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Died By Bear
Joined: 13 Jul 2010
Location: On the big lake they call Gitche Gumee
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 Posted: Thu Oct 03, 2013 3:19 am Post subject: American society has become much more violent |
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In the last 30-40 years, violent behavior like the recent Range Rover vs. 50 or so bikers incident, has skyrocketed. When I was a kid, this kind of stuff was unheard of. The Vietnam and protests on TV were just over like the war. We had the Love Boat and other stupid TV shows and the occasional movie like Apocalypse Now - oh, and the occasional drug bust to look forward to.
Nowadays, it's one violent act after another. The amount of violence on television and movies seems to be directly proportional to what has happened in our society. We've become numb. We've raised kids that lack emotion for some reason. I don't know. The whole escalation thing bothers me.
There seems to be a common thread in these instances of people believing they are above the law, to the point of trying to control others through intimidation and violence, because of some false belief that they are imbued with special privileges/ have special standing/ meet a criteria that allows them to violate the rights of others.
Then you've got your regular criminal element
http://abclocal.go.com/wpvi/story?section=news/local&id=9270522
That's not news, but mass shooting are.
It's incredible how far people have gone.
Is all of this Reagan's fault for closing down all the crazy houses? |
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northway
Joined: 05 Jul 2010
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| Posted: Thu Oct 03, 2013 3:56 am Post subject: |
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Camera phones and a 24 hour news cycle mean that you hear about of a lot of things you wouldn't have previously. Every meaningful statistic has violent crimes declining over the last few decades. But hey, keep shaking that fist from your porch.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crime_in_the_United_States
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| rime rates have varied over time in the United States. American crime rates generally rose after World War II, and peaked between the 1970s and early 1990s. Since the early 1990s, crime has declined in the United States,[5] and current crime rates are approximately the same as those of the 1960s.[2] |
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yodanole
Joined: 02 Mar 2003
Location: La Florida
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| Posted: Thu Oct 03, 2013 8:31 am Post subject: |
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Are you complaining or rationalizing?  |
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Ranman
Joined: 18 Aug 2012
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| Posted: Thu Oct 03, 2013 9:38 am Post subject: |
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| Mass media and 24/7 news coverage = proliferation of info. Lots of people don't know what their have been mass shootings dating all the way back to the 1910s and '20s (and yes, even at schools), but you wouldn't know that from watching CNN and Fox News. |
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Nolos
Joined: 23 Oct 2011
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| Posted: Thu Oct 03, 2013 2:42 pm Post subject: |
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| I believe the Bible correctly predicted that in the end times people would be much more violent. |
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Died By Bear
Joined: 13 Jul 2010
Location: On the big lake they call Gitche Gumee
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| Posted: Thu Oct 03, 2013 3:50 pm Post subject: |
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| I remember Colombine. I had been back from Korea about a year. I thought to myself, this isn't something that happens very often. It took awhile but the mass shootings started picking up in frequency. |
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optik404
Joined: 24 Jun 2008
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| Posted: Thu Oct 03, 2013 3:55 pm Post subject: |
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| Isn't the percentage of violent crime actually going down in the land of the free, home of the brave? |
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Fox
Joined: 04 Mar 2009
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| Posted: Thu Oct 03, 2013 3:55 pm Post subject: |
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| northway wrote: |
| Every meaningful statistic has violent crimes declining over the last few decades. |
That's because incarceration rates have skyrocketed. Yes, when you mass incarcerate the demographics most likely to commit violent crime, and then don't count most of the violent crimes they perpetrate against one another while in prison as crimes, the "violent crime rate" will decline, but that isn't because society is actually less violent. Further, the violence in America is not evenly distributed; many areas are virtually free of violence, while in others, one is taking their life into their own hands simply by going down the wrong street. Even back in my home town in Wisconsin there were places one simply could not safely go, while the same is simply untrue of my town in Korea.
