When I was a kid adults used to bore me to tears with their tedious diatribes about how hard things were when they were growing up; what with walking twenty-five miles to school every morning uphill both ways through year 'round blizzards carrying their younger siblings on their backs to their one-room schoolhouse where they maintained a straight-A average despite their full-time after-school job at the local textile mill where they worked for 35 cents an hour just to help keep their family from starving to death!

And I remember promising myself that when I grew up there was no way in hell I was going to lay a bunch of crap like that on kids about how hard I had it and how easy they've got it!

But....

Now that I've reached the ripe old age of twenty-nine, I can't help but look around and notice the youth of today.  You've got it so fuckin' easy!

I mean, compared to my childhood, you live in a goddamned Utopia!  And I hate to say it but you kids today you don't know how good you've got it!

I mean, when I was a kid we didn't have The Internet--we wanted to know something, we had to go to the goddamned library and look it up ourselves!

And there was no email! We had to actually write somebody a letter--with a pen!-- and then you had to walk all the way across the street and put it in the fuckin' mailbox and it would take like a week to get there!

And there were no MP3s or Napsters! You wanted to steal music, you had to go to the goddamned record store and shoplift it yourself!  Or we had to wait around all day to tape it off the radio and the DJ would usually talk over the beginning and fuck it all up!

You want to hear about hardship?

You couldn't just download porn! You had to bribe some homeless dude to buy you a copy of "Hustler" at the 7-11!

Those were your options!

We didn't have fancy shit like Call Waiting! If you were on the phone and somebody else called they got a busy signal!

And we didn't have fancy Caller ID Boxes either!  When the phone rang, you had no idea who it was it could be your boss, your mom, a collections agent, your drug dealer, you didn't know!!! You just had to pick it up and take your chances, mister!

And we didn't have any fancy Sony Playstation video games with high-resolution 3-D graphics! We had the Atari 2600!  With games like "Space Invaders" and "Asteroids" and the graphics sucked ass! Your guy was a little square!  You had to use your imagination!  And there were no multiple levels or screens, it was just one screen forever!  And you could never win, the game just kept getting harder and faster until you died!  Just like LIFE!

When you went to the movie theater there no such thing as stadium seating! All the seats were the same height!  A tall guy sat in front of you, you were screwed!

And sure, we had cable television, but back then that was only like 20 channels and there was no onscreen menu!  You had to use a little book called a TV Guide to find out what was on!

And there was no Cartoon Network!  You could only get cartoons on Saturday morning... ...D'ya hear what the fuck I'm saying!?!  We had to wait ALL WEEK, you spoiled little bastards!

That's exactly what I'm talking about!  You kids today have got it too easy. You're spoiled, I swear to God! You guys wouldn't last five minutes back in 1984!

[:D]

Very funny, and good points!

They way all this is supposed to work, is certain things make our lives easier, so we can spend time doing others.

We tend forget this due our programmed everyday grind here in america.

Instead of taking that time you just saved and spending with friends and family, we tend to move onto the next "tool" that once again saves us time.

All the while, time just gets shorter and shorter.

My only comment about the kids (really, I still am one @ 23) will be about the people I know.

Yes we do have it to easy, what will shock you even more is how many of us don't realize it!
It's a totally different america then when most of you where kids.

Most of my friends could give a flying shit about oversea's, US, state, local affairs. They don't care about the system. They don't care about what it takes to get there. They don't care about the trash they throw, or the food they waste.

THEY DON'T CARE ABOUT ANYTHING THAT DOESN'T EFFECT THEM AT THAT GIVEN SECOND.

And this is the attitude of most youth.

I've been doing my best with my friends, but I can only do so much.

We need more younger people like me that actually care!!

You think you had it tough?
I had to get up in the morning, at ten o'clock at night, half an hour before I went to bed, eat a lump of cold poison, work twenty-nine hours a day down at the mill and pay the mill-owner for permission to come to work, and when we got home, our dad would kill us and dance about on our graves, singing Hallelujah!

Actually, some of us "Whippersnappers" do know how good we have it. I have nothing in my experience to compare my current situation to, but I've heard all the stories, thought about what it must have been like. You do realize, the reason parents don't seem to take responsibility for their children any more (some of them) is because of the mental state of today's society. The collective mindset of today is "blame someone else!". Many of us close our eyes and ears to problems others try to prove, and would rather point fingers at others.  

Nah, on weekends we had it easy.
We used to have to get up out of the shoebox in the middle of the night, and lick the road clean with our tongues! We had to eat half a handful of freezing cold gravel, work twenty-four hours a day at the mill for fourpence every six years, and when we got home, our dad would slice us in two with a breadknife.
Now, you try to tell the young people of today that, and they won't believe you.

--credit and apologies to the folks who wrote that Monty Python skit.

Amen. I'm only 33 and I wish my kids could enjoy the same simple childhood pleasures I was able to while growing up.

Also, we forget how much easier we had it than did our parents. How about living through the great depression, social unrest, WWII, etc? Life wasn't always like Happy Days. I just got done helping clean out my grandmother's house and it amazed me what a profound effect raising a family during the Great Depression must have left on her. Even though my grandfather later went on to establish a very successful business that continues to provide for his descendants today and they were very well off financially, my grandmother continued to shop at second hand stores and lives what most of us what consider very frugally. I don't think she has ever been able to really enjoy their wealth.

Out with the old, in with the new.

Well most of the stories I've heard so far seem to focus on the majority of teenagers today, and they are true. Most of them are dumb, disrespectful, irresponsible, drug heads, and senseless. I'll admit that, but there are a few who have their senses, respect their elders, still know what manners are, and appreciate all of the things their parents can provide for them.

We had a Veteran's Day assembly at our High School where we hadseveral veterans from WWII, Vietnam, and some serving during peaceful time. Well our teacher Mr. Lauffman gave a great speech about youths today and my whole group of friends stood up and gave him a standing ovation because it was so true, we were the only ones stood up and even watched some people laugh at us for standing up and applauding him.  The other thing that disgusted me was how people would sit there and talk while the men that fought for our country spoke of their experiences. I felt privileged being able to hear their stories including one soldier who was a POW in WWII. Just really makes me think "What is this world coming to."

[ROFL2]