I think I know why they called them "The good old days"

[ghouck]

I think we touched upon this in another thread, or I am imagining things. Kids these days, they're wimps. Not their fault, and not all, but there are so many things that are different today, and while I'm sure some things are thought to be good by some, many aren't that good.

When I was a kid, we spent quite a bit of time blowing things up. We made pipebombs and oxy-acetylene bombs, we often had kick-ass Mexican fireworks, we even go a hold of blasting caps from time to time. Seems like most of our toys that we outgrew got blown up or set on fire. The longest but-chewing I ever got was from getting caught blowing crap up by the police. BUT-CHEWING is the key phrase. Nowadays, kids go to PRISON for it. As I understand it, federal law states that ANY TIME a person is found with a home-made explosive device, the BATF and FBI are automatically involved. So, a kid gets a hold of a string of black-cat firecrackers, and takes them all apart to use the powder to make one BIG firecracker, and he's a felon, and 'could' end up on a terrorist watchlist.

When I was a kid, the police had a "don't attract attention to yourselves" approach to teenage drinking. It was kind of a way of easing people into the drinking scene, instead of dropping them into it full-force, or so it seemed, but probably not by design. It seemed one of the first thing kids learned about drinking was how to behave while doing so. Kids that were caught got into some trouble, but not the disaster that getting caught is these days, and today a kid is in major trouble, even if they did so responsibly. I also think this is part of the reason the younger crowd in bars seem to be a bunch of idiots these days: They didn't get to practice at home, and didn't have anyone to punish them if they get stupid with it, until their stupidity crosses into the realm of 'illegal'.

When I was a kid, NOBODY wore a helmet when riding a bike. You know what we did? We learned how to not get hurt, and when we DID get hurt, we sure sucked a bunch of it up and kept on going. There's a place in town that is PERFECT for jumping bikes, and they mowed it down. When I was a kid, people saw kids jumping ramps and such and thought "At least they're not out getting into trouble". These days that IS trouble.

When I was a kid EVERYONE had a bb gun. We learned firearm safety, and kids used them relatively responsibly. In many states a kid can't use a bb gun without a parent present until they are 16, and bb guns are IME largely junk. It was pointless trying to target practice with a crossman bb gun, because the thing wasn't accurate within the shape of a beer can at any decent distance. I returned the thing where I bought it from and they said that inaccuracy was by design, and it was to prevent kids from killing birds and such.

[/rant]

[CheezeFlixz]

Fortunately I live in rural Kentucky and kids grow up with guns, still have mock wars with BB guns and the occasional kid has to have a BB dug out of them. While explosive are a little harder to get a hold of today, unlike the M-80's of my day, which was about a 1/4 stick of dynamite. So not as many mail boxes are blown up.

Granted the world is a far different place, it has changed quite bit and not a change for the better. Kid today don't know how to play all they seem to know is Video games and text messages. I had a group of kids over here this summer and they all sat around playing a video game, I told them to turn it off and go outside and play ... they went outside and appeared lost.

But when I was a young kid you could stay out until after midnight and not worry about being abducted. You could walk around town and and even ride your bikes miles from home with out a care in the world. Just be home for dinner was the only rule.

[Trevor]

. So not as many mail boxes are blown up.

I have a concrete mailbox outside my house: I wonder what a stick of dynamite would do to that? 

[Trevor]

 

The weird thing about my childhood in the then Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe) was that from 1965 to 1980, there was a civil war going on ~ I came along in 1967 and thus lived through thirteen years of war. Thankfully my parents survived unscathed but I know that, despite the war, my childhood was a good one. I learnt to take care of myself at an early age and continue to do that these days.

[Trevor]

When I was a kid EVERYONE had a bb gun. We learned firearm safety, and kids used them relatively responsibly.

When I was at school, it was not unusual in the war years for children to carry .38 revolvers or 9mm pistols to school. It was really nothing strange at all as they were carrying them to protect themselves and others, should Robert Mugabe, Joshua Nkomo or any other so-called 'freedom fighters"  decide to attack us.

