WHAT THE HELL IS WRONG WITH THIS WORLD...

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Personally, I believe that Atheism is an irresponsible cop-out to anything to do with the end reprocutions of ones actions. You can't pick a religion, so you pick the easy solution, no religion. This doesn't mean that Atheists are bad people, most are probably good people with a sense of good and bad. How did Atheism even wedge its way into this thread? Sorry to be un-PC, I suppose nowadays, everyone is supposed to be tolerent of how everbody is.
 
I truly expected better of you people, but I guess this is the sad truth.
So you think I'm a "Fool" a "Cheater" and my pefectly logical decicion in life is "an irresponsible cop-out to anything to do with the end reprocutions of ones actions" ? Well, thank you. I'm glad to see that you are all quite tolerent.
 
Just something to remember, GUNS DON'T KILL PEOPLE,PEOPLE KILL PEOPLE. A gun is a tool. Whether it be a tool to harvest game for your family or shooting skeet for fun or for protection. You make a deliberate decision to load it, to chamber a load and pull the trigger.I'm not talking about those instances where someone goes beyond normal meens to find thier parents loaded gun and a accident occurs. A parent should teach thier child about the dangers of guns and proper respect of it and others propety. They should also practice proper saftey themselves in the way they choose to store thier guns. Try this experiment, Lay a gun on the table sit in a chair and see how long it takes to go off.It won't unless someone chooses to pick it up and pull the trigger.I'm not talking about blackpowder guns or those that people have had the triggers shaved down to a fraction of a pound. Man has always killed with the most advanced weapon or tool readily available over the coarse of history,ie. knives,spears,arrows and guns which were all created initialy for other puposes than to kill people. Just my two cents worth.
 
Taking into consideration all that has been said already, I would like to voice what I believe to be wrong in the U.S.

The U.S. has been a nation for over 200 years. During that time the amount of change that has occured has been phenomenal. The very nature of the "melting pot" philosophy we have as our basis is leading to a breakdown in any moral and cultural solidarity we had prior to this. The anglo-european predominance that kept our institutions together is being rapidly eroded by the ideals and philosophies from many different cultures. At the same time new attitudes and beliefs are being created by a technology that has a life of its own. In short, we as a country and a people have no common element that binds us anymore.

Sure, many different peoples have occupied this country for a long time. But, the once white majority that existed up until a few decades ago controlled the government and institutions with an iron fist. Now that cultural diversity is accepted, there is no singular vision for the U.S

How does this translate to the violence we are now seeing? Simple, we are experiencing the beginning of a political and social revolution. Up until now, most of what we have seen has looked like senseless, random violence. But haven't you noticed that most of the extreme acts of violence that many people view as being senseless (columbine, unibomber, okla. city, waco tx. etc) has been committed by white males? The reason for this is that they are feeling displaced and the traditional, dominant role of the white male is all but gone. What is left is a growing void of chaos.

Until one dominant group takes control of the U.S. , or until the U.S. breaks up into smaller regional units, the violence will continue and increase greatly.

One more thing. Why is everybody so astounded that we as a nation seem so violent today? This country was founded though blood and violence. Just read a little American history. I find it so weird that we feel obligated to play moral citizen by bombing the crap out of Yugoslavia. We say we are stopping genocide, but the U.S. killed more distinct groups of people (indian tribes) than any government since the Roman empire.

The U.S. has run its course. Change is inevitable, and it is part of the natural course of events. We are like every other people/country that has existed since the beginning of civilization. We have had our glorious years, and now it is time for us to fall. There is nothing we can do about it but hang on tight for the bumpy ride ahead.


[This message has been edited by fenixforge (edited 25 May 1999).]
 
OY!

I wasn't looking for a day or so, and behold! a whole new "Life, the Universe, and Everything" thread in the Blade-All Topics forum!

I just skimmed this a bit. Some interesting thoughts. Some good ones. Some . . . I won't say which . . . to which I'd take great exception.

And I might be tempted to respond to something up there by saying "There ain't no such thing as a White Race!" but that would be best in a separate thread in the Politics Forum.

Matter of fact, if anyone wants to start any new "Life, the Universe, and Everything" or "Where are We Going and Why Am I in this Handbasket?" threads, the Politics or maybe Community forums are where folks would normally expect to find them.


