When I Was a Boy, America Was a Better Place [Must Read]

The day the O.J. Simpson verdict was announced, I said to my then-teenage son, "David, please forgive me. I am handing over to you a worse America than my father handed over to me."

With the important exception of racial discrimination -- which was already dying a natural death when I was young -- it is difficult to come up with an important area in which America is significantly better than when I was a boy. But I can think of many in which its quality of life has deteriorated.

When I was a boy, America was a freer society than it is today. If Americans had been told the extent and number of laws that would govern their speech and behavior within one generation, they would have been certain that they were being told about some dictatorship, not the Land of the Free. Today, people at work, to cite but one example, are far less free to speak naturally. Every word, gesture and look, even one's illustrated calendar, is now monitored lest a fellow employee feel offended and bring charges of sexual harassment or creating a "hostile work environment" or being racially, religiously or ethnically insensitive, or insensitive to another's sexual orientation.

Meanwhile, all employers in California are now prohibited by law from firing a man who has decided to cross-dress at work. And needless to say, no fellow worker can say to that man, "Hey, Jack, why not wear the dress at home and men's clothes to work?" An employer interviewing a prospective employee is not free to ask the most natural human questions: Are you married? Do you have a child? How old are you? Soon "How are you?" will be banned lest one discriminate on the basis of health.

When I was boy, what people did at home was not their employer's business. Today, companies and city governments refuse to hire, and may fire, workers no matter how competent or healthy, who smoke in their homes. Sarasota, Fla., the latest city to invade people's private lives, would not hire Winston Churchill, Franklin Roosevelt or John F. Kennedy if they applied for a job.

When I was a 7-year-old boy, I flew alone from New York to my aunt and uncle in Miami and did the same thing coming back to New York. I boarded the plane on my own and got off the plane on my own. No papers for my parents to fill out. No extra fee to pay the airline. I was responsible for myself. Had I run away or been kidnapped, no one would have sued the airline. Today, fear of lawsuits is a dominant fact of American life.

When I was a boy, I ran after girls during recess, played dodgeball, climbed monkey bars and sat on seesaws. Today, more and more schools have no recess; have canceled dodgeball lest someone feel bad about being removed from the game; and call the police in to interrogate, even sometimes arrest, elementary school boys who playfully touch a girl. And monkey bars and seesaws are largely gone, for fear of lawsuits should a child be injured.

When I was boy, I was surrounded by adult men. Today, most American boys (and girls, of course) come into contact with no adult man all day every school day. Their teachers and school principals are all likely to be women. And if, as is often the case, there is no father at home (not solely because of divorce but because "family" courts have allowed many divorced mothers to remove fathers from their children's lives), boys almost never come into contact with the most important group of people in a boy's life -- adult men. The contemporary absence of men in boys' lives is not only unprecedented in American history; it is probably unprecedented in recorded history.

When I was a boy, we had in our lives adults who took pride in being adults. To distinguish them from our peers, we called these adults "Mr.," "Mrs." and "Miss," or by their titles, "Doctor," "Pastor," "Rabbi," "Father." It was good for us, and we liked it. Having adults proud of their adulthood, and not acting like they were still kids, gave us security (as well as something to look forward to in growing up). Today, kids are surrounded by peers twice, three, four times their age.

When I was a boy, the purpose of American history textbooks was to teach American history. Today, the purpose of most American history texts is to make minorities and females feel good about themselves. As a result, American kids today are deprived of the opportunity to feel good about being American (not to mention deprived of historical truth). They are encouraged to feel pride about all identities -- African-American, Hispanic, Asian, female, gay -- other than American.

When I was a teenage boy, getting to kiss a girl, let alone to touch her thigh or her breast (even over her clothes) was the thrill of a lifetime. Most of us could only dream of a day later on in life when oral sex would take place (a term most of us had never heard of). But of course, we were not raised by educators or parents who believed that "teenagers will have sex no matter what." Most of us rarely if ever saw a naked female in photos (the "dirty pictures" we got a chance to look at never showed "everything"), let alone in movies or in real life. We were, in short, allowed to be relatively innocent. And even without sex education and condom placement classes, few of us ever got a girl pregnant.

