Don't read this, if you're in a Good Mood.

Come on, July 1...

I really want to say something nice to you to make you feel better about the world but I can't.
All the words and phrases that come to mind are just fucking mean. Sorry, honey, the world blows. Carry a gun.

[QUOTE=Undertow]Come on, July 1...[/QUOTE]
pretty sure july first isnt going to affect him

[QUOTE=sixteentimes]I really want to say something nice to you to make you feel better about the world but I can't.
All the words and phrases that come to mind are just fucking mean. Sorry, honey, the world blows. Carry a gun.[/QUOTE]
hey shes right, straight to the point, and i thought all of us here realized this a long time ago. the worlds an ugly place

[QUOTE=Undertow]Come on, July 1...[/QUOTE]
I see you hung out over a low fence, clutching you betting stub in one white-knuckled hand and the pink slip to your car in other. You are awash in sweat, desperation and just the glint of hope in the eye....

They round the bend, straight run, photo finish...

You close your eyes tightly and pray that when you open them the n00bs will be gone.

"Come on July, 1...."

[QUOTE=Cosmic Castaway]I discovered it years ago , that I’m lots happier when I don’t pay attention to the news . Ignorance truly is bliss . But ignorance doesn’t stop bad things from happening . And here , this society , this mass media mega-center is controlled by and for those that thrive on negativity . A culture of rubber-neckers , who constantly revive the chronic misgivings in human nature. A social order unable to evolve past the train wreck mentality.

Why do people watch Law and Order ? This show rips its cases from the headlines and changes the names and maybe a few small details. Is it because we want to see justice done ? I don’t think so. I think we’re feeding some darker part of our psyche. I think we, as a culture, care a lot more about the crime than the punishment. We care more about who killed who, and how they did it, than what happens to the killer afterwards.

My homepage carries AP / CNN feeds, and this morning, for some fucked up reason, I decided to watch them. That fucked up reason is 9 year old Jessica Lunsford. Who was abducted by a known sex offender, was raped and kept in a closet for three days, in a house police visited but decided not to search at the time. Her hands were bound with stereo wire , she was wrapped in trash bags and buried alive. This happened in Florida but it could’ve happened anywhere.

This is news .
This is more than I want to know.
This is what I didn’t want to see but couldn’t stop myself from looking.
This makes me sick on so many levels.

I’ve never been able to understand how a person could do something like this. Sure, we’ve all thought about killing someone, our boss , that dick who cut us off in traffic, elected officials, alex cassum. But there’s a built in safety mechanism in most of us, it knows right from wrong and sets off the appropriate mental bells and whistles when were about to cross the lines . My point is that we’ve all thought about doing bad things. Not abducting molesting and murdering a child, but something. What’s so different about these people, they actually can ? It makes me sick that a person could do this , could take a beautiful innocent child from her family, abuse her and kill her in this horrendous way.

I know if John Couey ends up in the general population of any Florida State correctional facility, he’ll be abused and raped and probably murdered. That’s [B]IF[/B] he manages to dodge the death penalty. But that doesn’t make me feel any better about it, because this kinda thing happens all the time. This kinda thing will happen again like a re-run of Law and Order, just in a different state, with the names changed to protect the guilty. What I want to know is what was missing from John Coueys head ? What psychological/physiological difference allowed him to do this? There’s got to be a way to isolate this difference and pluck it from those afflicted.

I question the journalists who could write this stuff down, make a report and put together video clips about this just to sell ad space or air time. I have no children of my own, I have nieces and it would be horrible enough to hear they died , but to know they were raped and buried alive would drive me plumb-fuckin-insane.
I’m wondering how seeing or reading this makes the Lunsfords feel.
I’m wondering how anyone made the grade, if we all slept through our ethics classes.
I’m wondering why journalists don’t spend more time looking for solutions instead of just peddling ad space around the problem.

I question myself that I clicked on that link thinking; maybe there will be some information there that I can use in one of my fictional stories. Which makes me a pretty shitty person too. Little different from anyone else who profits by the tragedy of others.

There are things that get in your head that you just can’t get out .
I want to forget this.
I want to empty all the shit that’s in my head fill it back up with happy.
I’m done with “news” I’m tuning out .
I’m looking to get back to zero on the karmic scoreboard.
I want to do something keeps these things from ever happening.
I want the Jessica Lunsfords to come home.[/QUOTE]

They had a phrase inm 'Nam, that's apt:

"There is no gravity, the world [I]sucks[/I]."

A thread for feeling bad? I'm game. Here's my confession. My contribution to America's decline.

Last week, I left my car unlocked and parked on the street instead of beside my garage where it belongs, locked. I came out in the morning to find the center console and glove box hanging open, a few things missing. Nothing major, a cell phone hands-free kit and such. I was late for work, so I just said "fuck it" and drove off. I never reported it, or did anything about it other than huff and puff for a few minutes.

Today I was doing yardwork and a gentleman pulled over, said he lives down the block. Someone broke into his car. He swears it was locked. This time they got some more valuable shit. A wallet this time. One that had a badge inside.

Now there's someone in my neighborhood running around with a badge that isn't his.

Or hers.

I'm not here to discriminate.

Probably just some kid that's scared shitless now, knowing he fucked up big time robbing a car that turned out to belong to a cop.

Probably.

That's how I comfort myself.

The best case scenario.

