The world is changing... bad changes or good?

[EricG1793]

I think it would be awesome if you started another topic like that. There are some people who think that a World War III is inevitable. There is just too much hate and sin in this world.

-Originally posted by spyells

Well, upon your word, I feel no guilt starting this topic!

Well, all community members... I've been thinking about this kind of thing to myself for a while now. But after being here for a little over a month, I know a lot of you pretty well. And you're the kind of people who I think would be perfect to discuss with.

We all know that the world is changing. Global warming, yes. Continental Drift... extremely slow; we don't notice a thing in our own lifetimes, but, yes, it is happening. But what I'm talking about is our own behavior. In someways it's getting better as the years go on, but in more ways it's getting worse.

Let's talk about how we're getting better first. We have been getting better and better in terms of medical treatment. For example, back in the Civil War (Excuse me if you don't live in the United States; I'm using an example that I am pretty knowledgeable about) medical treatment was HORRIBLE! The surgeons did not clean their tools between patients, they didn't wash their own hands before they did a surgery, etc. So most people ended up dieing in the hospital rather than leaving it healthy. Nowadays, and for a very long time we've seen the importance of keeping medical supplies clean, so now more people live in hospitals, or at a war hospital, even. It seems as though there's less violence, say, in high school in terms of people beating other people up. It also seems as though there are less people on drugs, too. Education seems to be getting better, more thorough.

All right, now for the bad stuff that's going on in the world. Wow, this is going to be long!

Shootings, robberies, etc. are definitely skyrocketing; that's the first thing I think of. All of the big factories, like computer companies, car companies... just aren't making their products good, to last as long as they possibly can anymore, and things are just getting more and more expensive. Greed. Evil greed, that's what's going on. People are always in a rush to go somewhere. People apparently don't have time, are too lazy, etc. to make a good homecooked meal, so they're more and more processed food. Research what processed food does to the body. And yes, as I said before, there is Global Warming and Continental Drift. People are just getting... oh, I don't know, antisocial. My grandfather has his microwave right above the stove, and it has a vent. When the vent is on, whatever's cooking, the smell goes outside, and there's a beach on a lake down there. My grandfather said once that people used to come up and say that the food smelled so good, so they'd give those people some of the food... but that doesn't happen anymore. Once a few days ago my mom, a friend, and I had gone out to a lake that we have always liked. It's in a state forest, and in it they have a rock island. You can take a ten minute hike or so out to the rock island, and when you get there there's a massive rock, right next to the water, and there are a couple places where you can jump off the rock and in to the water. Right next to that big rock, there's a smaller rock that has an incline, where the little kids play there and slide down the rock. And about fifty feet in to the water there's another rock that you can jump off of, where the water's really deep. But the last time we went... there were dozens of older, rowdy teenagers there, dominaing all three of the rocks, swearing, singing dirty songs, smoking, littering... that's the last time we are going there. And the water had gotten dirty and kind of smelly. Now, all three of the lakes around, which used to be pristine and clear, and dirty, and in this one's case, dominated by rowdy older teenagers. We don't know where to swim now! And we don't have a pool either.

Well, that was my rampage about how the world is changing, in good and bad ways, but mostly bad.

I'm interested to see what everybody else thinks.

[Rhi]

The world changes, yes. But you know the saying about how something has to get worse before it gets better? Maybe that's what is happening. I know that it seems like the world is rolling downhill and accelerating at way more than the usual 9.8m/s2, but there are a lot of good things that happen, too. Many people try to help others who are less fortunate, and many people try to do what is right in their eyes. And even some of the wars are for the purpose of doing good in the eyes of the fighters. But the keyword is "right in their eyes" because everybody has different standards of good and evil, which makes it hard to try to find one standard of judging good and evil. So is the world getting worse than it was? Well, it's changing, but so are the perspectives of the people of the world. The civilizations of the world before us had their perspectives of the world; I'm sure they thought their world was getting worse when big changes started happening, but would you really want to go back to, say, the Aztecs before Hernan Cortes came and wrecked their civilization? Or the Islamic Empire before their inward strife shook them apart into the factions that they are today? Even bad changes can lead to good changes, in the long run.

I realize that the above entry is very long and wordy, but the author would like to comment that her views are subject to change on this topic once she has read other views, because that is how people learn.

