We should listen to our Seniors

a reply to: MOMof3

...Anyway, I never seen any generation better than another generation ...
But their tactics are same :intimidation,brainwashing.

Some of the best talks I've ever had have been with the elderly.

I'm almost 32 now, when I was in high school I got to meet and talk with a WW1 vet, that really gave me some perspective. My great grandmother was born in 1885, 98 years before me. When I think back that to her the 1980's were as real as the 1990's were to me I really regret that I didn't get to learn more from her, but I was too young and too stupid to know better. She ended up living to 107.

WW2 vets are always fun to talk to, I never talk to them about the war but rather about life in general. The perspective of people that got to be national heroes in their 20's and then mature through the best economic times the world has ever seen in the 50's and 60's is very interesting. They got to experience things as optimally as possible, which means they also got to experience mistakes without anything to cloud their circumstances. They mostly seem to be pretty humble by this point in their life too.

Oddly enough, I don't like talking to Vietnam Vets. There's some that are ok, but they come across as a group as being far more entitled.

Atleast once a week I head to a local coffee shop here in town which is essentially a seniors hangout. Lots of people in their 60's and 70's in there, I'm usually the only person under 50. I have a lot of fun talking to them and can easily spend a few hours arguing politics and playing chess. At the end of the day though, you have to recognize that old people are still just people, and will be wrong or biased at times. The ones worth talking to however have a lot of life experience to draw from.

"The children now love luxury; they have bad manners, contempt for
authority; they show disrespect for elders and love chatter in place
of exercise. Children are now tyrants, not the servants of their
households. They no longer rise when elders enter the room. They
contradict their parents, chatter before company, gobble up dainties
at the table, cross their legs, and tyrannize their teachers."

Same complaint, different epoch.

The information provided by the elderly is important for long term pattern recognition, but if I want to actually learn something new I find it easier to pull the library of alexandria out of my pocket and google it.