The NEXT Generation -- a slightly different rant on kids.

F

FUD

Moderator
I first started working after my 14th birthday when my father became disabled. I didn't HAVE to go to work but I felt that it was the right thing to do to help out with the family financial situation. I don't remember all of the details since this was more than a quarter of a century ago, but because I was under 16, the school would not issue working papers and as a result, I wasn't even entitled to minimum wage pay. After taxes, social security and other withholdings, I was pretty much working for peanuts. Despite this, I was a good worker & a hard worker -- I even got a little merit award.

I'm starting to sound a little bit like my father ("I walked 20 miles in 3 feet of snow without shoes to get to school") but I'm beginning to wonder about the next generation. Due to personal reasons (change in jobs, moving across the country, new addition to the family, etc.), I've been eating a lot more fast food than I should. However, it seems that rarely do the people at the fast food places ever get the orders right. Either they forget to put the cheese on or forget an order of fries or whatever. It never fails that something is wrong with the order. Yesterday, they forgot to put the meat on the burger. I came home with two buns with nothing inside but tomato & cheese.

Another time I was at a national car repair center, when the kid who was inputting my credit car & DL's information into the computer stepped into the back room. After 20 minutes, I got tired of waiting and stepped behind the counter to get my DL & credit card back. Immediately, a supervisor ran over to scream at me. Well, I screamed back saying that I had to leave and I needed my DL & credit card back and I was already waiting for 20 minutes. It turns out that the kid decided to go on break in the middle of taking care of me.

This generation (and the ones that follow them) are the individuals who will continue our fight in the right to keep and bear arms. Not talking about your own children or anyone you know, but what has been your experience with the Next generation when you encounter them in an business environment?

[This message has been edited by FUD (edited July 30, 2000).]
 
I've sen similar types of things...a few years back in Florida, we went through a the drive-thru at a Burger King. Ordered two Whoppers with mustard, no mayo. The kid comes back and says 'Huh?' So we told him again. Couple of seconds later he comes back with-'How do you spell that?' Then he mubles and goes off...We wait. Then someone new comes on...we reorder...and still get the wrong stuff.

People can't count or spell anymore. Sad...very sad. And scary.

But I do meet some intelligent kids. Got another board I visit that is concerned with a particular series of computer games. [[Riven and Myst]] The ages there range from 10 to 65...and some of those kids are very intelligent...even the young ones speak and use proper grammar and hold decent conversations, so there is some hope. :)

[[Went to another gun BBS where most of the posting parties couldn't spell or use proper grammar was frightening in itself.]]

[[edited for misspellings. ~LOL~]]
------------------
Satanta, the Whitebear
Sat's Realm: http://SatantasRealm.tripod.com/Entrypage/entrypage.html

My Disability petition: http://www.PetitionOnline.com/DisbHelp/petition.html

[This message has been edited by Satanta (edited July 30, 2000).]
 
It goes back to the individual's character. I'm still on the youngish side (25 in Aug) and work a service job at a university. So I deal with lots of young people. Ain't nothing quite like 18 year old college freshmen.

Some are dumber that snot, and others are great. Some work hard, others are too lazy to use a remote control.

I don't think age is the most important thing, most of the soccer moms types that cause us so much grief in the fight for RKBA are in their forties.

I've seen reports & statistics that the so called generation X is actually tending towards conservatism as a backlash against all of the liberal crap of out baby boomer parents.

As far as fastfood work, it tends to attract morons. My Wife had the dubious honor of supervising a bunch of the aformentioned morons. She could tell you all sorts of stories. :D
 