[spyells]

According to the bible we are in the final days. Keep in mind though as I say this that a day in the eyes of God can be a thousand years. In the book of Revelations it tells us what will happen when the Apocalypse comes. Everything that is happening now is only going to get worse.

My grandma has pointed out to me how things have gotten worse since her day and how they continue to get even worse. Back in the day you could pick up a hitch hiker and not be worried about being mugged or raped. Children had more respect for adults. There was no talking back because you would get your butt whooped. Everything is okay now nothing is wrong any more. When my grandma was a child people may have had babies out of wedlock but it was more of a shame. Now people (especially ignorant girls) think it's cool. I'm not talking those girls that made a mistake and got pregnant I'm talking about the teenage girls that try to get pregnant and think it's cool when it's not. They don't even have any knowledge in their heads but they're going to go out and have a baby. Homosexuality is now okay. Not to make anyone angry on here because my best friend is gay. But this has never been okay and people are saying it is. Anyone can sin any way they like and no one cares. Men rape and abuse their wives (Some women though are just as guilty as some men). A man or woman should respect their spouse. No hitting, raping, or name calling should be tolerated. But it is because the American justice system makes it so hard to prosecute a spouse for abuse. In fact not until recently in some states as well as countries it was seen as legal to hit your wife (husband).

Drugs is becoming more prevalent. I use to live in the hood (I don't know if they call it that in other countries where poor minorities live) men would be just on the street corners selling drugs. A lot of these men would also be mentoring young boys (many of these boys did not have a father in the home, something that is becoming an epidemic in America. I have to admit that because many fathers and mothers are abusive not having a father in the home for some people is more of a blessing than anything else.) telling them how to be a man and sell dope on the street. But because these boys had no one to turn to they listen.

Gang violence is getting worse. Just a couple of months ago on the news this African-American girl who was in 8th grade was leaving her house. Her house was like the third from the corner. She walked to the corner and this Hispanic gang just shot her up only because she wanted to go to the store across the street. She was walking into their territory so just because they don't like blacks they had to shoot up a child. Still a baby like my grandma says.

In school no one wants to talk about religion. When my grandma was growing up the children use to say prayer. We're lucky to do "The Pledge of Allegiance" now. Everywhere you turn people are talking about sex and fornicating. Telling even in today's popular music, television, video games, magazines, and schools what a guy is going to do to a female and how explicitly done. Girls think it is cool to flaunt it and be provocative. It's okay to be beautiful but girls need to stop trying to follow the music video's examples and start to respect themselves. Boys at school don't even respect girls by telling me and others what they want to do to us and where and why, not to mention how they're going to do it. Many teenagers are in abusive relationships because what they see on television they feel is right. So it's okay to hit your girlfriend and demand sex because that's all boys see. Being a player is the life to live to them because they think it's cool.

And just recently the supreme court passed a law saying that race should no longer be a justification for who should get in a certain school. This goes against the case Brown V. Board of Education and not to mention everything else minorities have fought for. Since American slavery (Chattel Slavery) and segregation African-Americans have been on the bottom. It still is not equal in the terms of education. Caucasian children still out do them in test scores. Race shouldn't matter but because it is already hard for blacks to get into good schools this will only make it harder and make the gap wider.

Families aren't even as close as they use to be. I don't even know my cousins. Back when my mom was little all the cousins, aunts and uncles, in laws everyone was close and was there for each other. Now they act like they can't even say hi.

This is just my view on things so I hope nothing I said made anyone angry. But, who can't tell me that this world isn't getting worse.

[mythbusterfan]

*sigh* of course the world is going to pot.
i'd go on a long talk about it, but the people who have posted before me have already stated it, almost exactly as i would have. except one.

i don't think these are the end days just yet. i think we're in the midst of a major transition. a great sweeping change that at some point will end.
the nature of the universe and everything is not necessarily peace, it's balance. and if there's change now, then there will be stability later. i don't know what kind of stability. but i know there will be some. until we reach that point, things are going to continue to deteriorate. who knows. they may deteriorate to the point where stability is achieved because we're all dead, or mostly all dead due to a nuclear winter. i personally hope that that is not the case.

but i think we should gear our efforts not to halt this transition, more towards turning the transition towards an endpoint that we actually want to have. right now, i'm looking at more death and destruction as to where the international end point is looking. and i really
hope that that changes.

at this point though, it's all up in the air. nobody really knows what's going to happen.

i believe i'll end this post with a short quote.

