Why is popularity more valuable than integrity in modern society?

[fordhamboxing]

The last generation said that about our generation and the generation before said the same thing about theirs... Maybe it isn't a generational thing, maybe it's just the fact that kids are little shits.

Unfortunately I don't think so, I think each generation is actually getting worse lol I mean, hard to live up to the Depression/WWII generation's standards. But ultimately I think this is a result of the crap education system that we now have. Our schools, teachers, and students live, die, and are wholly evaluated by standardized testing so as a result teachers teach and students are taught the exam and not the subjects. If all you learn about in school is how to take a standardized test why would you be interested in anything other than celebrities or stupid crap like that?? You didnt learn anything in school to catch your attention so what else do you have?

[Jim Jeffries]

I always get a kick out of the hatred today's youth feel for a millionaire businessman, even if he built up a company from nothing, hires hundreds or thousands of workers and provides us goods and/or services. But turn around and absolutely worship some millionaire celebrity, actor, comedian, athlete, etc that provide nothing more than mindless entertainment.

You have morons like Michael Moore that call for the arrest of the Forbes 400 wealthiest Americans, which include Bill Gates, Warren Buffet, George Soros, Oprah Winfrey, Steve Jobs, Michael Bloomberg, David Geffen, George Lucas and Barry Diller.

[S.G.]

Baby Boomers destroyed Western society. Generation Y are the victims, not the culprits.

[fordhamboxing]

I always get a kick out of the hatred today's youth feel for a millionaire businessman, even if he built up a company from nothing, hires hundreds or thousands of workers and provides us goods and/or services. But turn around and absolutely worship some millionaire celebrity, actor, comedian, athlete, etc that provide nothing more than mindless entertainment.

You have morons like Michael Moore that call for the arrest of the Forbes 400 wealthiest Americans, which include Bill Gates, Warren Buffet, George Soros, Oprah Winfrey, Steve Jobs, Michael Bloomberg, David Geffen, George Lucas and Barry Diller.

You know what's funny is that, and I only speak for myself, I only begin to resent (definitely not hate) those people when they sacrifice their...integrity!! That goes for any person though, I don't hold them to any particularly unique standard. I prefer a sleazy businessman to the mindless obsession with fame though. At least you can rally against a sleazebag businessman if (s)he's getting out of line. Unfortunately, once we're infected with the celebrity obsession it's impossible to get rid of

[Jim Jeffries]

You know what's funny is that, and I only speak for myself, I only begin to resent (definitely not hate) those people when they sacrifice their...integrity!! That goes for any person though, I don't hold them to any particularly unique standard. I prefer a sleazy businessman to the mindless obsession with fame though. At least you can rally against a sleazebag businessman if (s)he's getting out of line. Unfortunately, once we're infected with the celebrity obsession it's impossible to get rid of

Well I'm not a big fan of Donald Trump, who tried to use eminent domain to take away the home of an elderly widow, Vera Coking. Or Someone like George Soros, who almost single-handedly destroyed the British pound back in 1992 so he could make a billion bucks in one day. Or someone who buys companies, fires off the employees and sells off the property and equipment. Or Al Gore, who makes hundreds of millions off of scaremongering and highly exaggerating the effects of Global Warming which he then uses to buy a 9 million dollar mansion right next to the beach (the same beach he claimed would be underwater soon.)





But a blanket hatred for someone just because they're more successful than you, even if they worked 80 honest hours a week their whole life to get there, is absurd. Especially when you turn around and worship some moron celebrity.

[fordhamboxing]

Hahahaha Trump and Soros were the two guys I was actually thinking of in my post. Still, Soros' speculative attack on Britain is pretty epic. I don't like it, but you gotta respect it. As for Gore, putting aside your/mine/anybody's thoughts of global warming and how real a threat it is, you would hope/assume that any money he's made off of raising awareness to it would go towards, oh I don't know, solving it.

But, before this happens:

This materialism and all, let's see how people handle it when our economy goes back down! Like it or not, once we cut spending (and we ****ing need to at some point) there will be another recession, possibly a bad one. But, recession isn't always a bad thing, and in this case a recession is well worth getting the country back on track. Still, maybe we need a nasty recession to get us back to where we should be as people. Kind of like the Dodge Line in Japan post-WWII

[Jim Jeffries]

My favorite part of recessions is the vibrant recovery that usually follows. Unless of course you have a 3.7 trillion dollar per year Fedzilla, led by a naive ideologue, trying to "fix" it (well that and pay back the unions and corporations that stuffed his coffers with cash during his election.)

[Cuauhtémoc1520]

The last generation said that about our generation and the generation before said the same thing about theirs... Maybe it isn't a generational thing, maybe it's just the fact that kids are little shits.

At the risk of sounding old (which I'm not I'm only in my 30's) I can tell you that while that is true, I think kids nowadays are lacking something so fundamental and I truly believe that technology has had something to do with it.

Now I know people might point out to the fact that technology has changed and everything is relevant but I think the leaps that technology has made in the last 20 years is staggering.

Think about life without the internet and cell phones for example. Just those two things have changed life in such a drastic way that people that are too young to remember life without them, can't imagine what life would be like without them.

The way we talk, we socialize, date, get married and get 99% of our information come from these two things. Things that don't promote fact, just OPINION and it always seems to come from the loudest source.

Look at the way we see politics in this country, it's all about what the loudest voice is saying instead of watching or reading unbiased news and making up our own minds the way it USED to be.

People are being herded into a group, either right or left, liberal or conservative. You are on one side or the other. Look at this place for example, I think it's a microcosm of what happen in real life. Either you believe the conspiracy theories, or you are blind to the truth.....it's never in between.

I see it all the time now, from news channels, newspapers, shows, movies...you name it. People are also losing the basic fundamental social boundaries which once existed. Women are acting like men, men like women. Basic etiquette is lost and with it goes respect. It's a fundamental break down of everything we know and I don't have faith it will get better.

People have forgotten to think for themselves and whenever someone does disagree, it gets ugly because it's part of the mob mentality.

[Cafe]

cause society sucks?

[Kris Silver]

Agree with most of the posts in this thread. I think year by year kids are being more spoilt and everything around them through to adulthood suppresses any strong taste for what integrity, classiness, or good morals truly are.

A lot of that is technology, a lot of things are just made too easy to the point it's taken for granted. Like finding new friends, partners, lives, products, that there's literally no loyalty. People would rather get the hype of a new product, person or whatever by replacing, rather than investing long term. It's all about catching the next buzz or going with the next best person, and it's ok these days because some other friend did it, so you may as-well.

I think it stretches to all of us though. A few years ago I said I'd never be the kind of guy that would ever cheat, or go with a girl that is with someone. I've done both in the past few months and I find myself excusing it based on so many others doing it. Bottom line is it is pretty bad behaviour and we all excuse each others behaviour at times based on "most other people doing it anyway". So it does spread like a virus and breeds into acceptable culture.

We need another world war or something because society is being negatively effected and the media drives so much all these celeb storeis etc. encourage and make it seem ok. In some respects I think the recent financial crisis has made people rethink what's important. But not to the degree it's quite reversing the trend. No way near unfortunately.