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- JKM
www.chaicutlery.com
 
fenixforge - i believe almost the exact opposite. the many different cultures of this country are not "eroding" anything. the mix of different cultures can only make this country stronger than if it was dominated by anglo-americans only. there is absolutely no need for one racial group to dominate this country. and there is no need for separate regions based on race. these ideas seem very close to those of white supremacists.

i believe that we, as a country, are experiencing growing pains. are you saying that the white male cannot handle this?

btw, i have news for you - the white male still controls the government and institutions. we non-white males are making great strides, however.

marco
 
Aha! A topic other than knives that is still worthy of discussion! I must agree w/ Rage's initial points about responsibility and people realizing that it's not b/c of the TV or music. I've skimmed the last half of this, but I have a few points to reply to. Spear Point: I realize that there is a growing validity to psychology studies, but I think that should be tempered w/ some basic principles, like personal accountability, honor, compassion, good judgement, etc. When you're talking about the heavy effects TV and music have on today's youth, you're missing the other half of the argument: parenting. You see, I believe that, regardless of how much violence, sex, drugs,etc. you see on the screen or hear on CD's or the radio, a good parent will be there to temper the shift in values between there generation and their childrens'. For my parents (I'm in my twenties now), sex was the bad thing. Now, it's violence, particularly the kind performed w/ firearms. The fact is, sex and violence are becoming (on television) increasingly popular and, therefore, accepted issues of life. However exagerrated those depictions may be, parents must realize that they cannot raise their children in bubbles. Instead, making them aware, instilling good common sense, and just plain damn talking to them will empower those children w/ the proper sensibility to decipher what's right and what's wrong. Myco: I'm right there w/ you man, I've had enough of preaching types trying to brand me as an infidel or someone going to hell. To each his own, it's in the Constitution, and it's just common courtesy. Buddha, Allah, God, Zeus, Nirvana or Zen, each religion should be equally respected as should those who don't follow a path of faith other than their own existentialism. That's coming from a guy raised Catholic and a former altar boy, thank you. I've seen enough of church, enough of the ceremony, enough of people to realize that if God exists, he's (she, it?) either busy, retired, or sick in the mind. Or maybe Nietszche was right (for those of you who are lost, you need to read "Thus Spoke Zarathustra")? In any case, I'm not condemning those kids who answered yes when the killers asked them if they believed in God, killing anyone based on creed, race, etc. is plain wrong. Quite frankly, I think those kids should have turned their guns on themselves at home. On the other hand, that doesn't make it right for those damn jock types to make fun of them, either. Besides being a martial artist, I did sports in high school, and was what you would consider a popular guy. However, I never hung out w/ the real jocks, I just knew them and talked to them at school. They were just too damn judgemental for me and if you want to hear bitterness, then I'll tell you that those Columbine shooters should have at least beat the piss outta those jocks, if they were anything like the guys at my high school. But killing them (as much as I hate to admit what an appealing idea that is--for the purposes of cleaning the gene pool of course
smile.gif
), just isn't worth any life, not the least of all yours. Jeez, have I rambled on too much here? Well then, I'll just step off my podium of pontification, then. No flaming, now!
 
First of all, I'm humbled by the sincerity and quality of your posts, folks! Marvellous analyses and ideas! With some I agree, with some I don't. But that's not my point now. I just want to try to explicate something of the overall picture with respect to extreme violence, its causes and cures. I've been thinking about this quite a lot recently, as some of the central themes of this topic have come up many thimes on these (or "the other") forums, under various headings. By the way, I agree that this is not exactly a "knife-topic", but I also think that it's no coincidence that it took off just now, just here (with all us myriads of knife-aficionados).

So, here it goes [I sketched this at home last night, it's morning now here].

Obviously, there are SEVERAL things that can be "part of the problem", or (partial) causes for it (with 'problem' I'm thinking mainly of extreme youth violence). Many of these have been exposed either in this thread or elsewhere. Then there are several things that can be "part of the *solution*" (many of which have also been pointed out alrerady), and, to complicate the matter a bit, these two groups may not overlap completely (because of, e.g., our inabibility to influence some things at will). No reason to ignore anything real (or even possible) at the outset, I'd think?

