A society “gone with the wind”

Published 1:35 pm Thursday, March 22, 2018

Writing a weekly column after moving to a new state is a difficult task. I try to keep my columns light-hearted because of all the bad news reported daily. My thought process is to give the readers something upbeat to relate to or smile about, which is why you will also notice a lot of the stories filling the pages weekly have a good amount of the same feel-good vibes. 

I have yet to take a stance on anything political, not only out of respect for the new state I moved to and the people who fill it, but because I am still getting my feet wet in a different culture and learning the ins and outs of what makes you all tick.

However, I read somewhere a few years back a quote that has stuck with me and weighs heavy on my heart when I see the events filling the newspapers and news stations nationwide.

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It said, “Welcome to the new America, we don’t stand for anything because we don’t want to offend you.”

How sad is it to live in a world where that quote not only exists, but one could argue also makes perfect sense.

Growing up outside of Kentucky, I may have been exposed to different experiences, cultures and politics, although the one similarity that unites many of us is arguably the way I was raised. A certain set of standards and values were instilled in my generation that are easy to see and argue somehow became lost along the way when compared to the current state of our youth and young adults in the nation.

We had issues then, as all generations do. You can argue the nation’s issues lie with Generation Z or Millennials. However another might argue Generation X is to blame, the “hippies” in the 1960s or the “beatniks” in the 1950s and then stretching all the way back to the “flappers” in the 1920s. Regardless of the generation, the blame sits on society’s shoulders, no matter what decade the changes took place in.

I believe when a generation is immersed in technology it loses all sense of reality. When a generation has mainly horror films, action movies, all too real video games, Snapchats, Facebooks and Twitters, which are predominantly viewed multiple times a day, they have no sense of how the real world operates.

When a generation can hide behind a camera on a smartphone and paint any picture they like for their viewers, that generation becomes entitled to think they deserve what is on the other side (reality or not) without having to do the work to achieve it.

And, when that generation sees the results and hype from a media which has arguably been desensitized reporting daily, nightly and regularly for hours and days on end about issues which used to be a one-day headline in a newspaper, that generation receives more than its fair share of coverage which has arguably been distorted into possible fame and notoriety, even among its outcasts. This generation almost morbidly bands together into what some might label a cool new trend among those rejected by their peers.

Every morning, every night and multiple times a day I pray over my children, a habit I started with them in my womb. However, the frequency in which I bow my head has increased throughout the days and years since their birth.

Not only have I had to sit my 5-year-old down with his older sisters and explain why he should not pick up packages delivered to our house, but every morning when they get out of the car to walk into their schools, my heart tugs and I realize how distressing, serious, tragic and pathetic it is they live in a world where I feel uncomfortable dropping them off at elementary school.

Regardless of which generation, media outlet, outcast or society’s fault it is, it is the responsibility moving forward of each generation, media, future outcast and rising society to change it.

It is time to stop playing it safe and allowing society to not take a stand in regards to their opinion and beliefs because it might offend someone.

It is time to rise up, even if it is difficult, and stand for what we believe in.

I stand for gun “regulations,” not control, and would never allow any form of government to take away my Second Amendment right.

I stand for strict prescription drug control and believe this issue is a bigger problem than our nation believes it to be. This is another false sense of reality, much like doctors prescribing cigarettes to patients in the 1930s to 1950s.

I stand for all ex-military and law enforcement officers to be enlisted in every school immediately. If our politicians can be protected around the nation, how much less do we value our children if they cannot have the same level of protection?

I stand with a nation that has the right to make a statement, regardless of the age of the individual, and demand change.

The generation that is rising is the one that will soon rule the nation.

I stand with others around the nation who blame society, and feel it is time to take back and stand up, creating a better future for the generations underneath us. Even if that means ruffling some feathers along the way.

I stand to take back a nation and civilization that for many of us seems gone with the wind.

Brittany Fuller is the community editor of The Jessamine Journal and Jessamine Life magazine. She can be reached at brittany.fuller@jessaminejournal.com.