okay. I just got this from my extreme right-wing mother-in-law

[lavenderdiva]

by e-mail, and I just don't know where to begin to respond. Help. That's all I can say at this point.

While I agree with some of what it says, when I got to the end, at the part about "before the lawyers and the government regulated our lives for our own good." THAT's the part where I draw the line.

here's what she e-mailed me:

*TO ALL THE KIDS WHO WERE BORN IN THE *

1930's 40's, 50's, 60's and 70's !!

*First, we survived being born to mothers who smoked
and/or drank while they carried us. *

*They took aspirin, ate blue cheese dressing, tuna from a
can, and didn't get tested for diabetes. *

*
Then after that trauma, our baby cribs were covered with
bright colored
lead-based paints. *

We had no childproof lids on medicine bottles, doors or
cabinets and when we
rode our bikes, we had no helmets, not to mention, the
risks we took
hitchhiking.

*As children, we would ride in cars with no seat belts or
air bags. *

*
Riding in the back of a pick up on a warm day was always a
special treat. *

*We drank water from the garden hose and NOT from a bottle. *

*
We shared one soft drink with four friends, from one
bottle and NO ONE
actually died from this. *

*
We ate cupcakes, white bread and real butter and drank
soda pop with sugar in it, but we weren't overweight because *

*WE WERE ALWAYS OUTSIDE PLAYING*!

*
We would leave home in the morning and play all day, as
long as we were back *when the streetlights came on.

*
No one was able to reach us all day. And we were O.K. *

*
We would spend hours building our go-carts out of scraps
and then ride down *the hill, only to find out we forgot
the brakes. After running into the
bushes a few times, we learned to solve the problem.


We did not have Playstations, Nintendo's, X-boxes, no
video games at all, no
99 channels on cable, no video tape movies, no surround
sound, no cell *
phones, no personal computers, no Internet or Internet chat
rooms..........WE HAD FRIENDS and we went outside and
found them! *


We fell out of trees, got cut, broke bones and teeth and
there were no lawsuits from these accidents.

*
*We ate worms and mud pies made from dirt, and the worms
did not live in us forever.

*
We were given BB guns for our 10th birthdays, *
made up games with sticks and tennis balls and although we
were told it would happen, we did not put out very many eyes.
*
We rode bikes or walked to a friend's house and knocked on
the door or rang the bell, or just yelled for them! *


Little League had tryouts and not everyone made the team.
Those who didn't had to learn to deal with disappointment.
Imagine that!!


The idea of a parent bailing us out if we broke the law
was unheard of. They
actually sided with the law!


This generation has produced some of the best risk-takers,
problem solvers
and inventors ever!

The past 50 years have been an explosion of innovation and
new ideas.

*We had freedom, failure, success and responsibility, and
we learned… *

*HOW TO DEAL WITH IT _ALL_! *

*And YOU are one of them! **CONGRATULATIONS!*


*You might want to share this with others who have had the
luck and good fortune to grow up as
/kids/, before the lawyers and the government regulated
our lives for our own good. *

*…and while you are at it, forward it to your kids so they
will know how brave their parents were. *

Kind of makes you want to run through the house with
scissors, doesn't it?!



Of course, almost anything she even says to me at this point, is like nails on a blackboard...

[tuvor]

1. I got that recently, too, except for the last three paragraphs.

You might want to ask her which government is regulating American lives for their own good.

[Lars39]

2. I'd be tempted to send her this article:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=102x2034065

[lavenderdiva]

4. In a 'normal' person, I think this might resonate...

however, she absolutely believes that global warming is a myth. She doesn't believe it has ever happened, is happening, or will happen... What can you say? I've gotten to the point where I just don't really even try to converse with her.

[Lars39]

8. Folks like that don't deal in reality very much.

My inlaws have shut themselves off like that.
Not much to talk about with them after they get past church gossip and why granny had to go to the doctor.

They're cocooning themselves into early senility.

