CNN reports on the O. J. Simpson trial, which started today in Las Vegas. To me it seems like some of the charges are trumped up a bit, but what caught my attention was the guns.
Prosecutors say the tapes will show that the armed confrontation was planned in detail -- including the use of guns.
Simpson has told police he had no idea the people with him were armed. But former co-defendant Alexander has testified that Simpson asked him if he could get "heat" in case things went wrong.
Another former co-defendant, Michael McClinton, also said Simpson asked him to bring guns and told him his role would be to act as "security."
Of course, I'm always interested in the easy availability of the guns. I think something's wrong with that and whatever steps we need to take to remedy it, I think we need to take. But, this particular case is loaded with other fascinating elements, not the least of which is that I can't believe there's any all-white jury in the world that can be free of prejudice in the case of O.J.
What do you think? I'd love to know.
Monday, September 15, 2008
Sunday, September 14, 2008
Las Vegas, Guns and Me
Some of my time away was spent in Las Vegas where part of my family lives and where I myself had lived from 1978 to 1981. Since then I've visited fairly frequently. During this trip I noticed how often guns came up, sometimes it was just a memory or a reflection, other times it was stuff I experienced or a conversation I had.
Through the years Vegas has had its share of shootings, like any big city. The killing of the famous Rap singer named Tupac was a big one. It came up in conversation just the other day. We were stopped at a traffic light on the Las Vegas Strip and my friend said this is the place Tupac got shot. "Yeah, car pulled up, couple guys got out and blasted the shit out of his car. No one was ever arrested." My friend blamed that on the fact that the players were all black and the cops would be just as happy to let them kill each other off.
A close friend of my family, a man whom I'd met a few times, killed himself with a handgun at the shooting range. This was a few years ago. The story was that he'd met a beautiful young girl from his home country, Hungary. She cleaned him out in some kind of scam. So he went to the range. The real shocker just now was while searching for the story I came upon this and this.
I knew a girl once named Lori. She was an innocent beauty, the type that frequently gravitates to Vegas and all too often gets roughed up in the process. I watched her get in with the wrong crowd, get into coke, but in those years none of that was too shocking. After I left, I'd heard she'd gotten strung out and started turning tricks. That just made me shake my head with sadness, blaming one guy we all knew. He'd corrupted her, I felt. Then it got much worse. She was walking down the street and a stranger came up to her and shot her in the face. I knew there was more to the story than that but never heard the rest of it. I saw her on a visit the following year. Miraculously, the .22 bullet had entered the front of her temple by the end of the eyebrow and somehow did very little damage and left very little scarring. She was different though: harder, tougher.
Back in those days I knew two guys who worked in L.A., good friends of mine. They got themselves into some trouble, basically it was a misunderstanding, but their lives were threatened by some connected people. What did they do? They came over to Vegas to get guns, of course. For a couple hundred bucks they picked up an old revolver-type pistol, I guess it could be called a Saturday night special, and a six-shot pump action shotgun, the kind referred to as a riot gun. I don't remember the details of how legal these transactions were. A couple days later, back in the jungles of L.A., whenever exiting their home or place of business, the one guy would go first with the handgun at his side, finger on the trigger I suppose, and the other guy, the main target, would warily follow holding the loaded shotgun at his side in its cloth case with his finger on the safety button, ready to press it, swing the gun up, feel for the trigger and fire through the carrying case. Somehow, no one got killed or injured. Whatever happened to the weapons, you may ask? The pistol no one remembers what happened, but the shotgun was in the trunk of a car that was stolen in Miami about a year after those guys made it out of L.A. The car was recovered, but of course the shotgun was gone along with the tape deck and spare tire. I wonder what mischief that gun got up to in the subsequent years.
A few days ago my Las Vegas family was gathered for the birthday of my sister-in-law. I introduced the subject by asking if any of them had guns. They were all responding in the negative when one of them fired the question back at me. I said simply, "No, I'm against guns." Then my nephew piped up that he has a gun. I guess my brother knew it, maybe my father too, so no one seemed too surprised or concerned. The kid's 24 years old. I asked him, taking care not to be contentious about it, what he has it for, going to the shooting range or for home protection. He said both and that he's thinking about applying for the Concealed Carry Permit because his work as a locksmith sometimes takes him into bad neighborhoods at night. That was it, no one seemed particularly into the subject one way or the other. But now I'm thinking. My nephew is like a lot of young people, got a DUI a couple months ago and got away with a few others. My father, in his gruff way, says the kid's a slob and can drink scotch out of the bottle. He lives with a couple other guys in a rented house. My idea is this is not the kind of person who should have a gun at all. He's not a squared away ex-marine who knows what he's doing with weapons. He's a typical 24-year-0ld.
