"The Mindless Menace of Violence"

I didnt' know where to put this - so I put it here- if it's the wrong place for it, I apologize.

I watched "Bobby" the movie about Robert Kennedy's assassination the other night.
His voice speaking these words played over the end credits.

The next day I woke up to the news of the shootings in Illinois.
I can't be sure, but I believe that in the six months I've been back living in the US,
there has been at least one random, mass shooting each month.

I realized that I don't even bother to read the details of them anymore.

And it reminded me of this speech by Robert Kennedy.

How sad that forty years later - our country is still beset by violence.

And I wonder if Americans know that people in other countries don't live the way we do in America-
afraid of our fellow countrymen (and even elderly women pushing grocery carts).

That's why I can't live here anymore.

I am tired of viewing others and having them view me, as the enemy.

And I know it doesn't have to be that way.

Anyway - this is a great speech.
He was a great writer-

and I think more of a sincere humanitarian than his more famous brother.

He made this speech the day after Martin Luther King was assassinated.

Quote:

On the Mindless Menace of Violence

City Club of Cleveland, Cleveland, Ohio
April 5, 1968

This is a time of shame and sorrow. It is not a day for politics. I have saved this one opportunity, my only event of today, to speak briefly to you about the mindless menace of violence in America which again stains our land and every one of our lives.

It is not the concern of any one race. The victims of the violence are black and white, rich and poor, young and old, famous and unknown. They are, most important of all, human beings whom other human beings loved and needed. No one - no matter where he lives or what he does - can be certain who will suffer from some senseless act of bloodshed. And yet it goes on and on and on in this country of ours.

Why? What has violence ever accomplished? What has it ever created? No martyr's cause has ever been stilled by an assassin's bullet.

No wrongs have ever been righted by riots and civil disorders. A sniper is only a coward, not a hero; and an uncontrolled, uncontrollable mob is only the voice of madness, not the voice of reason.

Whenever any American's life is taken by another American unnecessarily - whether it is done in the name of the law or in the defiance of the law, by one man or a gang, in cold blood or in passion, in an attack of violence or in response to violence - whenever we tear at the fabric of the life which another man has painfully and clumsily woven for himself and his children, the whole nation is degraded.

"Among free men," said Abraham Lincoln, "there can be no successful appeal from the ballot to the bullet; and those who take such appeal are sure to lose their cause and pay the costs."

Yet we seemingly tolerate a rising level of violence that ignores our common humanity and our claims to civilization alike. We calmly accept newspaper reports of civilian slaughter in far-off lands. We glorify killing on movie and television screens and call it entertainment. We make it easy for men of all shades of sanity to acquire whatever weapons and ammunition they desire.

Too often we honor swagger and bluster and wielders of force; too often we excuse those who are willing to build their own lives on the shattered dreams of others. Some Americans who preach non-violence abroad fail to practice it here at home. Some who accuse others of inciting riots have by their own conduct invited them.

Some look for scapegoats, others look for conspiracies, but this much is clear: violence breeds violence, repression brings retaliation, and only a cleansing of our whole society can remove this sickness from our soul.

For there is another kind of violence, slower but just as deadly destructive as the shot or the bomb in the night. This is the violence of institutions; indifference and inaction and slow decay. This is the violence that afflicts the poor, that poisons relations between men because their skin has different colors. This is the slow destruction of a child by hunger, and schools without books and homes without heat in the winter.

This is the breaking of a man's spirit by denying him the chance to stand as a father and as a man among other men. And this too afflicts us all.

I have not come here to propose a set of specific remedies nor is there a single set. For a broad and adequate outline we know what must be done. When you teach a man to hate and fear his brother, when you teach that he is a lesser man because of his color or his beliefs or the policies he pursues, when you teach that those who differ from you threaten your freedom or your job or your family, then you also learn to confront others not as fellow citizens but as enemies, to be met not with cooperation but with conquest; to be subjugated and mastered.

We learn, at the last, to look at our brothers as aliens, men with whom we share a city, but not a community; men bound to us in common dwelling, but not in common effort. We learn to share only a common fear, only a common desire to retreat from each other, only a common impulse to meet disagreement with force. For all this, there are no final answers.

Yet we know what we must do. It is to achieve true justice among our fellow citizens. The question is not what programs we should seek to enact. The question is whether we can find in our own midst and in our own hearts that leadership of humane purpose that will recognize the terrible truths of our existence.

We must admit the vanity of our false distinctions among men and learn to find our own advancement in the search for the advancement of others. We must admit in ourselves that our own children's future cannot be built on the misfortunes of others. We must recognize that this short life can neither be ennobled or enriched by hatred or revenge.

Our lives on this planet are too short and the work to be done too great to let this spirit flourish any longer in our land. Of course we cannot vanquish it with a program, nor with a resolution.

But we can perhaps remember, if only for a time, that those who live with us are our brothers, that they share with us the same short moment of life; that they seek, as do we, nothing but the chance to live out their lives in purpose and in happiness, winning what satisfaction and fulfillment they can.