When my Dad came home from border duty, it was always my pleasure to carry around his 9mm Uzi.

[Newt]

ghouck: you truly belong in Alaska!  (I have friends in Soldotna and they sound just like you.  )  But be careful: you risk sounding like an old geezer too.

I agree for the most part that kids 'these days' are wimps.  Not their fault?  Not entirely, perhaps.  However, I do include a general attitude of laziness in my definition of 'wimp'.  My observation has been that kids these days don't seem to have the same 'get up and go' that we had.  They do not apply themselves to active pursuits with the same dedication.  Effort is lacking.  Where is the "want to" ?  They are also less willing to take physical risks: and I do think this has gone to a ridiculous extreme.  This is largely a parenting and societal effect.  We are constantly beaten over the head with warnings and liability issues.   So we may be over-protective in general but we are also much more aware of potential consequences and are far less willing to accept death and maiming as a natural part of growing up. We no longer accept the more severe consequences of stupidity.  We tolerate (and maybe even promote?) stupidity and therefore must accommodate thoughtlessness.   

But moderation in all things: finding a good balance between extremes is always the most difficult part of anything.

My dad was a small-town/country doctor.  He patched up far too many kids who lost fingers or damaged eyes 'playing' with firecrackers or blasting caps.  Is compromising your sight or losing digits acceptable - especially when it is due to a recreational activity?  Not these days.  The security concerns are, valid or not, merely a *generalized* or blanket approach.  The necessity of which comes down to the logistics of sheer numbers and manpower (money).

I'm afraid I have had too much aggravation and expense replacing mail boxes over the years to be very sympathetic on the "gee, where did all the fun destroying mail boxes go?" issue.  Damaging and destroying the property of others is not negotiable.

Bike helmets are about surviving a crash: often caused by automobile involvement. More bike riders are injured badly or killed by going head-first into utility poles than by most other incidents.  Granted, this is a largely urban situation, but is a catastrophic head injury acceptable when it is so easily prevented?  Not these days.  Kids can still get hurt.  They do have fewer opportunities to do so, however.  Our community has a park set up with bike and board ramps.  Mainly to keep the kids off the streets where they were a hazard to traffic - both automobile and pedestrian.

Under-age drinking has always been a bad idea.  How can it be a good one?  So kids used to be 'idiots' out of sight in the bush or behind Uncle Joe's barn, where they would not annoy the serious bar patrons.  Hmmm.   I fail to see where bush parties promote responsible drinking.  Or responsible anything else for that matter. Under-age drinking IS illegal.  The suggestion that breaking a law is OK out-of-sight still promotes the *attitude* that it is OK to break laws - as long as you are not caught.  I do not agree with that one. 

I have very little problem with kids having guns: under appropriate instruction and supervision.  Too many parents these days abdicate that responsibility.  My farm neighbours all hunt, and their kids all take the firearms certification courses and know how to handle guns.  No problem.  Others are not so vigilant and would just give the kids a gun and walk away. And there I think is the true essence of the problem: I think too many people are looking for an 'easy' way to raise (for lack of a better term) kids these days.  The less effortful way.  The low-risk with less involvement way.  If the kids are parked in front of the computer, they are controllable. Easy as pie.  Plugged into a video game: great.  If the safety of the kids is  not being risked, then there will be no fingers pointed at the parent.  That is the dynamic at work here: balancing actual *risk* against how much time and effort and responsibility the parent feels like investing.  And all too often, that investment is far too small.

Our parents may have seemed disinterested or neglectful at the time: but chances are they did  do something: society expected it as a minimum.   Such as teaching the general principles of responsibility  - largely through application - and such things as sensible safety (eg with firearms) and the concept of accepting the consequences of your chosen actions.