Once I dated a girl in Vegas who's pocketbook weighed so much that I said what have you got in there. She pulled out a huge handgun, explaining that she had been raped once and the guy is getting out of jail soon. That's just a flash memory.
Last week I came upon an advertisement for this place, which I mentioned in the comment I left the other day. It made me wonder. I can't help but think there's a connection, just like I can't help but think there's a connection with what some of the frequent commenters on this blog profess, and the problem of gun violence. I've read every comment and every link, and I've done so with an open mind. I often find the arguments compelling, but I can't help but think arming the teachers, arming ourselves, playing with guns at the shooting range, all exacerbates the problem, the problem being the guy who shot Lori with a .22, and my two L.A. friends who could so easily have hurt or killed someone, the problem being my nephew and his buddies getting drunk and doing some of the crazy stunts that a lot of young people do.
Although I find the 2nd Amendment argument and the self-protection argument valid and compelling, I have to put more weight on my own personal experience. The things I mentioned above are only the few Vegas related incidents I could recall while writing this post. There are many more. I've lived in several other places. But, there is not one single positive gun story in my experience. Maybe my old girlfriend who'd been raped got to use that gun to protect herself, but I never heard that. Maybe my nephew will end up needing that gun of his, maybe his life will depend upon it, but that hasn't happened yet.
I ask the gun proponents, how can you discount this chronicle of violence? How can you not see that the right to gun ownership, while certainly wholesome and acceptable in theory, has turned into a major problem in America? And I ask you, how is it possible that gun advocates claim to be totally free of these types of experiences? Are you downplaying the problems to win the argument?
Please let me know what you think.
Through the years Vegas has had its share of shootings, like any big city. The killing of the famous Rap singer named Tupac was a big one. It came up in conversation just the other day. We were stopped at a traffic light on the Las Vegas Strip and my friend said this is the place Tupac got shot. "Yeah, car pulled up, couple guys got out and blasted the shit out of his car. No one was ever arrested." My friend blamed that on the fact that the players were all black and the cops would be just as happy to let them kill each other off.
A close friend of my family, a man whom I'd met a few times, killed himself with a handgun at the shooting range. This was a few years ago. The story was that he'd met a beautiful young girl from his home country, Hungary. She cleaned him out in some kind of scam. So he went to the range. The real shocker just now was while searching for the story I came upon this and this.
I knew a girl once named Lori. She was an innocent beauty, the type that frequently gravitates to Vegas and all too often gets roughed up in the process. I watched her get in with the wrong crowd, get into coke, but in those years none of that was too shocking. After I left, I'd heard she'd gotten strung out and started turning tricks. That just made me shake my head with sadness, blaming one guy we all knew. He'd corrupted her, I felt. Then it got much worse. She was walking down the street and a stranger came up to her and shot her in the face. I knew there was more to the story than that but never heard the rest of it. I saw her on a visit the following year. Miraculously, the .22 bullet had entered the front of her temple by the end of the eyebrow and somehow did very little damage and left very little scarring. She was different though: harder, tougher.
Back in those days I knew two guys who worked in L.A., good friends of mine. They got themselves into some trouble, basically it was a misunderstanding, but their lives were threatened by some connected people. What did they do? They came over to Vegas to get guns, of course. For a couple hundred bucks they picked up an old revolver-type pistol, I guess it could be called a Saturday night special, and a six-shot pump action shotgun, the kind referred to as a riot gun. I don't remember the details of how legal these transactions were. A couple days later, back in the jungles of L.A., whenever exiting their home or place of business, the one guy would go first with the handgun at his side, finger on the trigger I suppose, and the other guy, the main target, would warily follow holding the loaded shotgun at his side in its cloth case with his finger on the safety button, ready to press it, swing the gun up, feel for the trigger and fire through the carrying case. Somehow, no one got killed or injured. Whatever happened to the weapons, you may ask? The pistol no one remembers what happened, but the shotgun was in the trunk of a car that was stolen in Miami about a year after those guys made it out of L.A. The car was recovered, but of course the shotgun was gone along with the tape deck and spare tire. I wonder what mischief that gun got up to in the subsequent years.
