What is it that people insist so much on this thing "tradition"?
I write this, because today I once again had the great pleasure to receive another free newspaper directly into my (physical) mailbox – lead article: a Generic Someone just became 30 years of age and is sweeping crown caps someone in presumably good intention spread somewhere. This alwys occured me as somewhat dubious. Why do people still do this? (Both sides.) And why does it seem rather half-heartedly? Or do the media "just" almost never cover it?

So, I have to wonder, what makes people do so. It is said, this is "tradition", meaning to hand over or hand down – cultural heritage. At another place is elaborated:
Strukturell ist Tradition auf Wiederholung, Weitergabe und Ritualisierung angelegt.
(Structurally, tradition is aimed at repitition, propagation and ritualisation – Translation by writer)

By itself, that is a wonderful thing. It is exactely this circumstance, which brought us to our height in art and craftsmanship, knowledge and technology that enables you, dear reader, to perceive this text. Would I imagine I would never have been "traded" knowledge, I would stand (well, sit) here and would not be able to reach for insight in this matter.

None the less I am in principle a follower of the idea of "evolution". By this I refer to the natural principle of "survival of the fittest"; I do not confine it to biological processes á la Darwin. By extension, this principle even holds in economics, where each object that can not or does not produce more money than it consumes is left for dead. By even another extension, I conclude that each and every object, perceivable or thinkable, serves a purpose. This purpose does not have to be tangible – inducing laughter might be a purpose all in itself. It is just that, if a certain course of action does not produce more objects of positive value than negative (relative to the actor) this course is probably not to taken. Another conclusion is that an object will be replaced by another one if the latter fulfills the purpose(s) of the former "better".

If now my dear reader accepts the broad definition of "object" here to encompass ideas (at least "ideas" in the common meaning), I would like to formulate my questions: What purpose has this street-sweeper tradition? Does it still fulfill this purpose? Is it really "economical" to pursue this actions?

At first this text was going to be a rather cynic attack on the "common people" who did not appear to use their brain because I could not see any reason to pursue this tradition. Two weeks of time to think about it did change my mind – now I am more curious about the effects of tradition and evoltuion.

So, men who become 30 years old are dragged to a public place, usually the market place in front of the town hall, and are (let's say) "convinced" to do some street sweeping (neglecting the fact that most towns of a size worth mentioning have excellent service provider contracted to do that work). I have gotten the impression this is some form of courtship. Like a slight hint that being 30 years old, the time to get married has been there for years. Or maybe a sign towards women of the same age "hey this guy is up for grabs" (if I may say so).
Besides these things there is no reason to this traditional actions that is obvious enough to be found by me. Which brings me back to my questions: Why hasn't this tradition died? R.I.P. – Death by evolution.