Because the worst case could end up like that shit that started this thread. Some sick fucko flashes a badge to get in someone's house, rapes an old lady or bashes some kid's head in.

Either way, I don't watch the news.

Either way, I wave to the cops that now pass through my part of town.

my sister was on her way down to the city one time, to her apartment, she jsut bought a bunch of stuff for there, tiles, furniture, various stuff, she parks her car outside her apt for 15 mins, then puff, its stolen, never shows up for 6 months, where its bruised and battered and stripped completely. it was a honda civic hatchback, the old kinds. i was supposed to be there with her, watching the car but i stayed up here. maybe the car wouldnt have been stolen, maybe i would have been shot, maybe the theives would have been shot. either way, this thread sounds like the 10 people from "The Village" who wanted to start a utopia

The media just slams bad news down the people's throats because it's a ratings grab, and truth be told, what most people want to see. If CNN is covering some hot air balloon contest and MSNBC is covering a car bombing in Iraq, chances are people want to see/hear about the bombing. Morbid curiousity and the "I'm glad that's not me" line of thinking feeds the wheel that is negative media.

But yeah, I know what you are talking about. My Dad has always avoided the news because he says it's "all bad news".

[QUOTE=jase]A thread for feeling bad? I'm game. Here's my confession. My contribution to America's decline.

Last week, I left my car unlocked and parked on the street instead of beside my garage where it belongs, locked. I came out in the morning to find the center console and glove box hanging open, a few things missing. Nothing major, a cell phone hands-free kit and such. I was late for work, so I just said "fuck it" and drove off. I never reported it, or did anything about it other than huff and puff for a few minutes.

Today I was doing yardwork and a gentleman pulled over, said he lives down the block. Someone broke into his car. He swears it was locked. This time they got some more valuable shit. A wallet this time. One that had a badge inside.

Now there's someone in my neighborhood running around with a badge that isn't his.

Or hers.

I'm not here to discriminate.

Probably just some kid that's scared shitless now, knowing he fucked up big time robbing a car that turned out to belong to a cop.

Probably.

That's how I comfort myself.

The best case scenario.

Because the worst case could end up like that shit that started this thread. Some sick fucko flashes a badge to get in someone's house, rapes an old lady or bashes some kid's head in.

Either way, I don't watch the news.

Either way, I wave to the cops that now pass through my part of town.[/QUOTE]

I bet [I]Maniac Cop 3[/I] broke in and stole it.

You know, cops don't actually....

Nevermind. Cops are great.

[QUOTE=Scott~]The media just slams bad news down the people's throats because it's a ratings grab, and truth be told, what most people want to see. If CNN is covering some hot air balloon contest and MSNBC is covering a car bombing in Iraq, chances are people want to see/hear about the bombing. Morbid curiousity and the "I'm glad that's not me" line of thinking feeds the wheel that is negative media.

But yeah, I know what you are talking about. My Dad has always avoided the news because he says it's "all bad news".[/QUOTE]
See, the thing that's fallacious about this argument is [I]nobody's[/I] covering car bombings in Iraq.

Iraq is well on on it's way to Democracy, citizen. Move along.

jase you post a lot about current events, does this mean you are done being our friendly community newsman? are we going to ahve to rely on sellOut to be our weather man? the man is 93% lies! hes too good of a weatherman!

I felt bad about Comrade Ogilvy as well.

You got it all wrong.
We naturally have a destructive side and a survival caring side. It is a battle of both.

If someone killed your loved one right in front of you in a very horrific way, there is a big chance you would react to it in a similar manner. It is innate to respond like that, just like it would to any other animal.

Or better yet, if it was a survival scenario. Two people would fight to death for a final potato.

Trust me the world doesn't suck yet. Once there is no resources to satisfy demands, and overpopulations moves on.

People will indeed fight for such things as oil, or any other resource.

It is a little bit of an illusion to have a system called society, and think that none of those things happen. To think that secure health, food, and shelter will provide the human brain to somehow shutdown that reaction. Needless to say it happens less in a flawed society.

The news is not even accurate enough. How many things that happen daily at this instant that are not seen there?

I don't watch the news really because something shitty will happen. Someone will be killed somewhere tomorrow. Someone will die. It is all repetitive.

[QUOTE=sixteentimes]I really want to say something nice to you to make you feel better about the world but I can't.
All the words and phrases that come to mind are just fucking mean. Sorry, honey, the world blows. Carry a gun.[/QUOTE]
I'm aware the world sucks. Nothing new or shocking about that.
What I'm thinking is we, collectively, could work together to find solutions for these problems. We could look for ways to identify these types of offenders early on and correct whatever the fuck is wrong with them or at least seperate them from civilization.

We can send letters to News broadcasters telling them there are details we'd rather not know. It's sad enough that a little girl died. The rest should NOT be public info. We can, as previously stated, tune out. When they can't sell ad space around a story like this, they'll stop reporting them.

Looking back at it now maybe I shouldn't have posted this. I wasn't trying to bring people down. There seem to be some pretty sharp minds here and I'm sure that someone has or will, come up with a solution I haven't thought of. But If we just wave it off and say " Oh well, the world is fucked up." Then, we deserve to live in a fucked up world.
We create the world we live in. And while it'll never a be a utopic paradise we can at least put some effort into making it a safe place for childeren.

Oh and feel free to call me honey from now on.