This has been a rant of mine for some time now. So much so in fact that I think Terri and others that are around me all the time are beginning to tire of it. When I am ranting about it I always use the fast food Happy Meal analogy.
Remeber at one time when we ordered our meal at the drive thru we expected it to be wrong part of the time? Not always.....just now and then. Then it became more frequent. Eventually it got to the point that you were the fool if you failed to check your order before driving off because you just knew that they forgot the fries in your Happy Meal. Finally we came to expect this and automatically check in the sack before driving away. We wait on the people in front of us because they have to check and make the necessary corrections and the people behind us have to wait while we do the same. God help the poor soul that is tenth in line with a half hour for lunch. But you know what? We shouldn't have to check our order! It should not be incumbant on us to ensure that they (the kid in the paper hat) did his job. But we do. We check and we admonish and it goes unnoticed because he will screw up the order of the people behind us the same as ours. (It makes me wonder what they do with all the fries that didn't make it into the Happy Meal at the end of the day.)
We have grown to except this as a way of life and never, but never really expect to get those damn fries without having to ask for them. But there in lies the problem. We except it. We go on...life goes on. Now, however, it is becoming more than just not getting those elusive fries. At one time we knew that there would be the ocassional laps at the drive thru but we knew that everyone else was on the ball and doing their job. No longer. Now the problem is not just with the kid in the paper hat. It is at the bank, the doctors office, the accountant....yes the police. Everyone. And you know what? Right now we except it and just figure they screw up once in a while. Every so often the bank forgets to put our fries in the banks version of the Happy Meal. It isn't every time but enough that we know we need to look for those fries in the sack before we leave the bank drive thru. In tens years will the bank, doctor, lawyer, police officer, et. al. be as incompetent as the kid in the paper hat that now always forgets to put the fries in the Happy Meal[/]i?
I wonder........

------------------
Gunslinger
 
Gunslinger, you bring up a good point that has been on my mind for a while now: Service In America Is Going Down Hill FAST, and your are right, it ISN'T just the kid at fast food places.

If we are paying someone to perform a service, we should not have to double-check them to see if the service was properly performed and it has been my experience that the bigger the company, the more this seems to be a problem.

When I had my house built, I had it pre-wired with multiple phone lines in a number of rooms for telephone, Fax, computer, etc. as I was going to be using one room as an office (my boss requires me to be in the office only on Monday & Friday -- the rest of the time he doesn't care where I am as long as the work is getting done and he can reach me to work on a particular task if necessary). Before moving in, I called the phone company to wire the individual jacks with the proper numbers. They said the first appointment was three weeks out. The day before the service call, I checked to verify that they indeed were coming the following day and that they would be coming in to re-wire the individual jacks with the proper numbers.

I waited for them all day calling twice to check on the status of things and was told that the jobs are handed out to individual technicians and there is no way for them to check on the work in progress but that I was scheduled for that day.

When the sun went down and nobody still didn't show up, I called a third time and was told that the technician checked the service at the poll and that it was already connected. When I inquired about the jacks, they told me that the technician must have neglected to do that part but they could schedule me for another appointment in a couple of weeks. When I said that this was unacceptable, they pretty much told me "too bad, too sad".

Good service, like our gun rights, is quickly becoming a thing of the past.
 
I don't know if it has so much to do with "the kids today" as it does with the tight labor market. The drive-through at our bank was staffed with some real dough-heads. On several occassions my wife and I deposited checks and wrote in an amount on the deposit slip to get back in cash, only to find no cash in the envelope when the clerk was done.
A call to the manager had some effect, but she spoke of problems getting workers.

Times have changed, though. I went to my first job interview for an after-school job in 1966. It was for a 95 cent an hour dishwashing job, and I wore a suit and tie to the interview. That's just the way it was.

Dick
Want to send a message to Bush? Sign the petition at http://www.petitiononline.com/monk/petition.html and forward the link to every gun owner you know.
 
A couple years ago the local high school inacted a policy that anyone with more than x number of unexcused absences (I cant' remember the number but it was not unreasonable) would not be allowed to attend the prom. The policy went into effect at the beginning of the school year so no one would be surprised by it. Well, prom time rolls around and lo and behold, a number of the campus darlings found themselves unable to attend their prom. The kids cry foul, saying it is their right to attend the prom. I don't think so, the prom is a privilege. It is your right and obligation to attend class. Granted, many of these kids had excellent GPA's and were overall decent kids. But they failed to understand the consequences of their actions. Then the parents get involved...and the media. Parents decide to put on their own prom for these kids...that will show the school district! Media films the whole thing, giving them even more power. So what is the message these parents are sending their kids? You don't have to be responsible for your actions? You deserve to have whatever you want even if you didn't earn it? It's okay if you get a job and you don't feel like going to work one day, Mommy and Daddy will be there to give you an excuse and bail you out?

There are a lot of decent, hard working, and articulate young men and women out there. Too bad they are overshadowed by a plethora of morons.