"life's only constant, is that everything is subject to change without notice"

-MBF

[wildflower]

Spyells:
Homosexuality is now okay. Not to make anyone angry on here because my best friend is gay. But this has never been okay and people are saying it is.

I disagree. It is okay and I see no reason that it shouldn't be. If anything, the fact that gay people can be open about it at all is an improvement, not something going downhill. Of course, you still have idiots like Fred Phelps, who blame things like Hurricane Katrina on gay people existing, and I think people like him are what's making the world go wrong- not the other way around.

In school no one wants to talk about religion. When my grandma was growing up the children use to say prayer. We're lucky to do "The Pledge of Allegiance" now.

Again, I see this as an improvement. Having been homeschooled my entire life, I can't say I have experienced it, but I would hate having religion forced on me. I suppose I can't see why moving away from religion is considered so horrible and bad; I do agree with being against violence and unnecessary early pregnancies (although I'm not against abortion), but I don't think that any of it has to do with religion. It's quite possible to be an atheist without being amoral.

Of course, I'm still rather cynical and pessimistic. These are two points that I feel some people are getting better about- but as always, it balances out, and we have people getting worse about the same subjects (see earlier mention of Fred Phelps).

The main thing I hate about the world right now is that we're all getting stupid. Not so long ago, we were- well, not stupid as such; more like ignorant. Now that we're figuring the universe out just a little, you would think that we would be getting smarter- but we're not. If people were more intelligent, things might not necessarily be better; for all I know, we could just have a whole lot of angry and violent people who simply decided to use their intelligence to find more ways to kill. That doesn't seem quite so likely, though, since that way, at least people would be smart enough that you could reason with them, and we just might not destroy each other. With people getting stupider, you have a bunch of angry, violent, and confused people who already have enough ways to kill other people, and then end up using those ways without anyone really thinking about it...

I hate the world- but of course, as a highschool-age kid, it's impossible to voice any opinion whatsoever without getting a clueless look, a condescending remark, or, if they pick up on the bit about hating the world and also if they are eleven years old, getting called emo.

[EricG1793]

Wow, there are so many great points here!

But you know the saying about how something has to get worse before it gets better? Maybe that's what is happening.

-Rhi

I sure hope so.

I realize that the above entry is very long and wordy

-Rhi

In a topic such as this, the longer and wordier the better.

My grandma has pointed out to me how things have gotten worse since her day and how they continue to get even worse. Back in the day you could pick up a hitch hiker and not be worried about being mugged or raped. Children had more respect for adults. There was no talking back because you would get your butt whooped.

-spyells

The grandparents know best about what's getting worse/better in this world. Yeah, I would be extremely scared to pick up a hitch hiker. And I do believe that children are having less and less respect for their parents and other adults. Take school, for example; if you were rude the teacher would whack you with a yard stick! (Or whatever misconduct you'd like to put there.)

Gang violence is getting worse. Just a couple of months ago on the news this African-American girl who was in 8th grade was leaving her house. Her house was like the third from the corner. She walked to the corner and this Hispanic gang just shot her up only because she wanted to go to the store across the street. She was walking into their territory so just because they don't like blacks they had to shoot up a child. Still a baby like my grandma says.

-spyells

I never did think of gang violence getting worse. Although now that you mention it, yes, I see your point. Whatever motivated a bunch of people to shoot a girl trying to go to store.... Yeah, the ratio of her age to the expected living age for women is very low.

Families aren't even as close as they use to be. I don't even know my cousins. Back when my mom was little all the cousins, aunts and uncles, in laws everyone was close and was there for each other. Now they act like they can't even say hi.

