Great Uncle Norm sits back at the dinner table after plowing through his pork chops and mashed potatoes. He examines the room around him: to his left, his granddaughter, checking her email on her iPhone. To his right, his great-grandnephew, a PSP locked into his mitts.
"I can't believe kids these days. They don't talk to each other. They don't play outside. They don't even know how to write anymore! When I was their age, my mother kicked me out of the house and told me not to come home until the streetlights came on. Parents coddle their children nowadays. Can't eat this, can't eat that. Hell, we never had helmets when we rode our bicycles. And we never had a cell phone, either. If we wanted to talk to someone, we waited! And I'm here! I survived!"
We've all experienced it before – the adult soapbox. Hell, I'm guilty already, and I'm not even thirty. The box is tall, and to mount it you must have some years of experience – but its construction is rickety and ready to collapse at any given time. And for one simple reason. Ready for it?
KIDS FUCKING DIE.
I'm sorry, is that a new revelation? Does it sting? Yes, you're here, Uncle Norm, and you survived. You know why that's easy for you to say? Because you're here, and you survived. What a cop out. You're not making it very fair for Little Timmy, who was swallowed by the John Deere driving mower in '72 because, hey, "we didn't even watch our kids when they were young" – to defend himself. Know what I'm willing to bet he'd say? "I really wish I had a PSP to stop me from lying on the grass as Uncle Jim and his Jim Beam went buzzing through the yard doing 85."
We're all so hesitant to accept change because it's not comfortable. I get it. Sometimes change sucks. When crisp, beautiful fall gives way to rip-roaring winter winds and blizzard snowfall, it's a terrible time (for me, at least). But let's not butt heads with inevitable change just for the sake of it. Give me a good reason, why don't you? Just because you managed to play chicken with Darwin and jump out of the way just in time doesn't mean we all should.
"My mother cleaned the litter box when she was pregnant, and I'm just fine!"
Criticize modern medicine – check. Tempt fate just because someone else managed to successfully – check. Be an asshole – check.
How many of you younger parents have your own parents criticize your every move?
"You're holding him too much! He's never going to get off that boob (his main source of, you know, nutrition)!" "When is she going to sleep in her own bed. The marital bed is for the husband and wife. She'll be in your bed forever (I guess I still sleep in my mother's bed, then)!" "Listeria, schmisteria. I've never heard such a thing (which means it doesn't exist)!"
Knowledge is critical for any facet of life, isn't it? You can't go anywhere without knowledge, unless you're so full of dumb luck that you shit horseshoes. And even then, it'll almost certainly run out one day. So why are people so reluctant to open their mind to something? Perhaps it's that ugly change word again. Change is hard. When everything you think you know is suddenly wrong, that defense mechanism fires up with gusto.
Kids incessantly taking pictures of themselves makes me want to punch them in the neck, too. I'm with you, trust me. But the same kid can also take that photography machine and call 911 when they're stuck in a snowstorm in the middle of nowhere because they're teens and teens do stupid things. They can use it to call 911 when some drunk asshole is following them down the street at 11:30 in the evening. I think the tradeoff is fair, don't you? And let's be real, the people taking 243 pictures of themselves posing and posting them to Instagram are the same people who would figure out another way to be attention-whoring, narcissistic assbags in whatever other ways they could conjure up. It's not the device that creates stupidity, it's inherent genetics in combination with shit parenting. Playstation doesn't make your child violent – fifty years ago, he'd be shooting pretend injuns with pretend guns.
I do not believe that our parents and grandparents were terrible. They did what they were told and took what they were given when it came to things like health, outlook on life, and convenience. Smoke a cigarette to relax. Serve these compact, pre-made meals to your children to save time after work, and park them in front of the TV so you have some peace and quiet. That was understandable, given the circumstances. But it's 2014. The video game nerds of the 90s are engineering lifesaving software for brain surgeons. The parents who gave their kids a little more love and hugs are the ones passing laws allowing gay people to marry. And the kids who wore helmets on their bicycles were still able to fill their non-concussed brains with enough information to profess it to our generation, creating intelligent people – quite the contrary of what previous generations seem to think.
We're told we don't talk to each other anymore (has anyone met my five-year-old?). Whose fault is that? Is it Johnny Gameboy sitting at the dinner table playing Angry Birds? Or is it the parent who preaches about how different their childhoods were but refuses to simply take the phone away for dinner? It's not one way or the other. You can be strict and firm and still loving and supportive.
Perhaps we do have our faces buried in our iPads on our morning commutes, walks to the store, or while sitting in a waiting room. But to that, I'll leave you this:
kubrick-subway-newspapers
Thanks for the photo, Stanley Kubrick.