Don't casually dismiss the original post. Violence is a non-trivial problem in America, and it is not a fading problem, just one we are managing to contain to some extent through highly inhumane means. Packing people into prison cells at ever-higher densities is not compassionate or reasonable. |
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northway
Joined: 05 Jul 2010
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| Posted: Thu Oct 03, 2013 4:15 pm Post subject: |
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| Fox wrote: |
| northway wrote: |
| Every meaningful statistic has violent crimes declining over the last few decades. |
That's because incarceration rates have skyrocketed. Yes, when you mass incarcerate the demographics most likely to commit violent crime, and then don't count most of the violent crimes they perpetrate against one another while in prison as crimes, the "violent crime rate" will decline, but that isn't because society is actually less violent. Further, the violence in America is not evenly distributed; many areas are virtually free of violence, while in others, one is taking their life into their own hands simply by going down the wrong street. Even back in my home town in Wisconsin there were places one simply could not safely go, while the same is simply untrue of my town in Korea.
Don't casually dismiss the original post. Violence is a non-trivial problem in America, and it is not a fading problem, just one we are managing to contain to some extent through highly inhumane means. Packing people into prison cells at ever-higher densities is not compassionate or reasonable. |
You want to discuss violence in America, I'm all ears. You want to play Get Off My Lawn, I'm a lot less receptive. To say that violence has skyrocketed in America in recent years is simply untrue. Sure, incarceration certainly plays a role. So might the presence of lead (or lack thereof). But this sky is falling mentality is the same load of crap that every generation has spouted as it aged. |
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Fox
Joined: 04 Mar 2009
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| Posted: Thu Oct 03, 2013 5:14 pm Post subject: |
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| But "Get Off My Lawn" is a great game. One simply needs to play it with sufficient panache. |
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Who's Your Daddy?
Joined: 30 May 2010
Location: Victoria, Canada.
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| Posted: Thu Oct 03, 2013 8:00 pm Post subject: |
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| Died By Bear wrote: |
| I remember Colombine. I had been back from Korea about a year. I thought to myself, this isn't something that happens very often. It took awhile but the mass shootings started picking up in frequency. |
Yeah Colombine was a freak event then. Now there's at least one a year. It seems last year there were like 3 (movie theatre, school, something else?).
I think it is the breakdown of the nuclear family, and boys growing up without fathers. |
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ontheway
Joined: 24 Aug 2005
Location: Somewhere under the rainbow...
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| Posted: Fri Oct 04, 2013 9:09 am Post subject: |
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| Actually, the incidence of violent crime has been falling in America. One of the reasons is the aging of the population. Older people commit fewer crimes. |
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northway
Joined: 05 Jul 2010
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| Posted: Fri Oct 04, 2013 9:17 am Post subject: |
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| Who's Your Daddy? wrote: |
| Died By Bear wrote: |
| I remember Colombine. I had been back from Korea about a year. I thought to myself, this isn't something that happens very often. It took awhile but the mass shootings started picking up in frequency. |
Yeah Colombine was a freak event then. Now there's at least one a year. It seems last year there were like 3 (movie theatre, school, something else?).
I think it is the breakdown of the nuclear family, and boys growing up without fathers. |
Alternative view: a 24 hour news cycle and sensationalist cable news wasn't prevalent prior to Columbine. |
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Died By Bear
Joined: 13 Jul 2010
Location: On the big lake they call Gitche Gumee
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| Posted: Fri Oct 04, 2013 11:15 pm Post subject: |
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| ontheway wrote: |
| Actually, the incidence of violent crime has been falling in America. One of the reasons is the aging of the population. Older people commit fewer crimes. |
You're probably right. Forget everything I said.  |
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Julius
Joined: 27 Jul 2006
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| Posted: Sat Oct 05, 2013 5:21 pm Post subject: Re: American society has become much more violent |
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| Died By Bear wrote: |
Forget everything I said. |
Not at all.
You highlighted some important facts, as below.
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The amount of violence on television and movies seems to be directly proportional to what has happened in our society. We've become numb. We've raised kids that lack emotion for some reason. I don't know. The whole escalation thing bothers me.
There seems to be a common thread in these instances of people believing they are above the law, to the point of trying to control others through intimidation and violence, because of some false belief that they are imbued with special privileges/ have special standing/ meet a criteria that allows them to violate the rights of others. |
Your impressions are correct, andf there is plenty of research data to support you.
It doesn't take a genius to know that the way we raise kids, and our values, have changed considerably compared to how they were 70 years ago.
We've had decades of of teaching kids that they are the centre of the universe, that their "self-esteem" is all that matters and that violence is glamorous. We are much more about "rights" than "responsibilities". I agree that things were too repressed back in eg the 1940's and 50's, but the "me" generation swung too far in the opposite direction. |
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