Poll:- life better now or in 1959? In light of the run on stabbings by teenaged girls in B.C. - Is this a sign that life is getting better?
What do we think now?
- Thread starter JLM
- Start date
I don't have any real vivid memories of 1959 JLM but I do know that I didn't have to be afraid to walk down the street alone or go out to play. My friends and my brothers and sisters were not into drugs. The only way any kid died from being at a party was the drinking and driving scene but even that was rare. Legal age for drinking was 21 so no one wanted to be caught drinking by their parents let alone the cops. Parents were able to be more responsible for what their kids did then because double income families were not necessary and were more rare than the norm of today. Most kids today do not get to see their parents from breakfast to dinner or later. I used to go home everyday for lunch and it was very rare for me to arrive home to an empty house after school. If that did happen, my Mom was home within a half hour or less from the time I got there. Summer holidays were the only time I might have missed lunch at home. We used to get playing and forget to go home and eat. Parents didn't worry. They always knew you were at a friends place or in my case - playing down by the river. For all my playing by and later in the river, I would be afraid to let my grandkids go there and would probably have been afraid to let my sons go there. On the other hand, I wish they could have. Such great memories of swimming in the Similkameen all day long.
AS I remember our biggest danger was bears and cougars(4leged) We were forbidden playing on the booms and supposed to stay out of the shop yard which was kind of hard due to the way houses were laid out around it. Forbidden and not doing are not exactly synonymous.
Financially and health wise we are better off now.
Cars back then you could usually fix on the side of the road with a jackknife and a pair of pliers. Now your cars computer must consult with a shop computer just to turn off the light that tells you to change the oil.
Financially and health wise we are better off now.
Cars back then you could usually fix on the side of the road with a jackknife and a pair of pliers. Now your cars computer must consult with a shop computer just to turn off the light that tells you to change the oil.
I partly agree, we have more money at our disposal now, provided our credit rating is good and we can mortgage everything we have to the hilt and buy anything we want on credit. As far as health is concerned we are better able today to patch up health defects, many of which are brought about through a deteriorating lifestyle. In 1959 I'd say more people were BASICALLY healthier, of course if you had something like leukemia, you were toast. You are totally right about vehicle repair. My own cousin a life long mechanic is totally mystified by the new vehicles.
More people, more money, more taxes, more technology, more pollution, more killing, etc.
No more wisdom to use what we have than in 1959.
I'd say things are different but not better.
This is the same position I had in the other thread about this topic.
No more wisdom to use what we have than in 1959.
I'd say things are different but not better.
This is the same position I had in the other thread about this topic.
If I could go back then with what I know now ... it wouldn't matter 'cuz I would still only be three years old and have a Mommy who might object....
That doesn't surprise me, Les, I doubt if those who had it right the first time are going to change their minds. In fact there's more sh*t happening today to confirm it. :smile::smile:
lone wolf wrote:
"If I could go back then with what I know now ... it wouldn't matter 'cuz I would still only be three years old and have a Mommy who might object...."
What makes you think that you don't come across as a three year old?
I am sure this is the kind of remark you would have said if I had said what you said.
"If I could go back then with what I know now ... it wouldn't matter 'cuz I would still only be three years old and have a Mommy who might object...."
What makes you think that you don't come across as a three year old?
I am sure this is the kind of remark you would have said if I had said what you said.
In early 1959 I had just finished basic flying training with the RCAF and was thrilled to be posted to Advanced Flying School in Saskatoon for jet training. Life couldn't get much better.
Young girls were more likely to cut themselves while peeling potatoes than stabbing anyone. The number of ten stabbings and killings would indicate that our standards are definitely going downhill.
Young girls were more likely to cut themselves while peeling potatoes than stabbing anyone. The number of ten stabbings and killings would indicate that our standards are definitely going downhill.
Or it could simply be that the population has grown and the reporting by the newsmedia has grown with it.
And there you have it. It's all relative.
There was a time when one was too busy doing for him/herself to be concerned with what was happening in some unknown corner of the world. Now, unless you isolate yourself, absolutely everything is paraded endlessly in front of your eyes and ears.
As children we were certainly safer. But on the other hand we did have to participate in nuclear war drills.
I don't think there was any less child or spousal abuse back then, they were just better at covering it up. With inflation today, I had more buying power in the old days (I started working in '64). Cars were easier to work on but they were polluting gas guzzlers and your chances of dying in an accident was greater because they were so engineered