Foot in your mouth?
Well my friends, today we put aside our political obsurdities for a moment and discuss something from the Ivory Towers of Academia. This week in my Urban Policy course, I read "Urban Demographics in Canada" by Dr. David K. Foot, an economist at the University of Toronto. I'm not sure if Dr. Foot was slowly getting drunk while he wrote this ACADEMIC book chapter in 2002, but I will leave that to you to decide. Here are some of my favorite excerpts:
"The peak use of public transportation occurs in the late teenage years ... By their thirties, individuals have probably married, moved out to the suburbs, started a family, and are commuting to the office [using automobiles]...The [public transportation] 'problem' cannot be solved by attempting to modify behaviour regarding auto use ... Neither [car pools nor more bicycle paths] provides a necessary service or quality transportation medium, which is what the aging and busy Boomers require."
"Meanwhile, the aging boomers, driving their families and themselves, are crowding the roads and are becoming 'eyesight-challenged', which will increase the demand for larger and clearer road signs, not to mention large print maps and so forth."
"Most crime is committed by teenagers. ... [With the echo generation] entering their youth ages in the mid-1990s, a return to a rising crime rate would not be surprising. Meanwhile, the aging boomers, who can no longer run as fast, move into 'white collar' crimes..."
"Just as with criminal activity, there is a life cycle in drug use. Glue sniffing is followed by 'soft' drugs, which in turn are followed by 'hard' drugs. Hence, the boomers were sniffing glue in the 1960s, smoking pot in the 1970s, and shooting crack in the 1980s. However, the drug preferences of those in their forties moves away from illegal drugs to legal drugs, such as tranquilizers and sleeping pills."
"In general, population aging is gradually moving the nation and its communities away from sports and towards more cultural activities... Gender bonding for men increasingly takes place at the hunting lodge not at the hockey arena and, for women, at the ballet or opera."
Foot has taught me many things in his 2002 article - 1) Public transit is eewey and rich people and old people will never use it, therefore 2) We must make traffic lights and stop signs larger so blind people - pardon me, "eyesight challenged" baby boomers can continue to drive SUVs. 3) Teenage robbers grow up to be out of shape CEOs who steal lots of money from their shareholders. 4) My parents have been on drugs since the 1960s and no wonder they were so well-stocked with cold medicine over the holidays, and, 5) The hunting lodge. I think I'll just leave it at that.
Oh, forgot to mention - Foot's 19-page article had six sources for his bizarre facts. Five of those sources, were his own publications...
In other news, today is a big day for us - Since our dilapidating dining room table is no longer in stock at our furniture store, it is being taken away from us tonight and replaced with our new, square, stainless steel, black-glass table. While the new table is hip and cool and trendy (highly appealing to Jonathan), like a good pair of old jeans, I am going to miss our little round, wooden black table very much. He was so good to us for the short period of time we had with him.
A silence, I think, is in order...
"The peak use of public transportation occurs in the late teenage years ... By their thirties, individuals have probably married, moved out to the suburbs, started a family, and are commuting to the office [using automobiles]...The [public transportation] 'problem' cannot be solved by attempting to modify behaviour regarding auto use ... Neither [car pools nor more bicycle paths] provides a necessary service or quality transportation medium, which is what the aging and busy Boomers require."
"Meanwhile, the aging boomers, driving their families and themselves, are crowding the roads and are becoming 'eyesight-challenged', which will increase the demand for larger and clearer road signs, not to mention large print maps and so forth."
"Most crime is committed by teenagers. ... [With the echo generation] entering their youth ages in the mid-1990s, a return to a rising crime rate would not be surprising. Meanwhile, the aging boomers, who can no longer run as fast, move into 'white collar' crimes..."
"Just as with criminal activity, there is a life cycle in drug use. Glue sniffing is followed by 'soft' drugs, which in turn are followed by 'hard' drugs. Hence, the boomers were sniffing glue in the 1960s, smoking pot in the 1970s, and shooting crack in the 1980s. However, the drug preferences of those in their forties moves away from illegal drugs to legal drugs, such as tranquilizers and sleeping pills."
"In general, population aging is gradually moving the nation and its communities away from sports and towards more cultural activities... Gender bonding for men increasingly takes place at the hunting lodge not at the hockey arena and, for women, at the ballet or opera."
Foot has taught me many things in his 2002 article - 1) Public transit is eewey and rich people and old people will never use it, therefore 2) We must make traffic lights and stop signs larger so blind people - pardon me, "eyesight challenged" baby boomers can continue to drive SUVs. 3) Teenage robbers grow up to be out of shape CEOs who steal lots of money from their shareholders. 4) My parents have been on drugs since the 1960s and no wonder they were so well-stocked with cold medicine over the holidays, and, 5) The hunting lodge. I think I'll just leave it at that.
Oh, forgot to mention - Foot's 19-page article had six sources for his bizarre facts. Five of those sources, were his own publications...
In other news, today is a big day for us - Since our dilapidating dining room table is no longer in stock at our furniture store, it is being taken away from us tonight and replaced with our new, square, stainless steel, black-glass table. While the new table is hip and cool and trendy (highly appealing to Jonathan), like a good pair of old jeans, I am going to miss our little round, wooden black table very much. He was so good to us for the short period of time we had with him.
A silence, I think, is in order...
posted by Sima at 3:10 PM
4 Comments:
I must say, the way that Foot was able to take the huge amount of social, political and cultural issues surrounding the 60's, 70's, and 80's and packaging it up into a simple "happy meal" of progressive drug use is simply masterful.
Almost as masterful is his complete invention of the "echo generation" creating more teen crime - the distribution of ages from 29 through 10 is currently almost perfectly evenly distributed (it actually DECREASES with age if you want to be picky).
The scariest part is the huge numbers that will read it and slurp it all up.
I also learned a few things.
1.) I'm a prodigee. Proof? I skipped the glue and went straight to the "marijuana cigarettes", I am barely out of my teens yet I am already commuting in an SUV. next on my list? The "white-collar" crimes. Sweet embezzlement here I come!
2.) Stupid is apparently spelled F.O.O.T.
3.) Self-referenceing is A O.K. If only my college profs had been aware of this fact.
4.) You don't need to be particularly intelligent to get published in "academia."
5.) If there is any justice in this world Foot will be hit by an older "eyesight-challenged" woman driving through a large print stop sign in an SUV with one teenager high on glue, one high on weed and one trying to figure out how to shoot up crack then giving up and smoking it like everyone else sitting next to a middle aged CEO counting his money in his swiss bank account.
Foot does make at least one valid points. I can pretty much guarantee that I'd be able to outrun any baby Boomer. That is, if I were to stop my glue sniffing.
P.S. Can I cite this guy in my next paper?
- Brendan
I never follow the political blabble.
But on a plus note, your new table is gonna look SHweetness!
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