The citizen-Republican. (Scotland, Bon Homme County, S.D.) 1???-19??, 1920-11-25
Wild YOUNG FOLK
Not Much Worse Than Those Of
Other Days.
Writer Answers Indictment Of "Thess
Wild Young People"-Frankness q
Striking Characteristic Of the
Generation Of Today.

I'VE OF the younger generation"
says John F. Carter, 1Jr., In the, Allan
TIC. answering an Indictment Of ''those
Wild young people" by certain "Mr.
Grundy" in the same magazine, 1--WE
are trunk with each other, trunk, or
pretty nearly so, with our leaders;
frank in the way we feel toward life
and this badly damaged world. 1t may
be disquieting and misleading habit,
but is 1t a bad one?
1--WE find some few things in the
world that we like, and whole lot
that we don't, and we are not afraid
to say so or to give reasons. In ear
Her generations this was not the case.
The young men yearned to be glitter
ing generalities, the young women to
act like shy, sweet, innocent fawns-
toward one another. And now, when
grown up, they have come to believe
chat they actually were figures Of pris-
tine excellence, knightly chivalry. ador-
able modesty and impeccable pro-
priety.
"But really doubt If they were
so. Statistics relating to. let us say,
the immortality of college students in
the eighties would not compare favor
ably with those of the present. How
ever, now, as they look back on 1t, they
see their youth through mist of mus
lin, flannels, tennis, bicycles, Tenny-
son, Browning and the Blue Danube
waltz. The other things, the ugly
things that we know about and talk
about, must also have been there. But
our elders didn't care or didn't dare to
consider them. and now they are for
gotten. We talk about them unabashed
and not necessarily with Presbyterian
disapproval, and so they jump to the
conclusion that we are thoroughly bad.
and keep Fostering us to make us
good.
'"The trouble with them is that they
can't seem to realize that we are busy,
that what pleasure we snatch must be
incidental and feverishly hurried, We
have to make the most of our time. We
actually haven't got so much time for
the noble procrastinations of modesty
or of the elaborate rigmarole of chiv-
airy and little patience for the lovely
formulas of an ineffective faith. Let
them die for while They did not
seem to serve the world too well in It's
black hour If they are inherently
good they will come back vital and un-
furnished But just now we have lot
Of work, 'old time is still a-hying,' and
we must gather rosebuds while we
may.
ooh, know that we are a pretty
bad lot, but has not that been true OF
every preceding generation? At least
we have the courage to act according
ly. Our music is distinctly barbaric.
our girls are distinctly not mixture
Of arbutus and barbed wire. We drink
when we can and what we can; we
gamble, we are eXtravagAnt-but we
work, and that's about all that we can
be expected to do! for after all, we
have Just discovered that we are still
very near 10 the stone age.
ooh. suppose tat it's too bad that
we aren't humble, starry y-eyed. sl' re-
spcctful innocents, standing revcr"nfly
at their side for instructions, playing
pretty little games, in which they no
longer believe, except for us. But we
aren't, and the best thing the oldsters
can do about it is to go into their re-
spectivc back yards and dig for worms,
great big pink ones-for the Grundy
tribe are just about rs important as
they are, and they will doubtless make
company more congenial and docile
than these wild young people, the men
and women of my generation"