OK, I've got a question on which I'd like some feedback from all of you, concerning violence in our society.

I believe that the United States is an ultra-violent society. Our homicide rates are many times higher than those of other industrialized nations and we witness lots of senseless murders, school shootings, and crimes that quite often, are the result of lack of respect for life. (as in the life of others) I first came to this thought a while back when I was flipping thru some channels on cable TV. The first channel was showing a Bruce Willis Die Hard movie where he was "shooting up" lots of bad guys. Turn the channel, its Steven Segal, shooting up a lot of bad guys (and of course, the good guys are somehow immune to 20 bad guys with machine guns all shooting back). Turn the channel once more and it was Schwarzenager in one of his many movies where, once again, lots of people get their necks snapped, heads ripped off, or filled with bullets. I was appalled at the level of violence that garners absolutely no notice--being televised in the middle of the day for any person, of any age, to see.

Then I started to think about other forms of media in the US. Movies, for one, are also filled with violence. Just this summer we saw the most violent Star Wars of the series, humans being gutted and vaporized in War of the Worlds, creatures in the Cave, and assasins in Red Eye. Follow that up with video games. The #1 video game that was in the headlines recently was "Grand Theft Auto". It obviously deals with crime, guns, gangs, and violence. It came into a bru-ha-ha with Congress, not because its filled with illegal or violent situations, but because there was hidden sexual content. (I'll get back to that topic in a moment)

So the other night I was checking out a new Fox show called "Prison Break". In one scene a fight breaks out in prison. One guys has his neck slit and another gets stabbed in the chest multiple times with a large bolt causing him to bleed to death. I was a bit surprised that it wasn't just implied violence or that the scene quickly cut away, they aired the entire scene. (Once again, I thought about how so many of the top shows in the US are filled with violent situations--CSI, Cold Case, Law & Order series, etc.) So after seeing the Prison Break episode I felt I had seen enough and decided to look into filing a complaint with the FCC.

Well, the FCC website allows anyone to make a complaint if they have witnessed anything "obscene". And they give definitions of obscene--basically it refers to gratuitous nudity or sexual content. No mention of violence whatsoever. Not surprising though. I mean, Janet Jackson shows a breast and Congress holds hearings, Arnold guns down 20 villians and its family entertainment. I don't believe anyone has ever been harmed by a breast or a bare butt. Yet our society gets in a hissy over harmless nudity and completely ignores the senseless violence that permeates our media and entertainment. Even our government contributes to the problem with our continual need to solve disputes with military action, often leading to the deaths of countless civilians and terming defensive or intelligence operations as "wars".

My conclusion is that I think we as a society have become de-sensitized to it due to the fact that we are submerged in a sea of violent images. The American Academy of Pediatrics estimates that the average American child will witness 200,000 acts of violence by time they are 18. My questions to you all are, do you think that our misplaced values of whats taboo place too much emphasis on sex and nudity and not enough on violence? is there too much violence on the television, in music, in movies and in video games? do you think the violence culture we are exposed to causes the high rate of violent crimes and homocides in the US? Just wondering if others share the same thoughts/ideas as I do.

Yes, I agree strongly with you and am just waiting for the day when one of my colleagues at the bar sues Hollywood for inciting this violence along the same lines that gun manufacturers are sought to held liable.

show 2 guys k1lling each other and no one pays attention, show a boob and you'll be the center of controversy and religious groups will protest.

priorities priorities priorities.

The makers of Grand Theft Auto are being sued. The man who commited the crime attempted to use his playing of the game as mitigation in his criminal trial unsuccessfully. The family of the victim is going ahead with its suit.

I agree with Cher (Alicia Silverston) in Clueless: "Until mankind is peaceful enough not to have violence on the news, there's no point in taking it out of shows that need it for entertainment value."

I remember a case in law school stemming from a murder that followed a showing of the film "The Warriors". The court held that the movie producers and the studio (Paramount) could not be held liable for inciting the violence. I am sure under the "right" circumstances, though, a creative plaintiff's attorney or state prosecutor could make the charges stick.

But back to the topic, our society is ridiculously violent and ridiculously squeamish when it comes to bodies, nudity and sex. We are a country of 12 year olds who can pull the wings of a fly but who nervously giggle when we see a booby.

