We youth at EvC are in Moral Decline

doctrbill writes:

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You may recall that at least one poor loser jumped from a window on wall street when the market crashed in 1929.

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Incorrect.They even make mention of this in the movie, Seabiscuit. Contrary to the urban myth, nobody jumped out of a window because of the stock market crash.------------------
Rrhain
WWJD? JWRTFM!

truthlover writes:

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OTOH, destruction of the nuclear family

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This is another one of those myths the Right has managed to palm off on people.The "nuclear family" is a recent invention. The concept of parents-and-children living independently of all other relations is a product of the Industrial Revolution for that is the time that the population shifted from rural to urban areas.The "traditional nuclear family" has never been a tradition. The traditional family in the US was a family living with their extended relations in a loose community. You were just as likely to have your aunts and uncles looking out for you as your own parents.------------------
Rrhain
WWJD? JWRTFM!

buzsaw responds to me:

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All declined to their lowest levels during the evil, "liberal" Clinton years.

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The president does not run the country.

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The president does, however, set policy. Remember the funding for the policemen that Clinton pushed to get in place? Don't you think that might have some effect on crime rates?And what do you think will happen with Bush's cutting of those programs?

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George Bush of Texas leading the charge with his tough on crime state of Texas.

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Yes, putting to death more people than all other states at a time when we were coming to realize that the system was putting many innocent people to death. And then Bush came along and lied saying that he carefully studied every single death penalty case when examination of his schedule found that he could only have spent four minutes per case (and now we find that his advisor on those cases wasn't exactly forthcoming on the details of the cases presented to Bush.) Bush refused to examine the problem, claiming that there is no possibility of error in Texas regarding the death penalty.

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Btw, I too would like to know where you got your data. Take your time. We'll wait.

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Didn't you read my post. I stated where I got it: The US Department of Justice: What is it about my posts that people don't read them? This is really getting ridiculous.------------------
Rrhain
WWJD? JWRTFM!

truthlover writes:

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I'm sorry, but I just don't believe that owning a home in America is out of the reach of anyone who does a good job for an employer.

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Ah, yes...the poor are poor because they're lazy bums.And people claim the Left is the one engaging in class warfare....------------------
Rrhain
WWJD? JWRTFM!

Rrhain, you're engaged in some other debate than I am is all I can figure.1. What the heck does conservative leadership have to do with anything I said? We're talking moral decline over the last 40 years, not the benefits of left or right wing leadership.2. I used Judeo-Christian in a pretty normal sense that I'm sure everyone else understood. I made absolutely no arguments in defense of it.Ok, that answers most of your post.On the two issues I see that I addressed (maybe you're in a conservative vs. liberal debate with Buz, but I'm really not interested in defending conservative leadership in the US, nor am I terrible surprised that the economy might do well under liberal leadership):1. Your links don't even address suicide rates over the last 40 years, at least the ones you mention first. They may be real applicable to your liberal vs. conservative debate, but I don't know or care much about that debate.2. Suicide rates have more than doubled since forty years ago according to the links I gave.3. Your crime rate statistics also apply pretty well to your conservative/liberal debate, but again, it's off topic to me, and really, now that I think about it, I don't think even Buz has taken you up on that off topic issue.4. I also don't know what my comments about broken families have to do with the gay issue you brought up. Divorce hurts kids, and it has increased "dramatically" since the 50's. Many people like it. I think it hurts kids. I would never support a gay couple adopting a kid, but that's a totally different topic.5. I finally got that link #5 you mentioned to come up. It took a while. It does look like suicide, overall, only went up slightly. It's up over double with young people, but they did mention that leaves the # of young people committing suicide less than those in the 25-39 age group who commit suicide, so I guess I can see why the overall rates might have remained relatively stable.Anyway, this gay issue is obviously a big thing to you, but I brought up divorce, not gay couples nor adoption by single people. The number of children raised by a divorce, single mom or dad is far greater than those children raised by single dads or moms who adopted. Divorce is one issue. Adoption of kids is completely another. In the former, a parent is leaving. In the latter, no parents are leaving.

