Things Were Simpler Then

As I watched my son play with my iPod this morning, after watching his regular cartoons before and during breakfast (first on the TV, then on the computer), I wondered if I was ruining him because of all the technology that he is constantly inundated with.  My thoughts went to the posts I regularly see on Facebook, declaring that:  "My curfew was when the streelights turned on.  My parents called my name not my Phone. I played outside with friends not online. If I didn't eat what was cooked for dinner, then I didn't eat. Sanitizer didn't exist, but you COULD get your mouth washed out with soap. I rode a bike without a helmet, getting dirty was ok, and most of the neighbors LOVED YOU as much as your parents did."

Whenever I see things like this, I can't help but think, "While this may be true, your parents and grandparents could make the same claims to simpler times.  Generations are always changing, and we as people also remain so much the same.  Is it bad that things change?  Specifically, is it bad that technology continues to change the way we live?"

I will preface the rest of my thoughts with the fact that I believe that we should have moderation in all things.  I am not advocating that children watch TV, play video games, and use technology all day long.  I think it is very healthy for kids to play outside, to invent and use their imagination to play new games, and read books that are made from paper.

That being said, is there anything wrong with kids today using more technology than we did?  It is because of technology that we can share our thoughts and feelings here on the internet.  Both of us.  It is because of technology that James is even here.  It is because of technology that surgeons can save lives, chemists can create life-altering and life-saving drugs, and astronauts can explore outer space. 

Did each generation, more technologically savvy than the previous one, also complain that when they grew up times were simpler?  Had they had Facebook and Twitter while they raised their children, would they have posted the same thoughts that we see today?

Perhaps we worry about the future generation not having the same things we had growing up - the simpler things.  But our lives have become easier and more convenient because of technology, even amid the worries that our children would grow up somehow "messed up."  Each generations' children have actually grown up to become as or more intelligent than their predecessors, evidenced by our increasing technology and conveniences.

So, whenever I begin to worry when I see a child playing a video game, or learning how to use a touch screen at 2 years old, or even just staring at a TV or computer screen, I think about the life they have ahead of them.  They will be using these things their entire lives, growing up around it, and even, when they become adults, recreating it.  The technology they will have, and the technology they will create, because they have become used to it and grown up around it, will save even more lives, create even more beneficial drugs and medications, and explore even more of the universe.  Perhaps when our kids have kids, whatever their Facebook or Twitter may be then, they will write something about their curfew, and the ways that things were simpler when they grew up.