Has the world gone mad?

So what do you think Kitty?

Just wondering where you went Kittylester? !

Surely the time when most of us were young was by definition, the best of times? With exceptions of course. I think the internet has been a double edged sword. On one hand it has given every fantasist and conspiracy theorist a platform to spread their theories, lies, harm, but on the other hand it does mean that monsters like Trump no longer have anywhere to hide, are shown up for what they are by people brave enough to write articles about them. It gives a mouthpiece to those not employed by and beholden to the tax dodging right wing press barons, and it does give us an awful lot of information on everything.

Summerlove I meant, when the world cries 'abuse' at any form of child discipline other than a 'naughty step' or removing a toy.

It wasn’t too good in the early 40s. Fear of bombs and not much to eat. TB, infantile paralysis and all the childhood illnesses were par for the course. It’s just that things are different now. Different things worry us. But we do have flu jabs and we do (for the most part) have plenty to eat. Social media has created different problems, and of course the pandemic, completely unexpected, has changed lives. So I think things, though bad now, have been worse in my lifetime of 80 years.

I was interested to hear what others thought. I was thinking that it definitely has.

It’s an interesting thread kitty and has evoked different responses. I suppose we have more technology at our disposal now to achieve “going mad”.

Antonia surely a good parent shouldn’t need much more than The naughtier step or taking away of privileges What did you prefer snacking, beating, hitting? call it what you will,
my friend told me only the other day how she loved her father and understood his reactions even though she was beaten black and blue as a child her brother has scars on his face and a wonky eye from the beatings he took! But it was deemed an acceptable form of punishment

Women could be beaten by husbands, men thrown in prison because they were gay or queer as it used to be, babies born to woman and ‘children’ of rape and abuse and yes SuzieWoozies post illustrates many things about the ‘good old days‘
I think it’s always been mad but the modern day madness is just a different form of madness and May seems worse because there’s a few different mad things happening at once

Bluebell I am not advocating beating children. But I have two well balanced, successful adult daughters, and they got smacked as toddlers and young children when they were naughty. Neither of them even remembers it.

Yes and no.

Definitely yes, with global warming. What an awful place it's going to be for our grandchildren to grow up in. Also the virus. Right wing popularist governments who haven't got a clue what they're doing leading us to disaster.

But no. As suziewoozie said. (Careful Suzie, you're in danger of becoming popular.)

Well we ll have to differ there antonia I have three well adjusted hard working successful children with families of their own who were never hit And thankfully none of them have ever hit their children
In my opinion hitting to solve a problem teaches hitting to solve a problem why would I want to hit someone I loved is it ok for them to hit me or to hit their friends no of course not so why is it ok for a parent to hit it doesn’t make sense at all

We'll agree to differ, then, Bluebell

Posted too soon. I was going to add, at least we both have successful adult children, even if we got there by slightly different routes.

Antonia

Summerlove I meant, when the world cries 'abuse' at any form of child discipline other than a 'naughty step' or removing a toy.

So what type of discipline would you suggest?

I certainly remember being smacked. The fear and dread, of being terrified of being naughty.
My parents were not abusive, but my goodness it is not what I wanted for my children, or for them to fear me

I’m with BlueBelle. Hitting children, whatever you call it, can never be good or necessary. It was common when I was young, though thankfully my parents never hit me.

If you bully your children, what are you teaching them? My friend was abused as a child, then as a wife. She had no real idea how wrong it was.

That's the problem with (what people call) 'strict discipline'. The child may well become somebody else's victim - or an abuser themselves.

As for the 'World gone mad', well the only certain thing is change (or is it death and taxes?) - yet so many rail against it.

Why the wish to keep things the same? The way we lived was never sustainable.

The world does feel mad to me just now. The pandemic has made it more mad than usual.
As Suzie says it has always been mad. The people who inhabit the world make it so.

The people who claim that being hit as a child did them no harm are always using it as justification for hitting their own, in my experience. I've always thought that was ironic!

I agree that when we were young always seems like the best time, but that's because we were full of hope and hormones, and had none of the responsibility associated with adulthood.

I am also on a local history site, and without fail, whenever there is a photo of children playing on a bombsite in the smog there will be comments about how 'those were the days', and saying that today's children either have it far too easy, or that the poster is sorry for them because they can't play outside. On the whole, they were playing in the streets because of large families and overcrowding, not because of the 'fresh air' - the buildings were all black with soot.

They forget the cold, damp housing, the childhood diseases that killed people, the poverty, the limited lives of people who had nothing and had to live by strict social norms, because what they remember is the music they danced to, the boys/girls they kissed and the hope they had for the future.

Doodledog, well put! As youngsters, we wake up full of energy, days last forever - and our whole, wonderful lives stretch out in front of us!

Doodle yes - I was hit as a child, and I don’t mean a slap on the wrists or legs. It made me determined never never never to do it to my child. And she in turn has never hit hers. She and the two dgc are the kindest, loving , empathetic and well behaved people you could ever meet. Why is there ever a need to hit a child? Why?

The universe is chaotic. We spend our lives, as do other creatures, trying to impose some order. I don't think our patch of universe is any madder than it's ever been. It's possible we just know about more of the madness or that because we are, generally speaking, more comfortable (not living hand to mouth) than any previous generation, we have more time to notice.

My DH was hit quite often by his father, he never hit his own children. He loathed his father and refused to go to his funeral. If you read diaries from long ago everyone in them seems to think that things aren't as good as they used to be!

To hit a child is utterly horrendous.
Would it be acceptable to hit an elderly person who had difficulty understanding things? IE someone with dementia?
Violence is never acceptable.

Has the world gone mad ?
When two loving sons can't comfort their distressed mother at their fathers funeral despite the fact that they were living with her and traveled to the funeral with her in the same car then yes, the world has gone mad.