Let's suppose, that we could have pointed out some necessary "parts of the problem", that is, things that must, in general, be there for developing a serious problem. With respect to extreme (youth) violence there might be something like parental irresponsibility, drug abuse, desensitization, diminished worth of human life, group pressure, lack of good role models, self-love, specific conditioning or "programming", bad temper, poverty, lack of respect for sensible and/or legal authority, hate, ability and means to cause serious harm, etc., etc. (yes, Dave Grossman has written about some "enabling" factors like these in his book 'On Killing', but I'm attempting here only an example; for a fuller account of the causes, I'd start from dividing them into, e.g., physical, psychological, social, economic, cultural, philosophical, spiritual, etc., and trying to see their places in some causal sequences).

Individually, none of those factors is sufficient, and in that respect everybody's right in claiming that "that cannot be the cause". But think of a specific case (though hypothetical), a would-be killer, if your wish, where most of the other "enabling" factors are already present. In that case, the ONE factor might well be THE decisive one (though by itself it's only a partial cause, or a factor in a chain).

There may be intellectual, structural, even cultural violence, but violent crimes are mostly done by individuals (not to neglect the "group" factor). It's of no use to say, for example, that a massive exposure to ultraviolent movies cannot cause a teen to kill her parents, *because* most of the others who were exposed to the same dind't kill their's. That is simply faulty reasoning. In THIS case the one factor might have been decisive (because others were already present). Similarly with group pressure, drug abuse, specific conditioning, availablity of a gun, or even regular presence on these very forums!
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Don't know, what might be the best analogy here. Maybe it's like a chemical mixture which needs some specific ingredients and conditions to explode, and when enough of them are present (and their "neutralizers" absent), it *will* explode? And surely, a culture fostering those ingredients and conditions, is, more generally, asking for serious trouble.

Of course, it's even more difficult with respect to the SOLUTIONS, in general. Deep politico-economic waters ahead very soon, and talk about a minority's "deficiencies" (i.e., lots of enabling factors already present) in fact regulating what's legal for the majority, etc. But even here, it's possible to say that every known "partial cause" for extreme violence should (a) be taken into serious consideration and (b) evaluated openly for its controllability and possible side-effects and costs thereof. *There* we might begin to see the real issues? (I'm in no way implying that most of the issues in previous posts weren't real. Just wanting to stress the depth and difficulty of some choices.) In addition, it seems clear that some specific instances of extreme violence *could* have been prevented by control of a specific factor X. Sometimes X may be parental irresponsibility, sometimes hate, sometimes group pressure, sometimes the availability of a weapon (in prison, maybe?), sometimes even training in its realistic use. You'll continue the list, please! And the problem is, of course, knowing in advance which one it might possibly be (because we cannot, or won't even seriously try, to control them all).

Well, enough of this, for now. I'm not sure how this fits into the "flow" of the thread, and I'm just beginning to read again the newer posts. At least I tried to *think* about it (though I agree that it may be better to rage on these forums than on the streets). My interest lies in clear, analytic, and realistic thinking. I apologise, if this effects to the contrary.

Thanks for your time.

Markku
 
James,
You could say something like "There aint no such thing as a White race", but then someone could say "there most certainly is".

JK
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There's more than one way to skin a cat!


[This message has been edited by Jedi Knife (edited 26 May 1999).]
 
Hey Marco,

Have you looked at the per capita crime statistics lately sorted by race of offenders, or do you consider that to be what you would consider "white supremist" as well?
While I'm editing this, let's examine what you said "there is absolutely no need for
one racial group to dominate this country. " Have you ever heard of the "Congressional Black Caucus"? (or something similar by name). Have you noticed there is no "Congressional White Caucus"? This very fact alone disproves your compllaints/claims of "one racial group dominating this country", that is, if you were referring to White people as the "dominate" group.
JK

[This message has been edited by Jedi Knife (edited 26 May 1999).]
 
