I’ve been listening to this song lately, probably because right now I am having trouble making sense of so many things – things in my personal life and events and happenings in my own country and in the world at large. I have said this before, the world is a scary place. Most times, life is never easy. People’s thought processes and actions and reactions continue to confound me. Sometimes as I write this blog, it’s not so much to share MY opinions, but to get insight from you, my readers and others I follow, as to how to make sense of it all. Are you as confused (and concerned) as I am?
The racial tensions in Ferguson, Missouri, are troubling. I saw a town meeting today on one of the news channels, and it was pretty apparent, to me anyway, that the governor of Missouri is totally in over his head and has very little control over the situation due to a lack of trust from his constituents.
The crowd kept asking why the police officer involved, Darren Wilson, hadn’t been arrested yet. I do not know all the details of the Michael Brown shooting, but in all honesty I don’t believe a week is long enough to investigate it, all the while dealing with the protesters and rioting. Just being realistic here.
I know the cops aren’t always the good guys, though I was raised to believe that they were. I also know sometimes kids are ignorant and immature and do stupid and crazy-ass things. I did (not stuff like robbery but still really cocky , thoughtless, careless and stupid stuff) and I am not that person anymore. Unfortunately these days, we can’t be sure if some dumb-ass punk (AKA young adult or teenager totally not acting in an age-appropriate morally and socially acceptable way) is going to try and kill us when they act stupid.
IF this kid acted towards the cop the way he did toward the store clerk he robbed, I can understand why the outcome was what it was. In all honesty, if that was my store and I had a concealed handgun license, I might have shot him myself when he doubled back and came back into the store rushing me, after pushing past me to get out and make a run for it. Pretty sure as big as he was and as small as I am, I would have felt threatened. Shit, what is wrong with kids today?
They are doing a second independent autopsy to confirm the findings. I am sure that is going to answer a few questions. {Man I love science!} Then again maybe not. They’re also continuing to investigate the robbery. I hope they do an honest and thorough investigation of this entire case. I hope the people of Ferguson can find some closure soon.
A curfew was to begin tonight – just checked the news, and it is not going well. Protesters and others are not getting off the streets and looting is going on. Peacefully protesting I understand, looting, definitely NOT. I can only say, with the way the situation continues to escalate, I hope no one else gets killed.
ISIS – now I do not even know where to begin with these radical killing machines. Their ideology and attitudes and mind-set are beyond me. I certainly comprehend it, but for the life of me, can’t understand it. My husband and I watched some 30 minute piece CNN ran with a reporter embedded on the mountain with the Yazidis, flying in on a supply drop helicopter. It was truly horrific what these people are going through, AND we didn’t see any of the really bad stuff – but I can just imagine . . .
What is going on over there has to be stopped. I don’t know what they need to do, or even actually WHO “they” are. But collectively, all of these leaders have got to get on the same page against ISIS and figure out how to take them out. Warring between themselves is bad enough, but this is a whole new enemy. And I know this sounds really bad, but between everyone involved, they ought to be able to figure out a resolution. I’ve said this before, when Syria, Iran, and Iraq are asking for us to help them, it’s some bad shit.
I’ve already talked about Ebola and it’s getting worse.
In light of all that, I got my own stuff nipping at my heals, too. Some days are longer than others. Music (though I can’t play it – or sing it 😉 ) is a staple in my life – kind of like breathing. On that note – yeah pun intended – I like to start my day with this one . . . here’s to you . . . with blessings from above . . .
Just something I was thinking about . . . ☮
Just something I was thinking about . . . 
There are some scary situations out there for sure Sadie. The ISIS thing is beyond me. They are corrupt for sure. The Feguson problem seems to be a needle that pricked a balloon. There was massive tension and prejudice underlaying this for a long time. When the young man was killed, it all came rushing out. I used to truck in that area years ago and I’ll tell you that racial tensions are real and strong and denied. The young man was a trigger for sure. As far as the officer is concerned, I suspect he is less guilty than the blacks would have us believe. They state that the young man was walking away from the problem with his hands up when the officer shot him. For a seasoned officer with no record to do that is not real. He would know that if he did such a thing he would be charged with murder and loose his job and freedom. No way it happened like that. “Witness” reports are wildly different. Some one or all are lying. It is going to be really hard to get a fair investigation when there are so many ulterioir motives involved. i wish them the best of luck. No doubt that racism is causong a lot of the problems but equally no doubt the young man threatened the officer in some way or the incident would not have started.
Thanks for the post Sadie – I enjoyed it.
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Thanks for reading & commenting Paul! I’m thinking my next post needs to be something funny, or maybe really off the wall for this blog – some poetry 🙂 But there is so much going on out there that I want to write about (scary or not) – and usually when I write about it, I need to research it – which just enlightens me more! Still thinking about the poetry . . . LOL!
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And you say you have no trouble sleeping after thinking of all this….
