I have been getting more and more aggravated lately. I sat here for days trying to figure out what was aggravating me so much and I think I finally hit it. Our country is endangered...no, I am not ranting against immigration, Democrats, Republicans or anything like that. No, what I AM ranting about is the weakening of American society. Essentially, what I am saying is, we are turning into a nation of pantie-wastes! Thanks to the misguided, inane notion that society needs to make life as fair as possible, we are creating a generation of ignorant, weak, entitlement-minded idiots!
When I was a kid, I played Little League Baseball. We had to tryout for a position on the team and if you weren't good enough, you did not make the cut, period; there was no thought that every kid should get to play. No, if you couldn't hit, catch or throw you didn't make the team. The reasoning was like this; we are competing against other teams for a Championship! Yes, people, we had a Championship where the two BEST teams competed for a TROPHY! The losing team did NOT get a trophy nor did every kid on the winning team get an individual trophy! Do you want to know why? Really, do you want to know? Simply put, the trophy was a TEAM TROPHY! Every kid on the winning team worked together to win; simple and fair. What I think happened, though, was some of the kids who were not good enough grew up and became parents. Once their kids were old enough to tryout, they remembered the "pain" of not being picked. So, they took over youth sports and changed the rules so that every kid who tried out made the team and every kid on every team got a trophy just for being there because this would help their "self-esteem". Gone is the idea of TEAMWORK and PRACTICE. Why bother coaching and practicing when everybody is going to get a trophy anyway?
That's not the only thing that bothers me today about society; no, there is so much more but the baseball analogy is the broadest description for the problems we have today. Check this out; it used to be that in school, if you failed you got an "F" on your report card and could be held back if necessary. Nowadays there are no "F"'s anymore; they've been replaced with kinder, gentler marks like "I" for Incomplete...and nowadays it seems like kids today are not TAUGHT. They are not taught to think critically and study; they are taught instead on how to pass a standardized test and they are asked how do they feel about a certain subject. HUH??? To quote George Carlin, "We have no more stupid people, we now have "challenged" or "learning disabled"; nobody is crippled or retarded anymore, we now have "handicapable" or "differently abled"; people don't die anymore, they "pass on" or "expire". This is where liberal thought and political correctness came from. Essentially, the people who couldn't cut it on the playing field as kids grew up and changed the rules to what THEY thought was fair.
It's not just the liberals and political correctness that are ruining us. Nope, the conservative, Bible-thumping crowd is just as bad. These are the ones who try to protect their kids from EVERYTHING. They ranted about parental advisories on video games, the v-chip in televisions, and the television and movie rating systems. These are the ones who, in the insane thought that teaching kids sex-education will cause them to have sex. These are the morons who want this country to go back to 1950. They are so stuck in their mindset that they oppose growth and learning, spurn science and Darwinism, and literally want to go back to Ward and June Cleaver or Andy Griffith. This notion is just as dangerous as the misguided liberal notion that we can make the world absolutely fair for everybody.
I knew we were in trouble when, before a show on Discovery Channel, I read a disclosure that roughly read as, "Some material may be inappropriate for some audiences", I wondered what kind of show it was...are you ready for this? The show was called "Two Weeks in Hell" and covered the two week testing period to be eligible for Green Beret training in the Army. HUH??? I watched the show and for the life of me I could not find ANYTHING that could POSSIBLY be inappropriate or graphic. A bunch of soldiers being grilled and examined to see if they have the basic skills and mindset needed to endure Green Beret training and eventually BE a part of the elite unit. I can only think that they had to put the disclaimer up because somewhere in America some IDIOT was offended that the Army would not accept everybody who applied.
Today, it seems like the majority of Americans think they are "owed" something; they are "entitled" to have everything they want. No personal responsibility, no rules, no guidelines, no kind of regulation at all because they are ENTITLED to live however they want. Normally, I would not have a problem with that; the Declaration of Independence says it perfectly when it says we all have a right to "life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness". The PROBLEM lies with the last of that trilogy; PURSUIT of happiness. It doesn't say everybody is entitled to a trophy just for being on a team nor does it say everybody is entitled to a 2,200 square foot home with a 2 1/2 car garage. All it says is everybody has the right to PURSUE those things. Everybody has the right to educate themselves and work hard to acquire the things that would make them happy. Life is not fair, people, DEAL WITH IT! You are trying so hard to preserve your kids' self-esteem that you are crippling them! You are preventing them from ever experiencing the satisfaction of having built something or earned something! STOP!!!
Remember this, without the bad there can be no good! Without death there is no life! Without grief there can be no joy! Without effort there can be no appreciation! If you give your kids everything they never learn how to EARN! If you protect your kids from everything bad, they will not know what to avoid when they are grown! When you give welfare to the poor, you take away their dignity and motivation! Changing education to focus more on how the child feels will severely affect the child's ability to THINK! So make your kids play outside! Let them play cowboys and indians without worrying about offending the indians! Let them climb trees and ride their bicycles without knee, ankle and shoulder pads! Let them fall down and skin their knees! Let them settle their playground differences themselves...even if it means a fistfight! In other words, people, let your kids GROW and LEARN!
This isn't the end, people, stay tuned for more ranting...
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Keep on ranting. You're doing just fine.
ReplyDeleteBTW, the references to the education system and teaching the standardized tests, the pressure put on the teachers to do so in lieu of actually teaching is one of the major reasons I am now retired from teaching. Sadly, the kids know what is up and don't like it either, but the idiots in power have to have those scores to justify whatever it is they are up to this year and get the money to continue the charade.
I've been listening off and on to the debates in Congress about this proposed Health Care legislation that is about to become law whether the people like it or not (so much for a government of representatives of their constituents), and heard remarks from a representative from the U.S. Virgin Islands referring to the "Underserved" in this country. Now I had to ask just what the hell that is supposed to mean. As I understand what is about to be enacted, the government is going to make sure that something like between 30-45 million presently uninsured people are enrolled with health insurance. Of these, something like 10-15 million of these are illegal aliens, and perhaps half of the remainder are the "indestructable young" who decline to purchase insurance. Who does that leave? I think we are referring to those citizens who are unable or unwilling to purchase this insurance because their incomes are either minimum wage (as defined by the government) or welfare. Now of these, a huge percentage of them are already able to get free medical care under Medicare, and those of us who have the ability to pay our own bills are ineligible. Those of us who are inelegible for this free service end up paying the bills for those who cannot/will not. Additionally, those of the 10-15 million illegal aliens can go to any emergency room and obtain free care. I can verify this with my own eyes having arbitratily walked into the ER's of several local hospitals recently and just took a hard look at who was sitting there waitng their turn.
ReplyDeleteSo the question becomes, who the hell is underserved? Surely they can't be referring to the people who have already discovered how to play the system and get the freebies at the expense of those of us who actually have the desire and self-pride to work and pay taxes which in turn enable them to get the free stuff for which we do not qualify. I think this is something akin to the trophies for each member of these teams to which you refer. You don't have to play to win. You just have to show up. And this is supported more and more by our legislators and our judiciary which keeps forcing more and more of this sort of stuff on us.
With more and more of the services needed in our society being awarded to more and more of the "underserved", is it any wonder why more and more people are beginning to stand in line with their hands out for the free stuff? We no longer demand excellence. Excellence and productivity are now penalized as we see a Robin Hood mentality take over taking from those who have busted their collective butts to make it in this country and amass a substantial amount of mopney through their efforts and now the government sees them as a source to pay for the underserved who will not lift a finger to help themselves. Why should they have the incentive to better themselves when they have so many channels to watch on their big screen TVs.