[ghouck]

A big part of it is pansy parents playing it too safe. Give the kid every videogame they want, and you never have to worry about the kid getting hurt from jumping a ramp on his bike or such, no casts or stitches needed. You don't (think you) have to worry about them doing drugs or drinking or any other forms of misbehavior, because they only hang out with other nerds, and stay at home. You can always claim your perfection as a parent because you ALWAYS know EXACTLY where your kid is, and EXACTLY who he's with and what they are doing. No worries about your kid's self-esteem either: Nobody will know the kid sucks at all sports, and if the kid isn't the best at whatever videogame is popular at the time, then wait a week for the new best video game and get it for them early, and let them get lots of practice (after all, 8 hours of videogame practice is MUCH more realistic than 8 hours of baseball practice). You also don't have to worry about your little couch potato having his heart broken, as he'll have no social life. Getting a girl pregnant rates right up there with his plans for joining Nasa, that's a relief. He surely won't be a part of the 'in' crowd, so no need to spend money on designer clothes, as if they made them in "extra pudgy". Forget about all the time and money needed for doing things as a family: No need to go through all it takes to go fishing or camping, no need to spend money on dirt bikes, snowmobiles, or jet-skis. Gas is way too expensive for those anyways. After all, since the kid is at home all the time, there's no need for you to do anything special 'as a Family'.

I guess that really WASN'T the end of my rant. .

[/rant, , ,  for the time being. . .]

[Mr. DS]

I think many parents today neglect their children and try to buy their happiness through a barrage of material possesions.   For example, my wife's Aunt has a son who is 10 and she spends countless dollars on every video game system which the kid ironically doesn't really play.  In other words the kid is spoiled and doesn't appreciate a damn thing. She basically does everything to keep him out of her hair.  Hence why the kid is also a whiny b*tch.  The kid cried the other day when he stepped on a rock barefoot.  There was no blood, there was no mark but just a barrage of tears for literally 5 minutes.  This is the same kid who won't touch worms or bugs.  He also cried when my son (1 at the time) closed a door on him. 

My son, who is 2, stepped on the rock once and said "ow" with a few tears.  Then he  moved on seconds later. I try to get my son outside as much as I can.  He's already been fishing several times.  I think an element of safety needs to be there for any kid.  I agree with helmets on bikes because I knew a kid who was killed by falling off a BMX.  I still think things are getting silly in the world of children's safety.  That and how quick we are nowadays to pump our children with meds.  Granted some kids need it but I wonder if some of these kids are just bored.  Come to think of it, we didn't have ADD back when I was growing up. 

[Patient7]

Most of this is probably a parental and socialogical problem, however I'm not also saying kids aren't to blame.  Society labels all the fun stuff as dangerous, they put a bunch of laws against it and get people all worked up about the dangers of it.  The parents hear this and say their kid is no longer allowed to do it, their too lazy to supervise them when they first start out so they put them in front of video games to pacify them.  These kids then, and I am no exception, don't even bother breaking the rules to do what parents found fun.  The worst part of it is that everyone has a cell phone now so if they get into trouble or if the parents are worried they can call them.  However if I get into politics I'll do what I can to fix this.  LEGALIZE FIREWORKS!!

[ghouck]

However if I get into politics I'll do what I can to fix this.  LEGALIZE FIREWORKS!!

And make it so any boy that doesn't think blowing stuff up is cool has to use the women's restrooms and pee sitting down. The test it we get some old fashioned M-80 and make them blow up Cheese's mailbox. If they show a positive response by laughing, saying "COOL!", or asking to do it again, we send them to Trevor's and have them takeout HIS mailbox. It's a highly technical two-step approach.

[Jack]

The whole difference is that back in the good old days, parents knew there was a small amount of risk involved in pretty much any activity kids were involved in, but they used a common sense attitude that, well, we all survived our childhoods and our kids probably will too.  Better to risk some tiny chance of injury than to strip a kid of his childhood experiences.  And learning how to deal with small risks when you're a kid teaches you how to deal with larger risks when you're an adult.  Today, that common sense is completely gone.  Oh, some kid somewhere once got killed doing that, so it must be banned!  All parents everywhere must be whipped up into a frenzy to permanently outlaw this activity!  Well, no sh!t - somebody somewhere has been killed doing any activity you can think of.  So you end up with kids sitting in front of their Xbox, getting fat as pigs, and text messaging their friends.  Hey, they may no have any actual childhood, but at least .0001% of them don't get a boo-boo.

