Wednesday, October 29, 2008
Old school: 1958 vs. 2008
Regular readers know that I rarely post the internet joke du jour, but this one seems to be right down our strike zone. I supply it as a public service on the small chance that I am not the last conservative in America to see it:
Scenario: Jack goes quail hunting before school, pulls into school parking lot with shotgun in gun rack.
1958 - Vice Principal comes over, looks at Jack's shotgun, goes to his car and gets his shotgun to show Jack!
2008 - School goes into lock down, FBI called, Jack hauled off to jail and never sees his truck or gun again. Counselors called in for traumatized students and teachers.
Scenario: Johnny and Mark get into a fistfight after school.
1958 - Crowd gathers. Mark wins. Johnny and Mark shake hands and end up buddies.
2008 - Police called, SWAT team arrives, arrests Johnny and Mark. Charge them with assault, both expelled even though Johnny started it.
Scenario: Billy breaks a window in his neighbor's car and his Dad gives him a whipping with his belt.
1958 - Billy is more careful next time, grows up normal, goes to college, and becomes a successful businessman.
2008 - Billy's dad is arrested for child abuse. Billy removed to foster care and joins a gang. State psychologist tells Billy's sister that she remembers being abused herself and their dad goes to prison. Billy's mom has affair with psychologist.
Scenario: Mark gets a headache and takes some aspirin to school.
1958 - Mark shares aspirin with Principal out on the smoking dock.
2008 - Police called, Mark expelled from school for drug violations. Car searched for drugs and weapons.
Scenario: Pedro fails high school English.
1958 - Pedro goes to summer school, passes English, and goes to college.
2008 - Pedro's cause is taken up by state. Newspaper articles appear nationally explaining that teaching English as a requirement for graduation is racist. ACLU files class action lawsuit against state school system and Pedro's English teacher. English banned from core curriculum. Pedro given diploma anyway but ends up mowing lawns for a living because he cannot speak English.
Scenario: Johnny takes apart leftover firecrackers from 4th of July, puts them in a model airplane paint bottle, blows up a red ant bed.
1958 - Ants die.
2008 - BATF, Homeland Security, FBI called. Johnny charged with domestic terrorism, FBI investigates parents, siblings removed from home, computers confiscated; Johnny's Dad goes on a terror watch list and is never allowed to fly again.
Scenario: Johnny falls while running during recess and scrapes his knee. He is found crying by his teacher, Mary. Mary hugs him to comfort him.
1958 - In a short time, Johnny feels better and goes on playing.
2008 - Mary is accused of being a sexual predator and loses her job. She faces three years in State Prison. Johnny undergoes five years of therapy.
Sadly, there is very little actual parody in this joke.
13 Comments:
By 
, at
Wed Oct 29, 09:56:00 PM:
"1958 - Vice Principal comes over, looks at Jack's shotgun, goes to his car and gets his shotgun to show Jack!
2008 - School goes into lock down, FBI called, Jack hauled off to jail and never sees his truck or gun again. Counselors called in for traumatized students and teachers."
Frankly, its worse than that. I graduated in 1989. We went hunting in the AM before school and parked in the school parking lot with all sorts of armament, the kind of which would simply result in a SWAT team and someone getting locked up in this day and age. Of course, I guess thats pushing 20 years, but just the same..
By 
Pax Federatica, at
Wed Oct 29, 10:49:00 PM:
Scenario: Johnny takes apart leftover firecrackers from 4th of July, puts them in a model airplane paint bottle, blows up a red ant bed.
1958 - Ants die.
2008 - BATF, Homeland Security, FBI called. Johnny charged with domestic terrorism, FBI investigates parents, siblings removed from home, computers confiscated; Johnny's Dad goes on a terror watch list and is never allowed to fly again.
You forgot: "PETA hounds Johnny and his entire family for the rest of his life for his cruelty to red ants."
By , at
Wed Oct 29, 11:06:00 PM:
1958 - Johnny has a rubber, principal informs his parent and he gets a whipping.
2008 - Johnny goes to school a gets a rubber.
By smitty1e, at
Thu Oct 30, 05:24:00 AM:
1958 - Johnny goes to history class, learns that Communinists and Fascists have butchered countless innocents and spread misery over large swaths of the planet.
2008 - Johnny goes to history class replete with airbrushed texts without so much scary stuff. Can't say who's teaching the class without being labelled "racist" for some reason.
