It was recently brought to my attention that I am someone's ancestor, too. This isn't something I usually think about in my daily research for my ancestors.
My daughter sent me a questionnaire for a paper she was writing for her college writing class. It was full of 'What did you do when you were a kid?', and 'How has life changed since then?' Things we talk about around the table with our coffee.
Life seems to have changed so completely since then that any resemblance between then and now is purely coincidental. Toys in the 1970's were dolls, trucks, play sets, rocks, sticks, and mud puddles. Toys in the new millennium are cell phones, computers, video games, and high tech things that I've never heard of, and don't know how to use. The old "When I was your age, Blackberries were fruit' adage. I never realized just how completely the world had changed since I was a kid. It makes me stop short to think about how much it had changed for my parents and grandparents.
My grandparents lived through two world wars, depression, the moon landing, assassinations, the advent of television and affordable automobiles. My parents lived through one world war, the 'Age of Aquarius', the creation of NASA, flower children, presidential resignation, Watergate, and the advent of women's lib.
Until I answered her survey questions, I never really thought about what I have lived through in terms of ancestors or family history. I have seen space shuttle launches become common place, the first civilian on a shuttle, and the explosion of that shuttle, the end of NASA, and the advent of home computers, the internet, and cell phones.
Long distance communication has gone from letter writing, to telephone calls, to text messages and emails. I have heard that the next generation finds emails too slow, and they are demanding instant options, but don't use their phones to talk anymore. While all the technology is impressive, I wonder if it creating a generation of socially inept and isolated people. ADD is diagnosed and medicated more and more often, as are autism, depression, and social anxiety disorders. There is no place for people to interact in real life (or IRL in chat speak), unless it is in 5 minute sound bites. Family dinners seem to have gone the way of the dodo, and people schedule every minute of every day, so that they don't have to over think any one thing.
When I was a kid, my friends were outside, and I would just go out and play with them. Now days, parents schedule 'play dates' for their children. Children now spend roughly 18 years in school before they graduate high school, between day care, pre-kindergarten, kindergarten and assorted after school programs. Kids have had their childhoods stolen by their parents and the school systems.
Recently, I got the opportunity to talk with my cousin's daughter (who CAN'T be older than 8, can she?!) She was talking about an article she had read, that stated that by the time today's kids are in a position to have sex, they have been subjected to so much pornography that they aren't excited by it. They have unrealistic and unhealthy opinions and ideas about what sex 'should' be, and don't know how to enjoy the act itself without 'toys' or videos.
One of my father's favorite sayings was "Isn't progress wonderful?" (said with disdain). Although I always understood what he meant by it, and agreed completely, I never saw the depth and scope of the 'progress' the way he did. Until now.
It saddens me to think about what we as a society have done to our children, and it horrifies me to think what they, in turn, will do to their children. I find myself thinking it wouldn't be such a bad thing at all if the internet crashed and took all the cell towers with it. There would be mass panic for about a day, and then people would learn how to talk to each other again. Maybe they will even learn how to write instead of type. Maybe they will start sending "snail mail" again
.
I can hope, right?
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