Cockfighting
Whether people out of Louisiana realize it or not, one of the yearly legislative efforts is to finally ban cockfighting, as has been done in most other states. I mean to keep blogging about this, because I feel the whole media emphasis is wrong. Most of the complaints come from animal rights groups. They say it's cruel to the cocks. The defenders say it's part of a culture that mainstream America just doesn't get. I think everyone reading these articles is completely missing the point.
The moral quandary should have nothing to do with the birds. It's about us. I think if we stopped and asked the roosters, they would probably say they'd rather train to fight and kill and die in battle rather than be bred on farms to make chicken nuggets. Think about, they die no matter what. Maybe one's more more cruel. Maybe not. At least they die with pride in the ring. No, I'm worried about us. About what it says about our culture (our as in human, because these things happen in other states too) that we want to watch animals fight each other and die.
And also, this is not just about America. The interest in various ultimate fighting and extreme fighting and mixed styles fighting is growing worldwide. Are we so cultured to promote violence that this is our best entertainment? An old friend of mine said that he had studied with a professor teaching "psychohistory" I think it was called. His whole thesis was that you could tell everything you needed to know about a culture through its popular culture as a reflection of that culture's character.
I worry for all of us.
The moral quandary should have nothing to do with the birds. It's about us. I think if we stopped and asked the roosters, they would probably say they'd rather train to fight and kill and die in battle rather than be bred on farms to make chicken nuggets. Think about, they die no matter what. Maybe one's more more cruel. Maybe not. At least they die with pride in the ring. No, I'm worried about us. About what it says about our culture (our as in human, because these things happen in other states too) that we want to watch animals fight each other and die.
And also, this is not just about America. The interest in various ultimate fighting and extreme fighting and mixed styles fighting is growing worldwide. Are we so cultured to promote violence that this is our best entertainment? An old friend of mine said that he had studied with a professor teaching "psychohistory" I think it was called. His whole thesis was that you could tell everything you needed to know about a culture through its popular culture as a reflection of that culture's character.
I worry for all of us.
Labels: louisiana, morals, politics
|| posted by mW @ 5:32 PM
Too Smart?
Plenty of people are upset at the current state of this country. In one sense, that's no surprise. People always complain. But in another sense, it seems heightened now. The Bush administration's approval rating has dropped into the high-twenties, an all time low. A lot of smart people I know constantly ask how so many people could be "so stupid" to fall for the tactics of this administration.
However, more and more, I feel the opposite is the problem. It's not that there are a lot of dumb people out there, too dim to notice the perspicuous manipulations of a devious regime. No. I'm starting more and more to think that there are too many smart people out there, controlling perception, managing spin, and manipulating representations in order to establish what the rest of us call reality. Our country is built on laws. But inherent to American culture is that whatever you can get away with to succeed is okay. Therefore, even moreso, whatever you can get away with legally to succeed is okay.
Just because something is not illegal does not make it right. Maybe insurance lawyers can find a loophole to tell someone that the insurance policy they've paid for twenty years doesn't cover their damage; maybe pharmaceutical companies can pay for pretty ads to make people ask their doctors for drugs they don't need; and maybe selling guns to Third World countries fills the coffers of this and other countries: but maybe none of those things are right.
No. We definitely have too many people keeping us busy with a surfeit of information, anesthetizing television, and sense numbing video games: while I have no objection to the content of any of these things, the problem that is it all functions to keep our attention off the things that matter. No matter one's education, every person has an instinct for what is right and wrong. But we only can care about it if we know about it. So no. Education is not the problem. How we use our educations is the problem. It's a moral problem. A matter of ethics. Choose the word you like. But something in our culture fosters those that can live without it. And that's a problem with which we all are being force to live.
However, more and more, I feel the opposite is the problem. It's not that there are a lot of dumb people out there, too dim to notice the perspicuous manipulations of a devious regime. No. I'm starting more and more to think that there are too many smart people out there, controlling perception, managing spin, and manipulating representations in order to establish what the rest of us call reality. Our country is built on laws. But inherent to American culture is that whatever you can get away with to succeed is okay. Therefore, even moreso, whatever you can get away with legally to succeed is okay.
