Self-discipline

Hmmm!  A $2 candy bar or a $140 bar of silver?

Much of what passes for moral wisdom is little more than the consistent exercise of self-discipline.

Whether the venue is food or drink or "thrills" or sexual gratification; the ability to defer pleasure is the common under-girding and is common to every major world religion.

The ability to defer pleasure is a skill, not a resource.  Skills are strengthened by repetition, not depleted.  Skills transfer from venue-to-venue whether it is catching a ball or holding off just a little longer.

It is fashionable to slag "old" moral codes that had prohibitions or guardrails on sexual congress, for instance.  "Things are different now."

The critics' reasoning are that there are no consequences to the hook-up culture.  Why would anybody discourage indiscriminate sexual intimacy (fun) unless they were just "mean" or "hateful"?

Perhaps because wholesale refusal to engage in self-discipline means that most people will not have the skills to engage in monogamy. Ever.  Oh, perhaps they will when life is easy, but what about when the spouse goes to Vegas for a week on business or you find yourself comforting a hot looking co-worker who just broke up with their SO?  Play that game and you will be looking at divorce court and broken families.

It is heartbreaking to see that it is not just older people.  Scroll to 1:22.  We perpetuate our lack of self-discipline by not teaching it to our children because we don't want to be "hypocrits".

It is not just broken families.  It relates to obesity.  Find a "gate" that does not self-select against "average" and "poor".  The Secretary of State waiting room and the entrance at Walmart are decent choices.  Watch the people walking through the door.  A third of the people are not just obese.  They are 60-to-150 pounds overweight.

The engineer/mathematician in me wishes I had a floor mat that could automatically weigh people as they walked or rolled across it. Even if it was just video data that capture height and diameter at the waist-line. I think we would get a clearer picture of America than just counting on what doctors offices report.