Where are we headed?

[Barry_v]

how old are you people? tell your "when i was a lad" stories to AM radio not ford forum...

[ROOSTA]

AM radio?? But its night time.... LOL..

Well i am 22.. And its that 'tell someone who cares' attitude that isa large part of the problem..

Cheers,
Nik

[Barry_v]

i fail to see any problem.. other than the amazing ability of old people to link unconnected examples of human behaviour with a time scale.

[troppo]

Us 'old' people have had the experience of being young..have you experienced what it's like to be old?

[Barry_v]

only briefly, when i become outraged about a letter to the editor regarding a young person not giving up their bus seat to an elderly person.

[troppo]

Ah...well the longer term experience has a way of contracting the passage of time.
The upshot of it is the time elapsed between those events that occasionally tick you off appears to shrink significantly, until it appears your life is no longer the party it once was, but one long chain of events that compound that 'ticked off' feeling.
Thus, it appears those seemingly unrelated events appear to be indirectly connected to the passage of time in the form of a trend, only observable after said passage of time.

[Barry_v]

translation: the older I get the better it was

[fmc351]

Societies characteristics are a result of ebb and flow, the declining and ascending of society has always existed as shown by the Socrates quote. Each generation tries to be different from the last, to benefit from life more than their parents did, some things are changed, while other things arent for whatever reason. Sometimes the difference is selfish, other times that change is community spirited and we can benefit from both approaches.

When those changes are selfish, society declines and tends to follow that direction for a few generations inevitably making the situation worse as each generation 'improves' the work of the last, as well as inventing its own changes. There will come a time where the generation next will strive for differences which will inadvertently improve the bonds and create a degree of community spirit, ie: the change is not directly self centred. The negative way we treat others today is for the most part condoned by your immediate peers, laughed about, humoured and in the end encouraged, we are headed in the wrong directions still, that was true in the 70's, and from what I can gather long before that too. When that immediate peer pressure condemns the behaviour, it will occur much less often. This pattern of a positive trend will continue until one future generation changes direction in its strive to change and eventually the changes are selfish in nature again.

I think it comes down to the lessons each generation learns from the lives of the past generation, which that middle generation then pass on those perceived 'improvements' to their kids. Its the interpretation parents make of their parents, and that interpretation they pass to their kids. We dont learn very well, were slow to take notice as a whole and that is complicated by the varying degrees of willingness to improve for the greater good, at our own immediate expense.

Blaming kids 'today' is just purely ignorance of ones own culpability. Society has been in decline since long before most of us were born. Were all to blame for the current state of things. Kids today merely picked up our baton and ran with it.

[troppo]

Originally Posted by Barry_v

translation: the older I get the better it was

That's one interpretation.
The older I get the worse it gets is a more accurate interpretation.
There is a subtle distinction between them.

[Barry_v]

Originally Posted by troppo

That's one interpretation.
The older I get the worse it gets is a more accurate interpretation.
There is a subtle distinction between them.

my young minds attention span is over. someone agreed with me now its not fun any more. good night.

[Agent86]

Originally Posted by Barry_v

my young minds attention span is over. someone agreed with me now its not fun any more. good night.

I can honestly say im embarased to be of the genreation i am.
Most people i meet around my age are so disrespectful and etc its unbelievable.
a goood mate of mine is a bus driver and the things these kids do/try to do to him on a daily basis is just unbelievable. And that goes for some of teh older genreations too, but is most prevailant in the younger ones.

I find country people are much more pleasant to assosicate with as they tend to instil respect for people and effort in their kids. out there, there is no easy way.

[3vXT]

Originally Posted by daniel_rossy

Word.
I got abused by a regular customer tonight at maccas because i accidently gave her a large latte instead of a small.
I just said listen, it has been absolutely flat out all day and a customer complaining about me making a little mistake, because i grabbed the wrong cup is the last thing i need. I said, get over it we all make mistakes, seriously give us all a break. (she complains if her coffee is too strong all the time, she always asks for half strenght)

No offense mate, but if she cares that much about her coffee wtf is she doing at McDonalds

[gozza]

Also - the customer has a right to complain - Its your job to shut up and do what you get paid for

I asked for cup trays because humans have 2 arms - I ordered 3 Drinks.

