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Generation gap largest since 1960s, study finds
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Proof that each generation produces a more liberal generation than the stodgy one before them.
In terms of religion, my own seven children have about the same average dedication to the Mormon faith as my own generation, that is, about the same as the average among my wife and me, my siblings, and my brothers- and sisters-in-law. That observation may or may not be generally true among Mormons.
Of course it would help if our Republican leaders actually had been acting like Republicans, instead of Democrats.
That said, it's still possible to raise conservative children. At age 14 and 11, my kids are very aware of politics and the world, and see things with conservative, religious values.
I think some of you people need to get out of your little box...
As for you senior missionary in Peru... you state "That observation may or may not be generally true among Mormons."
Typical for you to stand on your box and say that these problems don't affect the Mormons. That all is well in la la land... keep thinking that... you will see how wrong you are!
However, if I had to make a generalization from my years of being a youth and working with youth, then I would have to say that the moral climate and the free thinking, and the overall manners and entitlement of the youth is reaching empidemic proportions.
I love,honor and admire the aging generation. I not only support their stand on moral issues, but I strive to live them and ingrain them into my students.
The youth of today have so many opportunities at their fingertips. Yet with the attitude that many are taking, many of those opportunities may be taken away because of this attitude of free thinking. This may come from an outside influence, but more likely from an addiction that they have brought upon themselves because of that very attitude.
I love the youth and pray for their success.
- We are demanding higher pay while working less hours than any previous generation.
- Key educational metrics (ACT scores, literacy rates) are trending down.
- The amount of wasted time (i.e. time spent watching TV, movies, texting, surfing the web, and playing video games) are trending up.....WAY up.
- The sense of entitlement to have whatever your parents had without having to work for it is also up.
- Poor financial planning/management is worse among the young.
Looking at these facts, it's easy to see why my generation are electing people like Obama - promises of getting something for nothing, removal of personal responsibility, etc. I take that back....we're not as idiotic as I stated previously.
Every society that has ever let traditional morality fall apart has fallen itself. Children need both fathers and mothers, and suffer from the lack of either one. Plenty of social research backs this up.
It is so ridiculous watching liberals talk out of both sides of their mouths - on the one hand they say that it doesn't matter the gender of parents, and then you get female politicians and judges - who "bring something totally different" to their positions. How is it that gender matters in politics, business and the judicial system, but not in parenting?
Don't pride yourself on how conservative you children are at the ripe old ages of 11 or 14 or even 18, 20, or 30. At the age of 30 I was a conservative monster! Now I cringe when I think of those dogmatic, ignorant times!
Parents have to learn the truth that YOU HAVE NO CONTROL OR INFLUENCE ON YOUR CHILDREN'S ULTIMATE POLITICAL BELIEFS! As much as you try to indoctrinate them, they will be more persuaded by contemporaries rather than you. Get used to it. Your religion and your politics are one generation from extinction.
I completely agree with you that with every generation there are good and bad. I am not saying that all the youth of today are amazing, wonderful people, and that the older generation is full of closed minded, bigots! I know many, many people of the older generation, who I look up to an admire. All I am saying is that this new generation has all of these oppurtunities because of our free thinking. Imagine how it would be if the free thinkers of the past just sat aside and put racial rights and womens rights on the back burner??? Imagine what the older generations of Great Britian thought of the younger, free thinking people who sailed across the Atlantic in search of religous freedom??? The point is, great things happen, when people learn from the fathers, and their fathers before them, and dare to change things for the better! Of course my generation has things it needs to work on, but we will dare to push the envelope and bring freedom and free thinking to all. And it will be good!
If it weren't for them, we would see no progress whatsoever.
And this is the way it has been since time began.
How old are you? I think the legal voting age should be raised to one year older than whatever your age is!
In reality each new generation votes in BETTER government than the one before.
And in the last 8 years that took this country the closest to fascism as we have ever seen - a BETTER government wasn't hard to find.
Why do you think our younger voters turned out in droves last November?
Call it what you will. At least I no longer listen blindly and dogmatically to the rantings and ravings of conservative ignoramuses (such as Glenn Beck) who have, unlike myself, NEVER read Smith, Hayek, Condillac, Condorcet, Fichte, Hamilton, Hume, Jefferson, Kant, Madison, Mason, Montesquieu, Paine, Reid, Rousseau, Schiller, Voltaire, Stewart, Webster, Wollstonecraft, Adams, Bastiat, Bentham, Chevalier, Darwin, Douglass, Emerson, Engels, Goethe, Hazlitt, Malthus, Marx, Mill (both), Spencer, Tocqueville, Armitage, Friedman, Nisbet, Novak, Rothbard, and many many others.
Your speculations about my own indoctrination are ignorant. Just what we have come to expect from your kind.
How is it that parents are in control if they spend most of their days outside of the home, as do their children? All the while, kids teach each other how to be adults. It's called "socialization." You know, how the social norms of the day get passed on. School, TV, Internet, and video games have far more influence in kids lives than parents.
