I think the pandemic has made everybody a little bit crazy

[Horatius]

@Kimera757

The pandemic stress seems to be exposing the a-holes in life (not a pleasant thought, whether taken literally or not).

Yeah, this is the part that’s making me insane. I’ve been doing everything I can to limit my exposure to COVID, and thus also limit the spread in the community, even before masks and social distancing became official policies. It’s watching the assholes do everything they can to make all that effort a complete waste that’s really pissing me off.

And this week is just the topper. Here in Ottawa, we have all the idiots from the rest of the country in town causing shit because they don’t want to do anything to help anyone else out. Huge portions of my city are being held hostage by the biggest assholes in our society, and the police are just letting them do it.

So what was the fucking point? Might as well just start licking doorknobs…

[Tfletch1]

@pullin

My personal (likely unprovable) theory is we’re seeing the inevitable result of the US’s overall discipline failures. For decades now the entire country has decided to follow one overriding policy: “Let the bullies win”. Every time. Every customer. Every place. Every child. We have a massive education system populated by tens of thousands of trained people, with counselors, psychologists, Phds in every imaginable field, and millions of hours of training. And the entire system is powerless when faced with a 10 year old bully. They literally cannot handle or prevent a single undisciplined child from causing havoc and disrupting classrooms full of students. And in their powerlessness and cowardice, their decision (ime) has been to punish the victim should he or she dare to respond.

Fast forward a few decades, and these bullies now occupy all of our public spaces – doing what they want, throwing tantrums and occasionally harming others. Because that’s what they’ve been taught their entire lives – they can always get away with it.

Bravo! I couldn’t agree with you more.

[Machine_Elf]

@Bill_Door

Somebody must have had a beef.

It’s weird how many people got involved in the fight, considering how few had a steak in the outcome.

[Slithy_Tove]

Maybe 30+ years ago Bill Moyers made the observation that we’ve become less citizens and more consumers. That’s resonated with me.

[running_coach]

@Machine_Elf

@Bill_Door

Somebody must have had a beef.

It’s weird how many people got involved in the fight, considering how few had a steak in the outcome. -

What few understand is that the losers get a Golden Corral steak.

[ThelmaLou]

@iamthewalrus_3

Then she asked if I’d been following what was going on in Washington, and when I wasn’t quite sure what she was talking about, she said they were about to approve a plan to have posses round up the unvaccinated and put them into camps, “like in Australia”.

Well, that’s partially correct. They’re going to round up the unvaccinated and serve them possets. A sweet, creamy dessert always calms everyone down.

[BigT]

I’ve never understood why we keep treating these people who don’t care if they kill with kid gloves. These are the same people who applaud anti-riot tactics, so use them. Arrest the biggest offenders and charge them with negligent manslaughter.

Stop acting like it’s the antisocial people that society needs most to protect.

[Twoflower]

My take is that now that all the moronic asshole narcissists in the country have seen one of their own elected president, they suddenly feel that they have the right to be assholes and be proud.

[Horatius]

@BigT

I’ve never understood why we keep treating these people who don’t care if they kill with kid gloves. These are the same people who applaud anti-riot tactics, so use them.

I can sort of understand the cops not wanting to move in with force the first two days, because there were about 8000 of these assholes, and it was a safe bet they’d burn shit down if confronted.

But now they’re down to about 300 hard core assholes. The only reason they’re still a problem is that they’ve got big-assed trucks blocking a bunch of streets. Now, the cops could arrest the lot of them if they wanted to. Go block by block, establish local superiority of force, and tell them, “We can tow your truck while you watch quietly, or you can get in our way, get arrested, and then watch us tow your truck.” The only limiting factor I can see is the availability of tow trucks.