I saw the news on the killing of that guy, he wasn´t the gentle giant as they first portrayed him, not that he diserved to be killed, but imagine you´re an officer patrolling in a not so good part of town if the reports are right which yesterday I saw the attorney for the friend of the dead guy(and he´s not a kid, he´s 18, I saw 18 year old “kids” in wars and acting like no “grown up” man have or ever act) said that yes indeed the dead guy did approach the officer, I don´t know if a guy that big came after me I´ll fight him ofcourse but if I had a weapon I´d probably shoot his ass. Believe me that fists can put you in a hospital bed for a very long time or kill you. Plus of course there´s the Reverend Jesee Jackson and that other Reverend the one that has a t.v program on MSNBC adding more fuel to the fire. Most of the black community want to make it about race, that´s a fact. They want the officer to be tried and sentenced to prison. Plus the President isn´t helping too much by making this a civil rights criminal investigation, that´s dangerous. He´s the President and he sets the tone. So the fish rots from the head. The minds have already have been made up in that community, so any form of rational thinking goes out the window. Maybe the officer did use exscesive force and should be terminated or go to prison or maybe he acted out of fear that this guy was going to be able to beat him and grab his weapon. But this is the thing that I don´t think is good in the U.S, and it´s rare that I criticise what I consider my second home which is the media. They are the ones who are trying this in public, get ratings, sort of a replay of O.J Simpson.
About ISIS, Obama Wama has let it be. He pulled out of Iraq too soon, he say´s he couldn´t reach a consensus with the Iraq President…bullshit. You have the man power and the fire power there, you´re the top dog, use that for consensus. How do people expect for a country that has never experienced democracy to jump into a western style democracy in a couple of years or 10, specially these muslim guys that have nothing to do with western values. I know, been there, seen it, done it. And their culture is freaking weird. Look at Japan, the U.S still has troops stationed in Japan, they didn´t pull out the months or a couple of years after they won the war, look at South Korea also, and even Europe, here in Spain there is a base called Rota, a naval station in Madrid(the capital) where there´s a detachment of U.S Marines. The U.S like it or not, but it´s certainly necessary, has to be involved in the world. Yep, they have to get their hands in other countries affairs because although it´s not a perfect country at the end of the day the world is more stable and less dangerous if the U.S is proactive not isolationist. ISIS even twitted a picture of the a hand holding their flag right in front of the white house. You could literally see the White House in the background and that black flag up front. I believe that leading from behind(which is still a mystery to me how you lead from behind, you either lead or you take the rear but you don´t have it both ways, it´s a contradiction that sentence but people buy it)does not work. The Europeans, have their own interest and unless they don´t see a strong U.S that is leading and telling them or persuading them to move they won´t do anything in the interests of the U.S or the general world. I will say this, as of last year France and Spain, had troops in combat in Mali. Because there is something there that is in our interest. I didn´t see anything of this in the Spanish news, I found out through an old army buddy. It wasn´t humanitarian thing, they where actually in combat with some crazy rebels. So point being is that the U.S or Obama should stop with that stupid apologetic tone that sorry for all the troubles and wars we have caused in the world, and start doing proactive things. In the world there´s a bunch of nut case countries and now terrorist so peace on earth there has never been and there will never be. So unfortunately(although I still don´t know why civilians protest the wars, fucke´m they are not the ones going into one, plus last time I checked you do join by your own will and I don´t care your circumstances for joining. There´s a lot of young men and woman who have a hard life and don´t necessarely join the army, although through personal experience I can tell you that a great % of guys do come from poor families or broken families and from not the best places of town. I think that is true for most of the western armies. Plus if you join infantry you know sooner or later your going to end up in some shitty country doing some crazy things. So last point, is that you need young men and women to join up and send them to do the nasty work that has to be done and realise that some of them will not come back or will come back with injuries. That´s the world, that´s how it works and you can´t change it. So better have well trained and equipped people to deal with threats to civilians in their own countries.
That was a mouthful.
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Yes – it was . . . happy what I wrote inspired that 🙂 I agree 100% with your media comment – they love to get everyone all riled up & it’s dangerous at times. It’s getting late, so I’ll have to address the rest of this tomorrow because I have to get up early in the morning. Have a great day!!
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Ferguson is an example of a community at the end of its rope. Neighborhoods don’t usually erupt because of a single incident.I am guessing that the employment rate is high, income is low and hope for the future there is nonexistent. As sad as the shooting and robbery is, it is not about that, the killing was the last straw, a symptom. It is a sick dying town, a very frustrated confused placed. The affluent and influential are just as confused as the poor and underprivileged in that community. You can tell that by the overreactions of both the citizens and the law enforcement. No one there has any answers (not just about this incident but fucking life in general) and they are all, white and black gasping and struggling , taking their last breaths. The place is suffocating. There was a brief moment of hope and leadership from the Missouri Highway Patrol and I think the governor was correct in taking over the situation. It did calm emotions for a few hours. The citizen’s, the law enforcement and governing problems are so much greater than just calming demonstrations. Their problems should not be a surprise for any of us. Ferguson is not unique in this country.
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DSS – that’s the scariest part . . . Ferguson is NOT unique in this country . . .
Sadly, I agree with your assessment . . .
Thanks for reading & commenting – really enjoy hearing from you!