[QUOTE=spacemonkey1888]pretty sure july first isnt going to affect him[/QUOTE]

It might , maybe I should send Denis a pm asking him to send the money order back.
Then he can send Undertow a pm saying " You owe me $60.00 . "

[QUOTE=Parkaboy]See, the thing that's fallacious about this argument is [I]nobody's[/I] covering car bombings in Iraq.

Iraq is well on on it's way to Democracy, citizen. Move along.[/QUOTE]

And Afghanistan just sent us big heartfelt thank you.
"Neocons: Americanizing the world . One country at a time."
Don't it just give ya the tingles?

[QUOTE=Cosmic Castaway]It might , maybe I should send Denis a pm asking him to send the money order back.
Then he can send Undertow a pm saying " You owe me $60.00 . "[/QUOTE]
dont take it out on me, undertow just has a thing with noobs.

theres nothing we can do collectively to better the world. people will always be animals. thats who we are. and we are the worst kind of animals. because we have emotion. there is no way to conglomerate the world into agreeance

[QUOTE=Xk3zofrenik]You got it all wrong.
Or better yet, if it was a survival scenario. Two people would fight to death for a final potato.

Trust me the world doesn't suck yet. Once there is no resources to satisfy demands, and overpopulations moves on.

People will indeed fight for such things as oil, or any other resource.

It is a little bit of an illusion to have a system called society, and think that none of those things happen. To think that secure health, food, and shelter will provide the human brain to somehow shutdown that reaction. Needless to say it happens less in a flawed society.[/QUOTE]
Sounds like someone's been reading "Peak Oil " ?
...And maybe I'm misunderstanding but I don't see what survival instinct has to do with killing a little girl. Seperate things -- in my mind at least.

[QUOTE=Xk3zofrenik]The news is not even accurate enough. How many things that happen daily at this instant that are not seen there?[/QUOTE]
Orwell got some of it right. Some things though are the exact opposite of what he thought .Like instead of one omni-present news network constantly shilling propaganda, there are thousands. Each shilling their own version of the truth based on their subjective bias. Nobody knows what to belive, because ten different news networks often tell the same story, ten different ways.

[QUOTE=Xk3zofrenik]I don't watch the news really because something shitty will happen. Someone will be killed somewhere tomorrow. Someone will die. It is all repetitive.[/QUOTE]
I want Clark Kent to stop just reporting and actually DO something.

[QUOTE=Cosmic Castaway]I'm aware the world sucks. Nothing new or shocking about that.
What I'm thinking is we, collectively, could work together to find solutions for these problems. We could look for ways to identify these types of offenders early on and correct whatever the fuck is wrong with them or at least seperate them from civilization.[/QUOTE]

Psychologists and prisons already do these things. School principles tried doing the same thing when school shootings seemed to be all the rage in the late 90s.

[QUOTE]We can send letters to News broadcasters telling them there are details we'd rather not know. It's sad enough that a little girl died. The rest should NOT be public info. We can, as previously stated, tune out. When they can't sell ad space around a story like this, they'll stop reporting them.[/QUOTE]

I'm still trying to see where you got the idea that the news is reporting about a little girl to get ad space.

[QUOTE]Oh and feel free to call me honey from now on.[/QUOTE]

This will make everyone take your arguments very seriously from now on. Guarantee it.

[QUOTE]It might , maybe I should send Denis a pm asking him to send the money order back.
Then he can send Undertow a pm saying " You owe me $60.00 . "[/QUOTE]

This makes no sense, even as a joke.

[QUOTE=spacemonkey1888]dont take it out on me, undertow just has a thing with noobs.[/QUOTE]
Really, I wasn't taking it out on you, but why would anyone pay sixty bucks to be somewhere they are not wanted. I was responding to you to avoid returning the bitterness. It didn't work, and I guess that's my fault. But for the record , you're cool in my book.

[QUOTE=spacemonkey1888]theres nothing we can do collectively to better the world. people will always be animals. thats who we are. and we are the worst kind of animals. because we have emotion. there is no way to conglomerate the world into agreeance[/QUOTE]
Wait . You don't think we can get the majority of the world to agree that children shouldn't be raped and murdered?And that we can and should work to find ways to prevent these things from happening?

no one said youre not wanted.

what can the world do to stop crime? completely?

[QUOTE=Cosmic Castaway]I'm aware the world sucks. Nothing new or shocking about that.
What I'm thinking is we, collectively, could work together to find solutions for these problems. We could look for ways to identify these types of offenders early on and correct whatever the fuck is wrong with them or at least seperate them from civilization.

We can send letters to News broadcasters telling them there are details we'd rather not know. It's sad enough that a little girl died. The rest should NOT be public info. We can, as previously stated, tune out. When they can't sell ad space around a story like this, they'll stop reporting them.

Looking back at it now maybe I shouldn't have posted this. I wasn't trying to bring people down. There seem to be some pretty sharp minds here and I'm sure that someone has or will, come up with a solution I haven't thought of. But If we just wave it off and say " Oh well, the world is fucked up." Then, we deserve to live in a fucked up world.
We create the world we live in. And while it'll never a be a utopic paradise we can at least put some effort into making it a safe place for childeren.