- spyells

Well with my extended family, ie cousins, uncles and aunts, etc. things are going great; we have big gatherings, for my mom's side anyway, several times a year. With my dad's side, however, we don't see each other quite as much, but a few times a year anyway. It's my immediate family that's the problem. My dad is always working in his office downstairs, reading, eating, traveling on business or pleasure, or sleeping. My mom works after my school hours, so she's never home in the evenings, and in the two days a week when she IS home she never does anything. My sister's never home between her dozens of friends who she sees regularly, school, and work. That's why I spend much time away from my house; at my friends' houses or at my dad's dad's house. I'm at my dad's dad's house pretty much every weekend, on Saturday nights, for church on Sunday, and while I'm there I do housework for him. But anyway, we just can't get along with each other, the house is always extremely dirty, we don't play games with each other half as much as we used to, we don't eat out nearly as much.... Wow, saying all this about my immediate family makes me feel even worse about everything.

i don't think these are the end days just yet. i think we're in the midst of a major transition. a great sweeping change that at some point will end.
the nature of the universe and everything is not necessarily peace, it's balance. and if there's change now, then there will be stability later. i don't know what kind of stability. but i know there will be some. until we reach that point, things are going to continue to deteriorate. who knows. they may deteriorate to the point where stability is achieved because we're all dead, or mostly all dead due to a nuclear winter. i personally hope that that is not the case.

but i think we should gear our efforts not to halt this transition, more towards turning the transition towards an endpoint that we actually want to have. right now, i'm looking at more death and destruction as to where the international end point is looking. and i really hope that that changes.

-mythbusterfan

No, the end days aren't here yet... we still have to suffer for a while before we die away. Although, there's a very likely possibility that things will "stabilize". I just hate to think about what life will be like before things get stable, or if we all die. I hope this doesn't happen either.

I couldn't agree with you more!! If we just can't win the battle, and things will end, we might as well enter Timeheart knowing that we ended peacefully, the right way. Although I do wish that we wouldn't have to choose out end, and we could just make things the way they used to be.

You know, it was actually the Young Wizards series that made me think of how much the world is changing, and how bad these changes are. It may have been coincidental; but it was around the time I finished the third or fourth book that I really started getting these vivid thoughts. Did these thoughts just come to everybody else here, or did you start thinking them after you had read a few YW books?

This sure is a really fast-growing thread.... I didn't really think that it would be that popular, but I was wrong; it is.

[spyells]

Originally posted by EricG1793:
Well with my extended family, ie cousins, uncles and aunts, etc. things are going great; we have big gatherings, for my mom's side anyway, several times a year. With my dad's side, however, we don't see each other quite as much, but a few times a year anyway. It's my immediate family that's the problem. My dad is always working in his office downstairs, reading, eating, traveling on business or pleasure, or sleeping. My mom works after my school hours, so she's never home in the evenings, and in the two days a week when she IS home she never does anything. My sister's never home between her dozens of friends who she sees regularly, school, and work. That's why I spend much time away from my house; at my friends' houses or at my dad's dad's house. I'm at my dad's dad's house pretty much every weekend, on Saturday nights, for church on Sunday, and while I'm there I do housework for him. But anyway, we just can't get along with each other, the house is always extremely dirty, we don't play games with each other half as much as we used to, we don't eat out nearly as much.... Wow, saying all this about my immediate family makes me feel even worse about everything.

I don't know what your race is and I'm also aware that every African-American family is different. But what I have noticed in my culture and in many American families the family isn't as close as it use to be. At least I've noticed in my particular culture that we have strayed away from the church and extended family. Many in the American culture (not just African-Americans) don't spend time with their family. The parents don't talk, teach, and in many cases pay attention. I know others at school who talk badly about their parents, hate their sibling, and back stab their cousins. It use to be that even if you couldn't trust anyone else in this world you could always count on family. Now in many families that is not the case. Now their are cousins and uncles who don't think twice about getting their nephew or cousin killed. They'll offer them drugs without even a second thought. There are dads who act as if their kids don't exist. They don't call, don't send money, basically acting like they didn't have kids and they don't know what the word means. There are mothers on drugs now doing all sorts of stuff. Not paying attention to the kids so they have to take care of themselves.

I know a girl who was being molested by her step father. She told her mom and grandma (her mother didn't raise her her grandma did) and they told her she was a liar. The family she lives in is abusive. There is another girl she was raped by her own cousin. He got her pregnant and he is boasting about it to the whole extended family. The girl is due in a couple of months. The family doesn't care. What happened to those days where everyone was there for one another, when we knew you could go to your family for anything?

