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“In the 1950s kids lost their innocence.
They were liberated from their parents by well-paying jobs, cars, and lyrics in music that gave rise to a new term ---the generation gap.
In the 1960s, kids lost their authority.
It was a decade of protest---
church, state, and parents were all called into question and found wanting. Their authority was rejected, yet nothing ever replaced it.
In the 1970s, kids lost their love.
It was the decade of me-ism dominated by hyphenated words beginning with self.
Self-image, Self-esteem, Self-assertion....
It made for a lonely world.
Kids learned everything there was to know about sex and forgot everything there was to know about love,
and no one had the nerve to tell them there was a difference.
In the 1980s, kids lost their hope.
Stripped of innocence, authority and love and plagued by the horror of a nuclear nightmare,
large and growing numbers of this generation stopped believing in the future.
In the 1990s kids lost their power to reason.
Less and less were they taught the very basics of language, truth, and logic and they grew up with the irrationality of a postmodern world.
In the new millennium,
kids woke up and found out that somewhere in the midst of all this change, they had lost their imagination.
Violence and perversion entertained them till none could talk of killing innocents since none was innocent anymore.”
- Ravi Zacharias
IS THERE ANY HOPE?
OR
IS THE WORLD SHORT OF HAPPY ENDINGS?
Each generation loses something, but the generations before those did too (due to world wars and economic collapse). The best hopes and plans of men and women come with no guarantees.
ReplyDeleteWe have to learn to look at the long view. This evening, I watched a documentary showing how much is stored underground in the US - from govt bunkers to special trains and hidden files. So perhaps in this decade we have lost our privacy.
Thoughtful post, Roland.
Somewhere in there kids also lost accountability and a good work ethic. I wonder how much of that is because somewhere along the way they lost faith and spiritualism.
ReplyDeleteOn a really odd side note, I never realized your virtual pet cat moved and meowed as you move the cursor...
Very well written and the sad thing is that it is the truth.
ReplyDeleteHi Roland .. I too hadn't realised about your virtual cat - now I've switched the speakers on ... that makes a difference.
ReplyDeleteI personally think it's the responsibility of each generation ... and the parents mainly ... good work ethics, accepting authority at times, questioning when we can and should, and our own accountability ...
Still there are kids out there who are amazing ... and always will be - somehow we just need to help ourselves and others ...
Excellent post - cheers Hilary
The human race is doomed. Doomed, I tell you.
ReplyDeleteReading this, made me happy to have been a teenager in the 1950s. When I came to America in 1962, this felt like a country of hope and change (sorry, Mr. President, but that's how it felt then). A dashing young president had told us to ask what we could do for our country, the Peace Corp asked us to help others, going to the moon was a possibility, civil rights getting closer on the political agenda, having just survived a potential nuclear showdown with Russia and won. And then the music died.....
ReplyDeleteA very thoughtful and ever so true post, Roland, thank you.
D.G.:
ReplyDeleteIn the past decades humanity seems to have lost its moral compass and the sense of the sacredness of human life.
With the assassination of JFK, adults lost their innocence. With Nixon, adults lost their trust in their leaders.
Interesting fact you've brought up about American bunkers. So the elite politicians and generals get to survive the end of the world, huh?
Alex:
Yes, Maukie is fun to play with. Purrs if you hit his chest and meows if you touch his head! And put your cursor over his head, and he will swat at it!
I work with a professing Christian who has no problem sitting, playing on his smart phone while others are working. I think you are right: the sixties seemed to rob us and our children of any eternal core sense of the spiritual to life. This loss has crippled whole generations.
Rhonda:
Yes. I wish I could see some hope for the future. Sigh.
Hilary:
Maukie eats up minutes of my time, playing with him. Put your cursor over his head, and see him swat at it!
You are right: the kids who manage to stay centered and whole are real champions in this day and age!
Wendy:
Sadly, I agree. It is in the nature of Man to destroy himself.
Inger:
ReplyDeleteYes, JFK filled the country with optimism, good will, and hope. The Peace Corps offered young Americans a chance to make a difference in the world while representing America without a weapon threatening the populace.
You sense, as I do, that the murder of JFK killed the heart of America, the fall of Camelot. Sigh.