[deadparrot]

3. The Pure Food and Drugs Act and the Meat Inspection Act are,

off the top of my head, two examples of so-called "government regulation" that I'm sure we're all pretty thankful exist.

Not to mention:
Infant mortality is used to compare the health and well-being of populations across and within countries. The infant mortality rate, the rate at which babies less than one year of age die, has continued to steadily decline over the past several decades, from 26.0 per 1,000 live births in 1960 to 6.9 per 1,000 live births in 2000. The United States ranked 28th in the world in infant mortality in 1998. This ranking is due in large part to disparities which continue to exist among various racial and ethnic groups in this country, particularly African Americans.

http://www.cdc.gov/omh/AMH/factsheets/infant.htm

[Left Is Write]

5. Interesting...I received that from my mother a while back.

WITHOUT any reference to the government or lawyers or brave parents.

[lavenderdiva]

7. I really don't mind the 'nostalgic' references...

its when she starts in with the government regulation bit, that I take issue. Of course, she voted and tried to get my husband to vote for the Texas legislation that would limit your right to sue insurers and limit what you could receive IF you perchance could file a lawsuit. Interesting dynamic huh? She goes on about how wonderful the world was when we had less regulation, but then VOTES for MORE regulation.

typical...

[Left Is Write]

36. I like the nostalgia too...

I just found it interesting that you received it from a conservative WITH the "government regulations" added on, and I received it from a liberal without those additions. :)

[lavenderdiva]

40. That IS interesting!

seems like its been sent 'round a bit, huh?

[Ikonoklast]

6. I was born in the 50's

I remember sonic booms from supersonic fighters and watching bombers scrambled during the Cuban Missile crisis. I remember going past the Nike Missile sites that ringed the city and seeing them raised and ready to fire. I remember being scared when my parents talked about it, because they felt so helpless.

Oh, yeah, those rose-colored glasses work every time.

[LibDemAlways]

10. I remember trucks going up and down

the streets of my New Jersey neighborhood in the 50's spraying pesticides into the air. I remember "drop drills" in school and "fallout shelter" signs on buildings because, I was told, the Russians might drop a bomb on me at any time. I remember my mother being injured in a traffic accident because she kept turning around to make sure my baby brother was ok since she had put him down on the back seat and had no way of strapping him in. I remember getting really sick with measles, mumps, and chicken pox. My husband will certainly never forget when his 41 year old mother died on the table during heart surgery in 1963 when he was 12 because medical advances that would have helped her were a decade or two away.

I have to agree.....that e-mail is a bunch of crap.

[hickman1937]

9. I grew up with all of this, and it was maybe a easier time but,

this part,
This generation has produced some of the best risk-takers,
problem solvers
and inventors ever! ,

is the crap. My generation ran with their freedom and then decided to deny it too the next generations. Why? Follow the money. As more money gets sucked out of the middle class into the wealthy, we all become hogs at the trough.

[Hong Kong Cavalier]

11. I got the same email...

I even hammered out a reply...if you can wait 10 minutes...I'll post it...

[lavenderdiva]

12. thanks, I'd be interested in reading your reply....

[Hong Kong Cavalier]

14. And here it is...

For some reason, I was very angry when I typed this reply.
Not surprising, the person who sent this to me never mentioned it again. It's not my best work, but
then again, I was very, very angry. Pre-packaged nostalgic crap pisses me off. Everything here was taken word for word...
my version misspelled "inventors" near the bottom (it shows up as "iventors")
y replies are in italics

> This is for all of you...i think you will find it very true.
>
> TO ALL THE KIDS WHO SURVIVED THE 30’S-40’S-50’S-60’S-AND 70’S
>
> FIRST, WE SURVIVED BEING BORN TO MOTHERS WHO SMOKED AND/OR DRANK WHILE THEY CARRIED US.

