Uh-huh. Sure this isn't about feeling old. Sure
August 18, 2009
From the Mindset folks at Beloit College we have the historical perspective of this year’s entering college class.
If the entering college class of 2013 had been more alert back in 1991 when most of them were born
oh c’mon now. 1991? I was …. oh nevermind.
Tidbits from the list:
4. They have never used a card catalog to find a book.
6. Salsa has always outsold ketchup.
7. Earvin “Magic” Johnson has always been HIV-positive.
10. Rap music has always been main stream.
13. The KGB has never officially existed.
17. They have never had to “shake down” an oral thermometer.
23. The European Union has always existed.
24. McDonald’s has always been serving Happy Meals in China.
28. The American health care system has always been in critical condition.
35. Women have always outnumbered men in college.
44. There have always been flat screen televisions.
46. Disney’s Fantasia has always been available on video…
47. Smokers have never been promoted as an economic force that deserves respect.
53. Someone has always been asking: “Was Iraq worth a war?”
54. Most communities have always had a mega-church.
56. The status of gays in the military has always been a topic of political debate.
59. For one reason or another, California’s future has always been in doubt.
62. Members of Congress have always had to keep their checkbooks balanced since the closing of the House Bank.
63. There has always been a computer in the Oval Office.
68. Official racial classifications in South Africa have always been outlawed.
70. Vice presidents of the United States have always had real power.
74. Congress could never give itself a mid-term raise.
Get off my damn lawn, yo!
August 18, 2009 at 8:43 pm
Geez. Every year about this time (because, you know, the new freshman class is entering college) someone constructs the same tired old list. It evolves slightly every year, but is more or less the same.
And it is more or less a matter of “get offa my lawn, ya whippersnappers!”
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August 18, 2009 at 9:59 pm
you forgot to shake your fist.
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August 19, 2009 at 12:18 am
Actually, Orac, the people I know who teach undergrads find the lists useful. For example, physics professors had to find a new way to talk about rotation when nobody had vinyl in the house growing up.
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August 19, 2009 at 12:54 am
I remember when a professor was teaching us about the sonic hedgehog signaling pathway, and he said, “that’s some sort of cartoon character, right?” The generation gap was quite palpable.
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August 19, 2009 at 5:54 am
Entry 4 is no big difference from many older students…..
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August 19, 2009 at 6:55 am
You forgot
* there was always internet
* twix was always twix (for us Europeans)
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August 19, 2009 at 9:56 am
you forgot to shake your fist.
Shouldn’t it be a cane?
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August 19, 2009 at 11:20 am
Orac sounds like he’s shaking his walker…
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August 19, 2009 at 11:21 am
I’m envious that they don’t remember New Coke or Crystal Pepsi for that matter, what ghastly beverages those were.
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August 19, 2009 at 11:31 am
New Coke? Bah! 7-Up Gold, on the other hand, was a beverage worth drinking!
It’s still interesting to take note of how many things that seemed to have some relevance in our lives twenty-some or thirty-some years ago (I’m 44) left no mark other than that in our memories.
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August 19, 2009 at 1:03 pm
I had to Ctrl-+ on Safari to get the italicized type big enough for me to read.
I have also had to abandon my lecture example of Sid Vicious in describing μ-opioid receptor desensitization.
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August 19, 2009 at 2:19 pm
Damn, and I the only one with the cajones to admit that I actually liked New Coke?
They should bring back New Coke and call it Coke L33T or Coke XXXtra. It would sell like wildfire.
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August 19, 2009 at 2:39 pm
Kids these days! The nerve.
/shakes fist
Pssssssst, what do you do with a card catalog?
heh, jk.
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August 19, 2009 at 2:54 pm
Abel, Sid, really? Okay, now I feel old.
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August 19, 2009 at 3:09 pm
This week someone from my high school class posted photos of her first grandchild on FaceBook and talked about how great it was to be a grandmother.
My daughter is 21, so physiologically it has been possible for me to be a grandmother for some time. Psychologically I am not ready. Repeat. Not. Ready.
Now I feel really old. Guess I should take some Metamucil with my wine tonight…
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August 19, 2009 at 4:10 pm
I am a good decade older than this year’s freshman class … but (in all seriousness), who is Sid Vicious?
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August 19, 2009 at 4:31 pm
Jason R: Coke l33t… with cupracabrine. FTFY.
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August 19, 2009 at 4:37 pm
@youngin’ #16:
fer crying out loud, GOOGLE it! 🙂
then rent the movie Sid and Nancy.
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August 19, 2009 at 8:38 pm
I spent 32 years in front of university classes. Awareness of your students’ short history is essential if you want to use analogies or make connection to anything they know about.
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August 19, 2009 at 11:31 pm
You should also remember that they don’t care about all your old stories and old stuff.
People expect old men to die,
They do not really mourn old men.
Old men are different. People look
At them with eyes that wonder when…
People watch with unshocked eyes;
But the old men know when an old man dies.
(Ogden Nash)
And if you’re 40 or so, you’re an old man to these kids. Not a man, an old man.
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August 20, 2009 at 12:25 am
I tried to pull the list up on my computer. All I got was a message in a blinking green light that asked: Abort, Retry or Fail?
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