Just because something is not illegal does not make it right. Maybe insurance lawyers can find a loophole to tell someone that the insurance policy they've paid for twenty years doesn't cover their damage; maybe pharmaceutical companies can pay for pretty ads to make people ask their doctors for drugs they don't need; and maybe selling guns to Third World countries fills the coffers of this and other countries: but maybe none of those things are right.
No. We definitely have too many people keeping us busy with a surfeit of information, anesthetizing television, and sense numbing video games: while I have no objection to the content of any of these things, the problem that is it all functions to keep our attention off the things that matter. No matter one's education, every person has an instinct for what is right and wrong. But we only can care about it if we know about it. So no. Education is not the problem. How we use our educations is the problem. It's a moral problem. A matter of ethics. Choose the word you like. But something in our culture fosters those that can live without it. And that's a problem with which we all are being force to live.
Labels: business, ethics, morals, politics
|| posted by mW @ 9:10 AMWhy Some Laws Are Wrong
Personal lives of people should be just that. Personal. The state has no business regulating sex in any way other than to prevent forced encounters and to protect children from adults who know better. The reason why this country will eventually fester and explode, like Rome before it, is because America refuses to evolve. Its people stagnate with an apalling apathy. No one is innocent. Politicians and public alike don't care.
We want to win wars, as long as our lives aren't impacted and all our sons and daughters return. We want everyone to be "normal," and we vigorously fight to keep America this way, pretending no one gets hurt in the process. And we never stop to question why people are in jail, instead content to put them away for years at a time, simply because then we don't have to deal with that person, all the while ignoring that the same causes that put that person in that situation will put another person in that same situation, leading to the same result.
And so it is, because our courts refuse to strike down laws that are not actively enforced, that we still have laws governing who can do what with their personal lives. What, in particular, has raised my ire, is the fact that the state of Georgia feels justified in mercilessly prosecuting a promising young man, aged 17, for having oral sex with a 15-year-old, in a situation where everyone agrees she was the instigator. Read the full story here.
This young man, who was a 3.2 gpa student, an athletic success, and homecoming king, was put away for 10 years without a possibility of parole. We say today that girl was too young to consent. Bullshit. Girls were married before then in those "good ole days" that laws like these are meant to preserve. It's an illusion of morality wrapped in righteousness that is grating on this country.
But that' s right. We have a war going on. We have gays getting married y'all. And, gasp, illegal immigrants. As if we don't have enough people to get concerned about anything else. It's all smoke and mirrors and people make deals out of a lot of things, because at the end of the day people just want to feel okay about themselves and they don't care at what expense it costs others. It's depressing.
We want to win wars, as long as our lives aren't impacted and all our sons and daughters return. We want everyone to be "normal," and we vigorously fight to keep America this way, pretending no one gets hurt in the process. And we never stop to question why people are in jail, instead content to put them away for years at a time, simply because then we don't have to deal with that person, all the while ignoring that the same causes that put that person in that situation will put another person in that same situation, leading to the same result.
And so it is, because our courts refuse to strike down laws that are not actively enforced, that we still have laws governing who can do what with their personal lives. What, in particular, has raised my ire, is the fact that the state of Georgia feels justified in mercilessly prosecuting a promising young man, aged 17, for having oral sex with a 15-year-old, in a situation where everyone agrees she was the instigator. Read the full story here.
This young man, who was a 3.2 gpa student, an athletic success, and homecoming king, was put away for 10 years without a possibility of parole. We say today that girl was too young to consent. Bullshit. Girls were married before then in those "good ole days" that laws like these are meant to preserve. It's an illusion of morality wrapped in righteousness that is grating on this country.
But that' s right. We have a war going on. We have gays getting married y'all. And, gasp, illegal immigrants. As if we don't have enough people to get concerned about anything else. It's all smoke and mirrors and people make deals out of a lot of things, because at the end of the day people just want to feel okay about themselves and they don't care at what expense it costs others. It's depressing.
Labels: laws, morals, prison, sex
|| posted by mW @ 10:34 AM[top]
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