Oh and feel free to call me honey from now on.[/QUOTE]

Like ScottSquigglyLine said, it's all ratings. The more info you have, the better reporter you are, the better network, the more readers, the more awards saying YOU ARE THE BEST HARD NOSED REPORTER EVVVEEEERRRR! People want to know. I wanted to know all the gorey Michael Jackson case details. I'm no pervy little kid boner but fuck, it's human nature to be curious about gross stuff. Thats why we go to horror movies and gawk at car accidents.
Also, no matter what the world does as a society to stifle the erections some people get from killing, raping, little kids, puppies, whatever, there's always going to be someone out there supressing it, hiding it, coming up with pervier shit to get off on. If you want this to stop you should become an advocate for better parenting in the world. Monsters aren't born, they're made.

[QUOTE=Cosmic Castaway]Orwell got some of it right. Some things though are the exact opposite of what he thought .Like instead of one omni-present news network constantly shilling propaganda, there are thousands. Each shilling their own version of the truth based on their subjective bias. Nobody knows what to belive, because ten different news networks often tell the same story, ten different ways.[/QUOTE]

They aren't different--they're all the same beast, just different heads. Talking heads. And don't worry about the news... shit, there's a lot more programming our brains out there. Orwell was right. So was Golding. And especially Conrad. "Exterminate all of the brutes." Oh, and Ecclesiastes: "There is nothing new under the sun, all life is vanity."

[QUOTE]Wait . You don't think we can get the majority of the world to agree that children shouldn't be raped and murdered?And that we can and should work to find ways to prevent these things from happening?[/QUOTE]

I know you weren't talking to me... but oh well. First question answer: No. No we can't. It's not that most wouldn't agree, it's that most wouldn't show up to discuss agreeing. Question number two: Maybe. Maybe we could and "should" but... we won't. Trust me. I don't like it either. But... trust me.

[QUOTE=sixteentimes]People want to know. I wanted to know all the gorey Michael Jackson case details. I'm no pervy little kid boner but fuck, it's human nature to be curious about gross stuff.[/QUOTE]

[I]Human Nature[/I] is also, like, what, track seven on [B]Thriller[/B]? Hmm. Well, [I]Billie Jean[/I] does overshadow it in the sixth slot...

I agree, it is human nature: violence and curiosity and insensitivity and what is labeled "evil".

But, you know, we're only human.

[QUOTE]CastAway: This show rips its cases from the headlines and changes the names and maybe a few small details. Is it because we want to see justice done? I don’t think so. I think we’re feeding some darker part of our psyche. I think we, as a culture, care a lot more about the crime than the punishment. We care more about who killed who, and how they did it, than what happens to the killer afterwards. [/QUOTE]

Note on LAW & order:
It’s story telling. It’s linking events together that result in consequences. It’s calling. It’s taking a life and molding it into an expression. It conveys knowledge as well as entertainment. I watched L&W in high school and it got me interested in the judicial system. How a case goes from Action, investigation, and courtroom. It’s still the learning of a process, especially for those who have never heard of things called books.

And why shouldn't real life cases be used? That defies sense, especially if you’re trying to depict the real world.

As for the ignorance is bliss part, no shit, and I sometimes envy those that see nothing but their own world, but what's the point in that? You can live a life in a cave, but when it comes time to look back your left with calk drawings on the wall and a sperm stained carpet.

[QUOTE]I'm aware the world sucks. Nothing new or shocking about that.
What I'm thinking is we, collectively, could work together to find solutions for these problems. We could look for ways to identify these types of offenders early on and correct whatever the fuck is wrong with them or at least separate them from civilization. [/QUOTE]

I cringe at arguments like less. You’re being an idealist, nothing wrong there, but what a crock of crap. Say my grandfather killed my grandmother then committed suicide in front of my father who would go on to murder my mother, oh sorry that's chuck (not positive on the last bit). The point is, how are you going Identify these people? I was chucked into psychiatric evaluation because I wrote "disturbing" stories. yet i'm not the one they should be looking at .

[QUOTE]We can send letters to News broadcasters telling them there are details we'd rather not know.[/QUOTE]

no thank you. I’d rather know. if you haven’t been told, you’re going to die. For the most part this country lives in the dark, American news isn’t news, it’s gossip, fear, and porn wrapped in aluminum foil. Your not seeing shit if your only watching cnn, or any American broadcast. Watch BBc, or listen to NPR, and you'll see snippets of those who suffer in horrific ways , and by saying, “we’d rather not know," you’re basically shitting in the face of the victims, their families, and the gift of giving Empathy.

yeaaap, i'm going to my haystack

[QUOTE=spacemonkey1888]no one said youre not wanted. [/QUOTE]
Not exactly. It was implied that someone wants the day to come when I'm not here.
[QUOTE=spacemonkey1888]what can the world do to stop crime? completely?[/QUOTE]
Do away with all the laws then everything will be legal. Silly.

Obviously, that's not possible. I already conceeded there is no utopia, but we can make things better. I'm not willing to just shrug things off and believe there's nothing to be done.

how would YOU concieve things better?

[QUOTE=Undertow]
This will make everyone take your arguments very seriously from now on. Guarantee it.
[/QUOTE]
Why ? I really do want her ( I'm assuming) to call me honey from now on. She was being sweet and empathetic, and I appreciated that .