[schmendrik]

Is it about time to post that "good old days/kids today are no damned good" article that was supposedly written in Ancient Greece? I think I first ran into that in the 60s, the time you guys are now talking about when kids grew up right, but when the old timers were doing plenty of griping about how kids today were sissies and over-coddled, and not like kids in *their* day.

Back then the blame was on Dr. Spock, a popular author of child-rearing books. Not sure who the ancient Greeks blamed. Probably Roman influence.

[Kester Pelagius]

I can just imagine ghouck's childhood friends adding something like. . .

"That's right!  And ghouck used to use white lighting for bong water because it was easier to get than whiskey.  Of course he only did that once.

Ah, good times."

You should do a one man stage show.  It would be awesome, especially if your incorporate some of your, uhm, pyrotechnics knowledge.

[asimpson2006]

My son, who is 2, stepped on the rock once and said "ow" with a few tears.  Then he  moved on seconds later.

Thinking of that reminded me to what happened to my middle nephew a few months ago.  My sister was getting ready to leave our house and was putting stuff in her car.  Well her kids stayed in the house and my middle nephew started crying like crazy I guess because he though that his mom was leaving him or something, even when she came back in he would still be crying about it.

My oldest nephew once fell off a chair and hit his head on the back of a hard wood end table, and didn't cry and just got up and walked off.

Though I didn't play a lot outside when I was younger when I did I knew what to do and what to be careful of.  Though I did cry a few times when I got hurt, it helped me later on to learn how to deal with pain for effectively and not b***h as much about it.  This was especially true once I started hard contacting sparring in karate,  if I got hit, I acted like it was no big deal and kept going.

The whole difference is that back in the good old days, parents knew there was a small amount of risk involved in pretty much any activity kids were involved in, but they used a common sense attitude that, well, we all survived our childhoods and our kids probably will too.  Better to risk some tiny chance of injury than to strip a kid of his childhood experiences.  And learning how to deal with small risks when you're a kid teaches you how to deal with larger risks when you're an adult.  Today, that common sense is completely gone.  Oh, some kid somewhere once got killed doing that, so it must be banned!  All parents everywhere must be whipped up into a frenzy to permanently outlaw this activity!  Well, no sh!t - somebody somewhere has been killed doing any activity you can think of.

That and the rise of soccer moms as well hasn't helped as much.  Like for example they put their kid in a sport the kid gets a minor injury (like a small scrape), then get the wild idea that they can't let their kid play that anymore because of that small injury then protect them from every time.  I played some sports back in elementary school soccer and basketball one year each.  I don't think I got any injuries in soccer, but I did get elbowed in the eye once when playing basketball and my parents didn't b***h or say you can't play that anymore.  My mom might have had a problem with it, however she wasn't there, but my dad didn't.  I've had my share of injuries and bruises in karate by parents didn't have a problem with it then just accepted it and let me keep doing it.

I don't think my sister is over protective of her kids when I see her.  I mean she will warn them about not doing something that can hurt them, then if they do and they start crying she says about "See what happens when you do that", or something along those lines and I think they seem to learn about the dangers of doing things, so I'm interested to see what happens when they start elementary school in a several years and when they start getting older to do other things and see how they turn out.

[Andrew]

I only intervene in "dangerous" activities that Jenna and Andy engage in if I believe they could cause themselves serious or permanent injury.  If we can avoid a broken bone, then I would like that. 

For example, one of the rules of riding their bikes is to wear shoes (not barefoot, not sandals).  Over the summer, I saw Andy run out to jump on his bike with his sandals on.  He is 3, almost 4, and clumsy in that way kids are while they are growing so fast.  He almost fell over on the bike and while doing so he managed to remove most of the skin off the top of his toes on one foot.  After that, I did not have to remind him about the shoes while riding a bike rule.