Done, I think.
I could not agree with you more about the problems in America being systemic in nature. I also consider that, for me anyway, I would extend "systemic" to the rest of the world, too. As I see it, pretty much every country has significant problems for which no one has yet figured out a solution. Part of the reason why no one has yet found a solution is because those who have the power think that their system is the greatest. When you think that you are the greatest and are unwilling to recognize that in being human, you have flaws, you can never see the problems that need to be solved. Introspection, as you imply and in my eyes, is key to one's own self-improvement, and I also believe that in improving one's self, one helps to improve others.
Having a complete disdain for using space on a cloud server, I quoted your whole post. And a formidable post it is.
I've arrived at many of the same conclusions that you have, however strangely enough, I attack them from a polar opposite viewpoint from yours.
My first response to a, "self improvement through introspection", aspect of behavior, is that a viable value system has to be present to permit advancement through it. Those values simply aren't present in many millennial superegos. You honestly can't "let your conscience be your guide", if it is either under, or undeveloped. Really, someone could think until they fart brain gas, and without a point of reference, nothing would be accomplished..
From an anecdotal point of reference. a young (millennial) black woman drives down my street. She bumps mirrors with a sizable box truck which parked, making a delivery. From my vantage point, she had sufficient room to clear the truck, without either scraping her tires, or hitting the mirrors. So, I chuckled. She stops the car, gets out and confronts me asking, you think that's funny? I of course said, "yes". The very next words out of her mouth were, "my car could have been damaged". You can't reason with hubris or a self righteous mentality incapable of accepting responsibility for one's actions at any level. Then she proceeded to tell me, "it was truck's fault, because the mirrors were sticking out past the body. Si I asked, (innocently enough
), "how the f**k could the truck driver see behind him, if the mirrors weren't out past the body. (OK, this is a simply question of the most basic plane geometric nature). Didn't matter to her, she was right and the static, unoccupied truck was wrong. So, this person certainly is indicative of
"Homo milleniensis", capacity, for thinking beyond the scope of their own interests. I could have argued with the stupid bit*h for hours, but then I've had had to kill her. (Please don't report me to the FBI, I'm only half serious about that).
In any event, this person was far far away from atypical, and you have another generation coming up behind her already. In fact, one of my former next door neighbor's daughter, popped out her first little dumplin' at 13! No biggie though, Social Security had it covered. In fact, the daughter herself received SS, since birth! Now you know why you'll likely have to retire something past today's 66 years of age. Oh, the "baby daddy" was an 18 + drug dealer. Oddly, no "sexual misconduct", or "statutory rape" charges, were ever filed. Mom's excuse for that was, I'm in ill health, so if she waited longer, I might not be alive to see my grand children. Although promptly receiving government subsidies on top of government subsidies for, a "child having a child", had a huge part to play in that.
I am nearly of your generation, too, being perhaps 10-years or so younger than you, and simply put, I cannot agree that our generation was desensitized to violence because of the wars. In fact, I think it is much more exactly the opposite - our generation protested like dragons about the Vietnam War, and in so doing, demonstrated that our generation was sensitized toward violence. In part, that was because at the time, the war was distinctly seen as not good and even so, many were subject to the draft - I.e., being forced to fight and possibly die in a war that was seen as having (and probably had) little true meaning.
At the time, dying in the Vietnam war was seen as futile - much
unlike dying in WWI or WWII where world-wide freedom from oppression was on the line. Pretty much every war since WWII has had significantly lesser stakes and the value of each of those wars might easily be termed questionable. Our generation saw the Vietnam War as unjust and unethical, and some died protesting against it -
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kent_State_shootings At that time, our generation was willing to do something about the Vietnam War that might be compared to the mass protests planned against gun violence.
Well, Vietnam was a turd that effectively was dropped on us.by our good buddies, the French. They could no longer defend their Michelin rubber plantation on their own.
And yes, the Kent State shootings are known to me, and probably all of our generations. But as for "these kidz today", I'm not so sure.
The US could , and should, have kicked North Vietnam's a**, save for the fact the China, acting in the shadows, was supplying weapon and personnel to North Vietnam on the sly. No biggie though, we did it to the Russians in Afghanistan.
And now, we're in Afghanistan, helping war lords harvest the only cash crop that I know of being grown there,
"Papavera somniferum". Now you know why Afghani hash was rated the best you could buy, during the 60's and 70's. I'm fairly sure, that black coating it always came with, was black tar heroin. Couple of hits of of that, and your mouth was so dry, it was practically glued shut. (Believe it or not, opiates are great antihistamines).
Which brings us to the complex subject of opiate abuse: (Actually a bit more on that later).