Still on politics. That's great, I'll work with your definitions. I have grown use to your inability to listen and your demand that I speak with your terminology, while you make no effort whatsoever to understand what's said to you.Forget the term "destruction of the nuclear family." Divorce rates are way up and kids are raised by one parent or no one a lot. I think it has as much to do with the crime rates in this country as anything.Your comments about aunts and uncles in the American past has nothing whatsoever to do with anything I've said.

I don't know about "the Left," but I do know that people who turn facts into racism, classism, or sexism are indeed creating class warfare, race warfare, and sex warfare.I can hit a softball further than 90% of the women in America because I'm a man. Blacks dominate sprint races because, in general, they're faster and jump higher than us white guys, especially ones as slow as me. This nation still provides opportunities that people who put responsibility on themselves, and not others, can take advantage of.I was raised in the military, so I don't know what it feels like to be racist. I've been in mixed-race communities for most of my life. On the other hand, since my dad didn't make E-6 until I was nearly eighteen, and since I've been hopping around the globe myself ever since, I've always been poor. I have to keep myself from being generally prejudiced against the rich, not the poor.

If suicides are up, it may have a great deal to do with the easy availability of cheap handguns.

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Few of these workers are doing much more than dreaming about owning a home.

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Granted, our situation is different because my husband is soon to have a PhD and (hopefully) a job in a University in the next year or so, but I never thought I would be 35 years old and still renting.Also, because the housing market is so obscenely inflated in this college town we live in, we pay around $900 a month for rent plus utilities for a one-bedroom (plus basement) apartment. I make descent money for the kind of work I do, but it ain't no 1980's wage.A small, small house with no garage, no dining room, one bathroom, dirt floor basement and two small bedrooms, in this town, goes for about a quarter million dollars.We have been slowly saving for a house for years, but as much as we like this area, we are definitely moving away to a cheaper part of the country, which is almost anywhere else, save Manhattan and San Francisco.Anyway, I see how things have gone with my other three siblings, of which I am the youngest.My oldest sister is a young Baby Boomer, so she, even as a graphic artist, rode the gravy train of the late 80's and has owned two houses with her husband as well as a business. They are in an economic crunch right now but are able to ride it out due to their equity and investments and savings.The next sister lives in a house with her husband and three kids. They own it, and bought it after selling their first house out east about 10 years ago. She has the luxury of staying at home with them and not working. She also complains about not having much money and she is still wearing quite a few of the clothes she bought in high school and college. She is kind of a agorophobic freak, so I think she is afraid to go out and work, but they could really use the money as the kids are 15, 14, and 13 and therefore will all be in college at once.My brother just bought his first house a couple of years ago at the age of 37.So, you see the trend in our family; it's gotten harder and harder to afford a house as time has gone by.Reall wages for the middle class have stagnated or gone down while housing prices have continued to rise.My parents were able to purchase a brand new, two-car garage, three bedroom, 1 1/2 bath, diningroom, split level on a large corner lot in the early 60's for $15,000, even though my mother wasn't working and my father was just starting out as a Upjohn drug salesman.

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I'm sorry, but I just don't believe that owning a home in America is out of the reach of anyone who does a good job for an employer. I just don't see it happening anywhere around me, and, like I said, I live in about the poorest county in America.

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If you live in the poorest county in America, property values are pretty low, aren't they?What if you want to live in a place where the schools are really good, so your kids will get a great education, but the homes are out of your price range?What if you can afford to buy a house, but only in the bad sections of town?What about all of those good workers in Flint, MI who's houses were foreclosed on by the bank because they got laid off when the GM plant closed?I do a very good job for my employer. So good that I have gotten regular raises, bonuses, awards and promotions for the last five years. I am paid probably double the industry standard for the work I do, and I get great benefits. Because of where my employer is located, I cannot afford to buy a house here, in the town where I work. Small, starter houses are at least $200,000, and that's just the asking price. Bids are usually tens of thousands of dollars over the asking price.If I were to go to the closest town, which is poorer, crime is higher and the schools are worse, I could expect to pay about $150,000 for a starter house. Of course, We would have to buy another car or buy a bus pass because we would both have to drive to work/school instead of walking or biking as we do now.[This message has been edited by schrafinator, 08-04-2003]

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truthlover writes:
I was taught--in public school--that Rome's fall had much to do with the loose morals (I don't remember what that meant to the teacher) of the city of Rome.