[QUOTE=sixteentimes]Like ScottSquigglyLine said, it's all ratings. The more info you have, the better reporter you are, the better network, the more readers, the more awards saying YOU ARE THE BEST HARD NOSED REPORTER EVVVEEEERRRR! People want to know. I wanted to know all the gorey Michael Jackson case details. I'm no pervy little kid boner but fuck, it's human nature to be curious about gross stuff. Thats why we go to horror movies and gawk at car accidents.
Also, no matter what the world does as a society to stifle the erections some people get from killing, raping, little kids, puppies, whatever, there's always going to be someone out there supressing it, hiding it, coming up with pervier shit to get off on. If you want this to stop you should become an advocate for better parenting in the world. Monsters aren't born, they're made.[/QUOTE]
I don't know ScottSquigglyLine but agree with or at least understand what you saying.

I think that sometimes monsters are born and no amount of good parenting can help them. Some people are born fucked up some get fucked up along the way.

[QUOTE=ralphthompsonxxx]They aren't different--they're all the same beast, just different heads. Talking heads. And don't worry about the news... shit, there's a lot more programming our brains out there. Orwell was right. So was Golding. And especially Conrad. "Exterminate all of the brutes." Oh, and Ecclesiastes: "There is nothing new under the sun, all life is vanity."

I know you weren't talking to me... but oh well. First question answer: No. No we can't. It's not that most wouldn't agree, it's that most wouldn't show up to discuss agreeing. Question number two: Maybe. Maybe we could and "should" but... we won't. Trust me. I don't like it either. But... trust me.[/QUOTE]
You make a good point , but ...
Did airline security change after 9-11 ? Did DUI become a crime ?
Because people suffered and died. Then enough of them finally did something about it.
I should've stayed in psych.I'd have better answers about how. None-the-less my stupid bleeding heart wants to fix fucked up people.

[QUOTE=ralphthompsonxxx][I]Human Nature[/I] is also, like, what, track seven on [B]Thriller[/B]? Hmm. Well, [I]Billie Jean[/I] does overshadow it in the sixth slot...

I agree, it is human nature: violence and curiosity and insensitivity and what is labeled "evil".

But, you know, we're only human.[/QUOTE]
Speak for yourself pal .

[QUOTE=Dr.Jekyll&Mr.Hyde]Note on LAW & order:
It’s story telling. It’s linking events together that result in consequences. It’s calling. It’s taking a life and molding it into an expression. It conveys knowledge as well as entertainment. I watched L&W in high school and it got me interested in the judicial system. How a case goes from Action, investigation, and courtroom. It’s still the learning of a process, especially for those who have never heard of things called books.

And why shouldn't real life cases be used? That defies sense, especially if you’re trying to depict the real world.[/QUOTE]
I wasn't dissing Law and Order , it's a good show, well done and all . I was looking more towards why it is that we watch it. Why we feel thew need to know about murder. An examination of our morbid curiosity, if you will.

[QUOTE=Hyde]As for the ignorance is bliss part, no shit, and I sometimes envy those that see nothing but their own world, but what's the point in that? You can live a life in a cave, but when it comes time to look back your left with calk drawings on the wall and a sperm stained carpet.

I cringe at arguments like less. You’re being an idealist, nothing wrong there, but what a crock of crap. Say my grandfather killed my grandmother then committed suicide in front of my father who would go on to murder my mother, oh sorry that's chuck (not positive on the last bit). The point is, how are you going Identify these people?[/QUOTE]
Psych evaluations.

[QUOTE=Hyde]I was chucked into psychiatric evaluation because I wrote "disturbing" stories. yet i'm not the one they should be looking at .[/QUOTE]
Right , you found an outlet , a vent for the negative energy. And in that way you deal with it . I don't know if theres any such thing as a "normal person" but if there are, their art sucks . I don't worry about people who write scary stories or horror movies, they've found an outlet. I worry about the people who haven't.

[QUOTE=Hyde]no thank you. I’d rather know. if you haven’t been told, you’re going to die. For the most part this country lives in the dark, American news isn’t news, it’s gossip, fear, and porn wrapped in aluminum foil. Your not seeing shit if your only watching cnn, or any American broadcast. Watch BBc, or listen to NPR, and you'll see snippets of those who suffer in horrific ways , and by saying, “we’d rather not know," you’re basically shitting in the face of the victims, their families, and the gift of giving Empathy.

yeaaap, i'm going to my haystack[/QUOTE]
I'm saying I'd rather not know that little girl was raped and buried alive. I'm saying it shows a lack of empathy towards the family on the part of the news networks to report those details. I do listen NPR sometimes and I think Jim Lehrer is on right now.

[QUOTE=Cosmic Castaway]I don't know ScottSquigglyLine but agree with or at least understand what you saying.

I think that sometimes monsters are born and no amount of good parenting can help them. Some people are born fucked up some get fucked up along the way.[/QUOTE]

I really disagree with this. People are products of their environments. No one is born corrupt or evil. Read any of the stories about serial killers on crimelibrary.com, all born into rotten households or raped by their pastors or watched their mothers waste away to cancer. Children are not born rotten. They're born children.

yea they arent born GOOD either, there is no definition of what they are, its like talking, they cant talk, they have to learn

exactly. people are made.

If it werent for people interested in the bad guy, there wouldnt be detectives to find them and prisons to put them in; getting those people off the streets and preventing the bad guy from doing more harm is better than ignoring the bad shit that happens and will continue to happen whether you want to acknowledge it or not. Who cares if theyre on death row but die before they get zapped.... Thats the easy way, they [I]want [/I]to get zapped more than they want to sit in a cell for the rest of their lives.

Sure, some people feel there isnt any justice in that. Of course, some people think that whoever does harm should have it done to them in the same manner. But what the hell does that say?