Have you actually seen someone suffering from Fetal Alcohol Syndrome? I'm surprised you'd make light of this.
My mom's a nurse and she's told me some of the COMPLETELY PREVENTABLE horrors of FAS. Here's a link: www.nofas.org

> THEY TOOK ASPIRIN, ATE BLUE CHEESE DRESSING, TUNA FROM A CAN, AND DIDN’T GET TESTED FOR DIABETES.

And we didn't know that children taking aspirin could cause Reye's syndrome. But we do now. Here's a link www.reyessyndrome.org
And why DON'T we get tested for diabetes? There's a lot more sugar in the world today, and medical science knows a lot more about diabetes now then it did (Did you know McDonald's puts sugar in their buns?)
And have you noticed that the good tuna comes only in the foil pack that's twice as expensive as the can? And I still eat tuna from a can. It's pretty much the same as...wait for it...TUNA SALAD!!!

> THEN AFTER THAT TRAUMA, OUR BABY CRIBS WERE COVERED WITH BRIGHT COLORED LEAD-BASED PAINTS.

Uh-huh. Whoever wrote this really, really needs to suffer from lead poisoning. Then they can get back to me.

> WE HAD NO CHILDPROOF LIDS ON MEDICINE BOTTLES, DOORS OR CABINETS AND WHEN WE RODE OUR BIKES WE HAD NO HELMETS, NOT TO MENTION THE RISKS WE TOOK HITCHHIKING.

"The risks we took hitchhiking"? Might as well slap a sign on me that says "KILL ME, I'M STUPID!" and walk down the highway. People did die when hitchhiking in the "good ol' days" but due to the lack of over-saturation of the media (we had 3, maybe four channels in the 70's) we didn't hear about it as much. Hell, we didn't even have news channels dropping everything important to follow a "runaway bride" or a "pretty girl" who disappeared from a vacation spot where people have disappeared in the past.

> AS CHILDREN, WE WOULD RIDE IN CARS WITH NO SEAT BELTS OR AIR BAGS.

And probably died when the car would get into an accident. Cars are driving faster than ever now. Considering that we know a lot more about how to keep someone safe in a car while driving at high (or even low) speeds, can you blame them? Remind me never to ride with you. Have you ever seen what an unbuckled human body does in a high-speed accident? Three words: Human death missile.

> RIDING IN THE BACK OF A PICK UP TRUCK ON A WARM DAY WAS A SPECIAL TREAT.

But falling out of the "pick up" (sic) truck caused a bloody, horrific accident and left a lot of parents crying.

> WE DRANK WATER FROM THE GARDEN HOSE AND NOT FROM A BOTTLE.

Arsenic, anyone? How about mercury? Haven't those two yummy chemicals have increased in our water supply? I know I keep my arsenic and mercury locked up tight, so I have no idea who's dumping it. Actually, I do, But That's Another Story (Cue Conan the Barbarian theme)

> WE SHARED ONE SOFT DRINK WITH FOUR FRIENDS, FROM ONE BOTTLE, AND NO ONE ACTUALLY DIED FROM THIS.

And people do this all the time today, even. They even swap more than just spit. But when someone backwashes in your soda (usually deliberately), didn't you want to kick their ass? Or did you still drink it?

> WE ATE CUPCAKES, WHITE BREAD AND REAL BUTTER AND DRANK SODA POP WITH SUGAR IN IT, BUT WE WEREN’T OVERWEIGHT BECAUSE WE WERE ALWAYS OUTSIDE PLAYING.

No, there were some pretty overweight kids in my youth. But that's a whole different story, considering the explosion of fast food places, and the massive lack of time most two-income families have just to make ends meet these days, they tend to eat out a lot more. I'm surprised you didn't mention raw eggs and cookie dough.

> WE WOULD LEAVE HOME IN THE MORNING AND PLAY ALL DAY, AS LONG AS WE WERE BACK WHEN THE STREETLIGHTS CAME ON.

Yes, well, times have changed, and no amount of pre-packaged nostalgia like this chain e-mail will change that.

> NO ONE WAS ABLE TO REACH US ALL DAY AND WE WERE OK.