A few days ago my Las Vegas family was gathered for the birthday of my sister-in-law. I introduced the subject by asking if any of them had guns. They were all responding in the negative when one of them fired the question back at me. I said simply, "No, I'm against guns." Then my nephew piped up that he has a gun. I guess my brother knew it, maybe my father too, so no one seemed too surprised or concerned. The kid's 24 years old. I asked him, taking care not to be contentious about it, what he has it for, going to the shooting range or for home protection. He said both and that he's thinking about applying for the Concealed Carry Permit because his work as a locksmith sometimes takes him into bad neighborhoods at night. That was it, no one seemed particularly into the subject one way or the other. But now I'm thinking. My nephew is like a lot of young people, got a DUI a couple months ago and got away with a few others. My father, in his gruff way, says the kid's a slob and can drink scotch out of the bottle. He lives with a couple other guys in a rented house. My idea is this is not the kind of person who should have a gun at all. He's not a squared away ex-marine who knows what he's doing with weapons. He's a typical 24-year-0ld.
Once I dated a girl in Vegas who's pocketbook weighed so much that I said what have you got in there. She pulled out a huge handgun, explaining that she had been raped once and the guy is getting out of jail soon. That's just a flash memory.
Last week I came upon an advertisement for this place, which I mentioned in the comment I left the other day. It made me wonder. I can't help but think there's a connection, just like I can't help but think there's a connection with what some of the frequent commenters on this blog profess, and the problem of gun violence. I've read every comment and every link, and I've done so with an open mind. I often find the arguments compelling, but I can't help but think arming the teachers, arming ourselves, playing with guns at the shooting range, all exacerbates the problem, the problem being the guy who shot Lori with a .22, and my two L.A. friends who could so easily have hurt or killed someone, the problem being my nephew and his buddies getting drunk and doing some of the crazy stunts that a lot of young people do.
Although I find the 2nd Amendment argument and the self-protection argument valid and compelling, I have to put more weight on my own personal experience. The things I mentioned above are only the few Vegas related incidents I could recall while writing this post. There are many more. I've lived in several other places. But, there is not one single positive gun story in my experience. Maybe my old girlfriend who'd been raped got to use that gun to protect herself, but I never heard that. Maybe my nephew will end up needing that gun of his, maybe his life will depend upon it, but that hasn't happened yet.
I ask the gun proponents, how can you discount this chronicle of violence? How can you not see that the right to gun ownership, while certainly wholesome and acceptable in theory, has turned into a major problem in America? And I ask you, how is it possible that gun advocates claim to be totally free of these types of experiences? Are you downplaying the problems to win the argument?
Please let me know what you think.
Friday, September 5, 2008
Blog Hiatus - One Week
I'm going away tomorrow on family business which will take me to Los Angeles and Las Vegas. It's not that I don't expect to find a good internet connection there, that's a joke because what we have to put up with here in Italy is awful, it's just that I expect to be busy with family and friends.
Please feel free to keep the commenting going on the other threads. God knows, we've certianly not exhausted them yet.
I leave you with this:
Please feel free to keep the commenting going on the other threads. God knows, we've certianly not exhausted them yet.
I leave you with this:
Condemned Man's Trial was Tainted
The New York Times reports on an interesting legal battle going on in Texas. A convicted murderer, Charles D. Hood, 39, is scheduled to be executed on Wednesday for the murder and robbery in 1989 of a couple he lived with in Plano, just north of Dallas. So far nothing out of the ordinary; sounds like business as usual for Texas.
The problem is that long-standing rumors have been circulating that the judge, Verla Sue Holland, and the Collin County district attorney at the time, Thomas S. O’Connell Jr., were having an affair during the 1990 trial. Blocked by a solid wall of silence, Greg Wiercioch, one of Mr. Hood’s lawyers finally got a break this year.
In June, Mr. Hood’s lawyers got a sworn affidavit from a former assistant district attorney, Matthew Goeller, who said the romantic relationship “was common knowledge in the district attorney’s office, and the Collin County bar, in general,” at the time of the trial. Mr. Goeller said the affair was going on when he came to the office in 1987 and continued through 1993.
Naturally motions were put forth earlier in the summer, but with time running out any obstacle could be disastrous.
That motion landed in the courtroom of Judge Robert T. Dry, who last week set a hearing date for two days after the scheduled execution, remarking, “In reality, you are exploring a civil lawsuit for the estate of Mr. Hood.” Judge Dry also acknowledged that he knew Judge Holland and Mr. O’Connell well. “It is likely that every local judge knows them,” he wrote.
On Wednesday, Judge Dry suddenly recused himself, saying he had also been close friends and business partners with Judge Holland’s former husband, Earl Holland, who is now dead.