It all goes back to one of my biggest pet peeves....Entitlement. :mad:
 
Old fogies have been complaining about kids since the dawn of time. In Plato's Republic some of the old men in the dialogue complain about how shiftless and disrespectful the youths of Athens, circa 400 BC, were. Complaining about kids just means you're old.
 
Ottergal said (several times ;) ),
"There are a lot of decent, hard working, and articulate young men and women out there. Too bad they are overshadowed by a plethora of morons."

I reply, "True.... True....."

But then the same can be said of us gun owners. :)
 
In my line of work (career development, preparation, counseling, training, etc.) we see a lot of kids -- some still in school, some out. What scares me the most is that they seem to have no interests whatsoever.
We administer a variety of assessments, including interest inventories, and most of these kids flatline! When you ask what they like to do, what they envision in the future, etc., the answer is invariably "I dunno, hang out, I guess." That is, if they talk to you at all. Eye contact is out of the question.
I have never seen such "flat affects" on a single generation of kids. You think you're talking with someone, but there's nobody in there! I find this frightening.
I remember my parents and grandparents predicting doom with the advent of rock music. Horsepucky!! Nothing!! We turned out great. But, what on earth is this coming along now? I'm not so much disapproving as scared.
It doesn't surprise me one bit that they can't provide service on their jobs, but I'm afraid that's the least of it; just a symptom. But, of what?
 
Uh oh...methinks I must have posted several times! ;)
I hit submit right when the boards must have gone offline...waited it out, went back to check if it had posted anyway and when it hadn't, submitted once again! I swear I only hit it twice Dennis!!! So any more of that must have been the board gremlins who were performing "System Maintenence"!!! Otter's Honor!!! :D

I owe you a Shiner or two for waving your magic wand and taking care of the extras! ;)

MrsMTN...It is scary, isn't it? I was a counselor for a church youth group several years ago, and I couldn't believe that none of the kids were interested in going to college. I knew by the time I was five that I would go to college. These were kids from stable, upper middle class families. They were used to having everything handed to them, I guess, and figured they could just waltz in anywhere and get a job...with no experience. You're right, they're flatliners. Sad. :(

[This message has been edited by Ottergal (edited July 30, 2000).]
 
I have a friend who owns his own business. He hires high school graduates from the best high schools in our area. He has a standing policy that nobody is to have any written communication with anyone outside of the company. It seems these high school graduates can't write a coherent sentence. Our schools spend too much time with social engineering and not enough time with real education.

Wanna have a good scare? Read None Dare Call it Education by John A Stormer. Our public school system is not about education.

A couple of days ago, I dropped my two oldest daughters off at a friend's house to attend a slumber party. All the girls there, with one exception, were home schooled. All of the girls were appalled at the public schooled girl's lack of anything that resembled manners. She was so difficult to get along with that the PS girl finally gave up and went home (she lived across the street). All the other girls were relieved. They had a wonderful time without her. ("What about socialization," people always ask us home schooling parents.) All of the families got together the next day for a BBQ. (The PS girl's family didn't show up.) There were 11 kids ages 12 and under. They ate in one room while the parents ate in another room. The kids hardly needed supervision. The older kids pretty much took care of the younger kids. One of the parents commented about the PS girl who couldn't get along with anyone, "I wonder what kids like that are going to do when they become adults."

I wonder too. I don't worry so much for how my kids will turn out, but I worry about the kind of society they will have to live in. I'm not impressed with the caliber of people who they will share this world with as adults.
 
Not that these are not all valid concerns, but, just to keep it in perspective...
<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>Our youth now love luxury. They have bad manners, contempt for
authority; they show disrespect for their elders and love chatter in
place of exercise; they no longer rise when elders enter the room;
they contradict their parents, chatter before company; gobble up their
food and tyrannize their teachers.
(Socrates, 5th Century BC)[/quote] :)
 
Just reminds me that I have to do a darn good job of raising mine when the time comes.
 
Maybe I should feel better, but it seems that they would need to have some energy, interest and vision to accomplish even the things that Socrates was worried about!
 
Kids give old people something to complain aobut. :)

I agree with Monkeyleg about the tight labor market. These days companies are hiring warm bodies, it's hard to even set standards. That has some real downsides, but maybe it beats the alternative.
 