People aren't like they use to be. What a child sees is what they'll do. We as children are trained by our parents, teachers, friends, and extended family members by what they do and not what they say. Parents aren't like they use to be. Not all parents are like this because I know some pretty strict ones but, many parents let the kids walk all over them. Their sons are in the streets selling crack, in gangs, and stealing. Some daughters flaunt their stuff and sleep with any guy. (not every case is this severe) The worse the kids get is only an example. How the child acts or is raised will determine how they will raise their children. Meaning that each generation will continually get worse. We have good people, bad people, and ignorant people. As long as there is ignorant people it will be hard for this world to change. I'm not saying it isn't possible but it will be hard and will take a long time it will also take a lot of work and everyone will need to contribute if we are ever to see any change.

[Garrett Fitzgerald]

Originally posted by spyells:
Homosexuality is now okay. Not to make anyone angry on here because my best friend is gay. But this has never been okay and people are saying it is. Anyone can sin any way they like and no one cares.

Personally, I prefer Heinlein's definition of sin: "Sin lies only in hurting other people unnecessarily. All other "sins" are invented nonsense. (Hurting yourself is not sinful - just stupid)."

Spyells, do you wear cotton/polyester blends? Leviticus 19:19 'You are to keep My statutes. You shall not breed together two kinds of your cattle; you shall not sow your field with two kinds of seed, nor wear a garment upon you of two kinds of material mixed together.'

Have you ever eaten shrimp? Leviticus 11:10 'And all that have not fins and scales in the seas, and in the rivers, of all that move in the waters, and of any living thing which is in the waters, they shall be an abomination unto you...'

Abomination. Hmm. Sounds familiar somehow...

Oh, yes. Leviticus 20:13 'If a man also lie with mankind, as he lieth with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination...'

[EricG1793]

People aren't like they use to be. What a child sees is what they'll do. We as children are trained by our parents, teachers, friends, and extended family members by what they do and not what they say. Parents aren't like they use to be. Not all parents are like this because I know some pretty strict ones but, many parents let the kids walk all over them. Their sons are in the streets selling crack, in gangs, and stealing. Some daughters flaunt their stuff and sleep with any guy. (not every case is this severe) The worse the kids get is only an example. How the child acts or is raised will determine how they will raise their children. Meaning that each generation will continually get worse.

-spyells

That first sentence is pretty much the theme of this topic... nobody's ever just flat-out put that in a sentence before.

I just thought of something, budget cuts are ruining schools everywhere. But if the people who are parents and grandparents don't want to spend money for our proper education, then much of the badness in the future of the world will be their fault. Somebody was saying, I think it was you, spyells, that people are getting stupider. And even if we do gain knowledge we use it for badness. Well, the people who don't want to spend money on our proper education have a horrible idea... who will be running the world when they're retired? For that matter, who will be controlling their money when they're retired? These thoughts utterly disgust me.

I have two friends who's parents are very strict. Strict as in discipline, not as in abusing because of every little thing that their children do wrong. These two families are probably the best families that I know of around, they're extremely nice, generous, always there to help, and they're always there for each other. And their children, or my friends, are a lot like the parents. Like you say, however the parents act around the children is what the children are going to be like when they grow up.

One of my neighbors, right across the road from me, is a logger. He is just completely unpleasant; he yells at my mom for going too fast down the road (although you should see HIM when he's in his big logging trucks, flying down hills around corners just waiting to hit somebody and kill them), and he is outside late in the night sometimes chainsawing, screaming, swearing, etc. And he burns something every night... stumps, maybe, and people who don't have AC in their house, such as us, like to sleep with their window open. So in the mornings I get up and I feel as though there's stuff stuck in my throat, and in my lungs. And around his children, the older boy that I'm friends with anyway... he acts the same way. And lately with his son, who I'm friends with, I've been seeing him get more careless about littering (his father leaves beer cans all around his property and on the road) and he swears himself... he's in fourth grade, swearing, every word! This is an excellent example of horrible parenting and how the children take after the parents.

That's all I have to say for now.... I'll probably think of more once more people post.

[spyells]

Originally posted by Garrett Fitzgerald:

Originally posted by spyells:
Homosexuality is now okay. Not to make anyone angry on here because my best friend is gay. But this has never been okay and people are saying it is. Anyone can sin any way they like and no one cares.

Personally, I prefer Heinlein's definition of sin: "Sin lies only in hurting other people unnecessarily. All other "sins" are invented nonsense. (Hurting yourself is not sinful - just stupid)."

