The Lost (Yeah You, Gaby)

Training Bodybuilding
101

evil wins when good men choose to do nothing. Each successive generation has had it easier in some way. As a history major in school, you can see this from the very beginning when man barely had an agriculture system to support himself. Generations face adaption events; disease, war, famine etc. I’m thinking our’s is (like most everyone is saying) health, which plays a pivotal role in everything.

The average life span is lowering. Its common knowledge that being over weight causes a number of health issues. I’m thinking it will be fixed when enough people have lost someone close to them, or get sick of being sick and feeling like crap that they change their ways.

Not sure if complaining about this current generation is right, though. We’re creatures of our environment, and I have a hard time thinking that if an older person was growing up in this world, as an 18-19 year old he would be the same person he is now. Technology alone would change your perception of what you think is normal. Solution is simply to out live, and out work everyone that is not doing anything. It is their extinction.

102

Yeah whatever man you always know best anyway.

Edit: @prof x

103

[quote]SuperAlienFreak wrote:
Yeah whatever man you always know best anyway.

Edit: @prof x[/quote]

Huh, this is one thing I don’t get. Why is it these days that when people speak their opinions with any kind of conviction, there is some jackass that gets offended.

“He speaks as if his opinions are fact! THE NERVE!!!”

104

[quote]akram.mohamed wrote:

[quote]undecimber wrote:
Well it seems that most of the posters on the this thread agree that there is a problem;

We’ve established that standards have changed, who’s to blame etc.

So what can be done / what needs to be done to improve the situation?

[/quote]

We can start by setting a good example.

For example: if professor X can do XYZ amount of community service per week while holding down a job and training, any of us able-bodied, of sound mind, men and women can donate our time and skills (for free) to improve the world.
[/quote]

Agreed, and I’d add by also being “good” people.

105

[quote]USMCpoolee wrote:

[quote]Maiden3.16 wrote:
I dont see how knowing one person that gets tired after doing one pullup or how somneone cant lift a 35 pound dumbell after three years of training reflects on a whole generation. No doubt there is some pathetic people out there (strength wise) but also there is some that are exceptional. The bench press record just got broken at the NFL combine so obviously some people are doing something right. I think it is too easy to find a group of weaklings and say “this generations is going to shit because of video games.”

EDITED[/quote]

Thats a great point Maiden, it seems like there is just becoming a bigger gap in our generation between those that want to achieve something in their life by their own hard work, versus those that want to be spoonfed. I reckon the gap between those two groups is much greater than it has been due to enabling parents vs. strong-willed parents. [/quote]

I would agree that there is a bigger gap in physical fitness.
Each generation is taller and bigger than the last and there are far more resources available young people who show promiss. However everyday life requires NO physical exhersion for 99.9% of the population.
But this has been happening in a downward trend for a while, people in their 50’s-60’s were probably the first generation where the MAJORITY were inactive. I have tained a bunch of these people who are comming in to improve their fitness due to iminent health problems, they are so unfamiliar with physical exhertion that they are literally SCARED of the feeling of an elevated heart rate or breaking a sweat.

106

[quote]tnt2005 wrote:
evil wins when good men choose to do nothing. Each successive generation has had it easier in some way. As a history major in school, you can see this from the very beginning when man barely had an agriculture system to support himself. Generations face adaption events; disease, war, famine etc. I’m thinking our’s is (like most everyone is saying) health, which plays a pivotal role in everything.

The average life span is lowering. Its common knowledge that being over weight causes a number of health issues. I’m thinking it will be fixed when enough people have lost someone close to them, or get sick of being sick and feeling like crap that they change their ways.

Not sure if complaining about this current generation is right, though. We’re creatures of our environment, and I have a hard time thinking that if an older person was growing up in this world, as an 18-19 year old he would be the same person he is now. Technology alone would change your perception of what you think is normal. Solution is simply to out live, and out work everyone that is not doing anything. It is their extinction.[/quote]

This is a good post, technology is so advanced now and or society is so efficient that most of the population have the luxury/curse of being in a job that requires very little work (both physical and also mental).

The current generation of children are predicted to be the first generation in recorded history to have a SHORTER average lifespan than their parents, many will die before their parents due to health issues relating to poor lifestyle. I think this threat is the only thing which will bring about change in the general population.

