Al-Jazirah newspaper

The elderly often say that their youth was when times were good. Does this mean that the current period, our times, are bad times or half good or half bad times or heartless times?

The “good times” of the old days were definitely different from the life that we now lead. It is not because people were kinder or nobler than we are today but rather it is because we have evolved, technology has developed and the number of educated and learned people is on the rise. So, simple life and rural areas are vanishing as people move into cities that are full of life, sound and color. Families have become busier with their own personal matters and have stopped looking after one another.

The world is now faced with a multitude of technological revolutions, and if they had occurred during the “good times” of the old days, the majority of people would not have been able to cope due to a lack of knowledge and capabilities. The population explosion of this new world has led to limited job opportunities, leaving many trapped in a vicious cycle of job hunting.

Considering all of this, it is only natural for people to look after their own needs, but what is not normal are the twisted ways they employ to get what they want. Such people have always existed, the only difference between their existence in the “good times” and our times is that they were a minority in the past, while they are increasing in number now due to the population explosion.

Technological and information revolutions have made it easier for people to communicate. Moreover, information is one click away and news is also one click away from going viral. All these technologies were not available to older generations and if they had been available, they would have proudly talked about how evolved they were. However, our senior citizens lived very simple lives when they were young with simple means and it is for this reason that they claim that their days were the “good times.”

They say that current times are the “bad times” because everyone lives an easy, modern life full of easily accessible pleasures. With such logic, in order for us to live in good times, we would have to go back in time and change the way we live and the way that we interact with one another. We would have to live in tents or mud houses, ride horses or donkeys, use rotary phones and send handwritten messages in envelopes. In the end, this is just a simplistic and rather naïve way to reject change and modernity.