Surely, this bond of common faith, this bond of common goal, can begin to teach us something. Surely, we can learn, at least, to look at those around us as fellow men, and surely we can begin to work a little harder to bind up the wounds among us and to become in our own hearts brothers and countrymen once again.

Were the victims in sufficiently humble n docile obedience
to the gun control laws ??

or were thay prepared to defend themselves ?

How sad that forty years later - our country is still beset by violence.

I am confident that when that happened those years ago,
no one in America predicted that in 40 more years ( nor any other number of years )
that there 'd be no violence here.
There has been violence since the dawn of man,
and during all the millions of years of human existence ( depending on how u define human ).

By what reasoning wud anyone believe that it wud come to a halt in 40 years ??
No one even entertained the possibility.

Quote:

And I wonder if Americans know that people in other countries don't live the way we do in America-
afraid of our fellow countrymen (and even elderly women pushing grocery carts).

Do u know someone who is afraid of our fellow countrymen ?

I don 't remember ever running into anyone of that description.
Obviously, one shud be careful where one goes
and always be properly well armed to deal with such situations as may arise.

Quote:

That's why I can't live here anymore.

U r leaving again ?

Quote:

I am tired of viewing others and having them view me, as the enemy.

Did someone vu u as the enemy ?

Quote:

And I know it doesn't have to be that way.

Anyway - this is a great speech.
He was a great writer-

Do u know who wrote it ?

Quote:

and I think more of a sincere humanitarian than his more famous brother.

Maybe; depending on how u choose to define it.
The Kennedys were not good Americans.
The ring of freedom -- personal freedom -- was alien to their minds.
The Kennedys held freedom in disdain.

He quotes Lincoln, hereinbelow, as follows:
"Among free men," said Abraham Lincoln,
"there can be no successful appeal from the ballot to the bullet;
and those who take such appeal
are sure to lose their cause and pay the costs."

I noticed on the Military Channel this morning that
Abraham Lincoln ordered the assassination of President Jefferson Davis
and the entire cabinet of the Confederate States of America
and sent a Union raiding party to execute the order.

The rebels intercepted the raiders and found out about Lincoln 's plot,
then retaliated, more successfully, against Lincoln.
Shud he have taken his own advice ?

Quote:

He made this speech the day after Martin Luther King was assassinated.

Quote:

On the Mindless Menace of Violence

City Club of Cleveland, Cleveland, Ohio
April 5, 1968

This is a time of shame and sorrow. It is not a day for politics. I have saved this one opportunity, my only event of today, to speak briefly to you about the mindless menace of violence in America which again stains our land and every one of our lives.

It is not the concern of any one race. The victims of the violence are black and white, rich and poor, young and old, famous and unknown. They are, most important of all, human beings whom other human beings loved and needed. No one - no matter where he lives or what he does - can be certain who will suffer from some senseless act of bloodshed. And yet it goes on and on and on in this country of ours.

Why? What has violence ever accomplished? What has it ever created? No martyr's cause has ever been stilled by an assassin's bullet.

No wrongs have ever been righted by riots and civil disorders. A sniper is only a coward, not a hero; and an uncontrolled, uncontrollable mob is only the voice of madness, not the voice of reason.

Whenever any American's life is taken by another American unnecessarily - whether it is done in the name of the law or in the defiance of the law, by one man or a gang, in cold blood or in passion, in an attack of violence or in response to violence - whenever we tear at the fabric of the life which another man has painfully and clumsily woven for himself and his children, the whole nation is degraded.

"Among free men," said Abraham Lincoln, "there can be no successful appeal from the ballot to the bullet; and those who take such appeal are sure to lose their cause and pay the costs."

Yet we seemingly tolerate a rising level of violence that ignores our common humanity and our claims to civilization alike. We calmly accept newspaper reports of civilian slaughter in far-off lands. We glorify killing on movie and television screens and call it entertainment. We make it easy for men of all shades of sanity to acquire whatever weapons and ammunition they desire.

Too often we honor swagger and bluster and wielders of force; too often we excuse those who are willing to build their own lives on the shattered dreams of others. Some Americans who preach non-violence abroad fail to practice it here at home. Some who accuse others of inciting riots have by their own conduct invited them.

Some look for scapegoats, others look for conspiracies, but this much is clear: violence breeds violence, repression brings retaliation, and only a cleansing of our whole society can remove this sickness from our soul.

For there is another kind of violence, slower but just as deadly destructive as the shot or the bomb in the night. This is the violence of institutions; indifference and inaction and slow decay. This is the violence that afflicts the poor, that poisons relations between men because their skin has different colors. This is the slow destruction of a child by hunger, and schools without books and homes without heat in the winter.

This is the breaking of a man's spirit by denying him the chance to stand as a father and as a man among other men. And this too afflicts us all.

I have not come here to propose a set of specific remedies nor is there a single set. For a broad and adequate outline we know what must be done. When you teach a man to hate and fear his brother, when you teach that he is a lesser man because of his color or his beliefs or the policies he pursues, when you teach that those who differ from you threaten your freedom or your job or your family, then you also learn to confront others not as fellow citizens but as enemies, to be met not with cooperation but with conquest; to be subjugated and mastered.

