Men Are Becoming... Something Else

  1. Knots… my dad taught me how to tie a square knot, and later, a bowline.
  2. Sharpening a Knife… he gave me a little pocket knife and showed me how to whittle small pieces of wood, and to always cut away from myself.
  3. Starting a Fire… we used to go camping on weekends, and I got to gather the small twigs, pinecones, and leaves that we used to start the fire, and learned how to do it myself.
  4. Direction… lots and lots of that, from my mother.
  5. Fishing…. I loved fishing ! We went camping and fishing on weekends in the summertime.
  6. Bicycling (Unsupervised Mobility)…. My mom bought two bikes, and taught me how to ride one. We went riding together until she thought I would be safe on my own. Then, a horse once I was older.
  7. Changing/Repairing a Tire…in high school Drivers Ed.
  8. Fighting…..was told not to ever hit anyone. No bad language, either !
  9. Childhood Jobs…….cleaning out the horse manure and hauling it for my mom’s garden, taking care of the dogs, cats, and my pony.
  10. Boredom (Free Time, Thinking Time)…I had lots of free time, and always found things to do, or just go and read a book.
  11. A Voice (Memorization, Recitation)… we had to do that in school.
  12. Manners, Respect… Absolutely ! And I also had to learn how curtsey and sit “properly” with my knees together at all times.
  13. Disappointment, Failure…..yes, it was part of learning how to do things.
  14. Truth, Honesty…. My parents expected it, and they were honest with me.
  15. Being Left Alone… after I was older, I was often home alone, or out riding my horse in the hills around where we lived.
 
Ken Anderson said:
I have noticed, too, that buses will make 3-4 stops on the same block, as if a child can't walk from the neighbor's house to their own. Even in elementary school, we could decide for ourselves whether we were going to walk to or from school or take the bus.
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I see the same thing, and wonder if part of that is a liability issue. I also think the "Stranger Danger" crap has largely been fabricated (or at least, blown way out of proportion) in order to shrink our lives and damage our trust of (and connection to) each other. Some years ago I did cursory reading on child assaults and kidnappings (FBI stats) and things were way worse when we "rode our bikes unsupervised until the street lights came on, then we went home." I recall a 4th grade classmate being assaulted as she was walking to school in the morning. This was in the early 60s. These days with so many families breaking apart (or being driven apart), the primary "threat" to kids is the non-custodial spouse (almost always the disenfranchised father) just trying to spend time with their kids, or fighting back against their ex with the kid being a proxy.
 
Marie Miller said:
Has it ever been any different?
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The expectation used to be that when we were making a purchase of $10.76 and gave the cashier $21.01 so we could receive a ten dollar bill and a quarter, everyone working at the register could process it. It's basic 3rd grade math. These days, there's almost 100% certainty they'll look at the what we gave them as though we just handed them a rock. I understand that "the more things change, the more they stay the same" but intellectually, we are going being driven backwards.

Look at the large percentage of idiots who sit in the hallowed halls of Congress. We have sitting a Congress critter who wonders out loud during a hearing if too much shit on an island will cause it to tip over, and he gets reelected by constituents who may agree with him. We have another one displaying the depths of her foreign policy chops by publicly declaring Venezuela is below the friggin' equator. She also has no idea how horses got to this continent, which is not really an issue except that she aggressively pukes out bullshit about it...and there's a chance that this idiot might be the Democrat's presidential candidate in a couple of years.

So Yeh, it's been different.
 
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I know that stats on abducted children are skewed by the fact that most, or at least a significant number, of them are taken by the non-custodial parent. By that, I don't mean to suggest that it's okay for non-custodial parents to take their children and run, but that it's not the same thing as a stranger abduction.
 
Ken Anderson said:
I know that stats on abducted children are skewed by the fact that most, or at least a significant number, of them are taken by the non-custodial parent. By that, I don't mean to suggest that it's okay for non-custodial parents to take their children and run, but that it's not the same thing as a stranger abduction.
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The non-custodial parent is driven to it by a corrupted system that militates against him, and denies the child that connection with the male parent in the process...all by design.
 
John Brunner said:
The expectation used to be that when we were making a purchase of $10.76 and gave the cashier $21.01 so we could receive a ten dollar bill and a quarter, everyone working at the register could process it. These days, there's almost 100% certainty they'll look at the what we gave them as though we just handed them a rock.
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I have noticed repeatedly that if I owe $4.07 and don't have any ones on me, but hand them a five, a nickel, and two pennies, although it should be obvious that I don't want to receive coins in return, they will say that I gave them too much money and want to hand me back the coins and make change on the $5.00. Not so long ago, that would have been intuitive, but no longer.
 
Ken Anderson said:
I have noticed repeatedly that if I owe $4.07 and don't have any ones on me, but hand them a five, a nickel, and two pennies, although it should be obvious that I don't want to receive coins in return, they will say that I gave them too much money and want to hand me back the coins and make change on the $5.00. Not so long ago, that would have been intuitive, but no longer.
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Yup. "You gave me too much." I've heard that before.
 
Yvonne Smith said:
  1. Knots… my dad taught me how to tie a square knot, and later, a bowline.
  2. Sharpening a Knife… he gave me a little pocket knife and showed me how to whittle small pieces of wood, and to always cut away from myself.
  3. Starting a Fire… we used to go camping on weekends, and I got to gather the small twigs, pinecones, and leaves that we used to start the fire, and learned how to do it myself.
  4. Direction… lots and lots of that, from my mother.
  5. Fishing…. I loved fishing ! We went camping and fishing on weekends in the summertime.
  6. Bicycling (Unsupervised Mobility)…. My mom bought two bikes, and taught me how to ride one. We went riding together until she thought I would be safe on my own. Then, a horse once I was older.
  7. Changing/Repairing a Tire…in high school Drivers Ed.
  8. Fighting…..was told not to ever hit anyone. No bad language, either !
  9. Childhood Jobs…….cleaning out the horse manure and hauling it for my mom’s garden, taking care of the dogs, cats, and my pony.
  10. Boredom (Free Time, Thinking Time)…I had lots of free time, and always found things to do, or just go and read a book.
  11. A Voice (Memorization, Recitation)… we had to do that in school.
  12. Manners, Respect… Absolutely ! And I also had to learn how curtsey and sit “properly” with my knees together at all times.
  13. Disappointment, Failure…..yes, it was part of learning how to do things.
  14. Truth, Honesty…. My parents expected it, and they were honest with me.
  15. Being Left Alone… after I was older, I was often home alone, or out riding my horse in the hills around where we lived.
Click to expand...
My life was similar but they never taught us to change a tire in driver's ed. My Dad got me a four pronged lug wrench for Christmas one year. I still have it.
 
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