Why don't parents pass on their values? There isn't time.
For many, this is all very good news. It feels like progression, even though we've seen it before...
What a bunch of sickos!
"How is it that parents are in control if they spend most of their days outside of the home, as do their children? All the while, kids teach each other how to be adults. It's called "socialization."" - Now that's sick. Even if most people think it's normal.
Kids don't teach adult behavior - ever read "Lord of the Flies"? Kids need their parents to teach adult behavior, otherwise we end up with the law of the jungle. So parents need to turn off the TV and the video games, and either put their kids in schools with similar values or home school them. I'd much rather socialize my kids myself, passing along my values and ensuring they learn appropriate behavior. They are polite, independent, smart kids who are comfortable with adults and children both.
so says this conservative fool.
And what behaviors are they being taught?
Lies about WMD's in order to rush to war?
Bilking people of of zillions of dollars (Madoff)?
Crooked elections (Rembember the chad in Florida?)
Adulterous Politicians from "family-values" parties?
The list goes on and on.
Forget it young people. Ignore the nasty right-wing.
It amazes me how people on the left can see no wrong with Obama, while those of us on the right were constantly griping about Bush's screwups. And then the left turns around and thinks we're the unthinking ones.
We tell them the truth, as far as we know it, while acknowledging we make mistakes and don't always know everything. We teach correct principles, and hope that they'll learn to govern themselves as adults, while giving them appropriate limits and consequences now.
What part of that conservative approach do you think is wrong?
Trouble is they are listening to your "conservative values" via Rush Limbaugh, Hannity, Coulter" while you are listening to these hypocritical creeps.
What part of the approach is wrong?
Easy.
The in-your-face lies (WMD's in Iraq) and non-stop hypocrisy (GOP "family values" Sanford and his adulterous affair)
It has been amusing to see all of the back and forth in these posts and the name calling by "liberals" and "conservatives" alike. I've taught high school for 20 years and there is both much to praise in today's youth as well as much to be concerned. They haven't inherited a world that is all that great, but rather a lot of uncertainty from 9-11 to the economy. Their moral compass is like a wind vane and swirls about. But are they as messed up as their parents? Hardly.
I remember when we wouldn't eat with blacks or mexicans - that was wrong.
I remember when we forced Japanese citizens to live in prison camps - that was wrong.
I remember when we used to make fun of gay people - that was wrong.
When you start getting "older" you start to think about your life and remember how right the attitudes seemed at the time and how wrong they are today.
I hope we learn from our mistakes and start being nicer to each other.
Guess what - almost every Democrat in Congress also voted to go to war in Iraq. Based on faulty intelligence maybe (which they all saw, just like the White House) - but everybody in our government and European governments believed it - not just the Republicans. And it may not have even been faulty - Saddam did have people in Nigeria looking to buy yellow cake - you might want to look at it, amazing how the MSM stopped reporting on it after that issue was found to have actually occurred. Not to mention the long convoys that went from Iraq to Syria for weeks leading up to the invasion (wonder what exactly was in those trucks), and the scientists who testified that Saddam was just waiting to reinstate the WMD programs once the world got tired of babysitting him.
So which one is the selfish, arrogant, closed minded group again? It does not seem to be the ones most known for studying both side of issues (research solidly points to conservatives as having a better grasp of both sides) Which one is known to be more mean spirited, name calling, and having the most personal of attacks (here the progressives and liberals win from study after study). Which group has demonstrated the greatest deal of closed minded one sided, and group think by technical measurement (once again it is liberals, so called intellectuals, and progressives that win this from research from it's own organizations and institutions).
Thats okay because a poor, narrow view, selfish and arrogant populous is exactly what progressive leadership requires to stay in power and continue to grow by scaring the uninitiated into hatred and a lack of responsibility.
They see the BS that has been force-fed them and refuse to buckle under to it.
Live with this fact, neocons.
When I was a yougster in the 1960's Our elder berated my generation because we were anti establisment. And we advocated civil rights and womens rights.
They also criticized us because we smoked pot and grew our hair long. And our music because it contanied lyrics for drug use and sex.
Now that I am part of the older generation. We berated todays youngers for low morals, racist and misognist and racist lyrics of rap music.
When the young generation mature. They will berate theier youngers. This cycle will continue with all future generations
Most of our failure has been moral! Most of our sins have roots in envy. I'm sad for most of the children in the world. Many many mothers have failed to love their children as they should. Almost all of the fathers have also failed their children with bad role models or completely abandoning their fatherly duties altogether! The latter is acute abuse to kids and our society will pay the price of such shocking error and sin.
I pray for my 35 grandchildren and fear for the world which they will live in.
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There are many factors for this, but parents are in control and failing to just talk to their kids and stay close. It starts with disinterest at an early age. I see this as a shift that as a societal 'global warming' with far-reaching impact for the children of this generation.