Stone Deaf and Stupid

It just occurred to me tonight. Forget GenZ (or whatever comes after Z), our nation is headed for generation 'Stone Deaf and Stupid'. Now, I can't take all the credit for coming to that realization. My neighbor helped me as she and all her friends stood around a vehicle with the windows rolled down and the stereo blaring loud enough for me to hear it over the ballgame. You see, they were having what must've been a very loud conversation and beside them were a couple of baby-filled strollers and a couple other children who were under the age of four.

Why wait until they're old to get them stone deaf? Ruin their hearing now. Saves time.

Yeah, yeah. I sound like an old fart. But even when I was a teen, I couldn't stomach loud music, and the older I get, the worse it gets. I've been to approximately five rock concerts in my life, and all of them were too loud. Seriously, though, how can anyone enjoy music when it's making their ears bleed?

My thought is that no one cares about enjoying the music any more. It's a excuse people use to cover up the true reason for loud music... It drowns out thought. If you can't hear yourself think, you don't need to worry, to wonder, to care about anything. You just let the music fill you up, and you can float away on a cushion of mega-bass.

Come to think of it, this theory about the reasoning behind the need for loud music is the same as the reasoning behind drug use and heavy drinking. To stop thought. If you can't think, your problems are always pushed aside. (And as anyone who's tried to drown their sorrows in a fifth of Black Velvet can tell you, the problems are never gone. They're waiting just around the corner to pounce when your brain is allowed to be active again.)

But let's forget about the adults for the moment. If they want to ruin their ears and their brains, that's their choice. Think about the kids this noise-philia culture is producing. Stone deaf and stupid - how could they be anything else after what they're being subjected to? Sure, parents aren't liquoring/drugging their kids up to stop them from thinking. (Okay, most aren't. Did you hear about the chick in CO who gave her baby meth? Sick. Just sick.) These parents are just building a different wall to the thinking process. A wall of sound.

And people wonder where this fresh rash of childhood syndromes comes from. It's not just one cause; it's many, and I think this sound overload is part of it.

Okay, since darkness has fallen and driven the gaggle of geese inside, I now have silence and can resume work. (I don't need complete silence, but the boom-boom-boom of someone else's stereo derails my train of thought.) Talk amongst yourselves...

Quietly, please.

;o)

...sometimes when this neighborhood gets too loud with all its rap and rock and salsa and various other bass beat nonsense, I get the urge to put opera in the ol' car stereo, crank it, and drive around with my windows rolled down. "Like it loud? Let's see how you like Madame Butterfly cranked on high? How's about some Wagner? Huh? Like that? Do ya?" LOL Then I remember, I like my hearing and the urge goes away.

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