Well let me tell you a little story. 40 years ago, I saw how they were starting to take discipline out of our schools, telling kids to report their parents if they were spanked. I decided it would be abuse to bring a child into that world and the world that would result. I didn't have any and I don't regret it a bit, this country has continued the down hill spiral that started back then.
LOL WTF. You seriously didn't have a child because it became socially unacceptable to hit them? That is retarded...so perhaps it's for the best for all of us.
Here is what I noticed about all these America-is-going-to-hell discussions - they simply reflect poster's situations, not macroeconomic realities.
Old people are going to talk about the good ol' days...because they were young in the good ol' days were optimistic and had their life ahead of them. By today many turned into grumpy old men, especially very conservative ones.
To me, the un-spanked person born some years after OKTexas has made the decision not to procreate, there is no better time than today. I want no piece of your wonderful 50s, 70s or even 90s, even if I had my salary doubled and workday halfed. 2016 is awesome.
When you have people not taught discipline and respect for others, you get things like students attacking teachers, students killing each other and shit holes like our major cities where life is meaningless. All the situations you regressives are now using to try to take away rights from the law abiding. You still refuse to address the criminal class that is your own creation. An undisciplined society is a lawless society.
Your phantasies do not seem to match reality of lower crime rates and many people with quite meaningful lifes in major cities.
No, in raw numbers crime has increased, the barbarity of crime has gotten worse, and lawlessness has increased. The only saving grace for your stats is the population has outpaced the criminals, but that's changing as you regressives put more criminals back on the streets before they complete their sentences.