are you an improvement on what has come before?

im sure that many in my age range (for the sake of this discussion lets say 15 - 19) have seen traits in their parents/older family members that some might call "dated", such as inability to shift paradigms (e.g. left vs right), racism etc.

im just wondering that if you have seen these traits in older members of your family group and if you had changed these or carried them on, since personally i think where one generation zigs the next should zag to a certain degree, where one trys intolerance the next should try mutual respect and so on.

as a personal example, my parents have had nothing to do with religion at all, whereas im immersing myself in the history of different forms of spirituality and the history of spirituality itself, there are a lot of others but this is the most obvious to me.


thank you for reading, even if you dont post a reply i hope ive given you something to think about


p.s. i only mean "improvement" in the way i said before: "one zigs where one zags", so a better way to put it might be are you a variation on what has come before.
[edit on 28-3-2010 by james420]

[edit on 28-3-2010 by james420]

Well if they teach us something, then that means we learn it...for whatever that is worth. Like my Dad was religious and used to hall me to church every Sunday.

So why not go to the dark side, why not try the opposite side of the spectrum to see what it's about? I quit going to church, it didn't interest me because it brought back emotions of boredom.

Your parents say don't do drugs, but don't give you many reasons as to why. Well I tried them, got addicted to them, they didn't physically hurt me. I grew from them, became my own person, formed by own beliefs. But with it, you gain a certain level of sanity you will never get back. The people that never did drugs will never understand your view on things. Hopefully you see where I am going with this.

So would I advise my kids to try drugs? Certainly not.
They are powerful, and if the mind is not ready...they can send your whole reality filled with paranoia and fear.

As long as you keep maturing, and accepting things around you for what they are...you will never die.

To answer the question stated in the title: a resounding yes.

There are many reasons why today has improvements over the past. There are of course some downsides in living in today's world, but overall, we got some good things going for us, if you look on the bright side of life.

One way we in general can be seen as an improvement today is that hopefully we have all learned from our past mistakes and tribulations on a personal level as well as on a human wide level. We can look back at the history of man, and see all the ridiculous things that have happened, like all kinds of wars, genocide, crazy stuff like that. Being alive in today's world gives us a unique perspective of the human experience, especially with the power of the internet.

I'm not in your age group

but my response to your query is a resounding 'NO'


When I look back at what my ancestors achieved, I'm a lazy, undiciplined, self-serving, selfish, self-absorbed waste

And I'm far from the exception, in my opinion

I believe the culture of 'Self' is approaching toxic levels

As is the culture of 'entitlement'

The result is all around, in the form of obese, mentally-stunted, semi-literate, over-indulged teens and pre-teens. And unfortunately, these conditions are not automatically self-correcting as the individual passes through his/her 20s, 30s, 40s, etc.

I see no evidence of the much-touted 'evolution'

Nor do I see in this generation 'an improvement on what has come before'

In some ways yes:

I don't have any racism towards people, my grandparents do. I myself have no problem with gay and lesbian people and I firmly believe they should be able to get married and find it incredibly weird that we have to vote to see if they can get married to the people they love. No one had to vote on our marriages. My parents dont have a problem with them but they dont think they should be able to get married. My parents are going through a divorce which is so hypocritical it makes me sick.

I was born without wisdom teeth, yay, so I think that means Im more evolutionary advanced then they are.

Some bad things:

I grew up in a time with instant gratification and I never can sit back and just enjoy the silence. I have to have some noise, the more the better. Im not content with just having the tv on, I have to have the blackberry surfing the net while the tv's going. I also will probably only outlive my parents due to medical advances, not my lifestyle. Who knows if those are going to be good years though due to my diet since I was young of mcdonalds and other fast foods.