JK - i said that there is no reason for any one racial group to dominate. i never said that many racial groups don't try to dominate. they do try, and i believe it is one of our many problems.

as for statistics - i know about all of the race-related crime statistics. i also know about the socio-economic related crime statistics. POOR PEOPLE COMMIT MORE CRIMES.

of course, being poor is no excuse to commit crimes. the vast majority of poor minorities i have known, have not committed crimes and would not even think about accepting any form of welfare.

the very fact that there is a need for all of the minority organizations (black caucus, naacp, lulac, etc), proves to me that there is indeed a dominant group. it would be very nice if there was no need for any of these.

i would have answered you via email, jedi knife, but it appears that you don't have one listed.

marco
 
Wait a minute! I never said that the white "race" is supreme. I not sure, like James said, that you can divide humanity into different races. But it is obvious that European culture, social institutions and peoples have dominated most of the world for 1000+ years- usually to the detriment of the rest of the world. But, that is all changing.

Minorities are becoming majorities, and vice versa. This is not true only in the U.S., but everywhere. The "grand" model of imperialism that provided England, France, Spain, U.S., and others with riches and property is no longer morally acceptable.
The "people of the sun" are finally starting to make a comeback from years of destruction, abuse and oppression. And, yes, a lot of white males can't handle it.

If you look honestly at history (U.S. and other) you will see that order came about in different country only when one homogenous group had power. The U.S. is no exception. We, as a country, may have had a diverse population from the beginning, but minorities were not allowed to participate in decision making until fairly recently.
Now that many voices are allowed to speak out, there is no common vision for the U.S. This doesn't mean that I believe the old, european way was right. But, until one group (black, hispanic, asian, whatever) takes control the violence and strife will continue. Until that happens stability will lessen, and institutions will crumble.

BTW, I didn't say that the U.S. would break up by races (I think you are getting that from Louis Farakan[sp ?]). I said it might break up by REGIONS. It happened to the Soviet Union. It happened in Yugolsavia. It will most likely happen here. Believe it or not, democracy is just as fragile (if not more than) as any other form of government. The fact is that cultural diversity, as interesting and beneficial as it is, can and does lead to political strife. Just look at Yugoslavia (ancient Greece, Rome). The only thing that kept the Serbs and Albanians from killing each other was the Soviet Union. Once that crumbled, they went back to butchering.

I'm not trying to be a doomsayer. I just know a little about history and the processes of civilizations. We need to get our head out of our a**** and realize that the U.S. will not be here forever. We have too short of a history, and too much geography to keep everything and everybody under control forever. The violence and decadence we are seeing is a sign of restlestness, dissatisfaction, and lack of vision. It is the hallmark of the drastic change that will occur sooner than we think.
 
You said "the very fact that there is a need for all of the minority
organizations (black caucus, naacp, lulac, etc), proves to me that
there is indeed a dominant group. it would be very nice if there was
no need for any of these."

It certainly proves that Negroes in the US today are attempting to dominate the US through racially motivated special interest groups.
By the way, there are more poor White people in the US than there are poor Blacks, yet percentage wise Blacks are still commiting more crime. That shows that you cannot use being poor as some sort of excuse for criminal behavior.

JK



[This message has been edited by Jedi Knife (edited 26 May 1999).]
 
JK - i think i clearly said that being poor is no excuse for criminal activity.

there are more white people in this country than blacks, period. but, the percentage of poor blacks is greater than the percentage of poor whites. same with hispanics.

the organizations that you claim are "attemting to dominate the US", are there for a reason. these organizations were created to DEFEND certain people against political and social injustice. hopefully, someday, they will no longer be necessary.

JK - why is it that you keep pointing out crime statistics by race? does it matter at all? we are all americans, and if a black, hispanic, asian or white kid commits a serious crime, it is still an AMERICAN problem. it affects all of us.

and btw, blacks are not the only minority. hispanics are rapidly gaining powerful political clout. the population growth among hispanics is incredible. in my opinion, this will only help our great country improve.

marco
 
I've been busy on the Rosie site for the last couple of days, so I've missed this by and large.

No offense guys, but this topic belongs in the politics forum and as such I would request that you take it there.

I do not approve of religious debates on this site, so please keep them out of it.

With you permission, I am now locking this thread so that it can be continued in the more appropriate area.

Spark

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Kevin Jon Schlossberg
SysOp and Administrator for BladeForums.com

Insert witty quip here
 
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