I always find it interesting that people try to attach today's
values to my childhood posts. Back in the seventies things were done
differently. People gave their kids "whippins" and that is just the way
it was. There was no trying to reason with a child who was misbehaving,
mom or dad just busted their ass. When kids lost a game there was nobody
there telling them "hey, you are all winners in your own way". We were
told "well if you want to win, you have to practice harder." And you
know what? Practicing harder worked a lot of the time.
We knew if
we went in a store and threw a "screaming candy fit" that there would
be severe repercussions when we got back to the car. We sure didn't get a
piece of candy for doing it. If mom and dad decided to order the family
a pizza they didn't order "just cheese or pepperoni" because "Johnny"
didn't like anything else. "Johnny" was told to "pick the onions off!"
Parents sure didn't drive from drive thru to drive thru (there was no
such thing back then!) for each member of the family. We all went to the
same restaurant and ordered whatever was on the menu. Actually parents
ordered whatever they wanted and you ordered the "child appropriate"
foods that were cheaper. If we would have tried to order the most
expensive stuff on the menu that I have watched so many kids do "just to
see if they could mostly" we would have been told "NO."
It was a
different time with different ways of doing things. You can't apply
today's values to yesterday's memories. I'm not saying everything was
right, it wasn't. But things weren't done to be deliberately mean they
were done to teach you how children should behave and because "that is
how MY mom and dad did it". Of course as kids we all swore that when we
grew up things would be different. And in many cases they are.
I
remember talking to my niece once about being paddled in school. She
said, "You mean they actually physically laid their hands on you!" Hell
yeah they did, and if my mom would find out about it we would be whipped
again when we got home. It wasn't just my mom and dad either. It was
that was with everbody's mom and dad. So if I post a childhood memory
that includes a "whippin" I am not looking for sympathy, I am just
remembering things how they were.
Perhaps the biggest change is
peoples attitudes toward sex crimes. We were always told that it was
wrong but if a man was caught doing something inappropriate most of the
time you were just told to stay away. There was never any thought of
prosecution. Anita Hill can be thanked for turning that around. Her
testimony against Clarence Thomas may not have kept him off the Supreme
Court but it did open the door for change involving sexual
discrimination in the workplace and it also changed the way harassment
claims by children were handled...a definite change for the better.
People
wonder how priests and scout leaders could get by with what they did
for so long. It was because that was the way things were done back
then. So, in this case change was good.
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