The argument often goes, 'we did x while I was growing up, we stopped doing x today now look at the world we find ourselves in.' This generation is out of control. Not like we use to be. Therefore it stands that is the x reason we were all angels. We turned to upright citizens because of x, so we should return to doing x.'
This is nothing more then the Cum Hoc, Ergo Propter Hoc fallacy. We make the connection that since we all turned to fine people in the end, that it must be because of x. Even though there is no evidence to form such a relationship. If we were to honest with ourselves we would have to face some harsh realities.
The first one would be that we were not as perfect as we recall ourselves being. Not when it comes to comparing our generation to those that came after it. We tend to look back on the past with rose colored glasses. Things were much better when we were growing up than they are today. It is as if we are genetically incapable of seeing the mistakes that took place during our youth. And even if we somehow manage to acknowledge some unpleasant from the good ole days, it is nowhere near as rotten as things that are going on today.
The second thing we would have to admit is that our parents were saying the same thing about us, as we are saying about our kids today. You go back and our grandparents are talking about our parents in the saw way. Each generation looks down upon the one that came along after it. This has been going on ever since Ug looked at his son Mug and shook his head at the boy wearing his loin cloth hanging off his ass and listening to that new fangled thing called music. Things were much simpler when Ug was growing up.
We did not grow up to be the people we are today because we were perfect little angels. We grew up to be who we are despite the fact that we were not so innocent. We did all manner of dumb things when we are teenagers, we rebell against our authority figures when we are kids so that we get it all out before we can enter the stage of life when we must take our place in the grown up world, to be responsible and bring forth the next generation. Civilization would not be possible if we only thought of ourselves all the time instead of seeing that at some point you have to give a part of yourself for the betterment of those we live with. We are rebellious as teenager so that we can be upstanding adults.
In reality things are not as bad as they seem. If we look at poll numbers we see that the younger generation are more accepting of those that are different than themselves. We see that our children are more multicultural than those generation that came before them. Our children are more likely to believe it doesn't matter who you love, but that find someone who you can love. No matter their skin color, nationality, ethnicity, their religion or lack there of, or which sexual organ they may have been born with. Things that many of us older folk still have major hang ups on.
In there eyes everybody deserves the same rights!
No the world is not as bad as we make it out to be. It is no worse than it was when we were growing up. When we feared that gangs from the big cities were going to come into our small Midwestern towns performing drive bys, stabbing us for that pair of Nikes on our feet, or shooting us because we wore the wrong colors on the wrong street. Today's world is no worse than it was yesterday. We just see it through different eyes.
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