When I was a boy, "I Love Lucy" showed two separate beds in Lucy and Ricky's bedroom -- and they were a married couple. Today, MTV and most TV saturate viewers' lives with sexual imagery and sexual talk, virtually all of which is loveless and, of course, non-marital.

When I was boy, people dressed up to go to baseball games, visit the doctor and travel on airplanes. Today, people don't dress up even for church.

When I was a boy, Time and Newsweek were well written and relied little on pictures and illustrations. Today, those magazines often look like adult comic books by comparison. They are filled with large illustrations and photos, and they dumb down the news with features like "Winners and Losers" and "Who's Up and Who's Down." And when I was a boy, it would have been inconceivable for Time to substitute anything, let alone a tree, for the flag planted by the marines on Iwo Jima.

One might argue that these are the same laments that every previous older generation has expressed -- "Ah, when I was young" But in America, that has not been the case. In America, the older generations tended to say the opposite -- "When I was a kid, things were worse."

Can we return to the America of my youth? No. Can we return to the best values of that time? Yes. But not if both houses of Congress, the presidency and the Supreme Court move the country even further leftward. If that happens, many of the above noted changes will simply be accelerated: More laws restricting "offensive" speech will be enacted; litigation will increase and trial lawyers will gain more power; the American military will be less valued; trees will gradually replace the flag as our most venerated symbol; schools will teach even less as they concentrate even more on diversity, sexuality and the environment; teenage sex will be increasingly accepted; American identity will continue to be replaced by ethnic, racial, gender or "world citizen" identity; and the power of the state will expand further as the power of the individual inevitably contracts. It's hard to believe most Americans really want that.

Praeger is spot on.

We are at a low ebb mark culturally.

We are the most leftist we have ever been obviously. Obama is openly trying to do things McGovern could have only dreamed of uttering privately.

Rotten we are.

and sorry you PC kids....stopping Jim Crow only did one thing...it stopped Jim Crow and that’s about the only good thing you can find to juxtapose against the morass that is today

and btw....segregation still exists...to some degree it’s the nature of humans to group with like folks

what a mess.

I blame whites. They are too weak to govern themselves or anyone.

When I was young, the want ads were divided up by ‘White Male,’ ‘Black Male,’ ‘White Female,’ ‘Black Female.’

where was that exactly?

I am 50 and 7th generation Mississippian and do recall separate drinking fountains and restrooms till I was around 6 or so but never saw such want ads.

With all due respect this obession with what has happened race and gender wise is tomfoolery.

There is now more broad based animosity between some races than ever before. Blacks against whites for example. Aside from moonbats like Rap Brown and Malcolm X that was unheard of amongst rank and file blacks in the 60s. Now it's ordained. Folks think Reverend Wright is an exception are naive as hell.

Which brings me back to what I said earlier....whites have been neutered ...brainwashed into all being obedient little Reginald Dennys for anything minority.

But not me.

It galls me when folks go on and on about the past like Jews and blacks were being lynched pell mell like so much entertainment. That's hogwash.

Btw, I can't believe you don't see how young men have been so damned feminized. Are you blind?

Go to any T-ball game and watch the mommies who can't get their asses out of the dugout or can't stay off the field to bring little pampered Johnny his cool Capri for refreshment mid inning. It's nuts.

Look at most educated grown men under 35.....can't fight, don't know guns, Hunt?...what's that?, all enviro wacko little boys in girl jeans being led around by their wife slash new mommy.

Things have not just gone south, they've collapsed culturally.

Just off the top of my head:

Let's use 1972 as a dividing line.

Very few abortions, we've had 50 million since then....that's enuff by itself

How many illegals and their families since then?.....who knows......40 million ...our population has doubled since then largely due to immigration period and the collateral increase.

Gun control.....besides transfer stamps for full auto and no felons without a waiver, the only regs were a few local.

