Last updated 6/18/09



Wednesday, January 28, 2009

The trouble with kids today...

Well, more so adolescents than kids, I suppose.

This article focuses more on girls and young women, but of course the problem is just as wide-spread among young men. The problem is, I think it's a lot easier for girls to act out and dress in exhibitionist ways. 

The older folk lamenting the way times and trends have changed is nothing new. However that doesn't make it any less legitimate. Indeed, I'm not exactly "older folk," but I've decried this kind of behavior before, as have friends of mine. I think one thing that girls need to realize is that there are plenty of good men who are not impressed by this culture of sex, and I know many guys (myself included) who are turned off by women who dress and act in the ways discussed in this article. Sure, they are attractive and may turn our heads, but they're not the kind of women we'd want to be involved with.

I wish I had more of a readership so I could ask for a sound off of opinions...

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

It's 2am, far too late to make much sense (I've started a long response twice, and deleted both), but there is much to say on this topic. We don't see eye to eye on a great many things, but this is one of our common grounds. Like you, I don't care for the promiscuous gals, and how the "sleeping around" lifestyle is glamorized on TV and film.

I could go on for pages, but I'm too tired. Another night.

Blue Shoe said...

You could go on for pages, huh? Well, our readership is not that large, as you know, but if you wanted to write an essay or OpEd of sorts on the topic, I'd be glad to post it.

But yes, it's a shame the direction popular values have shifted towards.

Gobbler said...

It would especially be interested coming from you Jeff, as this coming from conservatives would be seen as something typical. Might hold more weight coming from you. If only people read the blog...

Anonymous said...

Hopefully, Gobbler (if that IS your real name), Paul's told you a bit about me other than what you've read here. Perhaps I come off as some Godless, hippie liberal who's all for killing babies and shooting heroin between my toes during commercial breaks from "The Daily Show." Far from it. I prefer "The Colbert Report."

If you like labels such as "Conservative," "Republican," or "Catholic," then aye, I'm none of these. But I AM a registered Independant, straight-edge (anti-drug/smoking/drinking), pro-life fella who believes that some higher power out there COULD exist, but I don't base my morals on any one book of religious teachings.

Religion aside, we probably have more in common than you think. My viewpoint on our oversexed culture may hold a bit more weight, as you said, since I don't have the fear of God over my head, but from a purely moral standpoint, our views may fit a common mold.

Anonymous said...

As for the article you linked to (right now it's 1am, not much better than last night, but I'll give it a shot)...

First of all, yearning for some kind of sexual freedom is nothing new -- look at the flappers of the 1920's (rowr, check out her ankles!), and the drug-happy hippie generation of the 60's. At least the roaring 20's had a depression (I hear it was great) to knock some sense back into people, and tell them "Hey, stop screwing around and go work in a coal mine for 18 hours a day." We hit a lull in the 70's, as well. I was born in '79, so I don't remember much of it. What we need to remember is, their behavior back then was just as shocking at the time, compared to all the crap these kids are doing now. Back in the 20's, women were going to bars, smoking cigars, prostitution was everywhere and they were starting to bare more skin. In the 60's, people were having unprotected orgy sex in the mud, high as hell off LSD.

A big part of the problem now is that hippie generation went and had itself a whole bunch of kids (we fall close to this category), and as parents, they're afraid of being hypocritical. How does a generation that was defined by free love and experimentation now turn around and have to play the role they were rebelling against? And so, maybe they're a bit more lax in their parenting. This isn't the case EVERY time, but it's pretty common, at least based on what I've seen. And now those children, who had more lenient parents, are becoming parents themselves -- parents who were never truly disciplined, and therefore, won't be nearly as hard on their children.

Take all that, and combine it with the fact that we now live in a society of instant gratification. When I was a young, curious lad, I stumbled upon an old Playboy in one of my dad's old shoeboxes (his storage system of choice), and THAT was my source of sexual material. A few years beyond that, once cable TV was a part of our household, I'd have to sneak out into the living room at 4 in the morning to see boobs. Volume on mute, of course, lest I wake the folks. Today, any 12 year old boy with a computer and an internet connection (which nearly every house now has) knows what "Yahoo" or "Google" is, and can find pictures or videos of hardcore sex acts with a few clicks of the mouse. And most kids today have computers in their room, or know a friend who does; it's TOO easy to obtain porn.

Along with instant gratification, we're also escalating. Paul, you may be a bit too young to remember, but when Madonna came out with a new video in the 80's, it was cause for alarm. Compared with the music videos of today, she's almost tame. Same for TV shows and movies. Shock value keeps increasing while attention spans keep decreasing; I think the internet (again) is to blame.

Humans have always tried to top one another. It's what we do. With the internet, there are now millions (billions?) of people all trying to top one another at once. Remember when you were a kid -- if you were the best at Street Fighter II in the local arcade, you were THE best. Now, everyone's hooked up to the internet, out to top one another. Same with sexuality and shock value. Except before, when only "artists" - singers, actors, painters, and what have you - could join in, today, ANYONE can. Hell, a good 3/4 of YouTube is all one big pissing contest. "Oh yeah? I can top that."

With the exception of "Jukin' Japan," of course. I find that guy delightful.

So...we live in a world where sex is at our fingertips, and almost everyone in America is broadcasting their lives on the internet, trying to be the most popular...and we're SURPRISED morals have hit a steep decline? If anything, I'm surprised things aren't much worse right now. I hear some of the people around me at work talking, and I just don't "get" it. Bragging to one another about their drunken, meaningless sex with "what's-her-name," as if sexual conquests were medals of honor. But then, the braggarts will keep bragging, and those of us with a bit more moral fiber will keep silent. And in our silence, society will keep shining the spotlight on the voices it CAN hear, in the name of entertainment. Nobody's going to pay a $10 movie ticket to watch a bunch of high school seniors NOT try to have sex with the hot cheerleaders.

And for all the young kids growing up today, looking at that spotlight...well, you know the old saying. "Monkey see, monkey do."