The upshot is this:
On Wednesday, 22 prominent former judges and prosecutors — among them the former F.B.I. director William S. Sessions — urged Gov. Rick Perry to put off the execution to allow more time for a hearing to determine if the claim of an affair is true.
It makes me wonder why is it so difficult to play by the rules? If we tell people don't go around killing each other, then turn around and kill them with lethal injection, I say something's wrong. If we demand that the citizens adhere to certain norms, but the judges and prosecutors do whatever they want, I say something's wrong. And what is this wall of silence? Isn't that kind of covering up illegal? We're talking not only about people's lives, but about the reputation of the great state of Texas. Judge Dry recusing himself at the eleventh hour, the presiding judge and prosecutor carrying on during the trial, these are shabby behaviors which we cannot afford. I understand capital punishment is legal, but it has to be administered in as clean and upright a manner as possible. Otherwise we take an already barbaric practice and turn it into a true travesty of justice.
What's your opinion?
The problem is that long-standing rumors have been circulating that the judge, Verla Sue Holland, and the Collin County district attorney at the time, Thomas S. O’Connell Jr., were having an affair during the 1990 trial. Blocked by a solid wall of silence, Greg Wiercioch, one of Mr. Hood’s lawyers finally got a break this year.
In June, Mr. Hood’s lawyers got a sworn affidavit from a former assistant district attorney, Matthew Goeller, who said the romantic relationship “was common knowledge in the district attorney’s office, and the Collin County bar, in general,” at the time of the trial. Mr. Goeller said the affair was going on when he came to the office in 1987 and continued through 1993.
Naturally motions were put forth earlier in the summer, but with time running out any obstacle could be disastrous.
That motion landed in the courtroom of Judge Robert T. Dry, who last week set a hearing date for two days after the scheduled execution, remarking, “In reality, you are exploring a civil lawsuit for the estate of Mr. Hood.” Judge Dry also acknowledged that he knew Judge Holland and Mr. O’Connell well. “It is likely that every local judge knows them,” he wrote.
On Wednesday, Judge Dry suddenly recused himself, saying he had also been close friends and business partners with Judge Holland’s former husband, Earl Holland, who is now dead.
The upshot is this:
On Wednesday, 22 prominent former judges and prosecutors — among them the former F.B.I. director William S. Sessions — urged Gov. Rick Perry to put off the execution to allow more time for a hearing to determine if the claim of an affair is true.
It makes me wonder why is it so difficult to play by the rules? If we tell people don't go around killing each other, then turn around and kill them with lethal injection, I say something's wrong. If we demand that the citizens adhere to certain norms, but the judges and prosecutors do whatever they want, I say something's wrong. And what is this wall of silence? Isn't that kind of covering up illegal? We're talking not only about people's lives, but about the reputation of the great state of Texas. Judge Dry recusing himself at the eleventh hour, the presiding judge and prosecutor carrying on during the trial, these are shabby behaviors which we cannot afford. I understand capital punishment is legal, but it has to be administered in as clean and upright a manner as possible. Otherwise we take an already barbaric practice and turn it into a true travesty of justice.
What's your opinion?
Thursday, September 4, 2008
McCain/Palin Would Remove Abortion Rights for Women
Over at Hullabaloo, Tristero has posted an article entitled "Teen Marriages," which cites the New York Times at some length. Their point is that teen marriages don't fare very well statistically. The chances of ending in divorce, and often very quickly, are much higher for teenagers than for older folks who get married. I don't think we needed the NY Times to tell us that. It sounds like common sense to me.
The real problem as Tristero explains it is if the Republicans have their way and Roe is overturned, it's the poor and underprivileged who will suffer.
Wealthy, well-connected families will always have access to safe reproductive choices including accurate information, effective contraception, and several abortion choices. If McCain is elected, the poor and lower middle class will not.
Wealthy, well-connected families will always have ways to support a child who becomes pregnant and chooses to take the pregnancy the term. The poor and lower middle class often do not. A vote to continue the repellent ideology of Bushism, a vote cast for McCain to extend the hateful policies of the current administration is a vote to repeal Roe and eviscerate necessary social services. A vote for McCain is a vote to continue the class war against the poor and blue collar workers.
