posted
Sorry, Pel. I'd have to say that the bulk of teenage "oppression" arguments have to do with having responsibilties without getting privileges in return. Welcome to being a grown up.
I'm not much older than you so don't think of that as patronizing. It's more an, "Ah, now you're starting to get it. Welcome to the club."
Responsibilty isn't a one for one trade. You don't get something cool every time more is expected from you. Let's be honest, do you really need a beer to serve in the military? Why would the ability to die in war translate to the right to imbibe alcohol?
Heck, I pay Social Security taxes every month and all I get are more retirees moving to Florida and whinning that we need to cover their meds they can't afford. Where's my reward? Old people doing 30 in the left hand lane? 4pm dinner specials?
I'm a little wistful for the days when I was passionate about injustices. I was going to be an activist and change the world. My advice to you is do it now. It doesn't take long to become very tired. Just pick something you can look back on and be proud of. Go build houses for the poor or tutor a kid with learning disabilties. Pick something that will actually change someone's life. You'll get your vote and your beer soon enough.
Posts: 2283 | Registered: Dec 2003
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And whatever you do, don't use you debit card. Get a credit card for things like securing a hotel room and emergency car rentals.
Posts: 2283 | Registered: Dec 2003
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quote:If someone does something terrible later in life, and something heroic in their early life, are they still a hero?
Is being a hero a permanent status, or does it take your entire life into perspective?
I'd just add that at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier at Arlington, the Honor Guard keep a plague of every man who ever qualified to serve in that unit. If a member of the unit has even one criminal infraction, whether he is in or out of uniform, retired or active duty or whatever, the name is stripped from the plaque on the wall.
Posts: 1784 | Registered: Jun 2001
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posted
As for the Jessica Lynch thing earlier, I don't consider her a hero.
Her group made a wrong turn on a road and was captured. Her weapon jammed and she was easily captured, and was subsequently rescued in an overpowering covert strike.
Being captured and held at a hospital, where she was apparently well treated for her injuries, for less than two weeks, after being captured due to the incompetence of her team, I don't think qualifies as heroism, and I think it lowers the value of the word. I think giving her the bronze star was a mistake, and I don't think she deserved it. If she did, then every POW since 1942 who took part in American warfare deserves to be given one, and considering the conditions most American POWs have had to face, they should probably all get silver stars at the very least.
Posts: 21898 | Registered: Nov 2004
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posted
According to my local paper, which is, in fairness, generally recognized as being complete gibberish, I learned today that young people are being brainwashed into believing in global warming by the vast liberal conspiracy. From what I here, all too frequently, teachers and professors are the new pupetmasters controlling the world and bending it to their twisted and sick desires. I was even unfortunate enough to read a detailed, and more than a little unhinged, explanation of why all professors are mentally unstable.
I am not the only one, doubtless, that finds academia invigorating, but it seems that the world is becoming more anti-academic. This will, naturally, have a great effect on students. Students are inherently corrupted by their relationship with academia, and academia by its relationship with students.
This is not surprising in the least: universities were founded upon Renaissance, or sometimes pre-Renaissance, Humanist ideals, which remain prevalent within their halls and courtyards. But the world grows frighteningly more Anti-Humanist, and universities, far from being seen as dangerously radical, are viewed as dangerously reactionary.
In a world dominated by Nieztchen and Objectivist views, we, the young and the academic, still hold onto a quote from First Edras "Truth beareth away the victory."
We are but a small group on a sled, and the wolves draw nearer. And I am frightened of the encroaching darkness which no light can penetrate. Rage, Rage against the Dying of the Light.
Posts: 1332 | Registered: Apr 2005
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posted
Interesting that in a thread about the young, you quote a poem that refers to the old and/or dying.
Posts: 21898 | Registered: Nov 2004
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quote: In a world dominated by Nieztchen and Objectivist views, we, the young and the academic, still hold onto a quote from First Edras "Truth beareth away the victory."
*laugh* This more than anything else betrays the depth of your inexperience, Pel. Seriously, man, get over it.
Posts: 37449 | Registered: May 1999
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quote: From what I here, all too frequently, teachers and professors are the new pupetmasters controlling the world and bending it to their twisted and sick desires.
And here I thought it was the Jewish bankers, the Illuminata, and the Freemasons.
Posts: 484 | Registered: Feb 2006
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quote:From what I here, all too frequently, teachers and professors are the new pupetmasters controlling the world and bending it to their twisted and sick desires.
quote: I stand alone, a blind seer gifted not with prophesy and a mad philosopher gifted not with thought.
That, may I say, coming from out of nowhere in a post that makes little sense, and which I care little about, is genius at the ready. It's an ironic remark, in that it is so self-effacing, and that your self-efacement is in itself the one smart thing in the post.
This is fantastic. I wonder if you are cribbing the quotation from some literary source and merely implying the "obvious" reference? It sounds so good, it sounds so familiar, I can hardly believe you wrote it.
So what's up with that? Sorry if it was covered already. Posts: 9912 | Registered: Nov 2005
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quote:Originally posted by FlyingCow: You have it in you to do great things, even at 17, if you just apply your will to the task. I taught a girl who was 13 and already owned her own party planning company for elementary school students. At 14, she expanded to hire a secretary who was several years her elder. While her goals were small - to run the company through high school to make money to pay for an Ivy League school should she not receive a scholarship - she could easily turn that entrepreneurial spirit to some other task.