The beast that served me rolling her eyes and huffed and puffed - When did customer service die?

You don't argue with customers .I. .I.

[daniel_rossy]

Originally Posted by Barry_v

how old are you people? tell your "when i was a lad" stories to AM radio not ford forum...

im 17. and i have told 2 'when i was a lad' stories.
And these have happened in the space of two weeks...
unless you can prove i matured to an adult in a space of 2 weeks, so i can actually say that when 'i was a lad', i think you are wrong.

[Deadman]

Originally Posted by gozza

When did customer service die?

About the same time that customers decided to have attitudes like;

Originally Posted by gozza

Its your job to shut up and do what you get paid for

I don't work in customer service, but if I did, and someone (customer, boss, the pope, whoever) had that attitude, I'd tell them to get stuffed... Looking at it now, it's probably a good thing I don't work in customer service, I wouldn't have the patience to put up with half the crap some people in that field have to.

I swear, sometimes when I'm shopping, I see customers come in to stores just to take out their frustrations on someone they feel is there to "serve them" and therefore "take all their crap because their life sucks and they want to take it out on someone".

Treat them with respect and I find you get the same (and great service) in return. If not, I just don't shop there again.

[troppo]

I was going to mention another incident today as another example but it looks like there's one in progress...

I don't think it can be narrowed down or blamed on any particular group...sure I've been in stores where the level of apathy among staff has been outstanding but I've also marvelled at some of the behaviours of other customers while standing in queues. It happens just as often with people older than me as younger. The woman who near ran me down in a 30 zone while on a zebra crossing at the hospital today would've been at least 40 in the shade. If I'd thrown my leg out for one more step she would've had steelcap imprinted on her back door...and by Christ I was tempted. I also had a screwdriver handy and briefly considered holding it against the paint while she slipped past.

I've been doing a bit of work out at the hospital and it's seeing the sheer volume of idiots on the road out there that got me thinking about this post to begin with. On any given day there are about 40 cars illegally parked out there. I asked security who was responsible for traffic and parking on the hospital grounds during the first week...it seems they keep an eye on the hadicapped area right near the doors but the rest is up to council parking inspectors. I've never seen one there, indeed the only law enforcement of any sort I've witnessed on the hospital grounds was a police speed trap near the entrance where the speed limit drops to 40...and that only once.

When there were some TV crews out there to interview Mr Ramos Horta the other week, I jokingly asked if they were there to do a story on all the illegally parked cars there, and pointed to a rival crew's 4wd parked up on the lawn as a joke. No, they said rather sheepishly before quietly packing up and hopping into an unmarked 4wd parked on the lawn right next to the rival crew.

Last week I was stunned to see a notice on the wiper of an illegally parked car and had to check it out. A warning, not a fine, and only because it was parked on the zebra crossing in front of the gate, as well as on a yellow line in a no standing zone. I say only because of the zebra crossing because I counted 32 other cars parked on yellow lines, no standing zones, nature strips and driveways without moving from where I was next to the one with the notice. I spotted another dozen walking across the yard.
An awful big whinge about bad parking? Yep.
The kicker is that the carpark across the yard near where I have been working has been almost empty every single day..which leads me to the conclusion the only possible reason for it is laziness. They just CBF walking across the yard to the doors. Laziness is one of my pet hates, theres just no excuse for it.

[Falc'man]

Glad you brought this up Leon, its brought out alot of sentiments and good thoughts/feelings from a fair few who have this concern.