Well as one of this generation being discussed here I might as well put in my .02 worth. I definetly see a trend of becoming lazy in my generation. I also agree that public school is a waste of time. I was public schooled my whole life, and if it hadn't have been for me wanting to learn, I wouldn't know jack, but yet still would have passed. Public schooling is the reason that I decided not to go to college right away and joined the Marines. I knew that I did not have the self discipline to excel in college. I could have muddled through and graduated average in my class like most everyone else, heck I was in the top 10% of my highschool class and I barely did anything. But I didnt want to be average, so I joined the Marines. Here in the the Marines it isn't as bad, but sadly, it could be a lot better. Two months ago we had one idiot who finally got himself out of the Corps by recieving his 4th NJP, which he had gotten on purpose. When my CO asked him what he was going to do when he got out, his answer was "Hang out or something." That is no joke! But there are some of us that do take responsibility and pride in what we do, I would have to say that the two groups when I was in high school were evenly split, but thankfully in the Marines, we take more pride in ourselves and work to get rid of the slackers.
 
I teach at the high school level- physics and mathematics. Most years I carry mostly physics but also one remedial math class so I get the best and the worst. One teacher joked "The cream always rises to the top but so does the scum."
It seems kids are more polarized between one extreme or the other. I have had kids who literaly would not do ANYTHING in class even if you lit them on fire. Of couse those were the kids who were stoned out of their minds and whose parents would fiercely deny that their kids would ever do anything wrong. I have had parents come in and refuse to accept a failing grade for their child (came to class 5 times in a semester, got caught breaking into the local mall), one who blamed me for her 19-year-old not finishing his exam (deputy detained him because he and his buddies were drinking beer on the way to school and he threw the empties out into the yard across the street from the school while the deputy was driving right behind them), another who his friend remarked "smokes more weed than any other human being I have ever seen!" which is saying a lot but whose parents insist he doesn't do his work because he is a perfectionist and if he can't get pristine scores then he's rather not take the chance... the list goes on and on.
One of my common rants is that modern morality isn't based on Right versus Wrong but on Caught verses Got Away With. My point is that lots of kids are allowed to get away with doing a poor job so they continue in that manner.
You can point the indicting finger in any number of directions: television, schools, entertainment, government... My wife and I are about to have our first child and my wife is as concerned as I am about the direction our daughter will take as she grows up. We both believe that it is the parents' (notice that I placed the apostrophe to the right of the 's', implying the PLURAL)responsibility to teach ethics. There's that word "responsibility" again. If the parents don't have it then the kids won't.
I'm going to crank up the AC so flame away.

------------------
Those who use arms well cultivate the Way and keep the rules.Thus they can govern in such a way as to prevail over the corrupt- Sun Tzu, The Art of War
 
Congratulations on the expected baby! I wish you all well. :D The only thing I can think of is to talk to your child -- simply talk, and talk with them. It doesn't even matter if both parents work. My husband and I did, because it was necessary.
I asked my daughter about this (she is 25) and she said it didn't matter that we both worked -- we talked with them afterward. We had conversations at dinner, and before and afterward, and in the morning. We shared ideas, opinions and thoughts on things.
I suspect many parents don't. They are too self absorbed, or whatever. But those kids never become "engaged" with other people, particularly adults.
Our daughter does this consistently with her son, who is almost 4. She has talked with him since they first "met," in the delivery room, and haven't stopped yet! I have great hopes here, because he's a great kid! :D
Who knows, maybe that's it.
 
Gotta wade in here and get on my soapbox. (Wow! talk about mixing metaphors!!)

Most kids today are, basically, no different from what we were, or our parents, or etc., etc.

BUT ... we are inviting trouble with our social/educational policies at present. We are raising a generation that has no concept of personal responsibility or consequences. If something's wrong, we sue, or demand the Government "fix" it, or look for someone ... anyone ... to blame.

My wife was working with a group of Year 3 students (8-year-olds) recently, and was asking about "People in the Community Who Help Us". The subject of work came up and the class was asked what they would like to do as a job, and what their parents did.

Almost half had no idea what a "job" was, or what "working for a living was". The reason? Their parent(s) had been on the dole (welfare) the entire kid's life. Their parents didn't "work", why the hell should they?

While Di and I were having this conversation, a current affairs TV show was reporting on single mums who refused to work, instead staying permanently on child welfare. We were stunned by one young lady who informed the world that, even if she was offered a job she would refuse, because it was her "right" not to work!

B
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top