[jambutty]

If we were talking about 200 years ago you would have a good point garnida. But we are not. We are talking about the generation that spawned the generation that spawned the current youngsters.

50 years ago we could walk the streets with safety and confident in the knowledge that we wouldn’t be accosted or have our path blocked by crowds of yobbos.

If someone tripped and fell down in the street (even a drunk) people would gather round and help them up.

We could nip out to the local shop for a forgotten bottle of milk or whatever and leave the front door unlocked and the house empty. We KNEW that no one would come-a-calling and rob us blind.

We could let our kids go and play on the swings etc in the local park safe in the knowledge that they would come home more or less on time.

We could put out milk bottles with money in them to pay the milkman and no one came along and pinched it.

Our kids could set off for school clutching their bus fare and dinner money and no one stole it from them.

I could travel to an away football match and stand with the home supporters without fear of being done over. There was banter and fun poking but it was all innocent fun.

Men would hold open the shop door to allow a lady to go through first. Children would give up their seats on a bus to an adult, especially an old one or a woman without being asked to.

A young mum struggling with a pram to get onto a bus would be helped by total strangers.

In short, people were prepared to and did help each other whether we knew them or not. We KNEW how to behave and had RESPECT for others.

The jury is still out on the disputed easier exams today than yesterday shakermaker. All I know is that when I took “A” level maths at Blackburn College several years ago the curriculum was more or less the same as it was in my day for the equivalent of an “O” level. The exams may be just as difficult today as they were yesterday but the knowledge for them has been reduced. And of course multiple choice answers do make an exam easier.

Sadly the current education system is not churning out plumbers, electricians etc like they used to and some tradesmen are in very short supply. I accept that further education colleges do have courses that lead to a trade but do they lead to a job? School leavers were apprenticed to an EMPLOYER and would spend one full day and maybe an evening or two at a college to learn the theory of the trade. At the end of the 3, 4 or 5 years apprenticeship they had a job as a fully skilled whatever. The only bad point of an apprenticeship was that the skilled workers would treat the apprentice as a slave for the first year.

The war years generation, after suffering nearly 7 years of privation, shrugged off the past and settled down to rebuild their lives but they also kept control of the kids and taught them respect and good manners. There were tens of thousands of kids without a father and mum somehow had to manage on her own. But there was family around to help out.

But it was those kids who started to let things slide. They wanted the good things in life and many mums went to work to provide them. The kids became ‘latch key’ kids and were left to their own devices and little parental control. Once you get a rotten apple in a barrel it is only a matter of time before the rest are tainted.

I’m not trying to apportion blame but trying to understand why today’s society is amoral and only out for what it can get for itself.

Of course there are always exceptions and there are many fine upstanding people today who do care but they get fewer with each passing year.