Hmmm -

Is the violence in media the cause or the result?

Coach Gumby will have some excellent thoughts on this subject.

Many cultures which have 'low crime rates'; such as those in Asia and S&C America, really have crime that is just as high or higher, but it is unreported.

Ex. In S & C America there is a Kidnapping every thirty minutes. 70% of kidnap victims are killed. Very rarely is it reported. Almost always the family of the victim pays the demands. If the victim is murdered, then it is generally quietly covered up for fear of gang retribution from the kidnappers against the remaining family members.

This is also big business. Insurance companies sell millions of dollars worth of policies a year S of the border for just these circumstances.

Even though Americans are rarely targeted for this kind of economic kidnapping; because I am the chief stockholder in my company, I am required to buy this kind of insurance for the travel I am doing. In certain countries the insurance companies require their policy holders to have bodyguards.

In counries like Japan for instance where there is supposedly one of the lowest crime rates in the world. Organized crime is so deeply intrenched and institutionalized that as much as 80% of violent crime may go unreported according to Amnesty International. The same is true in China.

I believe we do live in a horrifically violent society, but that this is more a matter of economic class difference than portrayals of violence in the media. Most crimes are for money or passion.

Look at some statistics according to the FBI's NBCS:

Less than 6% of murderers ever repeat the crime of murder.

Violent crime is disproportionately against the lower income groups.

The vast majority (78%)of those arrested for a violent or an economic (burglary, theft, robery, etc.)crime are unemployed for longer than six months.

The vast majority of those arrested for criminal behavior have been in trouble with the law before.

In short I believe Wilson came as close as anyone has to getting it right. But then, I am a Social Psychologist by inclination.

Rob

[ August 31, 2005, 01:54 PM: Message edited by: ITJock ]

I've never understood this. Show people getting murdered, blood spattering all over the place, and no one seems to get that upset.

But show a little tits and ass, and well, it's the end of the frickin' world! Ridiculous.

The important context from the original question is that the "industrial world" has lower crime rates than the United States, not the entire world. I do not think that Western Europe and Japan have a significant problem with unreported crimes (rather, I think every country has a significant problem with unreported crimes, but that those country's problems are no more significant than the United States').

In that context, the United States culture of crime is disturbing. Are parts of South America, Asia, Africa and Eastern Europe more dangerous places to be? Absolutely, but in those places the poverty is more crushing and the governments less effective. The question is why is a nation as graced with the positives of an industrial society still capable of and, for that matter, hungry for violence that the rest of the insturial nations seem to be able to live without?

Ohh - so your argument is that because we are industrially or technologically more advanced our culture should be too?

Nazi Germany was one of the most industrially and technologically advanced nations on earth even before it unleashed its own private nightmare on the rest of the world. In many ways it's technology was far in advance (by a decade or more) of the Allies.

I think of this as the ET phenomena; so many people expect that technological or economic advancement automatically equals peace and cultural developement; In spite of the fact that some of the most peaceful societies on the face of the earth have been among the least technologically advanced.

No - for this you need to look much deeper, at American attitudes, Social Psychology, Economics, Mores, and societal development.

While you are right about crime rates generally in Europe. Crime rates throughout SE Asia are vastly under reported.

R

[ August 31, 2005, 02:10 PM: Message edited by: ITJock ]

It is far too tempting to find a simple solution or two to the problem of violence in American society, and to do so would be to play the politicians’ favorite game: raise fear, then propose some simplistic “solution,” usually something bombastic and draconic (ban something?) - and then move on.

Like most of our problems, a “solution” would take time, honest self-examination, and commitment. Unhappily, one wonders if we are capable any longer of taking this route…

I suspect that there are quite a few sources to the violence described above; in no particular order:

1) Violence is “cool”. From the President’s carrier landing and thumbs-up “bring it on” mentality, to the movie stars who make millions making violent films. What do kids see? Who speaks out against this sort of ‘cool”?

2) Education: we are seeing a very strong trend in some areas towards teaching kids what to think, not how to think. Reasonable people, who have been educated to think, are less likely to see violence as a solution - or as entertainment. Or so I believe.