The problems today are a result of our own doing, nothing else. You reap what you sow, its as simple as that. And the solution is also as simple as that, you reap what you sow. Think good, and be good, and spread that goodness. No, no force required, its not my/your job to change people, buts it is our job/responsibilty to do good, with hope that one day you will influence others to do the same. Its very simple

But then you have the first problem. What is good? Who has the authority to decide right and what is wrong. Eg, If you tell a young teenager its rude to swear, he will most likely respond with "everyone does it, I can't see what your problem is".
Or if you tell another person, they mustn't ridicule others, they will also give some sort reply. The point I'm trying to make is, we all disagree on many many moral issues, the exact same issues which are at the heart of our problem. So the questions are again raised, what is good and what is bad? What is the standard of morals that we should adhere to that we can all agree on? Impossible to find such a thing?

Further to this there is another problem. Why should people do good? As given in your post above where people blatantly ignore simple traffic laws for the soul reason that there is no motive to do the right thing. And most certainly that is the other problem. That is, no fear of any reprimand and no incentive to do any good.

Lets draw our attention to the education system. I mean the home, not the school. The standard we set ourselves (as parents/guardians) will most likely be the standard the rest of our household would adhere to. Eg, A father approaches a wise man for some advice. He complains about his son not observing his fathers orders or wishes. In reply the wise man said, "I have the same problem, my son never listens to me either". At this point the father felt there was no hope since even the wise man had this problem, until the wise man added, "My son does what I do".

Then there the mediums we're exposed that praise things that have no value - but in reality have no value - and thus value is given to this worthless object or idea. In other words, we are quite easily influenced and sucked in by some with their own hidden agendas. But we can only be influenced by what we allow ourselves to be exposed to. Again, its out choice, we shouldn't blame anyone else. The devil didn't make you do it. You have the freedom of choice. Thats what makes you human, and hopefully, noble. Even the simplest of things which one may think have no harm do actually hold alot of harm, when they're designed to slowly turn you off what is good. What is good? Not many of us know anymore.

Our laws and freedoms and democracies aren't part of the problem either. One cannot blame a party for doing wrong when it is ourselves who put them there. These parties consist of people just like you and me, chosen by people like you and me. Sure, they may do wrong, and may do wrong by us as well, but we only get what we deserve, since thats the quality we have. "Politicians are liars" is something we may hear people say and joke about on a daily basis, but the fact is, they're only a representation and reflection of what we are. Generally. Not pointing the finger at any individual.

[troppo]

Originally Posted by Falc'man

Our laws and freedoms and democracies aren't part of the problem either. One cannot blame a party for doing wrong when it is ourselves who put them there. These parties consist of people just like you and me, chosen by people like you and me. Sure, they may do wrong, and may do wrong by us as well, but we only get what we deserve, since thats the quality we have. "Politicians are liars" is something we may hear people say and joke about on a daily basis, but the fact is, they're only a representation and reflection of what we are. Generally. Not pointing the finger at any individual.

Certainly we are ultimately responsible with regards to the behaviour of the younger generation. The kids can't possibly learn if we don't teach them and some of us are lazy teachers.

The standard of morals is difficult to teach given we accept widely varying levels of behaviour depending on circumstances. The best we can do is try to teach which behaviour is acceptable in which circumstances. Many find it just too hard.

I agree with a lot of what else you've said, especially about the media. Society is not aided in any way by reality TV shows where winning is based soley on selfishness and deception. Of course, without them there would be zero entertainment value and no point in making the show, but the result is it makes those traits appear virtuous to the impressionable.

I'm not so sure I agree with the last paragraph though. I don't necessarily blame any particular party or person, as you say, we elect them. I'm blaming us as a society for being generally apathetic towards anything our Governments do. Having grown up in a small country town where everyone knows each other, Council elections meant you actually personally knew all of the candidates and could therefore base a decision on a first-hand opinion. However on the next tier of Government, how many of us can say they know their Local member personally, and I mean more than an ability to recognise them. Indeed, those of us in cities, how many even know your local council memebrs personally? We vote blindly, and unless our vote is for one of the final two contenders, it gets handed over anyway through preferences. The system is set up to favour the party with the most candidates and realistically, only 2 or 3 parties can field candidates in all electorates. Theoretically, any independant could become PM but the reality is the PM will always come from the ranks of Liberal or Labour, until such time as another party matches them for numbers...pure and simple.

