Simpler Times

I turned on Facebook this morning as I was preparing for Sahur. I am preparing for Puasa 6 in Syawal. We are encouraged to fast for any 6 days during the month of Syawal. Suddenly I came across this clip.

The first thing that came to my mind was, those were simpler times and as I read the comments, which was exactly what was written. And suddenly I realised, I was an 80s kid. I became a teenager in 1981. I finished school officially in 1986. I started college and technically moved out from my parents' home in 1986 as well. I made great lifelong friends in the 80s as well. I left for the United Kingdom in 1989. 1988 was the year I obtained my driver's licence.

And as I was growing up, I was entertained by the clips above. The music, the songs, the actors, the actresses, the movies, the tv series. We had our first exposures to all these artists that shaped our lives and for some they continue to shape our lives even up to now.

Compared to the cotton wool generation now that gets offended about everything and everyone. This cotton wool generation that was built and nurtured by my generation. We were built from tougher stuff, yet we created monsters. These entitled monsters that made police reports about everything. Even for failing grades. To the point that classic books had to be rewritten less it offends someone.

We get force fed by these new lifestyles. It may be offensive to some yet for these entitled flakes, we have no say, but they do. We are not entitled to an opinion, yet they do. These snowflake generation is even defined in the dictionary. They are defined as:

snowflake generation in British English

NOUN informal, derogatory

the generation of people who became adults in or after the 2010s, viewed as being less resilient and more prone to taking offence than previous generations

https://www.newidea.com.au/snowflake-generation

I don't consider them soft, yet they seem to be built overly sensitive about anything and everything but at the same time they seem to be blind with what is actually happening around them. In other words, their flakiness is selective. This generation picks and choose what to be offended about and when it suits them, they turn a blind eye about everything else even preparing substantive arguments, facts and figures.

I have no answer why we did this to our children or why our children turned out this way. We cannot really put the blame on anyone else except ourselves. Somehow, we feel that the world needed to be made safe for them. We no longer appreciated any form of punishments, be it physical or verbal. We feel that our children can do no wrong and, in the process, skewed and screwed up generations forever.

I became an adult in the 80s as well. At that time, we were just being exposed to the personal computer and all sorts of computer programmes. We were not exposed yet to the internet. That will be the 90s. Mobile personal devices were very much in their infancy. In the 80s we were still in the automation mode. Fax machines, Xerox machines, floppy disks, VCR etc. We were still into rotary dialing phones, keyphones were just being introduced and we were forced to remember phone numbers by heart. Means of communication on the road remains public phones and phone booths. Getting anywhere we still relied on folded maps and asking for directions.

Yes, there were inconveniences, yet it was simpler times. We were mot as connected as we are now. Our devices are like an appendage to our limbs. There was no necessity to be totally connected to the world, checking for messages on various apps as if the world will stop revolving if we do not check in. Yet, it doesn't matter if it's our employers, our business partners, our buyers, or our sellers, if we are not around or no longer around, they will just find a replacement. Yes, maybe the world might miss you for a few minutes but then life goes on. Maybe, people closer to us might miss us a little while longer, yet the world will still continue revolving. The world doesn't revolve around us. In fact, no matter how important our position in society is, in a blink of an eye we will be replaced. That's how fleeting the world is.

Being alone here gives me time to reflect on things and thus I indulge in reminiscing especially when I need a little peace, a little solace. This place gives me this. A time to reflect to simpler times when life was what it was above. Indulging in a life of fantasy as we prepare for the unknown. As we prepare for the vicious world. Thus, having gone through this we try our best to wrap our children in cotton wool, hoping that they won't ever go through what we went through. Trying times and traumatic events.

Thus, that little reel inspired the topic for today. It is not easy to find nor create contents, I marvel at people that can do just that. That's all that I have, my musings. I tried to act in front of a camera, I am a little awkward and can be a little stiff. So, here you are to my readers, thank you for reading.