Date: Tue, 27 Apr 1999 20:27:00 -0600 From: Allen Campbell <allenc@verinet.com> To: Terry Lambert <tlambert@primenet.com> Cc: chat@FreeBSD.ORG Subject: Re: [Fwd: Hopkins FBI] Message-ID: <372671F4.6C5F447E@verinet.com> References: <199904272142.OAA09956@usr04.primenet.com>
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Terry Lambert wrote: > > Moved to -chat... > > > > Also, to make so bold a leap and in the face of most current scientific > > > opinion on these matters is itself somewhat naive. By that I mean > > > blaming *violent* games for unbalanced children. > > > > And this wonderful scientific opinion has produced the utopia we now > > live in. Gee, that's a comforting thought. > > I went to grades 3 through 9 in rural Utah, as Wes well knows... > > The principal of the school had a paddle prominently displayed on > the wall in his office. > > There were no shootings, even though firearms were common: most > boys, and a not inconsiderable fraction of girls, of 15 years or > older owned a shotgun and usually a .22 caliber rifle, at a minimum. > > There were no knifings, even though knives were very common, and > frequently (pocket knives and hunting knives) brought to school. Shootings, knifings and bombings. Our politicians appear to believe these are things to be reduced with more unenforced laws. Our popular culture considers these entertainment in one context and anonymous tragedy in another. To actually fire a weapon at another human being is a truly transcendental act of violence. As those who bear indirect witness to such acts, we unconsciously dilute this fact to cope with the shear magnitude of it. The human body is rather fragile relative to the physics of firearms. Despite this, killing an otherwise healthy human is not easy. One must have extreme focus and absolute intent, a fact that is universally discounted by parole boards. To kill 13 is beyond my ability to comprehend. To walk through one's high school and slowly and methodically murder classmates as the final act before suicide represents the absolute height of depravity. These acts can only be accomplished after totally divorcing one's self from all constraints, social, moral or otherwise. From this perspective, the arguments offered by the politicians and media pundits can have no relevance. No amount of investment in mental health programs could possibly serve to address this. Someone in this state could only see such efforts as contemptible, worthy of destruction. No amount of censorship of violent content will mediate this. For someone this far gone, pursing violence is a symptom, not a cause. No amount of unenforced gun legislation will prevent these acts. The means will always exist to inflict horror, whether that means constructing bombs or quietly knifing people on the roadside over a period of years. > I put the problems today down to children being "protected" from > the knowledge that there are consequences to their actions. > > It used to be that if your child misbehaved at school, the child > would be sent to the principal's office and, if necessary, given > negative reinforcement for the misbehaviour by the principal as > a proxy for the absent parent. > > Thus even if the parent failed to teach the child that there were > consequences to ones actions, the school protected society at large > by making it clear that the parents were not representative of the > arger society, and that the larger society was where the child would > be living, at least part time, and theat they better learn the rules > which members of the society are expected to follow. > > This was our social "safety net"; now if a parent spanks the > child, the child can get the parent arrested, and schools are > permitted the same leeway as a British Bobby -- namely, they can > yell "Stop, or I shall yell 'stop' again!". Could it really be this simple? I have to point out that discipline applied by a lout only breeds resentment. Authority must be worthy of respect before punishment of any sort, martial or otherwise, can result in positive behavioral change. I submit that the typical divorcee boomer parent has no one fooled, most especially the kids. Living at work to earn a Beamer while Nintendo baby sits the live-in 'Goth' does not, at some reserved point in time, give way to wholesome and respectful relations. > My sister is a "hands off" parent; the most frequent question she > voices in response to compaints by other parents about one of my > nephews is "but what could I do?". She won't accept the answer > "spank him when he exhibits socially unacceptable behaviour". My > nephew wears gang paraphenalia, which makes sense, since he is one > of the, to be politically correct, "peer group leaders" at his school. > > With no adult enforcement of acceptable behaviour, I can only hope > he lives long enough to attend and then graduate high school and > join the Marines, since no one else is permitted (by my sister) to > teach him self discipline. > > I find it surprising that people who have to think in statements > like "if A then B" have such a hard time internalizing the idea of > action and reaction. > > In my experience, most people who exhibit socially acceptable > behaviour do so for fear of the consequences, not because people > are inherently nice creatures at some genetic level. I think this notion needs to be applied to the parents of the 'Trench Coat Mafia' generation. If these boomers can't be expected to nurture and discipline their spawn such that they mature into something worthwhile, then perhaps we must codify criminal liability into parenthood. Fear of the consequences of their children's actions might mitigate some of this if not lead to some measure of improvement, assuming the consequences were actually enforced. Unfortunately, the current state of parenting suggests this as one imperative which, before our time, has not existed. Thanks for moving this thread to -chat from wherever it came. I really needed to experience some thoughtful and rational opinions on this. I live about 60 miles North of Columbine in Fort Collins, Colorado. Naturally, a great deal of informal discussion is taking place amongst my neighbors and co-workers. I've been forced to avoid most of it; the level of ignorance and self-deception is not tolerable. -- Allen Campbell | Anti-social behavior is a symptom of allenc@verinet.com | rampant social depravity To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-chat" in the body of the message
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