scottyrocks
I'll Lock Up
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- 9,178
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- Isle of Langerhan, NY
Yep, those are now the standard. The splintery white pine that enhanced the flavor of the ice cream is as extinct as baseball players' pictures under the lids.
Ice cream tastes best off a wooden spoon.
I think a lot of the aggressiveness is fueled by media overload. Humans walk the earth today overwhelmed by a constant grinding din of information coming at them from every angle -- yes, sure, this has been lamented in the past, but any reasonable observer would have to agree that it has never been as incessant and as aggressive as it is today.
Watch a little child when they're in a place where there's too much going on, too much to see, too much to hear, too much to feel -- they panic, they scream, they get aggressive. That little child is inside every one of us, no matter how old we are, in some back part of the mind, and the constant screaming media noise coming at us from every direction has that inner child in a state of confused panic. And it comes thru, very easily, to the surface. We rationalize it because we labor under the fantasy that we're "rational beings" whose minds are fully controlled and governed by rational thought, but all the denial in the world doesn't change the reality. We're living and functioning in a state of near-constant sensory overload, and it's hurting us. We become aggressive because it's an instinctive effort to fight back against a media barrage that we're not mentally capable of processing. Show a lot of senseless flashing lights and make a lot of loud noises around a chimp, and that chimp will try to tear your face off. We, modern humanity, are now that chimp.
Those screaming hacks on cable TV are not your friends, and they don't have your best interests at heart. Every word out of their mouths was bought and paid for. Turn them off and keep them off. Quit social media. Turn off your phone unless you're actually using it for a legitimate need. Ignore the Boys. Don't swallow the hype. You don't need a constant stream of "information" to survive. You can get all the information you "need" by sitting down at lunch or at the end of the day and reading a daily paper -- relaxed and on your own terms, with no constant demand that you "react" to what you're reading.
I think a lot of the aggressiveness is fueled by media overload. Humans walk the earth today overwhelmed by a constant grinding din of information coming at them from every angle --
You can get all the information you "need" by sitting down at lunch or at the end of the day and reading a daily paper -- relaxed and on your own terms, with no constant demand that you "react" to what you're reading.
I agree, I think this entire thread skirted very closely to the boundaries right from its inception.I think this thread needs to die now, just like the high speed internet apparently has outside of major metropolitan areas as experienced by the poor chap above. My commiserations, M Brown. Even my cellphone can do better than those data rates
I’ll focus this post on London, where I live, although my argument might apply to some extent in other parts of the UK and the US. I think that identity politics along with the ideology and policy goal of ‘diversity’ are fuelling intolerance.
-First, because the focus is on our differences rather than our shared values and goals as citizens.
- Secondly, because the strident assertion of group rights (as opposed to individual freedom and civic responsibility) is used to shut down discussion and impose a uniform view: in Orwellian terms ‘Diversity is Conformity’!
- Third, because hierarchies of victimhood are created with self-appointed activists/community leaders competing for victim status for ‘their’ group and therefore refusing to show empathy towards anyone else.
-Fourth, because the population is increasingly Balkanised along lines of gender, ethnicity, religion, sexuality etc. and so there is actually less rather than more contact or dialogue between people with different characteristics or beliefs.
-Fifth, those who feel excluded by what we could call the 'diversity-industrial complex' are likely to become resentful and are good cannon-fodder for populist backlash movements.
Bartender Edit: very specific political content deleted.
This thread is already sailing very close to thew wind as regards house rules. Let's avoid having to shut it down entirely, please.