Posted on 01/17/2004 6:28:26 AM PST by JesseHousman
People Over 40 Should Be Dead
According to today's regulators and bureaucrats, those of us who were kids in the 40's, 50's, 60's, or even maybe the early 70'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 seatbelts 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! Tests were not adjusted for any reason.
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.
How fortunate we were to grow up as kids before lawyers and burgeoning government regulated our lives, for our own good. How sorry I am for what those years of meddling have done to our children and grandchildren and even sorrier that we all allowed the government and politicians to get away with it!
Yes, my memories too are of my playful exploration, rather than living in the house with my family. Ate at home, then, run as fast as I could out the backdoor to find my playmates. When I think about the trouble I could have encountered.... But it was a different time then. Seems like there weren't so many predators.
There was a large old house around the corner from me, needing paint badly, wherein resided an old lady, wrinkled with age. She scared me, her house scared me. I'd never seen anything like it. I remember one day (can't recall how I got there) sitting in her living room, rocking in her chair, as she tried to serve me tea. I was curious, she was lonely. We formed a friendship of sorts.
I recall decorating my bike (when I was about 8), and riding it uptown to the "square" where I rode in a 4th of July parade. No one organized it, I just wanted to do it, and could. Didn't need a permit.
Lovely memories....
I would too. I try to give my kids as much room to be kids as possible. I'm 39
That's another reason why I homeschool. My kids love American History. The real history, not the revisionist crap they are teaching in schools today.
Is this some new kind
of spam? We get the same crap
every so often --
According to today's regulators and bureaucrats, those of us who were kids in the 40's, 50's, 60's or 70's, probably shouldn't have survived [Email from a friend | 3/27/2003 | ?????]
Saved yourself many years of certain grief!
Methinks,what these latter-day Cassius clones-with their lean and hungry look-are saying is: " MINE ! MINE ! MINE !!"
Today they feast their eyes and gorge their minds on the endless supply of pornography that has permeated our society.
Every town and city has "Adult" stores where videos, magazines and sex toys are available hetero and homosexuals. When these sickies want to have sex with someone other than themselves they go for our children.
There's a lot of things that must be done in this nation before it can be restored to that freedom of bygone days. One thing that has to be done is to take a cleaver to the bloated monster known as the central government and chop away until it is a thread.
My dad and uncles would take us kids shooting whenever they got together. I was probably 9 or 10 when I shot my first 30 ought - 6. I wish there was somewhere that I could take my kids shooting out here in Norfolk. I think you have to be 16 to use a range with your parent, and I would love to introduce my 9 and 13 year olds to the world of real firearms.
(gasp) I thought they were the "greatest generation" (/sarcasm)
You got that right!!
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