If someone pokes your eye and laughs about it, and you do it back to them, it doesnt make things better because what you have done is create their need to want to poke you in the eye harder. The next thing you know, you've poked eachothers eyes out and now you cant see to shake hands. Im not saying shake hands with the enemy. But if you let what the enemy did get to [I]your[/I] quality of life, then you're no better off. And in a sense, become[I] like[/I] the enemy.

If you ignore it, then they will think is okay. They'll be out there proving its okay to poke eyes as long as no one is doing anything about it. If you tell them not to poke you in the eye and leave it at that, they'll just move onto someone who will either poke them in the eye as a favour, or until someone makes an example out of them by sending them to the corner, making sure that most everyone knows about it.

anyone see the movie K-Pax? it was interesting what kevin space said about an eye for an eye theory.

but yea min, youre right death sentence is giving them what they want. doesnt make anything any better

[QUOTE=Cosmic Castaway]I discovered it years ago , that I’m lots happier when I don’t pay attention to the news . Ignorance truly is bliss . But ignorance doesn’t stop bad things from happening . And here , this society , this mass media mega-center is controlled by and for those that thrive on negativity . A culture of rubber-neckers , who constantly revive the chronic misgivings in human nature. A social order unable to evolve past the train wreck mentality.

Why do people watch Law and Order ? This show rips its cases from the headlines and changes the names and maybe a few small details. Is it because we want to see justice done ? I don’t think so. I think we’re feeding some darker part of our psyche. I think we, as a culture, care a lot more about the crime than the punishment. We care more about who killed who, and how they did it, than what happens to the killer afterwards.

My homepage carries AP / CNN feeds, and this morning, for some fucked up reason, I decided to watch them. That fucked up reason is 9 year old Jessica Lunsford. Who was abducted by a known sex offender, was raped and kept in a closet for three days, in a house police visited but decided not to search at the time. Her hands were bound with stereo wire , she was wrapped in trash bags and buried alive. This happened in Florida but it could’ve happened anywhere.

This is news .
This is more than I want to know.
This is what I didn’t want to see but couldn’t stop myself from looking.
This makes me sick on so many levels.

I’ve never been able to understand how a person could do something like this. Sure, we’ve all thought about killing someone, our boss , that dick who cut us off in traffic, elected officials, alex cassum. But there’s a built in safety mechanism in most of us, it knows right from wrong and sets off the appropriate mental bells and whistles when were about to cross the lines . My point is that we’ve all thought about doing bad things. Not abducting molesting and murdering a child, but something. What’s so different about these people, they actually can ? It makes me sick that a person could do this , could take a beautiful innocent child from her family, abuse her and kill her in this horrendous way.

I know if John Couey ends up in the general population of any Florida State correctional facility, he’ll be abused and raped and probably murdered. That’s [B]IF[/B] he manages to dodge the death penalty. But that doesn’t make me feel any better about it, because this kinda thing happens all the time. This kinda thing will happen again like a re-run of Law and Order, just in a different state, with the names changed to protect the guilty. What I want to know is what was missing from John Coueys head ? What psychological/physiological difference allowed him to do this? There’s got to be a way to isolate this difference and pluck it from those afflicted.

I question the journalists who could write this stuff down, make a report and put together video clips about this just to sell ad space or air time. I have no children of my own, I have nieces and it would be horrible enough to hear they died , but to know they were raped and buried alive would drive me plumb-fuckin-insane.
I’m wondering how seeing or reading this makes the Lunsfords feel.
I’m wondering how anyone made the grade, if we all slept through our ethics classes.
I’m wondering why journalists don’t spend more time looking for solutions instead of just peddling ad space around the problem.

I question myself that I clicked on that link thinking; maybe there will be some information there that I can use in one of my fictional stories. Which makes me a pretty shitty person too. Little different from anyone else who profits by the tragedy of others.

There are things that get in your head that you just can’t get out .
I want to forget this.
I want to empty all the shit that’s in my head fill it back up with happy.
I’m done with “news” I’m tuning out .
I’m looking to get back to zero on the karmic scoreboard.
I want to do something keeps these things from ever happening.
I want the Jessica Lunsfords to come home.[/QUOTE]

it's your fault.

[QUOTE=Cosmic Castaway]Sounds like someone's been reading "Peak Oil " ?
...And maybe I'm misunderstanding but I don't see what survival instinct has to do with killing a little girl. Seperate things -- in my mind at least.

Would you mind dusting off your mind a bit then. I was refering to the "World Sucks" argument.

My comment is towards how not so ideal we are under some circumstances, and even in no extreme circumstances whatsoever.

You mention that there is a built in safety mechanism that knows right from wrong. I totally disagree. Right and wrong are ideal absolutes that are not part of us.

What we do learn is pain, imprisonment, guilt and fear. Those are the main detractors of some of the bad things people may have thought about doing, but don't act on it.

In many circumstances and in many people that doesn't work that way.

So it doesn't matter how big of a jail you got, any rapes going in there. Capital punishment, cutting hands, etc.

The destructive side of a human being is as present as its caring and nurturing side.

Throw in a little more desperation on limited resources and you may understand how I can say that the world doesn't suck at all yet.

You don't need the news. Try being a social worker, 911 operator, ER nurse or any front line person in the ugly aspects of society. I can garantee you the media is even making it look good, and it doesn't have time to put on air all the shitty things that happen daily.