Your parents probably never let on they were worried occasionally. Or you lived in a very small town. Or if they did, that's why they were mad at you. Also, see previous reply.

> WE WOULD SPEND HOURS BUILDING OUR GO-CARTS OUT OF SCRAPS AND THEN RIDE DOWN THE HILL, ONLY TO FIND OUT WE FORGOT TO ADD BRAKES. AFTER RUNNING INTO THE BUSHES A FEW TIMES, WE LEARNED TO SOLVE THE PROBLEM.

I never built a go-cart out of scraps. Besides, there's a lot more cars on the road now. And besides, what kid doesn't think of brakes? Probably one who munched on their lead-painted crib when they were a baby.

> WE DID NOT HAVE PLAYSTATIONS, NINTENDO’S, X-BOXES, NO VIDEO GAMES AT ALL, NO 99 CHANNELS ON CABLE, NO VIDEO TAPE MOVIES, NO SURROUND SOUND, NO CELL PHONES OR PERSONAL COMPUTERS, NO INTERNET OR INTERNET CHAT ROOMS…WE HAD FRIENDS AND WENT OUTSIDE AND FOUND THEM.

As I said: times have changed. If your kids are planting their butts in front the X-Box, then turn it off and lock it up. Don't blame Microsoft.

> WE FELL OUT OF TREES, GOT CUT, BROKE BONES AND TEETH, AND THERE WERE NO LAWSUITS FROM THESE ACCIDENTS.

Yes there were lawsuits. And any sane parent would want to know why their child broke their arm climbing in a tree. Whether that led to a lawsuit or not is something that can't be easily dismissed by this e-mail.

> WE ATE WORMS AND MUD-PIES MADE FROM DIRT, AND THE WORMS DID NOT LIVE IN US.

Um...no I didn't. And that's gross.

> WE WERE GIVEN BB GUNS FOR OUR 10TH BIRTHDAYS, MADE UP GAMES WITH STICKS AND GUNS AND TENNIS BALLS, AND ALTHOUGH WE WERE TOLD IT WOULD HAPPEN, WE DID NOT PUT OUT VERY MANY EYES.

So? Can you blame a parent for being cautious? They love their children.

> WE RODE BIKES OR WALKED TO FRIENDS HOUSES AND KNOCKED ON THE DOOR OR RANG THE BELL OR JUST WALKED INAND TALKED TO THEM.'

Kids still do that now. Are you implying there's an aura of distrust in the world?

> LITTLE LEAGUE HAD TRYOUTS AND NOT EVERYONE MADE THE TEAM. THOSE WHO DIDN’T HAD TO LEARN TO DEAL WITH DISAPOINTMENT. IMAGINE THAT!!

Still happens. Crap nostalgia like this e-mail doesn't make things any different. Besides, have you actually seen some of these sports parents? They're more into the sport then their children are.

> THE IDEA OF A PARENT BAILING US OUT IF WE BROKE THE LAW WAS UNHEARD OF. OUR PARENTS ACTUALLY SIDED WITH THE LAW.

Also still happens. And parents did bail out their children in the past, especially if they had the money for it. This is a pile of crap.

> THIS GENERATION HAD PRODUCED SOME OF THE BEST RISK TAKERS, PROBLEM SOLVERS, AND IVENTORS EVER.

Uh huh. Yeah, right, sure it did. But it's not because they were munching on lead paint and head butting trees. This generation obviously can't produce some of the best spellers. It's spelled "inventors", dumbass.
I know this isn't your e-mail but the fact that this chain e-mail has made it this far without a this spelling correction is really, truly sad in this day of "the best risk takers, problem solvers, and iventors (sic) ever." And it pisses me off to no end.

> THE PAST 50 YEARS HAVE BEEN AN EXPLOSION OF INNOVATION AND NEW IDEAS. WE HAD FREEDOM, FAILURE, SUCCESS AND RESPONSIBILITY, AND WE LEARNED HOW TO DEAL WITH IT ALL.