3) The ideal of the American Male: being weak, or showing emotion is to be somehow less masculine. In sports, in school - kids are taught to be “tough”, to attack, to suffer quietly, to push harder, to win at any cost. How do you address this? I don’t know. But who speaks against it, or promotes some other ideal?

4) A perhaps TV-generated attention span: violence always provides an instant solution. There’s no glory - and no rating - in finding a long-term solution to anything. As a coach, I know how much damage can be done to kids by coaches, parents, schools and peers who want a win now - or at least this season (and I wonder if this isn’t at the root of poor US showing in a lot of endurance sports?) How to turn this around? I wish I knew - but there probably wouldn’t be much money in it…

5) The American perception that one needs to take an adversarial role in everything from politics to sports, and our cultural distaste for cooperation and compromise; we seem to think that “winner take all” is the only way forward (e.g.: the two-party system… ) We can’t stand ambiguity.

6) A religious climate what as often as not, demonizes the other side; once you’ve got someone demonized - that is, reduced to a lower, preferably dangerous status - anything goes.

If there is a single problem it is that we as a culture don’t like complex discussion (quite aside from the fact that we’d rather take adversarial roles and scream at eachother), don’t have the attention span for a long-term “project,” and are rarely prepared to listen. Americans as individuals are very often kind and generous; as a herd, we cease to think very well.

Solutions? I don’t have any. But dialogue and an insistence on mutual respect is a good place to start.

[quote]ITJock:
[QUOTE]Ohh - so your argument is that because we are industrially or technologically more advanced our culture should be too?[/quote]No I'm saying we should compare apples to apples. Justifying the violence in the United States by saying it isn't as bad as the violence of the Third World is a cop out. We're more violent than the societies with similar socio-economic backgrounds. Your mention of the Nazis is a very important warning to our nation. If it could happen there, it could happen here. We are becoming a more violent and intolerant society while the rest of the industrial world is moving in exactly the opposite direction. We should be asking the hard questions here at home.

We punch the clock and each other because we are too scared to punch the boss.

In every job I have ever worked it is always the same. My reward for good hard work is always more work. There is the token lunch that is written off or taken out of the budget. Never a raise or a decent salary, I refuse to blow away the norms or expectations anymore. I try not to loathe my fellow "proles". Even when they are too stupid to see how solidarity always wins. Instead they compete against you and make their jobs and lives more miserable. Out of the misery comes the tragedy of violence.

We are set to struggle against each other so we never queston the paradigm that enslaves us. We never overthrow the revolution. We never bite the hands that feed us the complacent addicting poisons. We go to work and sip our pacifying synthetic gin. We drink our free Folgers robusta shit coffee made with tap water that has been sitting on the burner for a hour. Our low pay and bad food keeps us too tired and enervated to overcome our generic apathy.

You know, if we stop trying to get ahead at others' expense, the violence just might become a rare occurence involving unfortunate circumstance.

Where's that vodka? I have to make some brownies to take to work tomorrow.

I disagree with you Eric. The violence comes from those who feel they are "owed" something without the work that is necessary to get it. We have created society that wants, wants, wants, and won't work, work, work to get it.

Everyone is not guaranteed a wealthy lifestyle. Those people are typically gifted or just lucky (as in lucky sperm, etc.) The Violence comes from those that dream and want without the gumption, knowledge or hutzpah to get off their dead asses and do it on their own.

I am constantly amazed how Erik can channel Fellini channeling Noam Chomsky. Sort of a second hand channeling through multiple translations.

Erik, hon, I think it's time to update the resume and hit the road. It sounds awful where you work. I agree with others that it is people whom think something is "owed" to them that are responsible for a lot of the violence in our society. Why they resort to violence is beyond me. There are plenty of entitlement programs in this country so no one should ever have to feel "owed" something. You are a strong, smart man. You don't have to put up with crap like that.

Erik -

Run - do not walk - Run to your boss and tell him you are quitting.

Find something that makes you happy enough to pour your life into it, something you would willingly work long hard hours at for free, and then do it.

The rest of "it" will follow.

Life is to short to be so narrowly defined, or to have your life conscripted by those who do not appreciate you.

You will be happier, and make those around you happier.

You are endowed by your creator with certain unalienable rights, among them life, liberty, and the persuit of happiness.