I think you are truly in bliss thinking that is the media making all of this up. Whatever city you are in, I want to move there.

[QUOTE=Cosmic Castaway]
Why do people watch Law and Order ?

[/QUOTE]

Vincent D'Onofrio. That motherfucker is awesome!!

[QUOTE=Undertow]Come on, July 1...[/QUOTE]

God this guy is a twat, come on "Undertow leaving time".

[QUOTE=sixteentimes]I really disagree with this. People are products of their environments. No one is born corrupt or evil. Read any of the stories about serial killers on crimelibrary.com, all born into rotten households or raped by their pastors or watched their mothers waste away to cancer. Children are not born rotten. They're born children.[/QUOTE]

I haven't studied up on the Nature vs. Nurture argument. So you're probably better versed on that than I am. But I have seen kids from seemingly good sets of parents grow up to be horrible people. And I think we all ( most of us at least) have some trauma in our childhood, most of us don't grow up to be killers. Lots of people beaten and abused as kids don't grow up to be murdering molesters. I'm not saying those experiences can't have an effect, I'm sure they do. But I am certain that not all sickos came from broken or abusive homes.And that not all people who did come from broken or abusive homes are sickos.

I'll take a look at crimelibrary.com.
Thanks

[QUOTE=Minuet]If it werent for people interested in the bad guy, there wouldnt be detectives to find them and prisons to put them in; getting those people off the streets and preventing the bad guy from doing more harm is better than ignoring the bad shit that happens and will continue to happen whether you want to acknowledge it or not. Who cares if theyre on death row but die before they get zapped.... Thats the easy way, they [I]want [/I]to get zapped more than they want to sit in a cell for the rest of their lives.

Sure, some people feel there isnt any justice in that. Of course, some people think that whoever does harm should have it done to them in the same manner. But what the hell does that say?

If someone pokes your eye and laughs about it, and you do it back to them, it doesnt make things better because what you have done is create their need to want to poke you in the eye harder. The next thing you know, you've poked eachothers eyes out and now you cant see to shake hands. Im not saying shake hands with the enemy. But if you let what the enemy did get to [I]your[/I] quality of life, then you're no better off. And in a sense, become[I] like[/I] the enemy.

If you ignore it, then they will think is okay. They'll be out there proving its okay to poke eyes as long as no one is doing anything about it. If you tell them not to poke you in the eye and leave it at that, they'll just move onto someone who will either poke them in the eye as a favour, or until someone makes an example out of them by sending them to the corner, making sure that most everyone knows about it.[/QUOTE]

Minnie, Can I call you Minnie ?

I'm not sure who this response was for, I'm anti-eye-poking myself. I want people "cured" so they don't do things like this. If you'll reread my initial post I said knowing that Couey will most likely get the death penalty, doesn't make me feel any better.

Yeah okay I'll just go sit in the corner now.

[QUOTE=snuffy]it's your fault.[/QUOTE]
Your words, they wound like psychic daggers.

[QUOTE=MinervaG2]Vincent D'Onofrio. That motherfucker is awesome!![/QUOTE]
The boy has chops .

[QUOTE=Cosmic Castaway]
Psych evaluations.
.[/QUOTE]
hummmeiy.
You're putting a lot of faith in psychological analysis. I feel it's impossible to predetermine someone as a murder, rapist, child molester, etc. yes people have proclivities if they've been raised in a certain environment and have suffered certain abuse. But if you start in that way of thinking your leaning towards some sort of "human" cleansing, which turns into a witch hunt that eventually curves into genocide.

[QUOTE=Minuet]
If someone pokes your eye and laughs about it, and you do it back to them, it doesnt make things better because what you have done is create their need to want to poke you in the eye harder. The next thing you know, you've poked eachothers eyes out and now you cant see to shake hands. Im not saying shake hands with the enemy. But if you let what the enemy did get to [I]your[/I] quality of life, then you're no better off. And in a sense, become[I] like[/I] the enemy.

If you ignore it, then they will think is okay. They'll be out there proving its okay to poke eyes as long as no one is doing anything about it. If you tell them not to poke you in the eye and leave it at that, they'll just move onto someone who will either poke them in the eye as a favour, or until someone makes an example out of them by sending them to the corner, making sure that most everyone knows about it.[/QUOTE]
I LOVE your head

[QUOTE=Cosmic Castaway]I haven't studied up on the Nature vs. Nurture argument. So you're probably better versed on that than I am. But I have seen kids from seemingly good sets of parents grow up to be horrible people. And I think we all ( most of us at least) have some trauma in our childhood, most of us don't grow up to be killers. Lots of people beaten and abused as kids don't grow up to be murdering molesters. I'm not saying those experiences can't have an effect, I'm sure they do. But I am certain that not all sickos came from broken or abusive homes.And that not all people who did come from broken or abusive homes are sickos.

I'll take a look at crimelibrary.com.
Thanks[/QUOTE]

Its not always the parenting though. I mean, in the end, it always goes back to the parents but..shit..lets say there are two families, both have a mom and a dad and two kids. Family A and Family B. The kids from both families are pals. But the kid from family B is being molested by his grandpa, lets say, and comes to the understanding that that kind of behavior is acceptable in the world and passes on this knowledge to his buddy from Family A. Where as the kid from Family B may go on to live a normal life, never having any strange impluses after the fact because maybe Kid B went to therapy later in life, Kid A might not be so lucky and may have been quite damaged by what Kid B did/showed him.
While I disagree that anyone can be *born* evil, I will say that some people are born more impressionable than others, softer, I guess you could say, and easier to mold.

