What Did We Have to Give Up? from A Danger to Society

Years ago, a majority of the people I came into contact with had simply no patriotism at all. The conversation would have been based on the problems we face as a nation and would have ended shortly with some sentiment to the tune of, "Let's get off that subject!" Now, there's hardly a porch without a flag or a soul without a hero's spirit. Everyone has certainly shown true colors down to the smallest contribution.

Years ago, discipline in the home was defined a little differently. The line between "getting the belt" and "child abuse" was hardly drawn because people stuck religiously to their convictions that what went on in the home stayed in the home. And what went on in someone's home was no one else's business. These days parents are more or less forced to find constructive ways of dealing with misbehavior. The threat of child service intervention is more of an eye-opening reality than most people have come to realize.

Years ago, people were quickly categorized as slow or insane and placed in a group with others similarly categorized. A person who needed specialized treatment rarely got it mainly because of the infancy of our understanding. Today we have help groups and clinics with a high range of variety. Now we have categories of attention deficit disorder, mentally challenged and severely dramatized among the many other educated guesses.

I think of these things and many more just like them and I hope that the world is learning how to get better. But, I also try to keep in mind words the Dalai Lama once said. "Judge your success by what you had to give up in order to get it."

Michael Allen