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But wait. According to the Supreme Court of the United States of America, racism is no longer a problem in the United States. So what is going on in Ferguson can’t be racism. It must be something else.
As to ISIS, well: God and Religion.
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Doobster – just another example of how the powers that be can be so wrong 🙂 (regarding racism)
There was a political cartoon in the my local Sunday paper – it was titled “Nature’s Lethal Microscopic Threats To The Human Race” with 3 drawings below it of Ebola, Avian Influenza & Religious Extremism. I find it interesting that something that is supposed to be spiritual, peaceful and bring people together (God and religion) are the very things that seem to be tearing us apart globally. Thanks for reading & commenting – I need to catch up on your posts this week! I’ve had my grandkids a lot lately and being little, they demand a lot of my attention – so behind on my reading 🙂 I’ll get caught up though! Always enjoy hearing from you 🙂
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There is, I think, a growing sense of rage in many places in our own country and in places around the world. Much of it is due to (accurately) perceived injustice and unfairness in how the world works. In the USA, our government is almost completely defective: corrupt and useless. The economic divide grows and grows. And we turn our backs on science and reason and rationality. We disdain education and knowledge. And we cling to archaic religious beliefs while simultaneously ignoring the care of our spiritual souls.
Many dull themselves with mindless toys, others chose drugs or violence to somehow fill the growing emptiness. We flounder about wondering what went wrong with the Great Dream.
I’ve come to believe, that like any addict, things need to get worse before we wake up and realize the need to change. Or die. They talk about “hitting rock bottom” and how that’s what’s necessary to create that wake-up call. I think that’s what it will take.
(P.S. That’s my favorite Pearl Jam song!)
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You are likely right Wyrd. However that being said, there has never been a time in Earth’s history when it hasn’t been true. I just finished a book about Mary Magdalene and that description would exactly fit then, 2,000 years ago, as well.
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Very true. Something I’ve been considering for a long time is whether there are differences in today’s society compared to past ones. I think there are.
A key one is scope. Never in human history have so many been joined together by electronic media. Marshall McLuhan’s “global village” has been here since the first Gulf War when we watched a war on the other side of the world — in real time. It’s become ever more true as more and more join the interweb.
Never before have so many been so aware of the disparities in societies. And perhaps never before has society been so lacking in a clear moral compass. (Or perhaps it’s that never before have those lacking one been so capable of such major damage — the interweb and modern commerce extend their power immensely.)
There is also the realism of entertainment media. TV and movies are known to be extremely powerful in affecting the mind, and wide-screen HD and CGI bring extremely realistic daily violence into our homes.
It’s one thing to read about a battle; it’s quite another when CGI takes you onto the battlefield!
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Wyrd Smythe – I tend to agree with you. This growing sense of rage and hopelessness (and closed-mindedness) results in actions and behaviors that I think will only continue to get worse. Scares me when I think about the kind of world my kids and grandkids are faced with . . .
Marshall McLuhan’s “global village” was one of the first things I learned about in college – I wonder if he knew just how interconnected we would all be. Instant communication and “eyes” everywhere seems like a great idea, until it’s put into action – upon execution, all the problems are starting to shake out. We have only just begun to see the ramifications of this encompassing technology. Two interesting texts I have read concerning some of this – “Surveillance Society” and “The Extreme Future” – were pretty eye opening and definitely made me think.
Sometimes it seems the world has not only lost much of its moral compass, but is at a loss for compassion and has no conscience, either. And entertainment & the media – kids the age of 5 have seen more sexual and violent images then I had seen when I was 18 – no wonder there is such desensitization.
Glad you enjoyed the music – that is truly what inspired this post – the Pearl Jam song. The Call song is good, too 🙂 I have excellent taste in music – if I do say so myself LOL 😉
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McLuhan might indeed have predicted this, but quite a few science fiction authors definitely did. Whether it’s Orwell’s 1984 or Huxley’s Brave New World or various works by Kurt Vonnegut or quite a few others I could name, the outcomes we’re seeing now were foreseen long ago by quite a few prescient observers.
But did anyone listen? Nooooope. Technology is just too much fun. So is sex and violence! Stop predicting gloom and doom! Go away!!
Thing to keep in mind. In every fallen civilization there were people who predicted its downfall… and they were right!
And funny thing: all the freedoms and entitlements we’re granted by the modern era have a downside. People feel lost and without anchors. If anything is possible, then nothing is certain. It requires a lot of intelligence and perception to find our path through it all, but in an era that disdains education and intellectualism, those things are absent.
I’ve just started re-reading Thomas Moore’s Care of the Soul, and — talk about prescient — what he’s writing about in 1992 (the loss of soul in modern life) is all the more true today.
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Drones would do nicely against ISIS. 🙂 No boots on the ground.
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That is very true OM! Thanks for the visit & the comment 🙂
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lol I am glad you didn’t find that offensive. Many have lol.
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I am not easily offended & usually fairly open-minded 😉 – & in all honesty though I know at times it is necessary, I hate boots on the ground. With all the technology we have, seems like a great way to use it! Like so many things – the death penalty for instance – just gotta make sure they get it right. “Collateral damage” is ALWAYS bad!!
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