Focus on beauty and try not to associate the blood red color with the bloody mess we live with.
Fed up with the violence and fed up with the stupidity of people's knee jerk reactions.
No words, not yet.
SUENOSDEUOMI'S RUMINATIONS AND PERSPECTIVE
Showing posts with label Violence. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Violence. Show all posts
A Plea For Patience
Gotta love the climate of our Land of Enchantment. With recent temperatures down to 13 degrees at night and welcome snow (moisture much needed in our arid high desert mountains) above 8,000 feet, my door and window have been wide open all day, while we still have had no need to turn on the heat. I was getting too hot just now, sitting in my sweater outside in the sun sipping my coffee and consoling myself with an Eclaire, just about the cheapest ($1.50) treat available at Whole Foods.
After an exchange with a woman about my age, at the park, while walking my dogs, I ended up walking away from her, heading as fast as possible toward Whole Foods, yes, for consolation. The woman, dressed in drab, olive green, I assume Navy Surplus army fatigues with a matching Fidel Castro type cap was nice enough to offer my pups the last bit of her tuna tortilla. We got to talking about the election results and the woman once again, we had met and talked a few times before, started to espouse her radical ideas she must have formed due to having grown up in the deep south and then having gotten radicalized in the sixties. While I suppose that she is right in that the patriarchy is at it's most dangerous, like an abusive husband, at the very time that they realize their loss of power and dominion over another - violence can never ever be the answer! Like a Jungian animus dominated, crazed woman she spouted slogans and labels in the service of advocating a violent rebellion. This woman was though not crazy, spoke coherently with eyes bright and shiny and plenty of passion. I will never stand for violence. I told her so and walked away as I wished her well.
It bothers me this talk of violence, this acceptance by some, too many, especially Christians approving of warfare (government sanctioned violence) or from within the Occupy movement where supposedly extreme measures were warranted by extreme situations. After Gandhi liberated India through non-violent means, after a mature Nelson Mandela brought about a mainly peaceful transfer of power in South Africa, we have no right to fall back on archaic (and asinine as Vietnam Vet Ray Masterson would call it) means of resolving serious differences. The white male patriarchy will die out, they are already being replaced by a younger, more tolerant, more educated population, this is what our last election showed us clearly. Impatience for a new world, a more tolerant, a more for people - less for profit oriented world will yield nothing. Impatience has never been a sign of virtue. We have to chose the moral high ground, we have to do what is right and what is kind and keep our long term goals in sight; a better world, more just for all!
After an exchange with a woman about my age, at the park, while walking my dogs, I ended up walking away from her, heading as fast as possible toward Whole Foods, yes, for consolation. The woman, dressed in drab, olive green, I assume Navy Surplus army fatigues with a matching Fidel Castro type cap was nice enough to offer my pups the last bit of her tuna tortilla. We got to talking about the election results and the woman once again, we had met and talked a few times before, started to espouse her radical ideas she must have formed due to having grown up in the deep south and then having gotten radicalized in the sixties. While I suppose that she is right in that the patriarchy is at it's most dangerous, like an abusive husband, at the very time that they realize their loss of power and dominion over another - violence can never ever be the answer! Like a Jungian animus dominated, crazed woman she spouted slogans and labels in the service of advocating a violent rebellion. This woman was though not crazy, spoke coherently with eyes bright and shiny and plenty of passion. I will never stand for violence. I told her so and walked away as I wished her well.
It bothers me this talk of violence, this acceptance by some, too many, especially Christians approving of warfare (government sanctioned violence) or from within the Occupy movement where supposedly extreme measures were warranted by extreme situations. After Gandhi liberated India through non-violent means, after a mature Nelson Mandela brought about a mainly peaceful transfer of power in South Africa, we have no right to fall back on archaic (and asinine as Vietnam Vet Ray Masterson would call it) means of resolving serious differences. The white male patriarchy will die out, they are already being replaced by a younger, more tolerant, more educated population, this is what our last election showed us clearly. Impatience for a new world, a more tolerant, a more for people - less for profit oriented world will yield nothing. Impatience has never been a sign of virtue. We have to chose the moral high ground, we have to do what is right and what is kind and keep our long term goals in sight; a better world, more just for all!
Tucson Tragedy
In lieu of the Tuscon Tragedy, we all might do well to recommit ourselves to a civilized discourse that refrains from viciously attacking, bashing, maligning, even slandering people, real human beings, even if they espouse ideas we may disagree with.
