http://www.thedailycitizen.com/articles/2008/03/21/news/opinion/opinion04.txt
Thursday, March 20, 2008
In the late 1960's the Hippies took this world by storm. Their battle
cries advocated free love and a demand to do your own thing. What
legacy did all that leave for us today?
First, let's look at the free love that they vehemently advocated
with such arrogance and disdain toward traditional values at that
time. What really happened to our society when we opened our TVs,
movies, and minds to free love?
It didn't take long for free love to become synonymous with sex
without rules. Having sex with anyone and any time was okay.
Afterall, it was what our heroes in the movies, in athletics and in
politics were doing, so it must be okay.
The impact of all of this has finally come home to roost. You can't
turn on the TV at any time of the day and not see or hear some
reference or display of sex. And many times it is their first date.
Of course, even the newspaper is filled with articles concerned with
the sex life of this or that person. Headlines of politicians'
escapades are legendary. Oral sex is no longer sex. The use of
high-priced prostitutes is now a classy business. And so forth and so
on the stories have gone since the concept of free love was pushed
down our throats by hypocritical advocates of change.
Why the anger? Have you read the latest reports that show one out of
four girls in the 18 to 25 year old range will have a sexually
transmitted disease? Ads openly display people with sexually
transmitted diseases smiling as they advocate a pill they take to
combat their illness. Why combat it? They are still having free sex
with whomever and whenever they want. They are sooooo happy!
Have you been reading the stories of the high rate of oral cancer
that has been spawned by free lovers' oral sex habits? Afterall,
didn't a president of this nation declare he was not having sex with
that woman it was just oral copulation. Cancer of the mouth and
esophagus are two of the most painful cancers you can contract. And
having a jaw removed leaves a lot to be desired.
Have you not seen the statistics of a typical small town high school
with 5 percent of the female students pregnant? That means in a high
school of about 1,000 students, with about half being female, you can
expect to find 25 pregnant unmarried females in the classrooms. Hmmm,
it makes one wonder about our local schools. I have seen some
beautiful lives with great potential be completely destroyed by an
unwanted unmarried pregnancy. It makes for a long hard road to hoe.
The hippies were wrong, love is never free. Love comes with
commitment and assumption of responsibilities. Love requires respect
of all involved the two parties plus any issues forthcoming.
Responsible love is more what we need than free love. Quality in the
proper setting is more precious than a quantity of events with a
multitude of partners.
Which brings me to the second part of their movement a demand to do
your own thing. This aspect also has left a huge legacy. But not a
legacy to be proud of, because it is behind the dumbing down of this
great nation.
We have forced schools to seek the lowest level and not fail anyone,
because anything else would harm one or two individuals' rights to be
whatever. Instead of lifting up academics as a necessity of daily
survival, we have made it a boring chore and not cool. Drinking and
playing extra loud music now that is cool.
No! Let me tell you what is not cool. A person who graduates from
high school and never really read more than a text message or email
and demands to enter college. It doesn't matter to them that they may
have taken up a slot and scholarship of a poor but more serious
student. They are hell bent on attending college and cheering at the
games and joining in on the binge drinking, because it is cool. Then
after five or six years they graduate and discover that doing their
own thing has lead them to a higher-level job. Instead of flipping
burgers they are the shift manager, supervising those flipping the
burgers. Yeah, I gotta do my own thing.
It is time for all those old hippies to rectify their mistake on
society. Get out and send new messages and battle cries. Advocated
that free love ain't free and it has a high negative cost and impact
on more lives than one. Then let them know that a demand to do your
own thing is actually an infantile cry of a person with no real
perspective or contributable skills in life.
Then you may leave a legacy you will be proud of just as that
generation before you did for us.
---
Dennis Bennett is a columnist for The Daily Citizen.
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