107

[quote]Doyle wrote:
Thats a great point Maiden, it seems like there is just becoming a bigger gap in our generation between those that want to achieve something in their life by their own hard work, versus those that want to be spoonfed. I reckon the gap between those two groups is much greater than it has been due to enabling parents vs. strong-willed parents. [/quote]

I would agree that there is a bigger gap in physical fitness.
Each generation is taller and bigger than the last and there are far more resources available young people who show promiss. However everyday life requires NO physical exhersion for 99.9% of the population.
But this has been happening in a downward trend for a while, people in their 50’s-60’s were probably the first generation where the MAJORITY were inactive. I have tained a bunch of these people who are comming in to improve their fitness due to iminent health problems, they are so unfamiliar with physical exhertion that they are literally SCARED of the feeling of an elevated heart rate or breaking a sweat.[/quote]

Come to (think of it, my Dad is like this. It’s been so long since he’s physically exerted himself beyond 30min at a brisk pace on a treadmill) that he gets worked up when he sweats. I have uncles that NEVER physically exert themselves, I know this by following them around at work in the summer.

Things are a little different here though: Kids (under 20) play sports almost universally, and while there are a lot of skinny fat dudes, actual obesity is rare, though the numbers show it’s steadily rising. What scares me is the number of people I know that are done with college, in their late 20s or early 30s that almost never exercise. Most will play a game of street soccer every one or two weeks, and once they get hitched, even that goes away, leaving them to literally rot away into a mass of health problems. Hell I know two that started the process in college, they just so happen to be regular officers in the Army, heheh.

108

The point about technology being a big contributing factor to this new generation’s shittiness is pretty valid. It’s the single biggest difference in the environment of today versus when I was growing up (pretty much the same generation as Prof, I’m late 20’s). I think that’s what lends credibility to Prof’s statements about the unprecedented nature of this new crop of kids. There IS a big difference in what they’re growing up with.

Internet forums in general aren’t helping the matter. Forums, online games, stuff like that give dumbass kids a buffer from the ‘real world’. It drives me crazy reading posts like those from Gaby. When I was 15, I can guarantee I didn’t sound like that. I wasn’t hurling insults at people that I just asked advice from. And I didn’t sound like a complete moron either.

The kid can barely put a sentence together, but because we have Wikipedia and Google and everything else, he picks up a few buzz words to throw around and thinks he knows what he’s saying. He talks about ‘his theories’ that he just read on here from CT the day before.

Kids are just getting a partial education now. Technology keeps alot of kids from having to learn things because they can copy and paste from the internet to fulfill school assignments. When I was in school, there was cheating, as there has always been, but it could only go so far. If I was gonna steal someone else’s idea, I at least had to learn it first. Cheating has to be ridiculous these days, because it’s so easy to do. There’s pretty much no need to understand classroom material.

It’s just so frustrating to read Gaby’s posts, or that BruceLeeFan, or any of those guys, because it reminds me of how bad our future looks. End rant.

109

This thread is fucking retarded, no idea what is has to do with bodybuilding and I should never have posted in it earlier

110

For what its worth, I’m turning 40 this year and started training when I was 15. Of my many many peers who started training during high school and university, virtually none of them ever kept at it for more than 12-13 months at a stretch.

I believe the general level of fitness that youth bring to the gym when starting out has declined over the past 25 years but I don’t know that the current group has less discipline or work ethic.

Not to hijack the thread into a roid debate but the pattern I noticed among the people at my gym in my youth who lasted more than a year seemed to be that they would lift weights for 2-6 months, do a cycle or two and then conclude they didn’t want to stick with it when they shrunk post cycle.

On the whole, I judge my peers to be have been a bunch of lazy sods in their youth and believe the current crop to be equally (not more) lazy but demonstrating their laziness in a slightly different manner.

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Post to subscribe + read later

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[quote]gerald wrote:
On the whole, I judge my peers to be have been a bunch of lazy sods in their youth and believe the current crop to be equally (not more) lazy but demonstrating their laziness in a slightly different manner.[/quote]
I was saying something like that earlier, but according to X “i dont reed soh guud”

113

Is it just me? Or do most threads that Prof X has a profound interest in generally turn to shit? Laying blame to an entire generation is laughable. The older generation has ALWAYS complained about younger generations. This thread just proves nothing has changed but people have their heads too far up their asses to realize this.

