I remember from a very young age hearing the elders of society incessantly going on about "today's young people just dont know how good they have it." In one form or another hinting at the fact that they were far more appreciative of how great the world was than their children, or their children's children could ever possibly conceive.
This isn't to say that they were necessarily mistaken, but how many of these older and wiser ones had any clue as to how the younger generations got there?
I rememeber specifically my mom telling me about how her parents had grown up in fairly hard times during the great depression of US during the 1930's, also my grandmother telling me about how if her older brother wasnt able to catch any fish for dinner some nights they'd have to resort to shooting pigeons for a little animal protein sustinance.
I also remember seeing old silent home movies of my mother living a life quite more privileged than either of her parents probabaly ever imagined possible. Piles of the best Christmas gifts, vacations to theme parks, a swimming pool etc. Her father was also very fond of saying how poor he grew up and was determined to "buy his kids everything he never had the chance to own."
Now it is glaringly obvious to me how they got there, that is, entitled
Most parents seem to want their children to have an easier time at life than they did.
So as wealth and technology increases, comfort increases and we as society can easily become softer and weaker both physically, emotionally, and even morally.
Many of the most disfunctional people I've met are those whose parents handed them whatever they wanted without really teaching them what the actual cost of any such luxury actually was.
As stewards of our children it is possible to teach good work ethic and integrity to them, but with technology so readily available and inexpensive will it ever be possible for the next generation to really know how good they have it?
Just as an example I recently flew across country to visit with family. I was literally sitting in an aluminum tube at 30,000 feet above sea level travelling at 500 mph wondering to myself why the seats weren't a little more comfortable.
●This would have been absolute fantasy to even the richest of kings and robber barons even just a century and a half ago.
Honestly... I'm not a wealthy man by American standards, yet there I was doing something even the Rockefellers of three generations ago could not have possibly done. Yet this is simply a normal thing in this day and age for thousands and thousands of people .
While it is easier said than done to teach our children morals, ehtics, and thankfulness I question if it is possible to raise them in a place where there won't be things that they take for granted that we as the previous generation saw as total fantasy and unimaginable.
Really... A middle income craftsman felt entitled to be not so uncomfortable on a journey of a couple thousand miles that many people couldn't have even survived by carriage or on foot a couple of hundred years ago that would have taken months.
Not to say this is necessarily a bad thing but, I can't help but wonder where this will take society as a whole.
As the old adage goes:
●Hard times create strong men
●Strong men create good times
●Good times create weak men
●Weak men create hard times
This is a cycle, throughout history that has seemed to repeat itself many times over. Is there any way to avoid it?
What do you say?
Selah.
Photos via websearch duck duck go:
-great depression
-1950's christmas
-Virus