In my eyes, at least some of those who are supposed to "protect and serve" far too often reach for that gun without considering even one iota if or how the situation might be resolved without the use of deadly force, and that because they are viewed as "protecting and serving", they are far too often not held accountable for their actions. My bet is that there are instances of questionable "protect and serve" shootings that cross racial boundaries - though those that do not are not click-bait worthy, and far less publicized. In fact, there was a recent headline about a cop being fired for not shooting someone -
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news...d-for-not-killing-a-man-with-an-unloaded-gun/
It is an interesting read, and I think it helps emphasize my point. And once again, I think this points to problems that are systemic in nature.
The negative issues between law enforcement and the citizenry are manifold. Let's first concede to the fact "power corrupts"..
So, someone entering law enforcement can beforehand, could conceivably seek power for the benefit of seeking the "benefits" which corruption can provide.
That is "balanced", by the concept the people have less and less willingness to concede authority to law enforcement.
As a rational median, I think more officers are hired who have virtue, are idealistic, and simply want steady jobs. There's no shortage of crime. (Although now you have black initiated movements which aim to suggest that, whatever crimes blacks are locked up for, aren't crimes at all, just misunderstandings).
The net result of which, is thank god we don't have a bunch of armed meter maids. Because as much as abuse as those poor dears have to listen to, we'd have a huge body count of people who constantly and flagrantly double parked..
And if I dare, I again mention that meditation teacher who had called the police to report a crime that was killed by a jumpy cop with a gun. As I see it, there was nothing racial or religious about it - rather that was yet another symptom of the systemic nature of the problems that exist today.
Today's police officers work in a highly dangerous environment. Any psychologist will tell you that being constantly immersed in high vigilance situations, wreaks havoc on any person's mental well being.
Then you have to wonder how much provocation an officer has undergone, before he or she comes to the one subject, who becomes "the straw that broke the camels back".
The news media has an ugly habit of "white washing", (pun intended), the victim to the point where a low grade felon becomes an ethics professor. Then comes the hail of denials from the family, "he was a good boy, he never done nuffin' wrong".
But yes, huge mistakes are made, and if you put a baby gorilla under a microscope, it becomes King Kong. Which pretty much negates all the good officer's good work, on a national scale, at least until the end of the incident's news worthy cycle ends.
Human nature won't allow racial equality to take place, and not necessarily on the part of "the oppressor". The "oppressed", are inclined to never accept the strides made on their behalf, simply because of human innate greed. Greed which dictates you can never have enough of anything. Aggravating factors there include shyster lawyers, and perpetual dissidents looking to incite trouble.
Oh yes, and corporate greed. Let's say a predominately white staffed company hires a black person to do a job. The question then becomes, "when is racial equality met"? Well, if it means that it won't be met until a black person is running that company, "equality" can never be achieved until, the former white operators become the subordinates.
So let's say the CEO, decides not to allow the situation to escalate to that point, and hires cheaper, foreign labor, to replace the black employees, they're still be going to be insisting they're being discriminated against. Maybe they're right, but then again, maybe their demands we too expansive.
Much as you imply, my bet is that if one were to take a careful, objective look at the state of things in the US at this point, it does very nearly look like the state of things before the "advanced" empires of the past fell.
I think that you have in part hit on one of the major symptoms of the systemic problems in that there seem to be so many people out there that can think of no one other than themselves.
Yeah, we're spoiled beyond measure. No one seems to be able to take into account that empires of the past, were all built on conquered territories and slave labor. The industrial revolution happened, because greedy entrepreneurs, forced the impoverished to work very long hours for very little money.
Child labor laws, minimum wages, trade unions have eliminated much of those issues. However, the average American is completely unable to understand, that you can't have low prices, and high wages. The two things are mutually exclusive. And here we are scratching our heads in bewilderment, whimpering about how much American made goods cost, and off they go to Walmart, (myself included), for just about every durable good imaginable, most of which, now come from China.
It's both corporate and individual greed which has created, "the global economy", and other countries are sick and tired of being used by us. At one point I think I read that the US used 80% of the world's resources, with about 2% of the world's population. (You might want to check those figures, but the disparity is/was enormous).
About this, as I understand it from this article -
https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/2017/investigations/dea-drug-industry-congress/
More evidence of systemic problems?
How about if we agree to call it, "more evidence of
continued systemic problems".
The opioid crisis didn't really peak until we got into Afghanistan.. Much in the same way Americans are perhaps justifiably accused of, "starting wars in the middle east so they can pump out all the oil", if the only "natural resource" you can find in Afghanistan is opium, we'll pump that out too.
