From www.us.imdb.com:
SENATE VOTES TO INVESTIGATE VIOLENT MOVIES
The U.S. Senate Wednesday voted unanimously to order the National Institutes of Health to conduct an investigation into the impact of violent movies, video games and music on children and to authorize the Federal Trade
Commission and the Department of Justice to determine whether the entertainment industry intentionally targets children with violent products. The Senate vote came on the same day that it rejected a proposal that would have made it more difficult for minors and ex-convicts to obtain weapons at gun shows by requiring that all sales be subject to background checks.
Yep, same old same old.
** Phil D. **
“Not only is the world queerer than we imagine,
it is queerer than we can imagine.”
–J.B.S. Haldane
Here’s a story that equals that one. Sorry I can’t provide a cite but I read it several years ago. Back when those high powered squirt guns were a popular fad, several students brought them to school and were squirting other students. Other students, carrying real guns, either in the belief the squirt guns were real or just because they didn’t like being squirted, responded by shooting at the squirters. The administrator of one school district (Boston IIRC) had the solution to this problem; he proposed a crackdown on squirt guns in schools.
Guns are tools. They are not animate, they do not posess any intrinsic power to kill or injure on their own. It is lamentable that we have so removed ourselves from any standard of personal responsibility that the instruments employed in the commission of a crime, however horrifying, are blamed more than those who commited the crime itself.
Almost all guns are designed to kill. This is a fact. But, unmoved by a human hand and mind, they do nothing.
The person who muders another had at the instant of action “a heart to do murder” and shifting blame to an inanimate object is just another way to avoid facing the real issues.
“The universe doesn’t give first warnings or second chances”
Bombs are tools. They are not animate, they do not possess any intrinsic power to kill or injure on their own…
Almost all bombs are designed to kill. This is a fact. But unmoved by human hand or mind they do nothing…
“When the going gets weird, the weird turn pro.”
Hunter Thompson
Study after study has failed to make a connection between watching a lot of violent movies and tv-shows, and actually becomming violent. The question has been discussed endlessly over the years, but a study by a guy, Brandon Centerwall, suggest that it’s TV in it self that cuses the violence. His study shows a sharp increase in violence in most society efter the introduction of television.
It’s not the violent programs that cause this, it’s short attention span, pendulum swings of emotion, immediate gratification, superficial solutions to problems, self-pity and alienation.
So watching too much tv is bad for you, as it numbs your brain and gives you a false veiw of the world.
Remember when we were bombing Iraq during Ramadan? The pentagon got all pissed off about a picture of someone writing on one of the laser-guided bombs “Ramadan greetings from Sgt. so-and-so.” A spokesman actually apologized to the Muslims for the “gaffe” and said “we fully respect the Muslim Holy month, blah blah blah…”
So it’s ok to drop bombs on them, but don’t dare make fun of their religion. If that’s not the epitome of hypocrisy, I don’t know what is. Some government.
WASHINGTON (AP) – Two House Republicans are seeking federally funded drug testing in schools as a way to reduce youth violence.
Peterson said reduction in drug use could help prevent rampages such as last week’s shootings in Littleton, Colo., from being a regular occurrence. Toxicology tests revealed no drugs or alcohol in the bodies of the Colorado gunmen, but Peterson said there have been incidents elsewhere that involved drugs.
Great. The political solution to any problem in any country in the world. Try to look as if you’re acting forcefully by being “full of sound and fury”!
Go after the symptoms, not the cause, that is.
Oh… “Yet, signifying nothing.”
CT
“Mrs. Dole, why do you blame the gun lobby for violence when it’s so much easier to blame Hollywood?”
“That’s silly. Europeans are exposed to the same movies, TV shows, and video games that we are, and they have a fraction of our violence rates.”
“That’s because they’re soft!”
“Soft?”
“Europeans aren’t as manly! Studies confirm it!”
I might add that despite having 1/10 the population of the US, Canada has 1/100 the gun violence. I guess we’re not very manly either Go, girl!
Go, girl!