Spyells, do you wear cotton/polyester blends? Leviticus 19:19 'You are to keep My statutes. You shall not breed together two kinds of your cattle; you shall not sow your field with two kinds of seed, nor wear a garment upon you of two kinds of material mixed together.'

Have you ever eaten shrimp? Leviticus 11:10 'And all that have not fins and scales in the seas, and in the rivers, of all that move in the waters, and of any living thing which is in the waters, they shall be an abomination unto you...'

Abomination. Hmm. Sounds familiar somehow...

Oh, yes. Leviticus 20:13 'If a man also lie with mankind, as he lieth with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination...' </div>

This topic is about your views on how the world is getting worse. This is not a topic on Homosexuality. If you want that go start one. Please stay on topic.

This is just an example of global warming taking affect in my area.

hector.becerra@latimes.com

andrew.blankstein@latimes.com

Times staff writers Catherine Saillant, Jonathan Abrams, Garrett Therolf and Ari Bloomekatz contributed to this report.

It has been so hot lately I can't even sleep at night. I know it's summer and I know this is California but this is getting rediculous. If everyone and I mean everyone took part in taking better care of their world heat waves like this and rising water levels wouldn't be a problem because they wouldn't have been a problem in the first place.

GF: edited for formatting only (again)

[Rhi]

One of the symptoms of global warming is ocean current changes, which in turn changes our weather patterns. Some areas (i.e. California, Alabama) are in major drought mode while others (i.e. Texas) are getting flooded with water. I think that maybe our climatology is shifting, where different areas are becoming different climate zones than what we're used to. The climate has shifted before, just not in mankind's memory; it's not necessarily bad that our weather is changing because that happens. The history of Earth shows periods of warmth and periods of cold and times when the magnetic poles were backwards and...it's always changing, but now it's changing where we can watch it. Sure it's going to wreck havoc where people live, but mankind has survived the Ice Age; we can survive global warming. If we don't blow ourselves up first

The world changes; it's not stagnant. People change, too. Not all changes are bad; I've seen a lot more open-mindedness and willingness to try to make the world different; people who try to help the animals we endanger and people we've left behind. Humanity is not all bad, but not all good. It's complicated

And as for the final days? Revelation says that nobody knows the day or time

[Garrett Fitzgerald]

Originally posted by spyells:

Originally posted by Garrett Fitzgerald:

Originally posted by spyells:
Homosexuality is now okay.

Have you ever eaten shrimp? Leviticus 11:10 'And all that have not fins and scales in the seas, and in the rivers, of all that move in the waters, and of any living thing which is in the waters, they shall be an abomination unto you...'

Abomination. Hmm. Sounds familiar somehow...

Oh, yes. Leviticus 20:13 'If a man also lie with mankind, as he lieth with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination...'

This topic is about your views on how the world is getting worse. This is not a topic on Homosexuality. If you want that go start one. Please stay on topic.

Nice try, Spyells. You were the one who brought in homosexuality as an example of the world getting worse.

Diane is big on tolerance on these forums: keep that in mind. Thanks.

[spyells]

Yes, but you are starting an argument on Homosexuality. That is one of my views on how the world is getting worse. In stead of you giving examples and contributing to the argument on what you think about this world you want to argue about homosexuality. That isn't what the topic is about. Why don't you give more examples on how you think this world is getting bad or better. This is just my opinion and the reason I'm not providing bible verses to refute your argument is because I know that once I get into it I'll get yelled out for getting of topic.

[Garrett Fitzgerald]

Again, I didn't start it, you did. I just pointed it out.

And also, the Bible doesn't say we're in the end days: it describes the end days, and there are things going on that match the description -- but throughout history, there's always been things that match the description.

But, since you don't want to debate your own position, I'll give you this link. The question is, is it really less safe now than it was then, or have people just gotten a lot more paranoid, and less accepting of risk?

[Dragon Writer]

i agree that the world is changing...and i agree that it's not necessarily for the better. in fact, i agree with many of the points here, including that the world seems to be getting more stupid (or rather, the people seem to be getting more and more willfully ignorant) no boddy wants to learn, it seems...which is sad. But sometimes the world DOES have to get worse, before people can see that it needs to get better. *Is STILL half hoping for the third earth of the pendragon series*