(word processor parameters LM=8, RM=75, TM=2, BM=2) Taken from KeelyNet BBS (214) 324-3501 Sponsored by Vangard Sciences PO BOX 1031 Mesquite, TX 75150 There are ABSOLUTELY NO RESTRICTIONS on duplicating, publishing or distributing the files on KeelyNet except where noted! April 20, 1994 LEGACY.ASC -------------------------------------------------------------------- This interesting file is from the Double Helix BBS. It has much to say as to how young people view our modern society and what they perceive as a probable end result. Kind of gets one to thinking about what can we do to try to inspire the younger folks. How many times have you seen a Winnebago or camper with a bumper sticker saying, "We are spending our kids inheritance." Although I know many people who were left little or nothing, they chose not to depend on any kind of windfall from their parents estate and so made it on their own abilities. These are the ones I admire most..........................................Sysop -------------------------------------------------------------------- 5/93 English Final Essay "The Terrible Twenties" Smith-Rowsey Sometimes I wonder what it would be like to have been 20, my age, in the 60's. Back when you could grow up, count on a career and maybe think about buying a house. When one person could expect to be the wage earner for a household. In the space of one generation those dreams have died. The cost of living has skyrocketed, unemployment has gone up, going to college doesn't guarentee you can get a good job. And no one seems to care. Maybe it's because the only people my age that you older people have heard from are those who * do * make a lot of money: investment bankers, athletes, musicians, actors. But more and more of us twentysomethings are underachievers who loaf around the house until well past our college years. This is an open letter to the baby boomers from the * next * generation. I think it's time we did a little hitting back. Aside from the wealthy, none of you ever told your children, "Someday this will all be yours," and you're the first middle-class to fail that way. Did you think we wouldn't care? Thanks a lot. But the real danger lies in the way we've been taught to deal with failure: gloss over and pretend the problem doesn't exist. It's evidence you never taught us to be smart -- you only taught us to be young. Page 1 We are the stupidest generation in American history, we 20-year- olds. You already know that. We really do get lower SAT scores than our parents. Our knowledge of geography is pathetic, as is our ability to deal with foreign languages and even basic math. We don't read books like you did. We care only about image. We love fads. Talk to any college professors, and they'll tell you they don't get intelligent responses like they used to, when you were in school. We're perfectly mush-headed. You did this to us. You praised your youth so much, you made sure ours would be carefree. It's not that you didn't love us; you loved us so much, you pushed us to follow your idea of what you were -- or would like to have been -- instead of teaching us to be responsible. After legitimizing youthful rebellion you never let us have our own innocence -- perhaps because Vietnam and Watergate shattered yours. That's why we're already mature enough to understand and worry about racism, the environment, abortion, the homeless, nuclear policy. But we were also fed on the video culture you created to idealize your own irresponsible days of youth. Your slim-and-trim MTV bimbos, fleshy beer commercials, and racy TV shows presented adolescence as a time only for fun and sex. Why should we be expected to work at learning anything? Not that we're not smart -- in some ways. We're street smart, David Letterman clever, whizzes at Nintendo. We can name more beers than presidents. Pop culture is, to us, more attractive than education. I really don't think we can do this much longer. Not a single industrialized country has survived since 1945 without a major re- evaluation of its identity except ours. That's what you thought you were doing in the 60's, but soon gave way to chasing the dreams of the Donald Trump-Michael Milken get-rich-quick ethos --and all you had left for us was a bankrupt economy. The latchkey lifestyle you gave us in the name of your own "freedom" has made us a generation with missing parents and broken homes. And what about the gays and Blacks and Hispanics and Asians and women who you pretend to care so much about, and then forgot? It's not that I'm angry at you for selling out to the system. It's that there won't be a system for >ME< to sell out to if I want to. The money isn't there anymore because * YOU * spent it all. To be honest, I can't blame you for all that's happened. The pre- eminence of new technologies and the turn toward cutthroat capitalism over the past two decades would have happened with or without the pecualarities of your generation. If I had been born in the 50's, I too would have been angry at racism and the war in Vietnam. But that's not the same thing as allowing the system to unravel out of my own greed. Don't say you didn't start the fire of selfishness and self- indulgence, building it up until every need or desire was immediately appeased. Cable TV, BMW's, cellular phones, the whole mall culture has reduced us all to 12-year-olds who want everything ** > NOW! <** . Page 2 I'm not in love with everything your parents did, but at least they gave you a chance. As Billy Joel said "Every child had a pretty good shot to get at least as far as their old man got." For most of us, all we've been left with are the erotic fantasies, aggressive tendencies, and evanescent funds of youth. Pretty soon we won't have youth * OR * money, and that's when we may get a little angry. Or maybe we won't. Perhaps you really have created a nation of mush- heads who will always prefer style over substance. If that's so, the culture can survive, as it seems to be doing with the bright smile of optimism breaking through the clouds of decaying American institutions. And then you really will be the last modern smart generation because our kids will be even dumber, poorer and more violent than us. You guys will be like the old mule at the end of Orwell's "Animal Farm," thinking about how great things used to be when you were kids. You will differ from your own parents in that you will have missed your chance to change the world and robbed us of the skills and money to do it ourselves. If there's any part of you left that still loves us enough to help us, we could really use it. And it's not just your last chance. It's our only one. -------------------------------------------------------------------- If you have comments or other information relating to such topics as this paper covers, please upload to KeelyNet or send to the Vangard Sciences address as listed on the first page. Thank you for your consideration, interest and support. Jerry W. Decker.........Ron Barker...........Chuck Henderson Vangard Sciences/KeelyNet -------------------------------------------------------------------- If we can be of service, you may contact Jerry at (214) 324-8741 or Ron at (214) 242-9346 -------------------------------------------------------------------- Page 3