Kim67

We're just preparing for the future on planet Lesbos http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencete...s-started.html

GarryP

Like it or not, the world you enjoy was built off those traits and the actions of 'those men'. It's baked into capitalism, you win or you die.

If you want to try and remake it in some other, more fluffy, image, you have to understand that the societal structures are likely to end up in a heap in the process. Mind, they might well end up there anyway - but nobody said the world was nice and fair....

Zen10

Also, my understanding of history is that men come in rather useful when an invading army is marching over the hill.

paddyo

My kids flew here on there own a few years ago , 16 and 12, with no worries including a stopover in Singapore. I organised an airport chaperone via BA and all was good.
My eldest is in Uni in Swansea and her mother lives in Cardiff, its a decent enough separation to give the mother some peace and the daughter 'some' independence but if disaster strikes its only an hour away.
I fell out with some 'friends' of ours a couple of years ago (well..not MY friends, my wife and sons) due to the kids all playing happily in the garden and swinging off a tree and jumping on a trampoline when two of the 'Tofu eating, organic vegetable growing, hemp wearing, lefty' idiot mothers who don't live in a real world but exist in a home life while hubby goes out to work all hours god sends, started telling the kids to stop and be 'nice'. NICE!! I lost it a bit, "Are the kids upsetting you Paddy, they can be a bit rough." "No..the kids are fine, its the idiot parents who don't let them be kids who **** me off. Let them play, let them fall over, let them get a scratch and bruise, let them LIVE!!"
At which point my wife said, "Gosh, is that the time, we better go!"

Swerv-o

Ugh - I know these people...


S

rasen78

Not quite sure where you got that from my post Just trying to be a little light-hearted hence my use of the smilies.

Never mind, if you hear reports of a large fire in the foothills of Adelaide, it's just me burning my bras

paddyo

Bloody big fire then!!

rasen78

GarryP

Not the way I read it, even with the smilies. Maybe I've just heard similar sentiments too often for real

You know, I never understood that as a feminist statement - it always kind of pointed up to be how little the feminists knew of the male mind

BadgeIsBack

This thread amazed me as I placed myself in a state of 'outrage' last night.

I was appalled to see a programme on junior doctors on British TV last night and I couldn't believe that members of the higher professions were talking in teen speek and it seemed, completely lacked any sort of bedside manner or carried themselves with any sort of authority. I did not train in the medical profession, but when I was in my late teens and early 20s we were taught how to scrub up and carry ourselves that would allow us to manage in social circles with men and women 40 years our junior and to have credibility. We could operate at the highest levels but also focus with the day to day. Our parents brought us up to lead and show moral and physical leadership, and to think of others. It was expected that age and experience were lacking but in some cases, we were told to act and wing it, if that was what it took. The experience was soon gained - but the potential was there from 18,19 or so.

However: I do remember meeting people of my own age in my teens and early 20s who were a bit immature - and sort of talked in gang or student speek and the mannerisms of the time ('it's like....' had made an appearance then) and my experience is that a lot of these people do infact grow up - probably in their early 20s - within a few years of entering the workforce permanently. I know grads in Melbourne who start work as late as 23/24 and they show signs of some level of maturity.

It may well be that we've delayed it 5 years or so. The way in which some Australian grads stay at home is a very unfortunate circumstance. In both the Uk and Australia, university has become a college course with a syllabus for all, rather than a social and academic mecca for the people that need it the most. There are stories of students sort of pretending to move out but coming back for meals and of parents performing the sort of support that was last seen in the Berlin airlift.

I take some comfort from the fact that my kids show signs of self-reliance, leadership and independence: growing up in a village environment and on acreage seems to foster this and that there is also a history of drive and application in the family. It is almost certainly the case that the kids will be packed off overseas at the earliest opportunity, even if not to University.

Zen10

When I was a teenager/early twenties I worked with very senior military officers and politicians (I'm referring to generals and members of the British cabinet). Luckily, I was raised well enough to be able to fit right in - very smartly dressed, always punctual, efficient, and well spoken. Like you, I look at people who are that age now (including family) and it seems to me that people who are around 20 now behave the way I did when I was around 14 - their clothes, hair, things they say, aspirations, grip of reality, etc.

Your points about uni are very well made. A lot is made of the lower standards, but the "live at home" bit is a good point well made. Uni was always about more than learning academic material. Now it's just an extension of an already poor schooling.

ROMFT_WO2RN

the same idiots who'll sue the school if their little darlings fall over at play time want to ban filming of the school play etc etc just in case a "pervert", gets a glimpse, tossers

BadgeIsBack

+1 is the expression I am looking for. To be fair, there is always a group of individuals who raise their game - one of the lessons I have learnt is that people in their 20s can raise their game quicker than you might expect - and that they've advantages we didn't - for one thing - availability to information.

(40 years my senior, not junior, my outrage has had an effect on me...)

Zen10

I hate to say this, but back in that job I describe, I actually "knew my place", so to speak, which is to say a very junior administrator (one up from the bottom). I learnt a lot from those senior to me, asked questions and never gave any cheek. More recently I worked as a university lecturer and while most kids were pretty polite, they weren't particularly respectful, and some of them were downright rude. I think it's a rather common grievance from people in my generation, that we had to be respectful and start from the bottom, the pay-off being one day we would be at the top and receive the respect, only it didn't quite work out like that.

asher

I think every generation has said this kind of thing about the younger generation. My sons are in their early twenties and had much the same outdoor rough and tumble childhood I had, I made sure they did.