Big tobacco has been pushing a highly addictive drug, (nicotine), since the antebellum south. The only way they've been slightly thwarted, is "public education",
, and massive taxation on their product
Same goes for alcohol:
"The Twenty-first
Amendment (
Amendment XXI) to the United States Constitution
repealed the Eighteenth
Amendment to the United States Constitution, which had mandated nationwide
Prohibition on alcohol on January 16, 1919. The Twenty-first
Amendment was ratified on December 5, 1933."
We all know how that turned out, It seems you can't thwart the indomitable human proclivity for wanting to be intoxicated, by whatever means necessary or available!
As far as opium is concerned, evidence of its use as a narcotic, goes back probably 3000 years. And then it met today's snowflake population. One has to wonder, "how much pain can a snowflake take, if a snowflake could take pain".
So, when I hear these sob stories on TV about how, "I stubbed my toe on my bedpost, and the next thing I knew I was selling my a** to buy heroine". (OK, that's granted, and exaggeration), you really have to wonder, A: if these people are so insufferably stupid they didn't know opioids were addictive, or, B:we're listening to the fairy tale about "The Princess and the Pea". And here again, nobody is willing to take responsibility for their own actions, "the drug companies made me do it.
Make no mistake about it, I think big pharma is sh!t, but that's on manifold issues, not simply pain killers.
As for cigarettes, hell they've been known as "coffin nails", since the old west. Yet still, you can find lawyers greedy enough, and judges either liberal enough, or stupid enough, to hear suits from people who "didn't know what they were getting into,l when they took their first puffs.
Personally, I do not think that the end to gun violence is arming everyone in America. There are enough hot heads out there at this time that if everyone were armed, my bet is gun violence would go up - way up.
Well, that's why we have the gun violence we have now. More "hotheads" are being bred exponentially, without instilled senses of value or self control. It points toward animal behavior, not "human behavior", that's assuming you can actually differentiate the two.
Everybody wants to be an "alpha". Are we talking about a pack of wolves here, or human beings"? Don't know, or aren't really sure, are ya?
Hell, before Lee Harvey Oswald, you could buy a rifle or two, though the mail, no questions asked
Arming teachers, too, will also not necessarily help. Certainly, not all teachers are going to have the stomach, even in an under-fire situation, to shoot and kill someone else.
Well, we're watching "Planet of the Apes" here, and gorillas enforce the law, while most of the chimps, are academics.
I think armed teachers would require individuals to basically have "two careers". Obtaining a teaching certificate is intensive and expensive enough, let alone to require law enforcement credit concurrently.
Then there's this, when any animal's predators are taken away, they become more plentiful. But more importantly, they become bigger and stronger with each passing generation. The 6 foot, 200 pound, 15 years olds the ghettos are turning out, are every bit as likely to take the teacher's gun off him or her, and kill them with it, as they are to capitulate to the teacher's demands.
This too, reverts to the "high vigilance, high stress environments". An armed teacher, would have to constantly think in military tactics, such as "don't let anyone get behind you, don't allow yourself to be cornered, be suspicious of any and all movements by your adversary, (now a euphemism for "students"). Not conducive to learning environment, unless this is West Point we're talking about.
And I know 2nd amendment supporters will enjoy flaming me for this - but - I think it is arguable that at this point in time, the US has a "well-regulated militia" though I also think that there are some in that well-regulated militia that should not be allowed near any gun - especially those that meet the criteria of the stereotypical overweight, doughnut loving, out-of-shape and of average or below IQ.
That's even too big for me too tackle at least for now. But you haven't defined exactly what you're considering, " a well regulated militia", our National Guard, or a group of Klansmen without sheets and hoods.
Unfortunately, to me anyway, the gun violence is yet another symptom of the systemic nature of the problems, so while working to quell the gun violence might eliminate one of the symptoms, will it really make things better? Certainly, less gun violence will help, but that is no guarantee that the frustrations of living within a systemically problem riddled society will not surface in some other form.
The unfortunate result of all this is, people are begging for a police state, from more legislation for whatever imagined problem it might rectify, to the more subtle "Google Home" box, sitting right next to the toilet paper. You've invited industry into your homes to share your most intimate secrets. You've managed to get words eliminated from the vernacular, and you continually beg for more governmental controls.
But then, did anybody really think that, "one nation, under god, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all", could really exist? After all, that bullsh!t was written by a bunch of drunken slave owners, who were pissed off at King George
That said, I do not think that everyone should stop looking for solutions even if the solutions that are tried fail - at least we would be looking, and hopefully, there will be lessons learned along the way so that the next attempt at a solution will improve on the last.
Though things might be seen differently from different eyes, I think it likely that all of us want to find a better way. Now if we can only help each other recognize that.
The trouble with this is, the ones trying to come up with the solutions, are very often, the people most detached from the physical realities of the situations..
