The Impact of constant violent events

[XSE]

I more or less agree with the majority of what you've (and Coffee) said so far, except for this part. How exactly does this help at all? Just "doing what you can" and "Life is what you make of it. Do nothing and you are nothing. Help out, and you become somebody" quite frankly sounds a bit naive to me. Doing something does not automatically make you "something/somebody". There is no guarantee that doing what you can will actually have any impact or meaning.

The message is really for anyone who gets depressed at this stuff. People waste their lives living in fear, which is worthless. Doing some of the things I mentioned is a far better use of ones time.

There is nothing that automatically makes you a great person. That is something one strives for. Frankly, it's naive to think you can't do something that will have meaning. Impact and meaning aren't defined by "Oh, gotta find the cure to cancer. Oh, gotta help everything I can! Oh, gotta go to foreign countries to help children find clean water!" It's not defined by being super well known, or being rich, donating huge sums of money to charity. Saying that such things are unnecessary, and don't really have meaning is again, useless.

Listen, I know I can't help everyone possible in the world, it simply is not gonna happen. But you know, that doesn't make cleaning up garbage off the street, for example, useless. I've had several people thank me when I did so, people walking around, or just driving, and perhaps I have inspired people in these cars to do similar, or believe change is possible. Sure, no one knows me, but who cares? That's not what generosity or meaning is to me. I know that by doing such simple, obvious things, it does help the community.

I create meaning in such actions, but I am only one person. Imagine if every single person, just random people, cleaned up a single piece of garbage for a year in your city. I believe it would be clean by the end of it, even if 20 percent of the people kept throwing down garbage. And that's just a single example. Imagine if we did various helpful things, in our own communities. That would be meaningful, and far more meaningful then being scared of cleaning up garbage with someone, because "the news makes me think random people are suddenly going to shoot me."

I know, it's a bit repetitive, but it's a valid point. It both addresses the very question of the fear, and it's a solution to the problem of failing communities, where no one even knows each other. Communities like that are places of fear, because anything goes.

To summarize, meaning isn't appealing to the world, or doing world class help. It's really what you give it, and in our discussion, doing helpful things in our own communities and building unity between us, is better then doing nothing, complaining and wishing that someone would do something, or living in fear of each other. "I will do this" is more useful then, "I wish someone would do this." "I will be afraid." Is useless compared to "I will be brave."

This one was a bit hard to write, and I don't know how well I got it across, but there it is. Thanks for reading!

 

[MadHatter62]

The police issue in the US: As Bill Maher has stated recently on Late Night, you show enough videos of police beating, shooting, and killing unarmed black people, eventually someone will fire back. The Dallas shooting is a prime example of that. Everyone with half a brain knows that most police officers are decent people and that there's always going to be a few bad apples. However the higher ups in the police departments need to weed out these bad apples the best they can so that police brutality will become non existent. People need to stop attacking the police as well and assuming that the entire police force is just as bad as the 1-2 officers that sparked that assumption in the first place.

Terrorism: This all boils down to a couple of issues, culture clash and the 2 wars that the US started in the middle east. Culture clash is the result of 2 or more cultures growing into one another for whatever reason, be it a lot of one culture activating the hot coffee mod, or a mad dictator oppressing his people like in Syria. The war thing: I think it's common knowledge that the US had no business to be in Iraq and Afghanistan to begin with. As it turns out, Iraqis and Afghans don't like being shot at by US soldiers, nor do they like being invaded. Who would've thought? When Saddam Hussein was still in power in Iraq, he kept everything peaceful, despite him doing typical dictator stuff.

The coup in Turkey: I don't know that much other than what I just read about it via Wikipedia, which isn't the best source to find out about this stuff to begin with. This is also an event that is way too recent for us to know anything other than what we hear from the news. On top of that, we will never know the full story since this involves a government entity.

 

[XSE]

The police issue in the US: As Bill Maher has stated recently on Late Night, you show enough videos of police beating, shooting, and killing unarmed black people, eventually someone will fire back. The Dallas shooting is a prime example of that. Everyone with half a brain knows that most police officers are decent people and that there's always going to be a few bad apples. However the higher ups in the police departments need to weed out these bad apples the best they can so that police brutality will become non existent. People need to stop attacking the police as well and assuming that the entire police force is just as bad as the 1-2 officers that sparked that assumption in the first place.

Terrorism: This all boils down to a couple of issues, culture clash and the 2 wars that the US started in the middle east. Culture clash is the result of 2 or more cultures growing into one another for whatever reason, be it a lot of one culture activating the hot coffee mod, or a mad dictator oppressing his people like in Syria. The war thing: I think it's common knowledge that the US had no business to be in Iraq and Afghanistan to begin with. As it turns out, Iraqis and Afghans don't like being shot at by US soldiers, nor do they like being invaded. Who would've thought? When Saddam Hussein was still in power in Iraq, he kept everything peaceful, despite him doing typical dictator stuff.

