Guns, Girls, And WoW

Is this a joke? We're all capable of hurting our fellow brothers and sisters.

While that is true, I don't think it fits into this context.

Bloodrose is mostly talking about whether we hurt due to pride or other outside factors. Hurting people because of hurting them is a whole different issue.

Some people are sensitive about inflicting pain or suffering on others. They are also frequently victimized because of their disinclination to fight back.

They are likely physical capable of inflicting physical or psychological pain on others to some degree. But are loathe to do so because of the pain it inflicts upon them in turn.

Frankly if more people felt like this, the world would probably be a better place.

I'm not. And I'm not the only one of course. It's an insurmountable mental block that prevents me from doing so. I mean maybe with therapy you could overcome it, but I don't see why I'd want that.
Even just slapping someone for me is imposible, most I can do is pushing them and go away from the scene before I break down.

"I was hurt, therefore I should hurt others"

In the context that King pointed out for me, is that people (such as Sehachan) are quite loathe to cause harm willingly to another, be it physical or mental, even if it means defending themselves.

Also, in regards to pride, tossing it aside and begging the aggressor to stop, is a defensive mechanism that some employ, so it falls under what I said about pride.

Anyways, very few people even know the word empathy, and just as few, can grasp the concept, when the only word they can associate, is sympathy. Something most victims are actually against. Since Sympathy is viewed as the quickest way to distance yourself from the actual problem, and hence move around it, without actually dealing with it.

Harm comes in more forms than physical. If you've ever dated someone, you've likely hurt them at some point.

We kinda mean willingly here. I mean I've happened to turn quickly in my chair and accidentally smash my elbow in a poor guy's balls, but that's not the point.

I remember that incident, and so do my balls!

I'll be damned! I agree with Nausi. This is actually a good example too.

Whether intentional or not, it's cyclical among humans. The thought that every case is unique to a specific individual is a rejection of everyone inflicting pain and everyone taking doses of pain in one way or another.

I agree with Ono, it's also a part of growing up. Whether an individual takes it as a learning experience is up to the individual. Something something...What do you do when you fall off a horse?

What about me?

Don't you agree with me on anything?

Pain itself is unavoidable. But that isn't the argument.

It's also been clarified that within the context, some people, regardless of physical ability, can not willingly hurt another, even if it means taking physical and mental abuse to prevent from intentionally causing harm by any means.

I won't say that Nausi is wrong in his point, because he isn't.

Pain and hurt can also be used to teach us. Such as getting back up from falling off that horse, or giving up on a challenge we don't think we can overcome, and moving onto the next challenge.

Both can be positive things.

I exist in a weird place.

I was an outcast, but no one bullied me. One idiot tried to pick a fight with me at a party in freshman year but quickly backed down when he saw the way I move.

Actually, I scare a lot of people with how I move. I walk like a predatory cat and it sets off alarm bells all the time. In reality, it's a side-effect of being a ballet dancer who refuses to let that fact diminish his masculinity.

Anyhow, the odd thing for me was that the times people tried to bully me in high school, they were told in no uncertain terms to back off by several of the larger football players. No one ever said or did anything to me and I only found out about the failed attempts well after the fact.

As in everything else, I basically walked my own path and was left to do so, for good or ill. I was utterly miserable (in part because of certain important bits of self-knowledge that I really ought to have been given) and almost longed for someone to start ***just so I'd have a chance to bloody my knuckles, but it never escalated past that.

And eventually I got over it; notably, I got over it basically immediately after getting the hell out of high school. The summer after high school, I worked in a local restaurant, got hit on by a couple college guys including a co-worker, returned the favor, and made the most of moving to a new city where no one knew me when I turned 18. Middle school sucks for everyone, high school sucks for most, but the people to really pity are the ones who will never have a better day than the ones they had aged 17 and still locked in school. If that's where your peak is, then a random spree of violence makes a little sense.

As for causing pain... life is pain. It's not 100% non-stop unendurable agony, but getting a good workout leaves your muscles tired, getting laid has the same effect (unless you're a two-pump chump, I guess), and meanwhile your girlfriend dumps you, your dog dies, your mom gets breast cancer. Most of us, to greater or lesser extents, figure out how to cope with the vicissitudes of life. I won't say every coping mechanism is good or undestructive (how many people drink and how many can provide a compelling reason for doing so...?), but as a species we habitually try to limit the damage. Sociopaths and other deviants try to spread it and they're the ones who need to be shunned or rehabilitated.

And in late breaking news....

Joni Ernst: UCSB Shooting Was An 'Unfortunate Accident' - The Huffington Post

It is from The Huffington Post, but she did say it.

On first read I thought the horrific accident might of have been the timing of a campaign add showing her at a firing range released the day before the massacre, but she makes it plain she is referring to the massacre itself.

If anyone could possibly be too delusional for the senate, I think its her. Too delusional to own guns too.

