Welcome to Gaia! ::

Ohhh. Very nice. I agree with you all the way. biggrin

I think it's a mixture of things, now please read on, and you will hear my little rant on what's wrong today.

Television deffinately has something to do with it. Now, I don't think it's evil, and I watch alot of TV, but not as much as some people, and at least I read along with it. Now, TV has done alot of good things for me. For example, if it wasn't for tv, I would have never discovered my love for drawing anime, for I would have never been introduced to it. I got some good out of it. But, the problem is, most people are far to influenced by what they see and hear. I am smarter than to do stuff like this, and in a sence it is the kid's own fault, but many children have been put into hospitals for immitating their favorate TV shows. Not only that, but TV only reinforces the idea that stupidity is good and lovable, and does tend to make the intelligent seem like geeks. Even though there are stupid people out there who are kind, and very friendly, not all us intelligent people stay inside all day, not all of us are nerds, and not all of us are weak. There are shows that give the impression that certain behavior is ok. Some of these shows also give people the wrong idea on how things are. Life isn't easy or happy, and, at the same point, not everyone smokes pot, or drinks, and when someone acts alittle happier than usual, it doesn't always mean they're high or drunk. At the same point, people's intelligence and the intelligence of the jokes do seem directly connected. You will notcie taht as time goes on, humor seems to get lower and cruder. People are laughing at stupid sexual puns that seem like things a child could think up. Kids, also, haev more knowledge of sex and drugs than they are ready for, and child hood innocence, at least when I was growing up, ended at 6. If even that late. Along with that, they hear these jokes that they don't understand, and laugh because the parents laugh, or a audience laughs, without knowing what it means or why it's funny. Thus, every one has such a similare sence of humor, and whatever the TV says is funny, is funny.

Schools can also be to blame. I will make a quote from a book, Fahrenheit 451, I've read

The sad thing is, it's true. Test grades are sharply dropping, and the government does things to these school that they think wil benifit them, but only makes things worse. The test minimums have been dropped sharply, so the schools don't seem like an embressment. Most kids in college prep classes, suposidly somewhat higher classes, can hardly even read. It's not cool to read, or draw, or write. No. You must be like every one else. You must dress in teh latest fasions, watch the hottest shows, all lacking real intelligence or meaning, you must do this you must do that. If you don't, you have no friends. And don't even think about watching this, or reading, or knowing anything about this. Alot of the populare kids don't know this, but it takes balls, in high school, to be different. There are kids getting jumped because they wore their hair weird, or something dumb like that (Not exagorateing, that really happens.) It takes balls for a guy to admit he's gay, it takes guts to read. Those who show any true independence from their peers are rejected and alone, the fair sex not even giving them the time of day. In high school, one's worth is determined by how populare they are. Cliqs are a huge problem, and there are people, like me, that hardly have one because they're are so few people who have the balls to acctualy take part. People who don't really care about what every one else in teh school are wearing, who don't care what some kid who your never going to see after graduating, except at high school reunions, thinks about a certain show, and I don't care if every one thinks I'm a freak. I'm one of those people, who, no matter what I do, will always be a freak, because of one thing I did wrong in kindergarden. Some weird thing I did in first grade. How I dressed in 6th. When one reads, that person is seen as weird. Wheather it's jealousy, veiws based on how TV potrays us, or teh fact that most of the popluare kids can't, and thus you aren't clones of them, I have no idea.

I seriously agree with Ray Bradbury, that soon, reading will even go to the extent fo being a crime, and violence and manslaughter will be seen as less evil than reading a poem. Kids will run people down for kicks, and overdosage will become so common, that it is looked as like an every day thing. I mean, some of the things he described do exist, like "Sea-shell headphones" and the TVs he described are eerily similare to huge, plasma screen TVs that every one either has, or wants. The way Beatty described how the world came to be the way it was seems like things that have happened. And his time came in the 50's, maybe 60's. It will probobly happen later than he first predicted, but it'll probobly still happen. Unless, of course, the world was to do something about it, before we start making libarys illegal, and, at one point, blowing oursleves up.

I think its because people are just lazy. On the internet more than in real life, but I still see people write papers without puncuation.

I've had this one friend, who decided to scream at me (using Caps) because I corrected his grammar over YIM.