Sex....I love sex, I love naked women. But enough is enough. We have reached the bottom where Amy Winehouse lookalikes are cool. Slut is in.

Divorce....endemic.

Fatherless children and serial illegitimacy. This is the biggest killer especially in lower income whites, blacks and hispanic communities. It screws up everything.

Yes we do now have FOX and the internet and talk radio....all incredibly important but the other media have dropped any pretense of being anything but leftist activists. Much worse even than Cronkite's utterances.

Schools....forced busing and teachers unions and activist school boards killed public schools. Anyone in a poor or high black area knows this already. You might be ok in suburbs..we are here in Nashville but it's still mighty PC.

Smoking. This is where Nanny State Nazis rubber meets the road....ridiculous.

Trial lawyers....believe it or not kids, there was a time folks did not sue except with strong reasonable cause.

Affirmative action and quotas, look at academia, media staffs, and corporate boards. If you like all that and the resulting culture than this has been a big boon for ya.

Taxes...this one is mixed. Federal taxes are right now down but local taxes are as high as ever as are Social Security and Medicare.

Homosexual rights. There was a time folks thought picking on homosexuals was mean. It shoulda stopped there. Now the Stonewall riot is their Selma and they have undue influence in our culture and want very much to indoctrinate your kids. This is another no good deed goes unpunished area.

Thug culture. It thrives in cultures that are too collapsed to care and tolerated by those too weakened by political correctness to do anything. Drooges.

Obsession with celebrity...it may be worse now. They sure have a platform they didn't have before.

Feminism and the deconstruction of the home. The results are easy to peg but the causes are more complicated. Plenty of women work because they have to but many do it because it's expected of them by their fembot peers and children are raised in day care. I just don't see that as good and teachers will tell you they can see the difference.

Which brings me to no fault divorce...a scourge. Folk's actions in the marriage should be of consequence in the divorce.

that's just a few...i could do this for hours. Medical and technology are improved.....that's the brightside. The Cold War being over is mixed.....the new enemy may be worse....I know he is far less rational.

I cited my source and am tired of conversing with you.

Your fatigue is irrelevant to the illogic and incorrectness of your assertions. Sorry, I missed your source citation. Could you do so again? By the way, my consulting clientele includes 5 paper companies and I have worked with that industry since 1995. Therefore, I am personally familiar the processes, raw materials and prices in that industry including past experiments with alternate sources of fiber such as hemp.

I thought we were having a rational discussion, but you’re not interested in facts, just promoting a very strange, apparently pro-pot, and anti-intellectual agenda.

Apparently, we have different definitions of the word “rational.” From my perspective, it is you who have refused to be rational. You have asserted several times that government cannot change societal values. I have given you several examples to the contrary which you have ignored. Such behavior is not rational.

I thought we were having a rational discussion, but you’re not interested in facts, just promoting a very strange, apparently pro-pot, and anti-intellectual agenda.

Apparently, when some one cites facts that are contrary to your opinion or questions your reasoning, you accuse them of being uninterested in facts or worse.

I thought we were having a rational discussion, but you’re not interested in facts, just promoting a very strange, apparently pro-pot, and anti-intellectual agenda.

I confess, that I am not sure where you get the idea that I am apparently pro-pot, and anti-intellectual. Perhaps, you could elaborate on your logic for this ostensibly, groundless conclusion.

The banning of hemp changed nothing of monetary or societal value.

Based upon your unsupported assertion noted above, your knowledge of history appears sadly deficient. Prior to WWII, hemp was the major cash crop for large portions of Kentucky, Tennessee and portions of Missouri. Prior to 1943, hemp was considered a critical war resource. The banning of this product through excessive taxation literally resulted in bankruptcy or business cessation of a large number of farmers who had relied upon it and whose land was poorly suited to other crops that were as economically rewarding.

