Paul Richardson wrote:
>> For those of us that were born in the early forties there
have been
>> enormous changes.
>> By the grace of God we've all survived thus far to see
the year 2000 - but
>> is it little wonder that there is a generation gap?
>> Paul
Jack Drews replied:
>Ah, you touch a sensitive subject.
SNIP
>Three weeks ago, on the Internet, I found an item I wanted
to buy, I looked up
>the specifications on the supplier's site and found that he
was in Australia, I
>ordered it while sitting here at home, paid for it by
sending him my VISA
>number, and it arrived from Australia in eight days. When I
was a kid we rode
>downtown on the bus to buy everything!
>This is such an incredibly exciting time in which to live!
Jack,
I entirely agree. Had it not been for so many different
disciplines of a broadly scientific nature, the whole world
would be the poorer.
However, do we not too often overlook some of the older and
simpler values which surrounded our own childhoods and
upbringings?
While I will be the first to support (almost) anything that
leads to an easier and hopefully better life, we seem to
have lost quite a lot of our social skills in terms of
simple good manners, consideration for others and simple
self-reliance. Our society is and has been becoming ever
more materialistic over the last twenty odd years. We are
becoming more selfish in our needs, we are becoming less
tolerant of what we may see as failings in others and our
focus on money in terms of what it can buy with the least
possible delay appears to totally control our lives.
If we are not careful, our lives will continue in an ever
upward spiral of pressure and stress which has already
proved on too many occasions to be bad for our state of mind
and resulting health. The difficulty is surely finding a
balance between the positive benefits of today's society in
all that it can bring, allied to the simpler and in some
cases the more acceptable alternatives that were commonplace
in days gone by? Too often we tend to junk proven concepts
or traditions because 'they are too old' or just out of
date. I do not advocate a return to square one and today's
generation is different to our own. That's the way it should
be but at the same time, if it can take some of the older
standards along with it and re-shape them to meet a new
environment where they can prove as beneficial, then I do
not think we will have lived in vain.
Jonmac
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