WHATEVER HAPPENED TO ... COMMON SENSE : Call it what you will, but country seems to lack common sense
Posted on Monday, November 3, 2008
BENTON COUNTY — A household iron warns users: “ Never iron clothes while they are being worn. ”
Another label on a flushable toilet brush warns: “ Do not use for personal hygiene. ”
Yet another label — this time on a hair dryer — reads “ Never use hair dryer while sleeping. ”
The Michigan Lawsuit Abuse Watch Web site offers a link to even more “ wacky warning labels” that make a person wonder just what circumstances led to such labels. The labels also invite the question, “ Whatever happened to common sense ?”
It seems that many people in Benton County agree that society is not only suffering from an increasing lack of common sense, but that the problem is pervading many parts of life.
“ In today’s environment, common sense has gone out the window, ” Sharon Mitchell said. “ We’re in a society with so much information and technology that there’s not any traditional knowledge, ” she said.
For example, Mitchell learned how to cook from her mother, who learned how to cook from her mother, Mitchell said. Her own children have not learned the art of cooking, however.
“ The daily activities that encompass family living just don’t get passed on anymore, ” she said.
Mitchell is a nurse at Bentonville High School. She said that in her 22 years of nursing, she’s seen people become overly cautious, and they seek medical treatment for even the most minor of injuries — problems that used to be easily treated at home.
Samantha Bradley, a junior at BHS, agrees that common sense isn’t so, well, common anymore. She has a family member whom she calls “ book smart but not commonsense smart.
“ There’s stuff like the phrase ‘ bun in the oven’ that she doesn’t know what it means, and she doesn’t know like directions and stuff, ” Bradley said.
There’s also an increase in people acting before they think, as well as not recognizing the difference between wants and needs — both which lead to impulsive and often destructive behavior, she agreed.
One of Bradley’s classmates, John Betts, took a more political slant on the question, “ Whatever happened to common sense ? ” He said society often puts its moral judgments before using common sense. He gave the example of how many people say illegal immigrants should be required to pay income taxes. He said many illegal immigrants don’t have very high-paying jobs, and they are trying to support large, poor families. If they were required to pay taxes, they would have even less money to support their families.
“(People ) put their morals first, and it blurs common sense, ” he said of the issue.
Kathy McInroe had an even different take on the commonsense question. She said we, as a society, have almost made things too easy, that common sense has become not as necessary, so it’s not as encouraged. For example, she said, if people need directions, they use a GPS instead of just learning their way around.
“ The trouble-shooting piece of life is not taught, nor is it encouraged, ” she said.
McInroe also said that with people not having to learn about various aspects of life, they are not being given the chance to make mistakes.
“ We learn more from our mistakes, ” she said. “ If we don’t have a chance to do that, we can’t learn about how to develop a strategy. ”
Another idea that McInroe had was along the political realm. She said she heard about how some people have bought guns because they are concerned that, based on who wins the presidential election, they could loose their ability to own a gun.
“ With the economy and everything else right now, it’s not like (gun control ) is going to be at the top of anyone’s list, ” McInroe said with a laugh.
For Sylvia Miller, the idea of common sense “ went out the window a long time ago when we became a society that wants everything now, now, now. ”
She said the idea of being able to have everything at our fingertips has made people greedy, and that greed often supersedes common sense.
Miller also said she sees the concept of no common sense in her job as a nurse. So many people get more concerned with potential, minor side effects that they hear about on TV that they don’t care about the positive effects a prescribed medicine will have.
Owen Miller said he often sees children not have the same level of common sense as adults because of the many technological advances children are more apt to use.
“ With them spending most of their time with computers, that’s put them out of touch with real life, ” he said.
Miller also said that as an American society, we’ve lost sight of what brought us success.
“ What built this economy is hard work and good planning. We’ve lost sight of that, and now (the economy ) has gotten out of hand, ” he said. “ We’re losing our economy edge to other countries. ”
Sometimes the lack of common sense is simply not thinking about consequences before acting.
Susan Grossenbacher said she sees that “ people just don’t think before they act. They don’t think about what will happen.
“ They need to just slow down and think, ” she said.
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