Farmers and their families/descendants whose farms failed in the forties, typically went to the cities and towns for work. Most historians, sociologists, and anthropologists would class switching from an agricultural, rural existence to an urban, industrial one as a major, societal value change. Therefore, it would be logical to conclude that what ever caused this migration indeed drove the value change. Since facts exist that the US government directly interfered with hemp production, the resulting value change can logically be attributed to the governmental interference. Therefore, your position is disproved.

First, in a previous post you claimed Hemp has no value as an agricultural crop. After I cited figures which negated your claim you, then, alter your claim: The quantities you cited are miniscule as commercial crops go... Logically, a crop requiring labor and other resources cannot be both no of value and still planted, even if in amounts that do not meet with your approval. Therefore, your assertion is logically defeated.

Your resort to shifting premises and ad hominem attacks (as in accusing me of promoting a very strange, apparently pro-pot, and anti-intellectual agenda ) make your position appear extremely ill-founded and illogical.

Your opinion of what is “valuable” notwithstanding, you have completely failed to refute my position: …the fact that the US government through fiat and control of resources, changed American outlook on, and use of, a valuable agricultural product. With that government fiat, a societal value associated with that product and all benefits to society were also changed.

Thanks for the kind comments on my old poem. I DID “foresee” things, but in FACT..I could have written the SAME poem in 1995, as things have been bad for a long time.

NOW—however—we are on the brink of a REALLY serious situation, one that will remind some of the “way it was” in the 1930’s Germany,within a few years, if some people get their way.

This is ANOTEHR bit I wrote a year later or so. This one was written from the perspective of an “alien from another universe” who had “visited the Earth”, and longed for his world, where “things are not all upside-down and wrong-is-right”.

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/1601417/posts

I HAVE often said “it is all part of the big plan” many times in the past. And it DOES seem that way. but I stopped saying it over a year ago, after getting WAY too many insults from others here.

I don’t know how much I agree with him. The end of the Cold War and fall of the Soviet Union make it a better world today. I remember ‘duck and cover’ and the fear we had of nuclear attack.

Same here. I remember air raid drills and "duck and cover" drills. Scary times.

The end of racial discrimination, lynchings of Blacks, etc. is good, as Praegar states. Also, the end of gender discrimination is also a sign of progress. When I was young, the want ads were divided up by ‘White Male,’ ‘Black Male,’ ‘White Female,’ ‘Black Female.’ Also, there is less prejudice against Jews today.

It has been too slow in coming, but it is getting better. I grew up in the south and graduated high school in the early 80's. I recall the principal calling white kids to his office if they dated black kids and lecturing them on how they were "ruining their lives". That would simply not be acceptable today. This was far from being a "southern" thing, though.

At the same time, women not playing with a man couldn't tee off at local golf courses, before something like 11:00 AM, because men worked and "needed" the earlier tee-times. Also, there were no black members of the country club that the golf team from my school practiced at. That has all changed for the better.

I disagree about his statement about not being exposed to males. In the 1950s and 60s there was concern about what was called ‘momism,’ caused, it was believed, by young boys not being exposed enough to adult men.

This is a mixed bag, IMO. My dad worked around the clock when I was a kid, but he was more actively involved as a parent than a lot of men ever were. I know he went without sleep sometimes when he worked swing-shifts to see us. Some men are more actively involved today - my husband certainly is - but there are a lot of kids without married or involved parents. It's very sad.

In the suburbs, the men were gone all day (and often into the evening) while the wives took care of the children. Most teachers were women, even in the high schools. In the high school I went to, there were probably twice as many female teachers as male.

There seem to be more male teachers now than when I was little.

Conversely, we had a maiden aunt in our family who was a teacher - she would be over 100 now if she were alive, but when she taught, women could not be married; once you married, you were expected to retire from teaching.

Things have changed. Some things are better and some are worse, but that’s the nature of life. We can never stick our foot into the same river twice.

So true. On the whole, things are better, in my opinion.

Oh, and the highest marginal tax rate in the 1950's was 92%. That doesn't take deductions into account, but people talk about taxes as though they are as high as they have ever been and that is just not true.

http://www.truthandpolitics.org/top-rates.php

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