Ironically, finding a way to make enough money for Ivy league, at the age of 14, is precisely the kind of thing that earns you a scholarship! Success really DOES love success. It seems that often all it takes is the initial act, and things can spiral out of all control. Witness Paris Hilton, or the Olsen Twins, you get attention by accident, and suddenly you're the focus of a storm of constant attention, and its attendant attention getters (because we know that neither the Ots, or PH have any marketable skills OTHER THAN marketability. )
Posts: 9912 | Registered: Nov 2005
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posted
Yes, Orincoro, Yes. The Olsen Twins and Paris Hilton are exactly the problem. Well, not them but the culture that surronds them. The future intellectual leading lights of the twenty-first century live in obscuraty while people with no apparent talent are the foci of absurd levels of international attention. Well, to be fair to Europeans, the Beckams have talent in adition to marketability, although the latter is by far more prominent.
Posts: 1332 | Registered: Apr 2005
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quote:Originally posted by Pelegius: Yes, Orincoro, Yes. The Olsen Twins and Paris Hilton are exactly the problem. Well, not them but the culture that surronds them. The future intellectual leading lights of the twenty-first century live in obscuraty while people with no apparent talent are the foci of absurd levels of international attention. Well, to be fair to Europeans, the Beckams have talent in adition to marketability, although the latter is by far more prominent.
Also to be fair, I don't think teenagers are necessarily unwilling victims of the culture you describe.
posted
heroes, i have to say that my personal definition of who i find heroic, is probably a little different than what pel. was trying to say initially.
a hero is someone who chooses what in life is important to them, and is willing to accept great personal sacrifice to accomplish what is important to him.
my aunt is a hero to me. not because i've she has shown some level of bravery, but rather because she decided when she was 12 that she could do a better job raising children than her mother. she has 6 children who are absolutely wonderful. are there sacrifices she has made to achieve her goal of being a better parent than her mother yes. and it is those sacrifices that make her a hero.
i guess a hero is someone who chooses what they believe is right and is willing to accept any personal difficulty to do the right thing.
quote:The future intellectual leading lights of the twenty-first century live in obscuraty while people with no apparent talent are the foci of absurd levels of international attention.
Wow. This was one of Archimedes' complaints, I believe.
Posts: 37449 | Registered: May 1999
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posted
Having grown, in the past brief five years, from a 16-year-old feeling much about the world as you seem to, Pelegius, into a 21-year-old who doesn't feel a whole lot older but has lots more responsibilities, I'd offer this:
I understand your frustration. I was frustrated, too, as many of the older (meaning been at Hatrack longer) posters can attest . And while I feel that some of my frustration was justified - people, after all, keep telling me I seem much older than my 21 years, which would seem to indicate I could've handled more responsibility earlier - I'm now glad, frankly, that I didn't have to.
Young people chafe at the restrictions placed on them. But I've realized that not having to deal with all the responsibilities of life does make it easier to grow just because your mind isn't always preoccupied with paying bills or making sure your toilet works properly or whether or not the insurance company overcharged you. One of the big things for me was being sick - while I was in college, it was an opportunity to skip class and feel relatively guilt free about it (though sometimes it interfered with classes, etc).
In the working world, being sick means shirking your responsibilities, risking pissing off the boss, and punching an *enormous* hole in a precarious entry-level budget. When I got sick a few weeks back, my medicine and doctor's visits costs $120 - and when you're dealing with post-rent budget of only $500 or so, that's huge.
So yes, you don't get all the privileges of being an adult yet. But the one you gripe about - voting - isn't the one that will utlimately make the most difference anyway. And you get to enjoy the privileges of being young and having someone else be responsible for you. So my advice is enjoy it while it lasts.
That said, being grown up is much more fun. Though there are days when I wish I didn't have to do anything and I could just have my mom back to make chicken soup, financial independence is just about the best thing that's ever happened to me. It's definitely a world-at-your-fingertips feeling.
Worth waiting for, worth wanting; but not worth beating yourself up over.
Posts: 1784 | Registered: Jun 2001
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quote:Originally posted by Pelegius: Yes, Orincoro, Yes. The Olsen Twins and Paris Hilton are exactly the problem. Well, not them but the culture that surronds them. The future intellectual leading lights of the twenty-first century live in obscuraty while people with no apparent talent are the foci of absurd levels of international attention. Well, to be fair to Europeans, the Beckams have talent in adition to marketability, although the latter is by far more prominent.
But, to play Davidson to my own Scopatz, (I don't know exactly what THAT means), it seems that it might be better to have these brainless, uninvolving, vapid, worthless people as the center of public atttention, because they really don't have the time to do anything but be famous. Paris Hilton actually makes a hefty salary these days from being a TV personality, and from modeling, and from offering general famosity as a commodity.
Some might say it is better to have worthless people spendign their time this way, rather than more productive and intelligent people who are doing the substantive work of society. After all, Stephen Hawking does have to spend SOME of his time studying and working on science even though he is a celebrity.
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posted
Adolescence is that period of life when a boy refuses to believe that someday he will be as dumb as his father.
Posts: 993 | Registered: Jul 2006
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posted
sorry 'bout that last one. I kind just dropped in a felt a need to make a statement on adolescence. Though they are borrowed words, I do agree with the idea. Then again, in some cases adolescence last far beyond one's 18th birthday.
on Fame: We speak of fame as the reward for genius, whereas in truth genius ... is its own reward, and fame is but a foolish image by which its worth is symbolized -George Santayana-
Posts: 993 | Registered: Jul 2006
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