MetaChat - What will we people fifty years from now be shocked we did?

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17 December 2009

What will we people fifty years from now be shocked we did? →[More:]I finally got around to watching Mad Men and it was amazing how many things people did that (for the most part) you just don't do now. The smoking, taking kids places without their seat belts on, the sexual harassment, the drinking during pregnancy, etc.

So what do we do now that people will shake their heads at in fifty years?

post by: drezdn at: 15:02 | 28 comments

Wasted stuff, especially water and food.

posted by Miko 17 December | 15:04

Vaginal birth.

posted by msali 17 December | 15:11

msali, I came in here to say the very same thing.

posted by amro 17 December | 15:22

Sugar filled beverages.
Quantity of meat consumed.
No public transportation system.

posted by -t 17 December | 16:32

Medical treatment. I hope it advances to the point that a lot of what we do now will seem as outdated as leeches and chloroform. I hope that diseases can be easily and painlessly treated and eliminated by tweaking a gene or two.

posted by Kangaroo 17 December | 16:48

Homophobia

posted by drezdn 17 December | 16:49

Chemotherapy to cure cancer, and in the process, create more cancer.

posted by msali 17 December | 17:21

Vaginal birth.

Really?

posted by danf 17 December | 18:06

Sometimes we got in our cars and drove around with no place to go just because we felt like it.

posted by Joe Beese 17 December | 18:31

I'm pretty sure people in fifty years will wonder why pot was illegal.

posted by drezdn 17 December | 19:13

Lady GaGa.

posted by jonmc 17 December | 19:25

You did Lady GaGa?

posted by dg 17 December | 19:30

2009 BC: Lady Gaga sounds like the Archaeopteryx by the marsh! Or, Lady Gaga is making a metacultural critique of the Archaeopteryx by the marsh.

posted by filthy light thief 17 December | 19:44

I really like that comic/joke.

posted by filthy light thief 17 December | 19:45

Let people die because they could not afford health insurance.

posted by Susurration 17 December | 19:52

No, dg, we ALL get to DO her now.

posted by richat 17 December | 20:00

Imprison an unconscionably large percentage of our population.

posted by occhiblu 17 December | 20:58

Allowed people to lose their homes and declare bankruptcy because they got sick.

posted by jason's_planet 17 December | 21:00

Write checks. (Yes, I still write checks every month. And will continue to do so, damnit. I don't trust those fuckers with unlimited access to my bank account.)

posted by sperose 17 December | 21:19

Hm...it wouldn't have occurred to me, not having done it, but I think vaginal birth really is a good prediction. Something like 1/3 of births are already scheduled Caeasareans and it's increasing all the time. There are a lot of factors pressuring that number to keep climbing.

posted by Miko 17 December | 21:57

A little misleading, Miko - that chart didn't say scheduled C-sections, per se, just c-sections. so that includes emergency ones. Also, many scheduled c-sections are medically necessary, even though they are scheduled.

But anyway, yeah, the rates are rising. Definitely in the US. Is it the same for other countries? I'm pretty sure I remember reading it was for New Zealand (rising, still much lower than the US though).

posted by gaspode 17 December | 22:11

Invited people to vote on whether their neighbors could get married or not.

posted by BoringPostcards 17 December | 23:50

(I don't really think this will happen but...)

Junk food. We'll look at TV shows of people going to McDonalds and have the same reaction as we do now with all the smoking on Mad Men. How could people continually poison their bodies like that?

posted by gaspode 17 December | 23:58

I have never owned a cheque book. So I find it surprising that in the US at least writing "checks" is still going on.

C-sections are still very much a last resort situation here in Japan - natural with being induced is the usual alternative if things aren't kicking along normally. Considering an epidural is not an option here at most hospitals, c-sections are definitely not something you can elect to do.

posted by gomichild 18 December | 00:16

In 50 years, America will have reverted back to a hypersleek version of feudalism, with astronomically wealthy people living in huge airborne arcologies and with their biological systems consistently fed from the constant harvest of the poor.

In 50 years, America will be a nascent socialist country, with only the remnants of democracy as we know it now, and that only as marketing.

In 50 years, there will be no America, except as a massive suburb and bedroom community for well-heeled Chinese and Indian people who 'portcommute.

In 50 years, America will be the last country on Earth that still has no one living offplanet.

In 50 years, this sentence will read as:

En Fiy yars, snets reedis.

And only 1 percent of the population will know how to read it.

posted by Lipstick Thespian 18 December | 16:20

... I find it surprising that in the US at least writing "checks" is still going on.
Me too. It's actively discouraged here, in that bank accounts that have cheque access attract additional taxes over those that don't. I have no idea if this is a deliberate ploy by the government to eliminate cheques or just a way for banks to screw a little bit more money out of people, but I don't remember the last time I even saw a cheque. Direct transfers between accounts is pretty much the norm and some companies won't do business any other way.

posted by dg 19 December | 17:20

We don't write checks very often but I know that a lot of people are uncomfortable with electronic transfers and won't do them. Also there's no easy way to transfer money safely between two individuals (except maybe paypal).

posted by octothorpe 19 December | 17:55

In the UK at least, they've recently announced that cheques will be phased out by 2018.

posted by chrismear 19 December | 21:34

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