The coup in Turkey: I don't know that much other than what I just read about it via Wikipedia, which isn't the best source to find out about this stuff to begin with. This is also an event that is way too recent for us to know anything other than what we hear from the news. On top of that, we will never know the full story since this involves a government entity.

That first part is part of the problem, and again, is why watching most news is a bad idea. Sure, weather in your area is a good thing to know, but most of the rest of it is not. The whole black people being killed is a way for the media to further us from our own police officers, the people whom we call on for help in a civilized society, and make blacks seem oppressed by focusing on them.

"However the higher ups in the police departments need to weed out these bad apples the best they can" protip, they do! That is the exact problem with mass media. You have a specific incident, in some tiny town, some place in this country, of which we've probably never heard of, where a questionable police officer was let into the force, maybe hates blacks or people in general, and it becomes really widespread. As you said, anyone with half a brain knows that police are generally friendly. I had one come in the other day in my place of business, and he was a pretty friendly guy. The other employees either knew him, or whatever, because they were laughing along and such. To blame it on the higher ups doesn't really apply.

For example, lets say you work in a retail store or something, or even a classroom. If there is some guy that smokes pot and generally doesn't work, it is possible for him to hide it from his boss/teacher whenever they come around. It's not ineptitude on part of the boss/teacher, but the cleverness in which the employee/classmate hides it. Same here. Hell, for all we know, a coworker or classmate could be a serial killer, but they are simply great at hiding it. It's not hard to wear a mask after all, and someone who is in the police force is no exception.

"As it turns out, Iraqis and Afghans don't like being shot at by US soldiers, nor do they like being invaded." that bit was pretty funny mate. The bit about Saddam was also very interesting, and could be explored further in debates about the war.

However, terrorism is more of a mental war then a physical one. If you blow up a few buildings, everyone is set on edge and won't know where the next one can come from. With a name like ISIS, it sounds very scary and threatening, when for all we know, it could be a simple group of like minded people making up the fact that they are a group. Sort of like Anonymous, except ISIS may have a figure head. IDK, as I don't keep up with them. Again, that's another point of fear that wont help me in the slightest, so why should I focus on it?

If ISIS has a bomb or what ever the hell, you can't protect against that if you're the target, so really, why worry about it? If ISIS is right next to you in a mall or something, you're toast regardless, nothing you can do about that.



"Plus little things can sometimes have big effects." Esper gets me here with this point. That is not the whole picture, but part of it. I'm sure the shop keeper who sold Wozniak parts for the Apple I didn't know that Apple would become a monster of a company, but it did. For all we know, being friendly to that lonely kid who sits by himself could help him become the greatest president of all time. The other part is that, while the world isn't perfect, we do have control over some parts of it. Communities are one of those things that the members can improve. The tasks that I mentioned above are a much better use of ones time then worrying about ISIS, reading about the latest black killing, or being afraid to go out at night because of ones shadow.

Thank you for reading!

 

[Zodkiel]

Talking about violence and terrorism while keeping it G rated? Well I'll just say I personally enjoy violence and despair. I prefer violent events over peace, because you aren't going to feel despair when no ones fighting or doing anything bad, right?

 

[0]

Talking about violence and terrorism while keeping it G rated? Well I'll just say I personally enjoy violence and despair. I prefer violent events over peace, because you aren't going to feel despair when no ones fighting or doing anything bad, right?

Wrong. Mental despair is 1000 times worse. Physical despair is nothing compared to the hell your mind can make, if your into that sorta thing.

 

[Melody]

Overall yes, I believe that violence has gone down. The numbers don't seem to be false, nor capable of lying. But naturally with the advent of communication at greater speeds; word of violence gets out faster. This is good though. I feel like we should be somewhat outraged at violence. Ideally we should be always aiming for 0. Or at least fewer incidents than last period.

 

[Zodkiel]

Wrong. Mental despair is 1000 times worse. Physical despair is nothing compared to the hell your mind can make, if your into that sorta thing.

Believe me when I say no one knows about despair better than I. I know what sort of horrible despair filled things can happen in ones head all too well. But to spread despair, violent things like terrorist attacks help to shake up otherwise hopeful and happy people. I'm not wrong here, am I?

 

[0]

Believe me when I say no one knows about despair better than I. I know what sort of horrible despair filled things can happen in ones head all too well. But to spread despair, violent things like terrorist attacks help to shake up otherwise hopeful and happy people. I'm not wrong here, am I?

That depends on the person my friend. Such things don't effect me. It depends on the person.


You also sound like I when I was younger. Why don't you pm your despair, because I used to think like that too.