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        New Message Board Archives >> 2004 Posts >> lucky?
        
(Message started by: eddie on Oct 10^th, 2004, 11:44am)

Title: lucky?
Post by eddie on Oct 10^th, 2004, 11:44am

We Are the Lucky Ones

According to today's regulators and bureaucrats, those of us who were kids in the 40's, 50's, 60's, 70's or even the early 80's, probably shouldn't have survived.

Our baby cribs were covered with bright colored lead-based paint.

We had no childproof lids on medicine bottles, doors or cabinets, and when we rode our bikes, we had no helmets. (Not to mention the risks we took hitchhiking.) As children, we would ride in cars with no seat belts or air bags.
Riding in the back of a pickup truck on a warm day was always a special treat.

We drank water from the garden hose and not from a bottle.

Horrors! We ate cupcakes, bread and butter, and drank soda pop with sugar in it, but we were never overweight because we were always outside playing. We shared one soft drink with four friends, from one bottle, and no one actually died from this

We would spend hours building our go-carts out of scraps and then rode down the hill, only to find out we forgot the brakes.
After running into the bushes a few times, we learned to solve the problem.

We would leave home in the morning and play all day, as long as we were back when the street lights came on. No one was able to reach us all day. No cell phones. Unthinkable!

We did not have Playstations, Nintendo 64, X-Boxes, no video games at all, no 99 channels on cable, video tape movies, surround sound, personal cell phones, personal computers, or Internet chat rooms. We had friends! We went outside and found them.

We played dodge ball, and sometimes, the ball would really hurt.
We fell out of trees, got cut and broke bones and teeth, and there were no lawsuits from these accidents. They were accidents.
No one was to blame but us. Remember accidents?

We had fights and punched each other and got black and blue and learned to get over it.

We made up games with sticks and tennis balls and ate worms, and although we were told it would happen, we did not put out very many eyes, nor did the worms live inside us forever.

We rode bikes or walked to a friend's home and knocked on the door, or rang the bell or just walked in and talked to them.

Little League had tryouts and not everyone made the team. Those who didn't had to learn to deal with disappointment.

Some students weren't as smart as others, so they failed a grade and were held back to repeat the same grade. Horrors!
Our actions were our own. Consequences were expected.

The idea of a parent bailing us out if we broke a law was unheard of.
They actually sided with the law. Imagine that!
This generation has produced some of the best risk-takers and problem solvers and inventors, ever.

The past 50 years have been an explosion of innovation and new ideas We had freedom, failure, success and responsibility, and we learned how to deal with it all.

And you're one of them! Congratulations.

**And on a personal note...thanks mom and dad.

Title: Re: lucky?
Post by yikes_another_one on Oct 10^th, 2004, 12:08pm

A female comedian has a riff off that.

Playground humor and the game of Jarts

we used to hang form 20 foot high monkey bars over
concrete, and have mettalic slides set out in the sun,
with smooth stairs and no tread on our "gym" shoes.

Now kids have low, soft, cushy playgrounds, where
there are wood chips to land on, and no exposed
nuts or bolts to get scratched by.

But she had a one liner that was the best.

"You think we were messed up by the metallic
slides? You remember, hot day, in your shorts
sitting on the top most pointed part and letting
go just to stick an inch down, lifting the legs and
sliding another inch????

Our parent shad it worse than us.
Their slides were made out of wood....

(as she pulls a sliver out of her arse.....)

Title: Re: lucky?
Post by E-Double on Oct 10^th, 2004, 12:12pm

All those things contributed to my damaged hypothingamjig [smiley=laugh.gif]

All worth it ;)

Title: Re: lucky?
Post by Charlie on Oct 10^th, 2004, 3:04pm

When I was ten, mom and dad told me to go and have fun after supper. My cronies and I went several blocks away and played unsupervised kickball until we couldn't see the ball. Today, they'd probably be arrested for child neglect. We're all still here.

My best friends entertain their ten year old grandchildren and won't let the little twerps alone. God forbid they weren't in sight 24/7. Before you get nuts, children in the US have never been safer. There is far less crime, kidnapping, molesting than at any time in our history...just cable tv.

Anyway, they drag them to karate, dance, and all kinds of structured stuff. Today kids are never left to themselves. This is probably great for some social skills but nothing prepares a kid better than getting stung by a bee and skinning some elbows and knees.

Bike helmets? Ha. Bottled water? Ridiculous. It rivals Pet Rocks for the biggest con job anyway. We used to have to clean our plates of gallons of gravy, homemade French fries, Danish pastries, hamburgers that make a Big Mac look like health food, and a pint of chocolate ice cream or a chocolate malt. Carried a Baby Ruth for a snack and they were BIG back then and we did pretty much what Eddie wrote. This is why I'm such a sweetheart. 8)

Bruised Old Charlie

Title: Re: lucky?
Post by nani on Oct 10^th, 2004, 3:13pm

America has become a culture that lives off of fear. Watch the network news teasers one afternoon... Product recalls, new drug side effects, abductions, hate crimes, school shootings... I could go on and on. I for one refuse to buy into all that crap. That point stated however, I watch my kids like a hawk, and am referred to at my house as the safety police :-/

Title: Re: lucky?
Post by LeLimey on Oct 10^th, 2004, 4:58pm

I wish I could say its just America but it isn't. Kids here aren't allowed to play rugby 'cos its a contact sport, teachers aren't allowed to put suncream on little kids in case its deemed sexual abuse. My childminder has had to have forms printed for parents to say that they permit her to dress/undress children if necessary and change/wash them and to administer medicines. We are all so afraid of being sued that we won't help anyone in case it turns on us and its bloody ridiculous.
I blame all the insurance companies here at any rate who advertise "Have you had an accident in the last three years etc?" They have stands in shopping centres and harrass you going past asking if your neighbours dog has bitten you etc. My husband does corporate entertainment and their insurance premium has gone from £700 to £8000 in the last three years and they haven't made a claim in eleven years of trading.
The problem is that no one accepts the consequences of their actions anymore, be it falling over their own big feet or bringing their kids up as little horrors. Until people accept personal responsibility and stop with the greed it ain't going to change.
Oh and if my kids grown up wanting to be lawyers I'll kill 'em!

Title: Re: lucky?
Post by alleyoop on Oct 10^th, 2004, 5:42pm

For a really nice ride back down "Memory Lane":

http://www.thestatenislandboys.com/U_thrill_me/

............................alley ;)

Title: Re: lucky?
Post by Ronny on Oct 10^th, 2004, 5:52pm

I second all of the above.

Ronny.

Title: Re: lucky?
Post by Donna_H on Oct 10^th, 2004, 6:25pm

Wonder where all the sympathetic feelings and empathy have gone? Well, wait a few more years. When Fear Factor gets done with todays kids, a few thousand bee stings on one dying person won't even arouse an urge to wipe the bees off your best friend.

I remember just a few years ago when "Scanners", the movie, came out. It upset the crap out of me.....had never seen such a gorey, horrific movie before. Now, it is a nursery rhyme to todays 8 year old..

Title: Re: lucky?
Post by Charlie on Oct 11^th, 2004, 12:26am

That was fun Alley and I remember every item. It's a good list.

I agree with you too Donna. I find that department stores and all kinds of businesses have forgotten "goodwill." They scare the employees so they are afraid to use a little initiative or deviate a millimeter from the company "guidelines." It's depressing.

I hate the Matrix too. A bloodbath that I'm sorry I wasted time on.

Charlie