So was the Renaissance,. Or the Industrial age. Everything looks better on this side of the fence, doesn't it? And like I said, it's not because of nostalgia. Just wait 50 years and you'll be singing a different tune when you're in your flying car (where is my flying car, by the way? It's 2005 and I have no flying car!) or taking the shuttle to Mars Colony.

> AND IF YOU ARE FROM OUR GENERATION, CONGRATUALTIONS!

Yay. Pre-packaged nostalgia that wasn't necessarily true.
You left out the Depression, the Red Scare and McCarthyism, the Cuban Missile Crisis, the Berlin Wall, the Civil Rights Movement, the assassinations of the Rev. MLK, JFK, and Bobbie Kennedy, Vietnam, Watergate, and a whole lot other stuff that made the time mentioned in the subject more than just "the good ol' days". No wonder most people don't take History classes in college; it's probably too depressing.

This pre-packaged nostalgia e-mail has been making the rounds ever since e-mail started becoming common, which is a huge heap-o-irony, if you think about it. But I'm a little surprised you'd think I would "find it very true."

[lavenderdiva]

16. golly, that's good!

very well-thought out. Would you mind if I use some of these retorts, if I decide to reply to MIL's e-mail?

[Hong Kong Cavalier]

18. Use the whole thing, if you'd like.

In fact, I'd love to see rebuttals like this making the rounds as much as the original emails did...
Good luck!

I almost wish my "friend" (I can't consider a Bush supporter a friend anymore, honestly. How can I call someone my friend if they dont' share my values?)
replied, but I find it fascinating that he didn't ever mention it again. :evilgrin:

[Straight Shooter]

20. I'm sure all the old folks long for the nostalgia of polio.

Thanks for an awesome rebuttal.

:yourock:

[Hong Kong Cavalier]

22. Why thank you.

I totally forgot about polio!

[hyphenate]

13. And

we almost all had

uncles who never married, who were afraid to come out of the closet;

the priests who gave "private" catechism classes to lucky boys and girls;

daddy's friends who tried to sneak peeks up our dresses or rubbed their hands on our underwear;

and relatives who died young because they never knew about heart disease and smoking, and cancer risks, and other such illnesses;

and don't forget those children in slums and public housing who ended up with brain damage from the lead paint on all the woodwork;

and we must not forget the children who got asthma from cockroach droppings;

and all the people with ulcers who didn't know it could be helped by an antibiotic;

and we must not forget all the people who were killed by picking up strangers and hitchhikers along roads;

or the amount of alcoholism that was generated from people of these eras, where our brothers, sisters and even ourselves might have to live with the consequences of that addiction forever;

and finally, about the damage done to the psyches of anyone with an abusive parent, who beat the living shit out of us if we crossed them even the slightest, or the mothers who were also beaten, but were controlled to the extent that even if they wanted to get out, they didn't have the ability to know where to go, not likely either that shelters were around much in those days, either.




These are just some of the ones I can think of.

[lavenderdiva]

15. oohhh. those are GOOD!!

[Hong Kong Cavalier]

17. Looks like we're on the same wavelength, Hyphenate...

:hi:

[NMMNG]

21. And don't forget

Women treated as property, and abused by their husbands for not providing sex/not having dinner on the table on time/voicing an opinion/etc.

Blacks lynched, awakened to burning crosses on their front lawns, stolen away in the night by men in white hoods, and overall treated like second-class citizens.

Millions of developmentally disabled children and adults thrown into institutions where they were abused and neglected, as well as made to participate in horrific medical and psychological experiements without their consent.

The Eugenics Movement, designed to rid the nation of undesirables like the mentally ill, the disabled, the "socially inferior", etc. http://www.eugenicsarchive.org/eugenics/">Interactive Eugenics Image Archive

[Kathryn STone]

19. The idea of a parent bailing us out if we broke the law...

was unheard of. They actually sided with the law!