How many hallucinogens would I have to ingest to achieve the requisite level of political correctness that would enable me to refer to a deliberate act of randomized murder as an "accident," quite regardless of the audaciously insincere "unfortunate" modifier?

Oh Huff Post how I love using them for all my news and opinions.

Al-Jazeera links from here on out then. Or maybe BBC.

I only see like five articles about feminism on Huff I'm disappointed.

If you really want to hate men head over to: http://www.jezebel.com/

Usually break something.

The correct answer was never be Superman again.

But everyone doesn't go through the exact same thing. Those teenagers who fit closest to our cultural ideals don't usually experience the same degree of bullying. Some teenagers do have it worse than others.

True, I can't relate to bullying much myself. I was picked on some, being bi-racial AA in a town that was 97% white and less than 1% black, but when I got older and larger, it wasn't much of an issue. Most of my teenage pain revolved around a poor home life, but I was popular and had a blast through the last years of high school and into college. Looking back on it, most of the teens who bullied those weaker, uglier, or not in the right crowd had their own insecurities that they were compensating for, or they were just plain vapid, moronic wastes of flesh.

It's not bitching to point out that we can do better as a society to be inclusive of everyone. I agree that some people need to grow a pair, and after reading Elliot Rodger's manifesto I'd probably have put him in that category, a bit. Yes, some of the moves that society has made to prop kids' self esteem are ludicrous. For instance, my sons play kids baseball. They don't keep score so that no one feels bad when they lose! But there's a level of bullying that is just hateful, and harmful to teen development. This is what I'd like to see addressed, in an intelligent way, not with knee-jerk policies that do more harm than good.

Ha!

What is I said is exactly the opposite- that it doesn't make sense, because you get older and outgrow most of the bullying. Why go on a killing spree when you have your whole life to enjoy? It doesn't make sense. So how do we get this through to teenagers who are traumatized, who feel trapped, and who are maybe mentally-ill? Rodgers' psychiatrist and his parents didn't do a good job at this. Same with Adam Lanza. The system failed these young men.

Just watched a video about a chick talking about the incident, and I'm just honestly impressed that the phrase "rape culture" wasn't used, even though it was heavily implied otherwise.

You know that men are the source of all violence. It is a given. A world full of women would be sunshine and rainbows.

Apologies, I paraphrased poorly by adding in an implication you did not state.

Nonetheless, I find your point weak. Everyone who makes it through to adulthood managed to survive the ravages of puberty and the miseries of other adolescents. It's not being a teenager that is at fault here, any more than it is Asperger's syndrome. Both Rodgers and Lanza were apparently diagnosed, so they knew they were different. For the majority of aspies out there, that knowledge is freeing and it is lack of that knowledge which tends to make us deeply uncomfortable.

If someone knows they socialize differently but still opts to resort to capital murder, the system (whatever that means) cannot be said to have failed. Psychology experts examined Lanza and Rodgers and offered sound assessments. In Lanza's case, it appears his mother enabled his sociopathy. In Rodgers's case, my personal assessment is still out on the culpability of the parents, but they actually contacted the police not long before this incident, so I'm disinclined to lay a lot at their feet.

No one could reasonably predict what these two men did because what they did was not reasonable. Insane people like these two are notably adept actors when it comes to fooling people, too. If a mental serial killer alarm went off in normal people's heads every time one of them walked past, we'd never have mass murders. And it's not as though people don't instinctively pick up on other negative qualities (there's been a lot of research done into perception of trust and honesty and it has had some remarkably consistent results between gut feeling about someone and the actual behavior of the person in question).

Sometimes awful things happen and no amount of hindsighting is going to find a good reason. It doesn't really do much good to attach superficial explanations. At least, it does no good for me, since I don't personally get any solace out of having something to blame. I am, admittedly, an unusual person, so this may be symptomatic of that.

If we really want to talk about possible hindsight assessments, though, both Lanza and Rodgers were fans of first-person shooter games. And play-acting violence only increases violent tendencies (those pop psychologists who told patients to punch a pillow or something eventually found that their patients grew steadily more violent as they unleashed their outbursts). I think it's ridiculous to "blame" video games, but at what point do realistic hunter-killer murder games become culturally worrisome enough? I've had to explain to several people down the years that when I say I play online games, I mean that I'm bloodlessly killing dragons since the popular perception is that I'm talking about Call of Duty or Halo.

The media couldn't have a "story" if it wasn't guns, misogyny or some other buzzword to focus on. If they just came out and said "the guy is crazy as hell" that would end the story.

Jezebel and other feminists sites are having a field day with the tragedy to promote their cause. So I guess they are making money and supporting their cause. So good for them.

Too many girls turn you down Fone? Is that why you hate them so much because none of them will play with your peep? /comfort

You must be new here.

That new avatar is so sharp and edgy I cut myself on it trying to read the text.

Eh most avatars on here suck anyways.