Which horror is worse?

[Yollam]

I was just reminiscing about my adolescent years, when we believed that the Soviets were out to take over the world, and that at any moment, a barrage of world-ending ICBMs might rain down on us. "The Day After", "Threads" and other films scared the daylights out of us, and so did our president with a seemingly itchy trigger finger.

I used to have very vivid dreams/nightmares of a mushroom cloud rising from the other side of the mountain (Ft Bliss, White Sands Missile Range and a number of other major military installations were nearby).

Then came Glastnost, Perestroika, and what turned out to be an all-too-brief "peace dividend". And now our kids are growing up with 9-11 forever echoing in their minds, the media trying to keep the fear at just the right pitch.

I wonder if today's kids find the threats, both real and overhyped by the media, as terrifying as that mushroom cloud was to us 25 years ago. Sure, a terrorist, or Bushco operative acting as a terrorist might set off a nuke somewhere someday, but there isn't that shadow of global thermonuclear war.

Just thinking aloud, I guess...

[GreenPartyVoter]

1. My kids are 6 and almost 8. Nothing much from them about

concerns of that nature yet. (I remember watching "The Day After" in 5th grade. Completely freaked me out.)

[Katherine Brengle]

2. Speaking as a member of the younger generation...

I don't worry about terrorism. Not any more than is necessary, anyhow. Terrorist attacks can happen anywhere, any time--there is no way you can live your life worrying about it. If it happens, then you die, and if it doesn't and you have lived in fear, what have you gained?

However, I do have to live in fear every day that my husband will not come home alive from Iraq. This fear is very present in my life...

[leftchick]

3. mine don't

They are 9 and 11 and they know they are being lied to.