Now, I'm certainly no one to argue with Tristero, who is one of the experts I go to for information and analysis. But, although I always find this argument compelling, I don't think it's the best reason. The fact that lower and middle class women will suffer while the upper class will not, many of whom are among the McCain/Palin and Christian Right throngs, is not the primary reason to safeguard women's rights to reproductive services. The primary reason is because it's a basic human right. If women are free citizens of the Republic, with all the attendant rights and privileges, then no one should tell them what they can or cannot do with their own bodies, not a husband, a father, a minister or certainly not the State.
This argument is not unlike the one we often have about capital punishment. It is discriminatory. A disproportionate number of blacks and poor are put to death. But that's not the reason to abolish it. The reason to abolish it is because it's morally unacceptable in a civilized society to do state sanctioned killings.
I'm pro-choice for women and anti-capital punishment for everyone.
What about you? What do you think?
The real problem as Tristero explains it is if the Republicans have their way and Roe is overturned, it's the poor and underprivileged who will suffer.
Wealthy, well-connected families will always have access to safe reproductive choices including accurate information, effective contraception, and several abortion choices. If McCain is elected, the poor and lower middle class will not.
Wealthy, well-connected families will always have ways to support a child who becomes pregnant and chooses to take the pregnancy the term. The poor and lower middle class often do not. A vote to continue the repellent ideology of Bushism, a vote cast for McCain to extend the hateful policies of the current administration is a vote to repeal Roe and eviscerate necessary social services. A vote for McCain is a vote to continue the class war against the poor and blue collar workers.
Now, I'm certainly no one to argue with Tristero, who is one of the experts I go to for information and analysis. But, although I always find this argument compelling, I don't think it's the best reason. The fact that lower and middle class women will suffer while the upper class will not, many of whom are among the McCain/Palin and Christian Right throngs, is not the primary reason to safeguard women's rights to reproductive services. The primary reason is because it's a basic human right. If women are free citizens of the Republic, with all the attendant rights and privileges, then no one should tell them what they can or cannot do with their own bodies, not a husband, a father, a minister or certainly not the State.
This argument is not unlike the one we often have about capital punishment. It is discriminatory. A disproportionate number of blacks and poor are put to death. But that's not the reason to abolish it. The reason to abolish it is because it's morally unacceptable in a civilized society to do state sanctioned killings.
I'm pro-choice for women and anti-capital punishment for everyone.
What about you? What do you think?
Woman who Microwaved her Baby Spared the Death Penalty
CNN reports on China Arnold, the Ohio woman convicted of having microwaved her infant baby to death. The jury could not reach a unanimous decision concerning the punishment phase.
After about five hours of deliberation, the jury told Montgomery County Common Pleas Judge Mary Wiseman that it couldn't decide whether to recommend the death penalty or life in prison, and that it wouldn't be able to make such a decision even if it deliberated through Thursday.
Wiseman is now limited to sentencing Arnold to life in prison without parole, life without parole for at least 30 years, or life without parole for at least 25 years. She plans to impose her sentence Monday.
The defense attorney, Jon Paul Rion is still protesting China's innocence. He says that his client had never been in trouble before and that it's ridiculous to charge her with a crime such as this. I don't think however, that questions like this could have influenced the jury's decision to not recommend the death penalty. Since China was convicted, they must have considered other factors. What could they have been? Perhaps there were lingering questions about her soundness of mind. Supposedly she was drunk at the time of the tragedy. Are these mitigating circumstances? Perhaps, in spite of the prosecution's efforts to select jury members capable of recommending capital punishment, some of them had doubts about it.
What do you think?
After about five hours of deliberation, the jury told Montgomery County Common Pleas Judge Mary Wiseman that it couldn't decide whether to recommend the death penalty or life in prison, and that it wouldn't be able to make such a decision even if it deliberated through Thursday.
Wiseman is now limited to sentencing Arnold to life in prison without parole, life without parole for at least 30 years, or life without parole for at least 25 years. She plans to impose her sentence Monday.
The defense attorney, Jon Paul Rion is still protesting China's innocence. He says that his client had never been in trouble before and that it's ridiculous to charge her with a crime such as this. I don't think however, that questions like this could have influenced the jury's decision to not recommend the death penalty. Since China was convicted, they must have considered other factors. What could they have been? Perhaps there were lingering questions about her soundness of mind. Supposedly she was drunk at the time of the tragedy. Are these mitigating circumstances? Perhaps, in spite of the prosecution's efforts to select jury members capable of recommending capital punishment, some of them had doubts about it.
What do you think?
Wednesday, September 3, 2008
A Wonderful Story by Dick Cavett About Fighting
The New York Times published a beautiful story by Dick Cavett. I'm not quite as old as Dick, nor quite as young as some of our frequent commenters, but the story really brought me back.