What a bunch of redneck bs.
They need to reverse it: what if granny got Alzheimer's: heck just leaver her there at home. That's the way to toughen her up.

how plain wrong. My boyfriend's brother has a felony arrest for robbery with a knife.
btw he's a concert violinist. just depressed and on wrong meds. Oh yeah, let's make him go to "Oz"
I have received this email and many more like it. Nice to see somebody speak out against it.

[MountainLaurel]

33. Absolutely BS

I have two friends, both of whom have uncles who were busted with drugs in the 1960s and bailed out by their parents, who had to sell family heirlooms to keep their asses from going to jail. And if you look at many upper-class families, they're full of tales of ttenaged offspring and drunk driving arrests, assault charges, rape charges, not-so-accidental accidents that just went away.

[Kathryn STone]

35. I'm not sure what you are meaning to say to me rop

I must be too blonde or just daft. Do you mean that rich people especially celebrities (phil spector, robert blake, oj simpson) get away with crime big time crime more? pls advise

[MountainLaurel]

37. Not sure who rop is

But if you were mentioning my post, I meant to say that the concept about parents siding with the law if their kid got in trouble was pretty much a myth, particularly if the kid is from a wealthy family (e.g., Michael Skakel).

[Kathryn STone]

38. rop=read on -please nm=no more, got it from another site

[MountainLaurel]

39. Thanks!

:hi:

[RebelOne]

23. Well, I grew up in the 40s, 50s and 60s and I have survived just fine.

I think your reply to her was a bit too harsh

[pokerfan]

24. Ah, those were the good old days!

I've included what I consider to be a pretty reasonable article on the subject. My mother suffered from post-polio syndrome all her life. I'm grateful for the medical tech that allowed my father to live an additional twenty-seven years following his first heart attack and the therapies that allowed my sister to survive cancer.

To the neo-luddite who penned the original essay, I say, "fuck the good old days."


Ah, those were the good old days!
By Georgette Huff
THE REVIEW • 2/16/2004

Not long ago I walked into a store as the clerks were having a conversation among themselves. I’m a “regular” at that store so they included me in the conversation, which centered on a familiar theme: “I don’t remember things ever being this bad. I wish we could go back to how it used to be.”

You’ve heard it, too, haven’t you, and always in the same somber tones, accompanied by rueful expressions and head-shaking. I can’t remember a period in my life when I haven’t heard it, and you know what? It’s annoying.

Oh, sure. There are moments when we long for those days gone by, when, in our memories at least, it seemed that life was soooo much simpler. And kinder. And better, somehow. But, the thing is, when it was the good old days, people were wishing for the even better ones before that. In other words, the human condition seems to be one of perpetual dissatisfaction.

But, OK, I try to keep an open mind about some things, so I’m willing to look back on those halcyon days of yore.

Let’s begin with health issues. Never mind the “Black Plague” of the 14th century, which eradicated nearly one-third of Europe’s population; the early 20th century had its own horror, an influenza epidemic that killed 22 million people.

Before the discovery of penicillin, one of the first “miracle drugs,” people routinely died from everyday infections and curable diseases such as pneumonia.

And until the Salk and Sabin vaccines effectively put an end to polio outbreaks, every parent’s fear was that their child would be next. (My childhood was marked by my mother’s dread as the “dog days” approached. Swimming was forbidden; nor could we over-exert ourselves in any way. That may not have been how polio was transmitted, but you’d never have convinced my mother, so we were restricted to sedentary activities every August.)

Thanks to amazing strides in medicine and widespread common knowledge of good health care, some of the scourges of the past have disappeared and others are no longer as frightening as they once were.

The average life expectancy increased nearly thirty years over the course of the 20th century. Was it better in the old days, when children routinely died from such common ailments as measles, and when a 50-year-old was already “an old codger?”

Then consider the increased opportunities for families to own their own homes. What was once reserved for only the privileged few is now possible for almost anyone willing to work and save to achieve that dream.

