The Age Of Falling Morals

Written by Paranoid

Recently watching the news, I was shocked to hear about the shootings that occurred in Colorado, in the USA. Reading more about the story in the papers, a disturbing picture was painted of the event. The two guys who perpetrated the senseless killings were part of a group of misfits and loners known as 'The Trenchcoat Mafia', whose alienation from society and their peers drove them to commit the massacre. Debates on TV suggested that the Internet should be controlled - mainly due to the fact that the pipe-bombs which the two killers had used were constructed using information gathered from the net. Of course, video-games and films were also blamed for having a part in making the two killers go crazy. I think that blaming the Internet and video-games/movies for senseless violent acts such as this one, is quite hypocritical. The Internet, and all mass media caters for the majority of society, that means that all these media are a reflection of the society itself.

Think about that last statement. Society has undoubtedly degraded in the latter half of this century. Violence, promiscuous sex, rape, child- molestation and drugs have become more and more accepted amongst all of us. Maybe accepted is the wrong word for things like rape and child-molestation, such things still abhor most of us, but we're more desensitised to them. The moral fibre which was put in place by such great historical figures as Jesus Christ, have strangely begun to unravel and to be ignored by a large section of the populace. The morality which people stuck to 50 years ago are being rejected by the youth of today. We say things like, 'that's so old-fashioned' - but if this morality worked in the past, why should it be rejected, just because it doesn't suit us, or might require a little more self-control and work from us?

Now as we approach the next millennium, I think it's time we took a good look at society now. There are so many problems with society it's hard to know where to begin. But let's even look at the small example of TV. 40 years ago, you wouldn't see hard-sex scenes, glorified drug-use or senseless violence (such as Natural Born Killers), nowadays, you'd probably see these things at 9:00pm in the evening. Paradoxically, however, I don't believe in censorship, in most cases, apart from paedophile type material. Controls must be put in place though. And you need to ask yourself, 'why should anyone want to know how to make a nailbomb?' - should information like that really be allowed on the Internet? Making a nailbomb/pipebomb is pretty useless to anyone - unless they wish to construct such a device with violence in mind.

But ask yourself the broader question, why does society reject morality, and crave violence in their media - games, movies, even pictures of dead soldiers or refugees in newspapers. Why are things like promiscuous sex (broken marriages, homosexuality etc.), recreational drug use, and abortion (a mother murdering her own unborn child in a clinical and increasingly legal way? That's f*cked up... reality check!) becoming more accepted and more practiced by the people?

Now ask yourself this, if morality continues its downward spiral, what kind of world will we have for the next millenium - and would you like your children to live in such a scum-hole? Where your daughter can get gang-raped by a bunch of teenagers on heroin (which they bought from the newsagents) while walking down the street? Or where your children get gunned down by semi-automatic weapons while in school - for no reason at all, or maybe just because the gunman (or gunchild) is a little miffed with his teacher for getting only a D+ in a test. You can see where I'm going here, I'm sure I don't need to paint more horrifying pictures of ordinary life in the future. Look around you right now - in the US, the latest fashion for young teens is to be gothic, wear crazy black clothes, worship satan and paint upside down crosses on their foreheads. That's immature and stupid if you ask me, but why are young people so disturbed in the first place? Life is a lot more comfortable for everyone these days, your grandparents would have grown up in a time of poverty and hardship, yet they didn't turn into 12-year-old gun wielding, crack smoking, devil-worshippers - because they had morals and some intelligence. They weren't spoiled by having everything they wanted at their fingertips. But one thing people did have in your grandparent's days was a strong family unit.

This is the solution that I see: A strong family unit coupled with education (in morality and maybe philosophy too) is the only way to cure the cancer that is spreading throughout society. Then again, can you see the types of people that revel in hedonism and self-gratification providing such an environment for their children? Nope, me neither. That's why the government may have to step in and lay down some laws and morality, and stick to them. Of course the government doesn't do this, since no politician wants to risk being unpopular, so they cater to the masses. If 70% of the people of Europe demanded that we should have the right to shag-sheep in public, then a law would be passed allowing that to be legal. Don't believe me? Well, lots of things were illegal before pressure groups started making a fuss; the age of consent (the legal age for sex) gets lowered once every 10 years or so (it's 16 now, in 10 years it'll be 15).

So, with the government catering for the masses, and our religious duties and morality getting more lax, and changing to suit us, will society continue to decline? Unfortunately yes, unless we all draw a line which cannot be crossed, no matter what... Remember, change is not always good - if it ain't broke, don't fix it. And remember we all have to live with the decisions made by governments because of those do-gooders who don't live in the real world - just busy themselves with their pressure groups going totally left-wing to ridiculous levels. For instance, in Ireland there are a group of so-called 'anti'-fascists who say that no illegal-immigrant (including criminals) should ever be deported. These are the same group who beat up people who speak out against illegal-immigration and who disrupt their legal and democratic right to assembly and speech! Who's fascist there?

Although, the world-famous pornographer and freedom-of-speech activist, Larry Flynt, said a very true statement: Freedom of speech is not just for you, it's for the guy who's completely opposed to you, and what you stand for. So maybe it's the price we pay for free-speech. It's just a pity that so many people are not able to act responsibly with this freedom.

A message for all you guys out there who daydream about making bombs, senseless killing, satanism or run your immature web-sites glorifying these types of things: you are not the rebels anymore, not in this society - people like me are the rebels now. Get real, and don't be pricks all your lives.

BTW - The ideal type of government for the future, in my opinion, would be a democratic/socialist mixture, perhaps with the church having more of a say over state affairs (from a moral standpoint). If you don't agree with this, then write a reply article, but remember to include a solution which you think would work, and think about it before casting any stones!

Increase the peace!

- Paranoid