How On Earth Did We Survive??
 

TO ALL THE KIDS WHO SURVIVED the 1930's 40's, 50's, 60's and 70's !!

First, we survived being born to mothers who smoked and/or drank while they carried us.

They took aspirin, ate blue cheese dressing, tuna from a can, and didn't get tested for diabetes.

Then after that trauma, our baby cribs were covered with bright colored lead-based paints.

We had no childproof lids on medicine bottles, doors or cabinets and when we rode our bikes, we had no helmets, not to mention, the risks we took hitchhiking.

As children, we would ride in cars with no seat belts or air bags.

Riding in the back of a pick up on a warm day was always a special treat.

We drank water from the garden hose and NOT from a bottle.

We shared one soft drink with four friends, from one bottle and NO ONE actually died from this.

We ate cupcakes, white bread and real butter and drank soda pop with sugar in it, but we weren't overweight because WE WERE ALWAYS OUTSIDE PLAYING!

We would leave home in the morning and play all day, as long as we were back when the streetlights came on.

No one was able to reach us all day. And we were O.K.

We would spend hours building our go-carts out of scraps and then ride down the hill, only to find out we forgot the brakes. After running into the bushes a few times, we learned to solve the problem.

We did not have Playstations, Nintendo's, X-boxes, no video games at all, no 99 channels on cable, no video tape movies, no surround sound, no cell phones, no personal computers, no Internet or Internet chat rooms...WE HAD FRIENDS and we went outside and found them!

We fell out of trees, got cut, broke bones and teeth and there were no lawsuits from these accidents.

We ate worms and mud pies made from dirt, and the worms did not live in us forever.

We were given BB guns for our 10th birthdays, made up games with sticks and tennis balls and although we were told it would happen, no one I ever knew had an eye put out.

We rode bikes or walked to a friend's house and knocked on the door or rang the bell, or just walked in and talked to them!

Little League had tryouts and not everyone made the team. Those who didn't had to learn to deal with disappointment. Imagine that!!

The idea of a parent bailing us out if we broke the law was unheard of. They actually sided with the law!

This generation has produced some of the best risk-takers, problem solvers and inventors ever!

The past 50 years have been an explosion of innovation and new ideas.

We had freedom, failure, success and responsibility, and we learned HOW TO DEAL WITH IT ALL!
And YOU are one of them! CONGRATULATIONS!

You might want to share this with others who have had the luck to grow up as kids, before the lawyers and the government regulated our lives for our own good. And while you are at it, forward it to your kids so they will know how brave their parents were.

Kind of makes you want to run through the house with scissors, doesn't it?!

The good Old days

but.....all you ate was organic food, now it's fulll of chemicals. (big reason for cancer)

you drank soda....but look at today's portions compared to the 50's portions....now it's ridiculously HUGE! (obesity)

skin cancer increased like crazy cuz of ozone deterioration!


for riding in cars with no seat belts, mothers who drank and smoke while carrying the baby.........you have a point!!!

but what you say is true......nowadays you feel that everything is so regulated and controlled and it's not helping at all!! makes you wanna give up on everything and go back to living on a farm!!!

Um, check the infant mortality rate of 50 years ago and compare with today. Lots of us died back then from just those risks you listed. ie: seatbelts, lead-based paint

Of course some of the aspects you listed are good... like climbing trees and eating mudpies and going outside to play. But seriously, compare the mortality rates if you want to say one age is better than the other. That would be a better comparison, I think.

Ok... time for coffee....

some of those apply to me and i am only 29

good point :thumbsup

I remember going to friends houses as a kid - all sterile, perfectly clean, museum like. They were always sick.

I grew up in a house with a sign in the kitchen: "This kitchen is clean enough to be healthy and dirty enough to be happy." To this day, I'm maybe sick once every couple of years.

There's a lot to say about how parents raise their children and what they let / don't let them get exposed to.

Well,these were good ol' days.No more they are.

Back then, we also made things up by ourself: http://www.gofuckyourself.com/showthread.php?t=506475

kids still do that kind of stuff around here.

What would we do without internet ;)

Two excellent points - being brought up in the 50s and 60s we didnt have cleaning products to disinfect every spot of the house - and people developed immunities to diseases that todays generation dont build up - causing a huge rise in illnesses especially in children - its interesting to see the relationship between the companies that produce all of the disinfecting products and the pharmaceutical companies (ok so the tin hat goes on occasionally)

Second - the mortality rate in the 50s and 60s for the younger kids was a little higher than today (you have to watch out for the studies that say teens because a whole shit load of teens got killed in Vietnam back then) - but since 2002 the mortality rate has actually turned and started going back up
Of course the mortality rate for teens in the 80s and 90s are low cause you couldnt get them to go outside let alond do anything that might put their body at risk :1orglaugh

i was born in 1980 so i guess this doesn't pertain to me. lol

life without internet :eek2
can't be!! :Oh crap