy being a Boomer kid. Your friends and
classmates went off to war in Viet Nam (a police
action, never a declared war) or undeclared actions in
Cambodia, without choice, and others left for Canada
after chanting hell no, we won't go. Those who served
came home in pieces, or with PTSD, or in body bags to
an ungrateful nation.
Think Kent State and watching your peer group get shot
by the government on a college campus--or spied on and
reported as a traitor to our country for simply
dissenting.
How about don't trust anyone over 30, and living in a
J. Edgar Hoover era (well, I suspect an Ashcroft era
may come close, what with spying on dissenting
individuals but that's for a political forum)?
Students for a Democratic Society, Dr. Leary and the
LSD crowd, Woodstock, Civil Rights struggles, George
Wallace, and the Watts Riots. Angela Davis, the Black
Panthers, and Stokley Carmichael (can I get a "Right
On, My Brother"? Power to the People!), Malcom X and
Dr. King.
Mario at Berkeley and the Chicago Seven. Jane Fonda
and Hanoi.
Assassination of two Kennedys and a King. The suicide
of Marilyn (Monroe--not Manson), Castro's Cuba and the
Bay of Pigs, the death of Che, that "Commie Pinko"
Kruschev and his infamous shoe, the Berlin Wall, and
the disgrace of Thomas Eagleton when running for high
office simply because he had suffered from depression.
Getting sent home from school if your dress didn't
meet the middle of your knee, and your hair got cut by
your teacher if it touched your ears. Couldn't vote
until 21. Great dissension between the young and the
"Silent Majority." God was dead, and the most fatal
sin of all was apathy!
LBJ and his belly scar. Burning the bra for women's
rights. Fighting for Roe v. Wade (and with that I'm
not inviting debate on the pros or cons of abortion,
so please don't start). The inaccessibility of birth
control. Pregnant teens were rushed off to distant
areas, hushed up, and compelled to relinquish lest
they shame their family and left with lifelong wounds
instead of kept at home or termination of pregnancy.
We were the group following Happy Days and there was
much tumult throughout our nation. When they did the
remake of "What's Going On" last year, they had to
take the words "Picket Signs" out of the songs because
they were afraid kids of today wouldn't even know what
the hell that meant.
But we didn't go to Korea.
Or to World War II.
Or survive the Holocaust or the Great Depression.
Or World War I.
We had a better chance of living past 12 and not being
killed by influenza or whooping cough or small pox,
but we lived through vaccines for small pox and bear
the ugly scars and saw our friends fall ill to polio
while we rushed to get first the series of shots and
then the sugar cubes.
We froze during the Cold War and had regular Civil
Defense drills where you dove to the floor, covered
your head and hoped your ass didn't hang out in the
breeze because girls HAD to wear dresses to school.
Did we have it harder than kids today? Who can say?
Did we have it harder than our parents? Harder, I'm
afraid is subjective.
We were the Make Love, Not War Generation that
believed in Free Love and lived to see the
consequences come back to haunt in an era of AIDS and
HIV.
So let's be careful about comparing generations. It's
probably not a fair thing to do.
--- Merri Pemberton <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
> I think that looking at Columbine, metal detectors
> and drug dogs in schools,
> and knowing of a situation where a first grader had
> a pair of scissors,
> gripped them in her hand with the sharp point
> directed at the other student
> and threatened to stab her- should give plenty
> people reasons to say that
> this next generation is at least a little worse.
> Kids have even admitted that
> they have much more to worry about than when their
> parents were growing up
> e.g. heightened school violence. When I was a senior
> in high school (1994) we
> started to see the police and drug dogs patrolling
> our school, and we were a
> small town school at that. So, it is getting worse.
> Not every kid has serious
> problems, but the problems existing in this society
> are having a great impact
> on the generations to come.
>
> Sincerely,
>
> Merri
=====
Indigo Nights
[log in to unmask]
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