Consider, too, what’s in those homes. The indoor plumbing and central heating and electricity that are now thought of as birthrights were, a few generations ago, luxuries found only in the grandest homes.

It hasn’t been that long since educational opportunities and career possibilities expanded for everyone. Was it better when African-Americans were excluded from consideration for all but the most menial jobs, and women’s “choices” were limited to nurse, teacher and housewife? Honorable professions, yes, but would we want to return to the days when very little else was available?

Even without my raving about the marvels of modern technology that we take more and more for granted, you can see which way I’m leaning on the good old days. Still, some things were better.

Family life centered around — family. Sunday trips to the mall don’t create the same shared memories as three-generation dinners at Grandma’s house.

And, I think, the overload of information we have at our fingertips, about every event, contributes to a kind of sensory short-circuit that makes us occasionally long for the days when news took longer to reach us, was more “remote” and, therefore, easier to ignore.

Nevertheless, even if we could, I doubt if we would want to give up all the advances we’ve seen just in our lifetimes. The reason it’s annoying to hear how awful “now” is, compared to “then,” is that it often seems to be enough of an excuse for people to sit back and do nothing.

Maybe the way to alleviate the yearning for the old days it to invest more care in the here and now. Get involved, lend a hand, re-acquaint with some of the simple pleasures we remember so fondly.

That way, not only will the times we live in be more appealing, we can even make NOW what the next generations look back on as, you guessed it, “the good old days.”

[e-mail]

The PDF version can be found here:
http://www.the-review.com/archive/02162004/PDF/A04.pdf

[Rabrrrrrr]

25. Yeah, and a lot of you died, ended up injured or deformed or missing limbs

and some of you have had children with a higher than normal rate of genetic diseases.

[Rabrrrrrr]

26. and p.s., it was your generation that poisoned the water with mercury

and PCBS and other shit, so that we have to drink from a bottle now.

In fact, it was your generation that poisoned the land as well.

[ucmike]

27. reminds me of the scene in "fight club"

where jack's boss brings him the fight club rules from the copier and jack threatens him, then says "or you could not bring me every piece of trash you find lying around the office". just change "office" to "internet".

reply that in the 50's, 60's, 70's, your parents could raise a family on a single, blue collar income. mom was usually home, and a trip to the hospital for a go-cart related broken arm didn't mean financial ruin.

[bertha katzenengel]

28. You can start w/ stats that show how many children either suffered or

died because their mothers smoked, drank, took aspirin, put them in lead-painted cribs, etc., etc., etc.

I hate these things. :hug:

[ScreamingMeemie]

29. and...we went to funerals for our friends because they drowned

in the swimming pool/ingested medicine or cleaning fluids they shouldn't have/fell out of a tree house etc...

I will never forget the images of my friend John's funeral. We were six, he thought he could swim, and jumped into the family pool. Mothers trying to comfort one of their own, and failing badly. I don't blame his mother for hating the sight of us.

And, thirty years ago, my brothers played little league...and there were no tryouts, except for in the sense of making the teams fair skill wise. What a piece of crap email. You can tell your mil I said that. :hi:

[lavenderdiva]

30. Thank you MrsGrumpy for that quote!

:hi:

[realisticphish]

31. Gee

Nuclear weapons
Cold War
Vietnam
Psychadelic drugs
Prohibition
McCarthyism
Cocaine
Reagan
Nixon
Asassination of MLK and both Kennedys


Wow, THANKS those born in the 30's, 40's, 50's, 60's, and 70's!
My generation really appreciates it!

*just a reply to the email. Not you DU old people :D

[leftofthedial]

32. "we survived being born to mothers who smoked..."

but apparently not without significant brain damage.

[Patiod]

34. I do tend to think there is some over-protectiveness today

but one thing that makes me think "what were our parents thinking?" is when I see wood chips at the playground.

Whose brilliant mind made playgrounds 30 years ago (and more) and thought "What should we put underneath the monkey bars? Oh, I know -- asphalt!" Yikes! Grass & dirt were a better idea than asphalt!