But they are not an entitlement, you have to reach out and grab them, work for them. No one will give them to you. You must create them.

"Work is life, you know, and without it, there’s nothing but fear and insecurity." "Life is what happens while you are making other plans." J Lennon

Rob

[ September 01, 2005, 12:23 AM: Message edited by: ITJock ]

As a parent, I have always tried to limit my children's intake of violence. My children weren't allowed guns to play with and the media they saw were highly regulated by me.

When it came to the sexual stuff, while I didn't buy the kiddy-o's porn to view, I also didn't freak if they happen to see a little T&A.

My thinking was that although I hope my children never practice violent acts like others have learned, I do want them to grow up and have fulfilling sex lives.

So which exposure makes more sense?

You know, sadly, this kind of violent behavior we see in our society can be directly tied to desperation and lack of hope. When you have little or nothing to lose from a bad decision, then what the hell?

We all know that every town has a good side and a bad side. And most of us choose not to go on the bad side if we can help it. And it's really only news when the bad stuff happens on the good side of town. For the most part, that other side of town is violent all the time and we don't care. Poor people tormenting other poor people just isn't a big deal to most of us.

Erik's not completely off base, Guys. Getting shot in the 'hood may not be that different on some level than getting stabbed in the back in corporate America. We're taught this behavior and rewarded for being good at it.

I missed seeing the whiskey girl before her shift ended at the liquor store.

I am starting my Jedi training right away. Soon I too will be a judge.

Thanks to those "listening" to the post. My current job was okay. My boss is a useless ass. His boss is decent though. My hire date just got put off pending a financial re-evaluation. The good news is I get to keep my temp job. So I do not have to fight it out in the mean streets of Minneapolis. I'll be okay as long as MIB doesn't "ram" me while I am riding my bike with his SUV.

My take on violence is quite different. If everyone has their needs met their is no logical reason for violence. It is only the psychotic anomalies that pose the problems. These needs are often not met during childhood. So the child becomes a disfunctional adult. I just get this rational sadness from realizing how many steps we are always taking backwards in our quality of life. Progress is made or maintained as long as the knowledge is passed on, or better added on, to the next generation. But I just see and meet folks that do not have to tools to evolve. The best they will be able to do is hold their own and die in debt. No gains are made for the vast majority of families. The best we can do is throw people in jail for drinking or smoking pot. Our evolution is made in how we adapt to our current misery. No progress is made on preventing the cancers or curing much of any disease. Their is an enormous industry that profits off our continued misery. The truth and knowledge is perverted for corporate gains. This is often called dis-information. It is confusing the issues with half-tuths and lies. I would love to give countless examples. However MillerBeach hasn't sent me that "Russian love" yet.

I compare our levels of violence to that of countries where my friends are from or live. They have much less gun violence even though they are supposedly much poorer. I think they are only poor in the desire to buy and use guns on each other. They do not have the need. Their interpersonal relationships seem to be more sharing. One doesn't need to hoard or steal because they see there is plenty.

It was amazing. I took those brownies to work. They were good of course. Folks couldn't take one and wait until everyone got one. Some people took six and were hiding them for later. Some were eating them quickly so they could eat more. You can only taste so much chocolate on your tongue at once. It is a good thing I didn't extract any kind bud into the olive oil for the mix. Some folks would have been unable to drive home. They would have been drooling then falling asleep at work. Ironically I made a double batch. There were plenty of brownies for everyone anyway. There was too much food for everyone at our potluck anyway. The latinos were pretty mellow about the whole thing. A little bit of everything. You could see the culture differences of the different races and ethnicities. How long they had been in the states seemed to make a difference also.

As always :confused: and eek! then sometimes I am able to figure something out on my own :cool: I am just look to the root cause because the truth usually hides there.

There really is not a singular cause. People feel they are owed something because their value system is skewed. Entitlements have been annihilated as of late.

I feel I am owed a living wage. If businesses are going to plunder the public purses, then they need to provide me with the health care that they state no longer can.

I see some of the violence resulting from lack of constructive avenues. A lot of it is "acting out". Something which I see in myself a lot. Usually I can stop it before it starts. The same drive and energy that lets me ride a bike, like I think I can , is always present unless there has been a successful catharsis. If the energy capacitates, there need to be a means to ground it :cool: