Not doing stuff- that I can do! I’m good at not doing stuff.
I can understand why using drugs might be fun, but wouldn’t it be more fun if there were no possibility of something bad happening as a result? That’s the part I don’t get.
Sure, but only cause everyone else was, ya darn follower.
The problem with kids these days, is that polls aren’t accurate enough. Kids need to be able to wake in the morning, see that 51% of kids are or are not doing drugs, and be able to make an informed decision about being a trend-setter and not a follower.
Or to put it another way, how much do you need to know about an individual to be able to determine if their non-drug-use is their own conscious decision, or just a wimpy submission to authority? A 10-year acquaintenceship? A one-hour interview? A peek at their playlist?
I always thought that once the old ‘bourbon-and-branchwater was good enough for my Daddy’ geezers were out of the way, we Boomers might have a chance at legalizing cannabis. Now we’re gonna have to fight with the kids about it, too? Jesus. I hope Nancy Reagan roasts in hell.
We’re supposed to believe all these polls that say that kids these days aren’t toking up? Yeah, right. The ones who are are just scared shitless to admit it.
(Not saying that you do, just that the ‘fear factor’ has to be skewing the poll results.)
FWIW, I disagree with Trunk that part of the fun is the risk of getting caught. Nothing fucks up a good buzz like paranoia. I rather think that the ‘fun’ in that regard is the feeling of the civil disobedience of largely unjust laws… as long as there’s little chance of actually being caught. Of course, YMMV if adrenaline rushes are your idea of a good high.
Eight tabs of X - 8 years.
Not probation.
-Joe, not me
Just curious, what should she have posted?
Dude, you’re a curmudgeon. Nobody but curmudgeons begins a sentence like that. Shake your cane, pretend like kids today aren’t as cool as you were when you were a kid, and head down to the shuffleboard court for your afternoon exercise.
Or try this: what do you think your parents were saying about your generation when y’all were young? Were they saying, “Look at these cool kids, with their exciting drug rebellions”? Shit no: they weren’t understanding what the fuck you were doing, and so they were treating you with contempt borne out of a strange mixture of ignorance and experience.
“Supposed” is an ironic word to use there. First, if it’s fun because you’re supposed to do what they tell you not to do (which sounds like a more accurate phrasing of your point), you’re still responding to authority. Second, here you are trying to tell the younger generation what they should do. Third, the younger generation seems to be happily getting along without your advice, and it’s just steaming you up.
Kinda funny, really.
Daniel
Shut up. Shut up! Jesus Fuck- SHUT UP!
Every generation thinks the generation after it sucks. Every one. Yet, somehow society goes on. Amazing.
Here’s a clip of the journalism student in question on NPR from yesterday. She’s definitely not the sharpest knife in the drawer, but I think she’ll get something good out of her trip.
Believe it. My step sister is on probation right now… they searched her car with a dog because it was on school property they didn’t need a warrant or permission. She got busted for posession and was sent to an alternative school for her senior year and a year of probation… with random drug testing. If she fails her drug tests she gets to go to jail. The ONLY reason she’s not in jail is she Was a minor at the time. You cannot, and I can’t stress this enough, CANNOT count on a ‘slap on the wrist’ anymore.
How about some actual THOUGHTS (those things that rattle about in some people’s heads) about heading off to AFRICA with an op-ed columnist from the NEW YORK TIMES.
You can’t tell me that the most you would expect from a graduate student in journalism – or really, anyone with a college education – in that situation is a fucking playlist.
They were saying we listened to devil music, wore out hair too long, our clothes too baggy, did too many drugs, had too much sex, drank too much, and drove too fast.
They sure as shit weren’t saying, “you’re music is too soft; your behavior is too appropriate.”
If being a fucking pansy is what it takes today to be a rebel, give me the conformists.
But essentially, you’re saying “why aren’t those kids doing stuff that we were doing at their age?” Which is exactly what previous generations were saying.
(Not to mention that the complaint echoes those of the outskirts of society sneering at those who are successful. “Why aren’t they doing the ultimately counterproductive stuff that I like to do?”)
No, actually: they were saying that you were a bunch of self-absorbed, shallow little shits who didn’t stand for anything and who had turned their backs on what was important in life. They might have said, looking at the sixties and seventies, “If being a fucking pansy is what it takes today to be a rebel, give me the conformists.”
Daniel
No, what I’m saying is that the culture behind you should tend to be more outrageous in the older generations eyes, not more toned down.
The problem – my thread title notwithstanding – is that there is no reason for an older generation to say, “Kids, today. . .” because the “kids today” have apparently turned out to be tamer than their parents.
I guess I overlooked that the “kids today” didn’t want to get caught. That was my oversight. Previous generations didn’t have to worry about “getting caught”.
For what it’s worth, Casey’s subsequent blog entries have been much more interesting.
Jesus, you people are appalling.
Kids today don’t have the sex we and the generation before us did because YOU CAN DIE from it.
That said,Blow Jobs are the new standard. More of a hand shake than a sex act, (thanks again Bill) and kids still consider themselves virgins afterward. Kids should experiment, no doubt, but fer Christs sake, it’s not a business transaction.