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db: There were other factors, were there not?

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I was taught that, to make money for trade, the emporers ordered grapes to be grown for wine rather than food crops like grain for bread, so people began to starve and then the peasants revolted.

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Divorce hurts kids, and it has increased "dramatically" since the 50's. Many people like it. I think it hurts kids.

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You know, I really wished my parents would have gotten a divorce, or separated, or something.My childhood home was the most tension-filled, emotionally draining, spirit-killing place I have ever been, and it was all because my parents hated each other, but were also too co-dependent to cut themselves loose from each other.My father wasn't emotionally available for as long as I can remember, so I don't think that having him physically gone would have been all that different. I was mainly just afraid of him and resentful that he didn't seem to give a crap about me or my life in the least.My mother took all of her frustrations and anger and resentment out on us kids through constant emotional and occasional physical abuse.All of this, I'm convinced, is because they were completely miserable in their marriage for a very, very long time. Things are basically the same now between the two of them, except my mother doesn't have the kids to scream at at any more, so she screams at him.It's a sick, sick world they live in, and I can see no benefit whatsoever to any children caught up in it.

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1. Single parenhood. (Factual that by and large, children do better with a natural father and mother.)

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Yes... assuming their mother and father are capable of living together without making one another miserable. However, children are generally better if everyone in the house loves one another, regardless of what number is there.

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2. Unwanted babies and supposed need to kill the unborn.

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Gotta be alive before it can be killed.

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3. Divorce, legal hassles clooging up the legal system etc.
4. Rise of need for social welfare resulting in higher taxes.

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These would be moral failures... how, exactly?
There's a difference between "this sucks" and "this is evidence of moral decline."

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5. Decline in discipline and behaviour of children.

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Things sure were better in my father's day, when my grandfather would beat the holy living crap out of him. Man, I wish my dad had punched some sense into me like that.

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6. Sexual disease, the worse being aids. Again more tax dollars and social problems.

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Contracting a disease is a moral failure? I should go say some hail marys for that flu I got last month, I guess.

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7. Incidence of drugs, crime and all the ramifications of these.

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What exactly would you say the ramifications of drugs are? I'm not talking about the illegal activities of drug dealers (which would be stopped by legalization) but about drug use itself.Basically, why is drug use immoral?

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8. Need for more prisons, policemen and other enforcement personel.

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Which brings us back to drug legalization...

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9. Rise in incidence of suicide

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Yeah, I'll grant you that. Why we still push bullshit moral codes on kids that teach them what an abomination they are is beyond me.

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10. Increase in corporate, government and social corruption leading to all kinds of problems and causing financial ruin to many.

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Right. That's why labor unions were so unnecessary, back when businesses were so benign.Personally, I like to think corporations have come a long way from "What's that? You got your hand cut off? You're fired. Send your 11-year-old in to work tomorrow if you still want a paycheck."

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There's ten to ponder, my fiesty forum friends.

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Consider them pondered. What else you got?

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Divorce hurts kids, and it has increased "dramatically" since the 50's. Many people like it. I think it hurts kids.

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Yeah, brave stand on a contraversial issue.For God's sake, who likes divorce? "Hey Bill, got me a divorce this week!" "Frank, you dog, that's your third this month! Way to go!"Honestly. Does anyone see divorce as something other than an occasionally necessary but unfortunate circumstance?

Yup. Another good reason we should encourage the spread of atheism: U.S. Divorce rates for various faith groups. You'll note that the research was carried out by a Christian organisation.