As for what to do about it, I can't see any way to fix it short of sacking the lot and replacing them with people who haven't learnt the ways of politcal deception. That said, unless we discover some method of testing people for integrity the replacements would go the same way eventually. Power corrupts and all that.

I'll save Freedom for tomorrow.

[Barry_v]

After a hard day of skateboarding inside shopping malls and spitting on the sidewalk Im ready for another round.

Originally Posted by daniel_rossy

im 17. and i have told 2 'when i was a lad' stories.
And these have happened in the space of two weeks...
unless you can prove i matured to an adult in a space of 2 weeks, so i can actually say that when 'i was a lad', i think you are wrong.

Im sorry, I dont speak stupid. if you're asking if i think you're an adult then.. no.

as for those speaking english, I too can pick random events and make it seem like things have changed. how about kids with fireworks in the 1960s? no letterbox was safe and kids lost fingers reguarly. i suppose that was harmless fun PLANTING EXPLOSIVES IN PEOPLES PROPERTY. dont hear about it much any more do you? kids today must be so much more mature than baby boomers (perhaps these menace to society should be called baby bombers?)

[troppo]

Nah...hear about it for a month either side of cracker night (NT) every year and every year there's calls for banning. One bloke lost an eye last year...which says something about looking into a failed firework to see why it didn't go off. It's a fun night.

[Barry_v]

Originally Posted by troppo

One bloke lost an eye last year...which says something about looking into a failed firework to see why it didn't go off.

for the sake of the genepool I hope he bled to death.

[troppo]

Lol, no...it wasn't serious enough to make him a contender for a Darwin award.

[gozza]

Originally Posted by Deadman

About the same time that customers decided to have attitudes like;



I don't work in customer service, but if I did, and someone (customer, boss, the pope, whoever) had that attitude, I'd tell them to get stuffed... Looking at it now, it's probably a good thing I don't work in customer service, I wouldn't have the patience to put up with half the crap some people in that field have to.

I swear, sometimes when I'm shopping, I see customers come in to stores just to take out their frustrations on someone they feel is there to "serve them" and therefore "take all their crap because their life sucks and they want to take it out on someone".

Treat them with respect and I find you get the same (and great service) in return. If not, I just don't shop there again.

I never said taking out frustrations on a service is acceptable -

Also when your paying money for something you are entitled to take a course of action to ensure you get what you paid for -

Smart A$$ employees who roll their eyes and whinge about simple requests should be punched - My attitude is fine

[OzJavelin]

Yeah, it's weird isn't it? We (Western culture) are a highly specialised society who rely on each other for everything - very few of us can build own own shelter, grow our own food, provide our own water/sewerage/power, provide our own security .. or even entertain ourselves.

Yet we lead increasing insular lives, apparently have very little respect for very few others, yet expect all the interactions to just work without or participation. If a critical mass of society members adopt the "stuff you" attitude nothing will get done, the society will eventually fail.

An individual human isn't a very impressive creature - we are week, slow and defenceless. We are only useful as a cohesive group. It's a shame we are kind of moving in a reverse evolution phase ...

[Homer1]

Originally Posted by WILDB

Continuing on about what I was saying about people not having any respect for other people's belongings I was sitting in my car the other day sending an SMS after work and this woman comes flying into the carpark next to me and slams her door into mine. I had the window down and said what the F*%& do you think you are doing? and she replied "who cares its your car not mine and its just a Ford." JUST A FORD! I had to restrain myself from taking the key out of the ignition and making it her car's problem.

I would've let the air out of her tyres when she was out of sight. That way you wouldn't lower yourself to her level by damaging her car but still give her what she deserved :

[GK]

Originally Posted by troppo

Us 'old' people have had the experience of being young..have you experienced what it's like to be old?

My Secondary students hate it when I tell them this! LOL!

It's so true though! LOL!

GK

[GK]

Originally Posted by OzJavelin

An individual human isn't a very impressive creature - we are week, slow and defenceless. We are only useful as a cohesive group.

