I think that so much of it comes from the media and the home..especially current music that is being rammed down our throats, and film/television lauding violence as power..and from frustration over social circumstance and position and a growing distain for education..and mostly, from the total breakdown of the family as a unit...Not meaning the 'traditional' family..I mean any family AT ALL.
No one is being taught to love each other anymore. No one is being taught that hard work = success. No one is being taught to accept others' differences and celebrate them.
WHO'S MINDING THE FUCKING STORE?
They are being taught that money is everything..Parents don't listen to their children..they hand them a twenty. They are not home to guide them, as they are out chasing that buck, that next rung up the ladder. They don't bother to get involved with what is going on within the school system...as long as 'Chad' and 'Britney' come home in one piece, no questions are asked..no dialogues are even begun, unless there is a glaringly VISIBLE problem--and, by th en? It is usually too late. The flip side of that are the parents that don't even bother...that deal in violence and drugs themselves as a way of support, as a way of life. These scenarios go back at least a generation..it has become ingrained.
We are left with children that are not equipped to process the messages being shown them (IE: the glorifying of trash a'la Springer and 'Cops'...and the constant pounding of the ads screaming 'You MUST have this/be this to be cool! To be accepted!)...and no reasonable outlet for frustration, no alternative VALUES.
As much as it pains me to say it, I saw violence as a separate culture begin in the 70s (at least that is when it was shoved in my face)..with the Punk Subculture. I agreed with it at the time, sad to say, because at that age..I identified wholly with the rage at the government, the rage at the sleepwalking status quo of Suburbia (I still do, really). It was the blind rage of the 'have nots' exploding..but it brought no progress, no change. It was just drunken and drugged violence and destruction for its own sake in the end, and expellation of useless energy. (Anarchy is nothing but a mess, let's face it.)
But anyway, kids are forced to JOIN a GROUP, to FIT IN (with hopefully, the 'strongest group/gang/clique'), at ANY COST. At the cost of each other. At the cost of themselves.
Sadly, the 'US VS. THEM' mentality is alive and well. And it is everywhere.
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
momijizukamori
I agree.
Date: 2003-09-05 09:25 am (UTC)I think that so much of it comes from the media and the home..especially current music that is being rammed down our throats, and film/television lauding violence as power..and from frustration over social circumstance and position and a growing distain for education..and mostly, from the total breakdown of the family as a unit...Not meaning the 'traditional' family..I mean any family AT ALL.
No one is being taught to love each other anymore. No one is being taught that hard work = success. No one is being taught to accept others' differences and celebrate them.
WHO'S MINDING THE FUCKING STORE?
They are being taught that money is everything..Parents don't listen to their children..they hand them a twenty. They are not home to guide them, as they are out chasing that buck, that next rung up the ladder. They don't bother to get involved with what is going on within the school system...as long as 'Chad' and 'Britney' come home in one piece, no questions are asked..no dialogues are even begun, unless there is a glaringly VISIBLE
problem--and, by th en? It is usually too late. The flip side of that are the parents that don't even bother...that deal in violence and drugs themselves as a way of support, as a way of life. These scenarios go back at least a generation..it has become ingrained.
We are left with children that are not equipped to process the messages being shown them (IE: the glorifying of trash a'la Springer and 'Cops'...and the constant pounding of the ads screaming 'You MUST have this/be this to be cool! To be accepted!)...and no reasonable outlet for frustration, no alternative VALUES.
As much as it pains me to say it, I saw violence as a separate culture begin in the 70s (at least that is when it was shoved in my face)..with the Punk Subculture. I agreed with it at the time, sad to say, because at that age..I identified wholly with the rage at the government, the rage at the sleepwalking status quo of Suburbia (I still do, really). It was the blind rage of the 'have nots' exploding..but it brought no progress, no change. It was just drunken and drugged violence and destruction for its own sake in the end, and expellation of useless energy. (Anarchy is nothing but a mess, let's face it.)
But anyway, kids are forced to JOIN a GROUP, to FIT IN (with hopefully, the 'strongest group/gang/clique'), at ANY COST. At the cost of each other. At the cost of themselves.
Sadly, the 'US VS. THEM' mentality is alive and well. And it is everywhere.
Rant over. Flame away.