What passed as a fight in those days, even among the big guys, bore no resemblance to a fight now. There were no knives, chains, brass knuckles, blackjacks, saps, clubs . . . none of the current props employed in performing what was once termed, among gentlemen, “fisticuffs.”
And there were no guns. Guns were things you knew from the movies, unless dad was a hunter. I didn’t know anyone who’d ever seen a handgun except on police. In that innocent time, could you even imagine a day when you could get shot dead in a dispute over a parking place?
Comment number 107 by a man named Beer Belly Buddah, really got me thinking.
The situation we find ourselves in now, wanting to arm the teachers, wanting to go around armed ourselves, wanting, I suppose, to be prepared for violence, may have had its genesis in the days described by Mr. Cavett and Mr. Buddah. Back then, and perhaps it even predates the 40s and 50s and 60s, boys were taught to fight back, to defend themselves against bullies. We even heard it from Joe Biden the other night at the Democratic National Convention when he proudly thanked his mother for teaching him these manly lessons.
One thing I'm wondering is where are all these bullies coming from? Are they not a product of these very same lessons? I can understand that our dads taught us to fight back and we taught our sons the same thing, but who are we doing all this fighting against? And when does it end?
Another thing I'm wondering is why has the violence level escalated so much. Dick Cavett said there's "no resemblance." In some of our other discussions we've said that there's no such thing as turning the world safe again because it never was safe. But, we've also said that when some of us were young, like Cavett and Buddah, things were a lot different. Why is that? Did it start back in those simpler days in the school yards of America where boys were taught, "be a man?" I think maybe it did.
I say we teach a different lesson to our kids: violence is not the answer. At best it'll work in the immediate short-range, but over time it begets only more and greater violence. I say, we've got to teach our boy children a different definition of manhood. A man is one who can get along with his neighbors as well as his family members. We teach this first by example. I believe if we teach our boys that it's normal and healthy to be afraid in certain situations we can then teach them that they need not be paralyzed by that fear, that when necessary they can fight back, but only as a last resort. Once those lessons have been grooved, we can say with Mr. Buddha:
The only answer I have ever been able to offer is let no man bully you — but balance your response to the threat at hand.
We'd like to hear your opinion. Feel free to leave a comment.
What passed as a fight in those days, even among the big guys, bore no resemblance to a fight now. There were no knives, chains, brass knuckles, blackjacks, saps, clubs . . . none of the current props employed in performing what was once termed, among gentlemen, “fisticuffs.”
And there were no guns. Guns were things you knew from the movies, unless dad was a hunter. I didn’t know anyone who’d ever seen a handgun except on police. In that innocent time, could you even imagine a day when you could get shot dead in a dispute over a parking place?
Comment number 107 by a man named Beer Belly Buddah, really got me thinking.
The situation we find ourselves in now, wanting to arm the teachers, wanting to go around armed ourselves, wanting, I suppose, to be prepared for violence, may have had its genesis in the days described by Mr. Cavett and Mr. Buddah. Back then, and perhaps it even predates the 40s and 50s and 60s, boys were taught to fight back, to defend themselves against bullies. We even heard it from Joe Biden the other night at the Democratic National Convention when he proudly thanked his mother for teaching him these manly lessons.
One thing I'm wondering is where are all these bullies coming from? Are they not a product of these very same lessons? I can understand that our dads taught us to fight back and we taught our sons the same thing, but who are we doing all this fighting against? And when does it end?
Another thing I'm wondering is why has the violence level escalated so much. Dick Cavett said there's "no resemblance." In some of our other discussions we've said that there's no such thing as turning the world safe again because it never was safe. But, we've also said that when some of us were young, like Cavett and Buddah, things were a lot different. Why is that? Did it start back in those simpler days in the school yards of America where boys were taught, "be a man?" I think maybe it did.
I say we teach a different lesson to our kids: violence is not the answer. At best it'll work in the immediate short-range, but over time it begets only more and greater violence. I say, we've got to teach our boy children a different definition of manhood. A man is one who can get along with his neighbors as well as his family members. We teach this first by example. I believe if we teach our boys that it's normal and healthy to be afraid in certain situations we can then teach them that they need not be paralyzed by that fear, that when necessary they can fight back, but only as a last resort. Once those lessons have been grooved, we can say with Mr. Buddha:
The only answer I have ever been able to offer is let no man bully you — but balance your response to the threat at hand.
We'd like to hear your opinion. Feel free to leave a comment.
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