Is it a Normal Part of Maturing?

I think about the old caricature of the crotchety old man shaking his cane at the world and declaring, "This country's going to hell in a handbasket!"  Am I becoming that old man because I increasingly hold that sentiment?

My grandparents were scandalized when the Beatles showed up on Ed Sullivan with their floppy hair and wild rock and roll music.  They were also aghast at the increasing depictions and frank discussions of extramarital sex on television during primetime, not to mention the constant pushing of the envelope in the amount of skin displayed.

I'm shocked to find out that the Democrat party considers my views on abortion "extreme".  That nobody under 40 seems to understand that a major factor in the social crisis our country is experiencing is the destruction of the family.  Now they tell me I'm a bigot if I don't celebrate the idea of the government forcing us all to recognize (and celebrate) gays "marrying" each other?

My generation dismissed our grandparents' alarm at loosening sexual mores, but now those of us who managed to grow up are suddenly beginning to understand why they were alarmed.

Truth doesn't change.  God doesn't change.  I suspect every generation experienced a certain level of hubris in believing theimselves to be more enlightened than all the generations of human beings that came before.  It's sort of like a disease that has become pandemic with this current generation.

Mitch Daniels was right in telling our generation at the 2009 Butler commencement that it's our fault.  Absolutely, the current generation is merely a product of ours.  We're the ones that taught them narcissism, the myth of self-image, and the attitude toward everything of "what's in it for me?".

We've doomed the greatest country in the world to a path that ends at anarchy and dictatorship.  We've doomed our grandchildren to lives of hopelessness and want.  Because in our selfishness we failed to honor our parents' values.

My generation created a mess, and somehow we should strive to make it right for our offspring before we die.