By , at
Thu Oct 30, 08:14:00 AM:
Just wait until this joke is retold in four years.
By Mrs. Davis, at
Thu Oct 30, 08:49:00 AM:
You'll do hard time for retelling this joke in four years.
By , at
Thu Oct 30, 09:37:00 AM:
Since I graduated high school well before 1958 I can advise that all of the above is true. We even had a rifle club in my school and had regular target shooting in the basement range. Now as a school committee member I cannot enter the school with a pocket knife.
Somehow I think that if Tuesday next ends badly we will start the reversal very soon. Radical Marxist moves will incite massive pushback a broad spectrum of ways.
By , at
Thu Oct 30, 10:22:00 AM:
1958 - Johnny learns about Communism and Fascism, and how children denounced their parents as counter-revolutionairies. He thinks that is terrible.
2008 - Johnny learns that the United States has been a fascist patriarchy since its founding. Johnny is confused because it conflicts with what his father and grandfather have told him about the country they are proud of.
2018 - Johnny denounces his parents as reactionaries and counter revolutionairies at a school assembly, along with many other students.
2028 - Johnny doesn't go to high school since it was burned down in the riots of 2024. He works as a day laborer at the age of sixteen in the Chinese-run auto factory, to help make ends meet in his family.
-David
By , at
Thu Oct 30, 02:01:00 PM:
JMP: "Just wait until this joke is retold in four years."
Mrs. Davis: "You'll do hard time for retelling this joke in four years."
Four years from now, once the new odictionary comes out, thought crimes such as TH's won't even be possible.
Prototaxites
By GreenmanTim, at
Thu Oct 30, 04:10:00 PM:
Parody and eerie verisimilitude granted. But....
Scenario: Johnny endures brutal hazing at the hands of his peers that includes sodomy with a broomstick.
1958 - Johnny cannot talk about it and the damage is real and permanent. He does something similar to someone weaker and smaller as an adult.
2008 - Johnny may or may not feel he can talk about it, but there are support systems for him if he has the courage to do so.
Scenario: Johnny's 10-year-old sister is raped by a repeat offender.
1958 - Johnny's family doesn't trust psychologists so she doesn't get any professional help to deal with the trauma. The previous offenses were not reported because the families of those children did not want their daughters to carry the stigma. The perp either gets lynched or a light sentence, depending on the community standard in which it occurs.
TH knows that the second scenario, sadly, is directly from our own family history.
Just saying the 1950s were not all candy colored, and clear-eyed simplicity.
By , at
Thu Oct 30, 05:52:00 PM:
Greenman Tim, we are all aware that the 1050's were not a perfect, idyllic time when nothing was wrong. However, not all change is good change.
For example:
Scenario: Johnny is climbing a tree, falls and breaks his arm.
1958 - Medical insurance is rare so doctors charge what people can afford to pay. Johnnies Dad gets a bill for $13.
2008 - Johnny waiting 1 hour at the emergency room overcrowded by illegal immigrants and their families. The medical bill is $2,700. The Safety committee fines Johnny for not observing the law against tree climbing. The tree is cut down.
By , at
Fri Oct 31, 09:37:00 AM:
Teaching Math In 1950 - A logger sells a truckload of lumber for $100. His cost of production is 4/5 of the price. What is his profit?
Teaching Math In 1960 - A logger sells a truckload of lumber for $100. His cost of production is 4/5 of the price, or $80... What is his profit?
Teaching Math In 1970 - A logger sells a truckload of lumber for $100. His cost of production is $80. Did he make a profit?
Teaching Math In 1980 - A logger sells a truckload of lumber for $100. His cost of production is $80 and his profit is $20. Your assignment: Underline the number 20.
Teaching Math In 1990 - By cutting down beautiful forest trees, the logger makes $20. What do you think of this way of making a living? Topic for class participation after answering the question: How did the forest birds and squirrels feel as the logger cut down the trees. (There are no wrong answers.)
Teaching Math In 2005 - El hachero vende un camion carga de arboles por $100. El costo de produccion es.............
By , at
Sun Nov 02, 01:45:00 PM:
Over at World Net Daily (11/2) there is a link to an article about a 5th grader assigned the task in Art class of drawing a scary mask for Halloween. The mask so scared his homeroon teacher that he was required to undergo a psychiatric evaluation before he could return to school.