My friends in Europe have often shaken their heads on how Americans seem to lack the ability to differentiate policies from people. They abhorred Bush era politics, policies and rhetoric, but would not confuse such in their relating to real live Americans. From where I stand Bush era rhetoric did much to accelerate a culture of violence in the last decade. We all remember the so unfortunate 'hunt-down-and-get-them-cowboy-mentality' of which Bush recently expressed a rare regret in having resorted to. Of course the US has been steeped in violence since it's very beginning with the taking of land from the red nations, the Ku Klux Klan, the shooting of the Kennedy's (check out Robert Kennedy Jr. moving essay) and King.
But I only need to look at on-line comment threads to be shocked at the mean-spiritedness of what are supposed to be discussions, but too often degenerate to uncivilized bashings. I am a 'child of the seventies.' I learned early on, still in my teens, in encounter groups, that expressing feelings is important, but attacking others is not o.k.. We learned to own our feelings and make i-statements. By and large we came from a repressed culture and learned the value of expression, not to be confused with 'acting out.' Self-expression counters the forces of self-repression and serves as a means to mine and know one's Self. We might argue for a wish of the shooter to have exercised more repression of his impulses to harm. Instead, in his isolation he acted out his rage. What we really would want is to find means of therapeutic expression and increased relatedness.
The first image of this kid (and yes, I oddly have advanced to an age where everyone under 28 years of age, or before their Saturn Return is considered by me still a kid, green behind their ears, with a brain not yet fully formed as science confirmed) struck me with his almost sweet, angelic look so familiar from the sixties or my seventies. My impressions seem confirmed in reading that Kelsy Hawkes considered her high school sweetheart Jared sweet, caring and kind, with an interest in music, not alcohol or drugs. That was 6 years ago.
Consider Jared Lee Loughner born 9/10/88, 22 years old now, was only one day in to his 13th year when 9/11 happened.
Seems that Jared was rather apolitical, not surprising anti-government and in to conspiracy theories. A touching interview with his former friend Zach Olser suggests the Zeitgeist, a documentary that claims the US allowed 9/11 to happen, left a powerful impression. Zach also mentioned his excessive use of Salvia, a natural hallucinogen that made the news only very recently and seems on the rise in use among youth. Zach's tears and obvious regret in not having been more helpful to what used to be his friend are heart breaking to watch and will likely inform this young man's future.
Jaret may not have believed in politics or our social system, may not have read the news or watched TV, but he must have been influenced by the rhetoric, heated and ugly enough to raise concerns even in the Arizona Congress woman Gabrielle Giffords, the main target of his attack, now struggling to survive his bullet that seems to have gone straight through her skull. Oddly Congress woman Gabrielle Gifford, considered a Blue Dog Democrat, resisted gun control and in her charming manner supported the US citizen's right to bear arms.
While today is a day of mourning, tomorrow we will have to reconsider some hotly defended and liberally funded policies. While guns do not shoot themselves, unhinged people given access to powerful weapons can do a whole lot more harm with then without. 14 wounded, 6 people dead, among them a precocious 9 year old girl born 9/11/01.
When one Walmart did not supply Loughner on demand, he simply got the ammunition for his weapon of choice, a semi-automatic Glock plastic pistol, from the next Walmart. The right to bear arms, I don't understand it, that desire to kill, even questionable in defense. What I do understand is that any right demands responsibility, but with an American culture obviously as immature, this scares me. In Switzerland every man owns a rifle, but resulting violence is unheard of.
When one Walmart did not supply Loughner on demand, he simply got the ammunition for his weapon of choice, a semi-automatic Glock plastic pistol, from the next Walmart. The right to bear arms, I don't understand it, that desire to kill, even questionable in defense. What I do understand is that any right demands responsibility, but with an American culture obviously as immature, this scares me. In Switzerland every man owns a rifle, but resulting violence is unheard of.
We do not exist in a vacuum, trying to connect the dots and to seek understanding should not be labeled a blame game. We live in systems and are influenced by forces all around us. To deny so and put blame simplistically on the shooter alone is psychologically immature. It is a matter of learning to understand the various forces that contributed to this tragedy and then attempting to correct course. Mental illness and health care, or the lack of such, ought to be part of the equation. We should not dismiss the impact of chart's, like Palin's, that make people and places their literal, visual targets. Palin should be shunned for defending rather then apologizing profusely in the spirit of Keith Olbermann's plea.
Today is a day of mourning. I can not adequately express my horror at this tragedy or my sympathy for the victims and their families who suffer the terrible consequences. The effect must be felt by all Americans jolted out of complacency in hopes that we as a people recognize that we are given an opportunity to reconsider and not take for granted random violence. My sympathy lies even with the kid, the perpetrator, whose days are likely numbered. No doubt they will go for the death penalty a whole other subject matter. But for now the well being of Gabrielle Gifford will be foremost in my mind. Let us hold hands symbolically and wish for nothing short but a miraculous recovery.
All images are of course from the news media.
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