And drugs? What the fuck? I, honestly, am all for the legalization of pot. It carries the same level of danger as Alcohol over time, and doesn’t induce violence like booze sometimes can. Still though, it’s illegal, and is so for several reasons, not the least of which the culture of violence that surrounds all illicit drugs. Admittedly, this would fix if they’d legalize it, at least for pot. I don’t even smoke the stuff, and I can see the sense in legalization.
It’s not fuckin hip, cool, or rebellious to expose yourself to some chemical you buy off of some guy in an alley. You can’t trust the supply, and in my opinion, you never could. You boomers can wax nostalgic about getting high in the basement at your friends mom’s house if you like, but you’ve got to know that today is a different world. It’s not Mikey from down the block growing his supply in the woods across the street, it’s a cartel from Jalisco pushing tons of weight over the border in Home Depot trucks. It’s not about eating a couple shrooms and veggin’ out in front of a deep purple black light poster for 5 hours, it’s about downing 3 X tabs and having sex with random people until you pass out. It’s not about taking a couple of speed pills to cram for a test or lose a few pounds, it’s about your neighbor making meth in his bedroom to sell to your little brother and his friends. Then turning your neighborhood into a superfund site because he wasn’t a careful enough cook.
With all that said, kids today ARE soft, though in different ways. This is TRULY the ‘ME’ generation. MySpace, MY Playlist, me me me. The smaller the world gets and the more we know about the people who live in it, the farther apart we become, because we realize that, upon closer examination, people are fuckin weird. The only thing they have left is to take the things they like and know, and look for people who like the same things, and the easiest way to do that is in front of this contraption.
IMO, “kids” have been soft though for a long time, because they remain untested.
To quote Charles Bukowski,
“The trouble with these people is that their cities have never been bombed and their mothers have never been told to shut up.”
/hijack
Re: The OP, I’m going to reserve judgement (same as DavenportAvenger) until later. It’s too soon to tell.
It also used to be that you were barred from receiving federal education loans if you had a drug offense on record. I don’t know if this is true anymore but I clearly remember answering the question on my forms.
EXACTLY…because the fucking old people have taken away what little responsibility kids DID have at one time.
As someone just exiting the younger generation (I’m 23) I assure you there is PLENTY of support for marijuana legalization in my generation. Just because we may or may not be smoking it, doesn’t mean we’re not smart enough to make a rational judgement on whether prohibition is a good idea. I, like you, do not (and have never) smoke marijuana yet would strongly support legalization.
Kids are soft because every responsibility has been taken away from them. Curfew laws are being passed, driving restrictions are becoming tigher…shit (this is the pit isn’t it…oh yeah)…SHIT…in some school districts they can’t even choose their own fucking clothes in the morning.
And people wonder why kids these days want everything given to them…BECAUSE IT’S WHAT YOU’VE FUCKING BEEN DOING!
Just remember whenever you bitch about kids…you reap what you sow.
I can’t read the blog, so I can’t say anything about her comments as a whole.
But the point of a blog is that not everything has to be an earth-shattering, finished piece. I’ve always heard that when you can’t think of what to write about, the best solution is to just write something, and those warm-ups and personal asides that would have been hidden in an old-school columnist’s Moleskine make it into the final product on a blog.
This sounds like something I would do. Music is a big part of my consciousness, and writing down what I was listening to when I left on my adventure would help me remember how I was feeling when I looked back on it later. My travel journals have often started with mundane details–lists of what I’m taking with me, expected itineraries, etc.
Again, I haven’t seen the blog, and the rest of it may be truly vapid. But I wouldn’t draw this conclusion based on the fact that she posted a playlist.
As others have pointed out, there are still harsh penalties out there for marijuana possession. They’re pretty arbitrary, usually given out when a local PD or politician needs to look “tough on drugs”, but they exist.
The law isn’t the end of it, though, at least for those of us who are employed. Every major employer in my area does random drug testing. Just about everybody I know who isn’t self-employed could potentially be fired after a single positive test for marijuana, which could result from a single joint smoked weeks, or even (for those companies that do hair tests) months ago. It just isn’t worth it.
You just beat 4000 other people in a contest to travel with Nicholas Kristof for 2-3 weeks in Africa.
You’re going to Equatorial Guinea, Cameroon, possibly Libya, Cantral African Republic, Chad – to meet with dictators, observe AIDS clinics in sub-sahara, perhaps see refuge camps caused by genocidal regimes.
You’re a graduate student in journalism.
You’re getting a chance to write a publicized blog in the New York Times.
You’re going to tell me that you think it’s just fine that on the eve of this adventure that you post your playlist?
No wonder people think journalism standards have fallen. If this kind of thing is all people expect. . .why the fuck not? It’s a lot easier to list what’s on your iPod than actually do work.
As I said before. . .for what it’s worth, her subsequent entries have been more interesting.
That is still true, my boyfriend works in financial aid and he’s had to tell people that they couldn’t get it because they had a drug offense.
I’m not going to comment on the whole kids today stuff but man that was a really mundane, boring, stupid entry. I mean, all she had to do was type a little bit about her thoughts or maybe her fears on going to a new country.