Bahhhahah this could go on forever, so I'm just going to close with that. I feel that I have made my point. The end.

[QUOTE=Cosmic Castaway]Minnie, Can I call you Minnie ?

I'm not sure who this response was for, I'm anti-eye-poking myself. I want people "cured" so they don't do things like this. If you'll reread my initial post I said knowing that Couey will most likely get the death penalty, doesn't make me feel any better.

Yeah okay I'll just go sit in the corner now.[/QUOTE]

Oh damn, It wasnt to anyone in particular come to think of it.
The corners are quit interesting because that seems to be where a lot of interesting dust gypsies travel to. A wonderful choice if you ask me.

Minnie contains the same amount of letters as Minuet..so I guess its alright

i call her minny, so you can only call her minnie

[QUOTE=Cosmic Castaway]You make a good point , but ...
Did airline security change after 9-11 ? Did DUI become a crime ?
Because people suffered and died. Then enough of them finally did something about it.
I should've stayed in psych.I'd have better answers about how. None-the-less my stupid bleeding heart wants to fix fucked up people.[/QUOTE]

Well, speak for your own "stupid bleeding heart". Airline security standards DID change after the September 11, 2001, hijackings. Point? Yeah, DUI laws change all the time? Point? Are these examples of humans learning and evolving and becoming better, by making "better" laws? THAT is fucked-up thinking. If you think that when 'enough people suffer and die' that SOMEHOW this will MOTIVATE people to DO THE RIGHT THING, you are in LA-LA LAND and ought to try to STAY THERE--[I]remember, your ignorance is blissful, you said[/I].

[QUOTE]Speak for yourself pal . ;)[/QUOTE]

If you notice, "pal", I didn't quote you and wasn't speaking to you and... now that I think of it, I didn't even expect your free-month-of-June-ass to still be around to read any responses.

[I]Save the world, and you can have it[/I]. Fuck it. That's my THE END.

[QUOTE=Cosmic Castaway]I discovered it years ago , that I’m lots happier when I don’t pay attention to the news . Ignorance truly is bliss . But ignorance doesn’t stop bad things from happening . And here , this society , this mass media mega-center is controlled by and for those that thrive on negativity . A culture of rubber-neckers , who constantly revive the chronic misgivings in human nature. A social order unable to evolve past the train wreck mentality.

Why do people watch Law and Order ? This show rips its cases from the headlines and changes the names and maybe a few small details. Is it because we want to see justice done ? I don’t think so. I think we’re feeding some darker part of our psyche. I think we, as a culture, care a lot more about the crime than the punishment. We care more about who killed who, and how they did it, than what happens to the killer afterwards.

My homepage carries AP / CNN feeds, and this morning, for some fucked up reason, I decided to watch them. That fucked up reason is 9 year old Jessica Lunsford. Who was abducted by a known sex offender, was raped and kept in a closet for three days, in a house police visited but decided not to search at the time. Her hands were bound with stereo wire , she was wrapped in trash bags and buried alive. This happened in Florida but it could’ve happened anywhere.

This is news .
This is more than I want to know.
This is what I didn’t want to see but couldn’t stop myself from looking.
This makes me sick on so many levels.

I’ve never been able to understand how a person could do something like this. Sure, we’ve all thought about killing someone, our boss , that dick who cut us off in traffic, elected officials, [b]alex cassum[/b]. But there’s a built in safety mechanism in most of us, it knows right from wrong and sets off the appropriate mental bells and whistles when were about to cross the lines . My point is that we’ve all thought about doing bad things. Not abducting molesting and murdering a child, but something. What’s so different about these people, they actually can ? It makes me sick that a person could do this , could take a beautiful innocent child from her family, abuse her and kill her in this horrendous way.

I know if John Couey ends up in the general population of any Florida State correctional facility, he’ll be abused and raped and probably murdered. That’s [B]IF[/B] he manages to dodge the death penalty. But that doesn’t make me feel any better about it, because this kinda thing happens all the time. This kinda thing will happen again like a re-run of Law and Order, just in a different state, with the names changed to protect the guilty. What I want to know is what was missing from John Coueys head ? What psychological/physiological difference allowed him to do this? There’s got to be a way to isolate this difference and pluck it from those afflicted.

I question the journalists who could write this stuff down, make a report and put together video clips about this just to sell ad space or air time. I have no children of my own, I have nieces and it would be horrible enough to hear they died , but to know they were raped and buried alive would drive me plumb-fuckin-insane.
I’m wondering how seeing or reading this makes the Lunsfords feel.
I’m wondering how anyone made the grade, if we all slept through our ethics classes.
I’m wondering why journalists don’t spend more time looking for solutions instead of just peddling ad space around the problem.

I question myself that I clicked on that link thinking; maybe there will be some information there that I can use in one of my fictional stories. Which makes me a pretty shitty person too. Little different from anyone else who profits by the tragedy of others.

There are things that get in your head that you just can’t get out .
I want to forget this.
I want to empty all the shit that’s in my head fill it back up with happy.
I’m done with “news” I’m tuning out .
I’m looking to get back to zero on the karmic scoreboard.
I want to do something keeps these things from ever happening.
I want the Jessica Lunsfords to come home.[/QUOTE]
it's CASSUN, with an N.