Disagree with you here. Each person has the incredible potential to do amazing things, hard wired into them.

Just looking at the gazillion systems in humans shows us that we are a masterpiece of design. Try building a machine to replicate everything we are capable of. Can't be done! Humans rock!

Originally Posted by OzJavelin

It's a shame we are kind of moving in a reverse evolution phase ...

I'd say that it's a case of a created people moving further and further away from the Creator.

That's why society is becoming more damaged, more self obsessed, more greedy, more cut throat etc, etc. We largely keep turning away from the social and moral convictions that a few short decades ago were taken for granted (and work!). When we continue to worship ourselves, we can only really become more selfish.

Of course there's always great continuing examples of kindness and goodness and generosity that shine a light through the growing darkness. There always will be which is great. But ultimately, we are in bondage to decay, moral, social and physical, etc, etc.

Just the way it is. HOWEVER each person has built within them the capacity to shine. It's just a matter of where people draw the power to run their light!

That's my 2 cents.

I've enjoyed this thread!

GK

[troppo]

Thanks for the input GK.
I'd be inclined to agree with your assessment of individual humans. I"m reminded of another movie I forget the name of but it was an aussie movie about local politics but one of the characters (pollie) in the movie makes the comment that people are stupid. When questioned, he clarifies it by saying "
I didn't say a person was stupid, a person is an intelligent, free thinking individual...I said people are stupid."

Fooling the masses is easy when they really don't care if they are being fooled and something about being in a crowd makes us throw common sense out the window in certain situations. Lynch mobs, rioting...that sort of thing is the worst case scenario but ask anyone involved in live entertainment how fickle a crowd can be. Even the emotion around the Sydney Olympics was interesting to observe from afar. Maybe you had to be there but I just couldn't get wrapped up in it like the rest of the country seemed to. The media was saturated with stories at the time and even the news wasn't safe to read or watch without half the content being Olympic related. That in itself raises interesting questions about how much of an influence the media has on us as a whole, I guess.

As for movement away from the creator being to blame and without turning this into a religious debate, I'll just say it may be another piece of the puzzle. There's no doubt a smaller percentage of the population now attend religious services regularly than say 30 years ago. It may well be that the regular services and sermons some of us were exposed to as youngsters helped keep us in check in some way, but even if that's accurate, it still comes back to the change in values between generations.

I'd also agree with what you said about finding examples of kindness and generosity. Who knows if the good evens out with the bad though, it certainly isn't braodcast in even amounts. But yes, just when you think humans are doomed and become a cynic, somone slaps you out of it with an unxpected act of kindness....I hope I can hold out till the next one

I read this thread again from the start and there have been some good points made. It seems the scope of problems with society is very broad indeed and many of the points raised quite possibly deserve their own threads.

Anyway, us old folk need our sleep so we can be up with the birds....

[[Tonko]]

Originally Posted by gozza

Also - the customer has a right to complain - Its your job to shut up and do what you get paid for

I asked for cup trays because humans have 2 arms - I ordered 3 Drinks.

The beast that served me rolling her eyes and huffed and puffed - When did customer service die?

You don't argue with customers .I. .I.

Awww, poor baby got someone that could not read your mind...
I will not make assumptions, but going by your explination, you gave this person a serving about it.

As for being doing what we are being paid for, I dont remember "taking rude peoples bullshiit" being a part of it.

Customer service has not died, common courtesy has.

Working in a Bottle shop, i see alot of the worst stuff, i have been called every name under the sun for refusing a drunk... Racist, rude, arrogant, liar and many, many the swear filter will not allow.

Just the basic things annoy me, people ignoring me, throwing money (literally) and ones that complain about the prices, as if i pull a random figure from my *** and slap it on anything.

Just think, How would you like it?
Treat people how you would like to be treated.


/end rant.

[BA GT-HO]

This is why I am moving to the Yorke Penninsula (country coastline) with my boat and living a simple existance.. Nuts to the big cities and the people that inhabit them..