definitely NOT the greatest generation

[veronica_rich]

This falls in the category of 'Oh dear Dog, how stupid ARE you?'

There are two things in here that stand out as annoying and offensive to me:

1. When I was a kid and hadn't heard of something, I had to go look it up in a book or ask a teacher or my parents (or grandparents, whatever). We didn't have the Internet; hell, I was lucky I had an Atari 2600 and Pitfall for it. The point is, there was no ten-second point-and-click research. BUT REGARDLESS, THERE ARE THINGS YOU SHOULDN'T HAVE TO LOOK UP OR ASK ABOUT IF YOU'RE OLDER THAN, OH, NINE. "Was the Titanic real?" Are YOU for real? I knew about the Titanic literally decades before James Cameron told us about it.

I don't think I'm being culturally privileged; you people literally have the easiest research tool in the history of ever. The only way you could find things easier is if Servo the Robot could read your mind and download information directly into your brain as soon as you wonder something. If you have the privilege of access to Twitter, you probably have the privilege of Internet access, too. So don't give me that.

2. No, don't go "wikipedia" something. Use a real source. Take a few minutes to verify it by crosschecking. Wikipedia is good for killing time or bullshit, or finding external links to real sources. Period.

Comments

[kronette.livejournal.com]

I don't...I can't... WTF? How young are the people on twitter to not know who the Beastie Boys are? Yeah, I knew one of their names was Adam, but hell, a quick google search told me who he was. I won't even get into the horror of seeing the Titanic twittersode.

Before Teh Interwebs, I would call my grandmother if I had a question about cooking, my grandpa about math, my dad about cars, etc etc. Even today if I need to know something, I'll either call mom if I'm being extremely lazy or I'll google it (and NOT USE WIKIPEDIA DEAR LORD WHY). My niece did a report on Walt Disney and she was using wikipedia (she's 11), and I refused to allow her to cite those pages. I found the real information on Disney's site, plus his IMDB (Which I know isn't a whole lot better, but using that, I was able to find "legit" resources). I don't think teachers should allow Wikipedia as a resource. Ban it, make the kids look a bit harder than the first 3 returns on google, and LEARN SOME SH**.

[veronica-rich.livejournal.com]

Google is just super-easy. Now, granted, you might not get the correct reference on your first hit; it will require some supplementary research to figure out if you've got a reputable source, but shoot, that still takes less time than looking it up in paper form or finding the right person to call (which I did for years as a reporter, and still have to as an editor if I suspect something isn't correct).