Serious question

They have that because of all the parents in the 90s who forgot their kids in the backseat.

 

Consequences— bad behavior has always been around but there was enough folks around that wouldn’t tolerate it and it was mitigated— knowing that you most likely won't get your ### kicked soundly or suffer any negative consequences for participating in bad behavior will always increase the probability of bad behavior

 

"There will be terrible times in the last days. People will be lovers of themselves, lovers of money, boastful, proud, abusive, disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, unholy, without love, unforgiving, slanderous, without self-control, brutal, not lovers of the good, treacherous, rash, conceited, lovers of pleasure.."

It was pronounced 2000 years ago.

 

It's very much a societal issue.

There's been a significant decline in general mechanical knowledge, and the spatial intelligence that generally goes along with that. That shows in the stupid trucker tricks we see everyday, stuff that many of us can't even comprehend how it was considered an option.

On top of that, peer pressure has largely been pushed out of existence. You want to see hysterics? Watch what happens if you talk about shaming bad behavior, which was once a common thing and ensured the passing along of unwritten rules of behavior within the various professions. I promise if you'd have needlessly tied up a fuel island 50 years ago, it wouldn't be long before you were rather rudely edumacted about the folly of your ways.

Throw into that mix the fact the critical thinking skills are becoming a rare talent, and the major influx of different cultures with different acceptable behaviors, and it's a wonder things aren't more fubar'd than they are!

And to the OP's original point: There's a lot of things that were just "Stuff kids got into" in the 70's and 80's that would get you jail time today. And it wasn't out there for everyone to see on the internet. And cell phones have definitely changed how I drive and ride when off duty...not that it was necessarily unsafe, but how it would be perceived by a busybody would generate phone calls.

 

It is NOT a Driver thing, NOT a Trucking thing. The bad has always been among us. The thing has been changed is , somehow the bad guys got the idea, Hey we can be ourselves now! We don't have to hide any longer. Being bad and telling lies is now the way to be. Now we have "alternate truth" We are free. The bad has always been here but they knew that to act how they wanted was unacceptable. But "somebody" OPENED THE GATE. Made them feel they were normal, made them feel they will be accepted with any bad thing they do. They NEVER had an inner compass, nor did they care , but they knew their way was not acceptable, so bad was hidden. That is one of the best reasons trucking has such good people, for some reason good honest people were drawn to it. Many following their father, or other good person in their life. Now they are having many problems from the bad guys that feel is "OK" to be bad. But this goes into all things , it is not a trucking problem, as you have pointed out. It is a HUMAN problem.

 

True, but adding social media into the mix was like throwing gasoline on a fire.

 

Society is going the way others planned it .. I know many who raised their kids the way they were raised . Their kids show respect and have some common sense . If we survive in a generation or two it will swing back the other way now that minds are opening up to the distractions .

 

It's called the "Me" mentality. Modern society only cares about themselves. The lack of judicial and parental consequences has always fueled the problem. Now here we are.

 

I grew up around alot of "older drivers" they had the same problems. Same stories. Gramps always made a quote. "World went to sheet when we stated cooking in the back yard and sheeting in the house". That was his take and kinda stuck with me. Very sturn WW2 vet and trucker. Same sheet, different day. We are the ones getting older.

 

I have 2 words for this post, cell phone. When was it, late 90s? Almost overnight, I noticed a marked decline in peoples driving. For the 1st time in my career, I couldn't predict what a 4 wheeler would do, and that, for me, was the beginning of the end. I still want to defend our truck drivers as the best in the world, despite what blunders are posted here, and that has always been going on, we just didn't have cameras catching every one. Even with the multi-vehicle pileups we see today with trucks all askew, it still represents a very small number, and we can't forget the millions of safe miles accrued by our truck drivers every year. I say make a device that renders the cell phone useless while moving, and boy howdy, watch the crashes decrease,,,cell phone, the smoking gun to all these mishaps, and it's apparently okay.