114

Just finished reading this. X is right for the most part. My gym has a pretty even mix of guys around my age (25) that don’t know shit, and guys that are doing pretty well in terms of size, physique, etc (i assume strength but I don’t watch them workout). One thing that really sticks out to me though, and I think this relates somewhat, is the guys that really don’t know shit really appear to think that they do. Not sure how best to describe it, but you can just " tell" that it wouldn’t be well received if you tried to give advice.

Maybe 5 days or so ago, a guy that I estimated to be about 30’stopped me on my way out and said he’d noticed me doing deadlifts, asked how I programmer them, etc. It was cool. Talked to him for a min, gave him some basic info, gave him my email and told him to email me any questions he had and I’d try and help him. THIS GUY was not “lost”. Then, last night I noticed two guys somewhere in their mid 20’s doing “rack pulls” in the same room I was working in. The one guy was around my height, 5’8-9", the other was very tall, 6’5" at least, maybe as tall as 6’7". Both were doing the pulls from the same height! I noticed the bar was a hair under the tall guy’s kneecap, which meant probably in the middle or above the short guy’s! And both were REALLY hyperextending at the top, ridiculously. Guys like that I just kind of shake my head a little bit, because they walk in like they own the place, and give off an heir about them that you know it isn’t even worth trying to help them. It’s really sad, but it goes both ways.

115

Where’s poor old gaby? lol

116

[quote]Professor X wrote:

[quote]The Mighty Stu wrote:
Sadly, as a NYC high school teacher, I can say that this particular generation of ‘children’ (not all, but a good amount) has no idea that you have to work for things, that respect isn’t automatically given just for ‘being’, and that certain actions are expected, and do not warrant praise.

S[/quote]

I am not looking forward to that generation suddenly entering the workforce. I don’t think we have ever seen anything like this as a society…an entire fucking generation where the parents kept them in the house because they were scared to let them outside

…who also kept them from playing sports because they could get hurt

…who also made their kids wear full protective gear just ti ride down the street on their bike

…where you get gold stars just because you took the test even though you failed

…where a college level football coach can lose his fucking job for basically acting like most coaches did over the last 40 fucking years?

I mean, that shit is fucking scary…and they ALL think they are geniuses who know more than everyone else.

I am being serious…but maybe human kind does need a good plague. It’s been, what, a good 500 years or so?[/quote]

I was just talking about this. I didn’t have Xbox, Playstation, Ipod, or internet growing up. What I did have wasn’t even a priority for me. I loved building tree forts, shooting my pellet gun, and exploring the world around me. These days kids are growing up to be in tune and entertained from what comes from a box or displayed on a screen. Basically I’ve narrowed it down to there are 2 types of people in the gym. Entertainers and the entertained. Being 28 in a gym on campus, it’s easy to tell the difference. We work harder in the gym than our athletes do for our enjoyment. The student athletes are more concerned with bench, socializing, not breaking a sweat, and getting in our way.

It’s SERIOUSLY made me rethink how I plan on raising my children in the future.

117

[quote]Professor X wrote:
…
These kids are passing … out during training. You can’t train them “harder” because the moment one of them croaks, it will be all over the evening news with the parents calling for war against the military for it.
…[/quote]

Given the same weak recruits with more money and time allocated to training: do you think it would be possible to bring end-of-boot-camp physical standards back to where they used to be if the time period for boot camp were doubled, tripled, quadrupled, whatever? What if there were multiple levels of boot camp (physical testing, followed by placement into: regular boot camp; or double-length remedial boot camp; or triple-length remedial boot camp; or four-times-standard-length boot camp; etc.)? I guess the recruits who place into the longer physical training would have to agree to extend their service contracts by at least the additional time needed for the extra training – would enough of them agree to do it?

Just throwing out an idea.

118

These lyrics seemed relevant. Every time I think of my generation I just have to shake my head. I started working for my mom’s landlording business at age 11-pulling staples from where carpet was removed for $.25 an hour. By 15 I had my own land-mowing business.
I’ve made it through the first two years of college without loans so far. I know that no one owes me anything and I’ll have to earn my way in this world.[/quote]

Congratulations with your college loans and stuff but my question is, why the HELL would you ever work for 25 cents an hour…at age eleven. Unless you grew up in a third world country…that is insane.