We learn, at the last, to look at our brothers as aliens, men with whom we share a city, but not a community; men bound to us in common dwelling, but not in common effort. We learn to share only a common fear, only a common desire to retreat from each other, only a common impulse to meet disagreement with force. For all this, there are no final answers.

Yet we know what we must do. It is to achieve true justice among our fellow citizens. The question is not what programs we should seek to enact. The question is whether we can find in our own midst and in our own hearts that leadership of humane purpose that will recognize the terrible truths of our existence.

We must admit the vanity of our false distinctions among men and learn to find our own advancement in the search for the advancement of others. We must admit in ourselves that our own children's future cannot be built on the misfortunes of others. We must recognize that this short life can neither be ennobled or enriched by hatred or revenge.

Our lives on this planet are too short and the work to be done too great to let this spirit flourish any longer in our land. Of course we cannot vanquish it with a program, nor with a resolution.

But we can perhaps remember, if only for a time, that those who live with us are our brothers, that they share with us the same short moment of life; that they seek, as do we, nothing but the chance to live out their lives in purpose and in happiness, winning what satisfaction and fulfillment they can.

Surely, this bond of common faith, this bond of common goal, can begin to teach us something. Surely, we can learn, at least, to look at those around us as fellow men, and surely we can begin to work a little harder to bind up the wounds among us and to become in our own hearts brothers and countrymen once again.

Quote:

Were the victims in sufficiently humble n docile obedience
to the gun control laws ??

or were thay prepared to defend themselves ?

Quote:

I would deduce that they were not prepared to defend themselves.
But I would ask- why should we have to live day to day in expectation of
and prepared to defend ourselves against violence?

We don 't do that.
I don 't do that; ( I have felt safe since the first time I armed myself at age 8 ).
Its like a motorist who does not drive in fear of getting a flat,
but he has a spare and a jack in the trunk anyway, just in case.

Quote:

How sad that forty years later - our country is still beset by violence.

Quote:

I was a little child David.
I can't be sure, but I think
I was expecting that I'd be living in a world that was safe for me to live in.

U were RIGHT; no one ever shot at U.

Quote:

I am confident that when that happened those years ago,
no one in America predicted that in 40 more years ( nor any other number of years )
that there 'd be no violence here.
There has been violence since the dawn of man,
and during all the millions of years of human existence ( depending on how u define human ).

Quote:

Yes, but you have to admit that it all seems to have accelerated somewhat-
and I'm talking about violence here in the US in the last forty years -
I'm not talking about throughout history in all the countries in the world.

That is an illusion.
Since gun control began getting repudiated and rejected in 40 out of the 50 states,
in 1987 in Florida, with the others following,
crime has PLUMMETED because it became too dangerous for criminals.
Interviewing them in prison, thay said so themselves.
Thay r not afraid of the police; thay r afraid of danger from armed victims.

Quote:

By what reasoning wud anyone believe that it wud come to a halt in 40 years ??
No one even entertained the possibility.

Quote:

By a child's hopeful and idealistic vision of the world.
I guess I just hoped it would be different than it is.
Maybe it has nothing to do with reason.

Lemme get this straight:
if someone had asked u what u were thinking,
in your childhood, the correct answer wud have been
that u were hoping that violence wud end all of a sudden,
within the next 40 years ?

Quote:

Quote:

And I wonder if Americans know that people in other countries don't live the way we do in America-
afraid of our fellow countrymen (and even elderly women pushing grocery carts).

Do u know someone who is afraid of our fellow countrymen ?

Quote:

Yes, ME! As a woman, I've always had to be somewhat afraid of what
might happen to me in this country, and take precautions and be
hyperaware of what was going on around me.

There was a scandal in the press a few years ago
of a woman who got hit on the head, and seriously injured,
by a demented bum in the street, wielding a cement block, or fragment thereof.
Maybe thay have no demented bums in England or in Europe,
or no cement block fragments.

When I walk down the street, I have no emotion of any kind,
unless it relates to where I am going ( e.g., a good meal with good friends ).

Quote:

I don 't remember ever running into anyone of that description.
Obviously, one shud be careful where one goes
and always be properly well armed to deal with such situations as may arise.

Quote:

I have lived places where that is not the case at all -
or certainly not to the extent that it is true here.

I understand that since gun prohibition has been in effect in England
violent crime has gone up like a skyrocket, because it is so much safer
for criminals, especially burglaries of occupied homes.
I 'm not sure if I have the statistical backup for that conveniently at hand.
I have no plans to live in the land of my grandfather.

Quote:

Quote:

That's why I can't live here anymore.

U r leaving again ?

Quote:

Yep - back to England.
And with every passing day in which I read a newspaper,
I am convinced that my children and I will be able to live a freer
and safer existence there than here.

Because of your intense fondness for England,
that is probably the best choice.
U o it to yourself to cram as much happiness into your life as u can.

Got an English job ?

When r u leaving ?

Wanna have dinner again b4 u go ?

Quote:

Quote:

I am tired of viewing others and having them view me, as the enemy.

Did someone vu u as the enemy ?

Not me specifically - at least I don't think so.

Quote:

You've met me - that would be pretty silly wouldn't it -

I think I'm about as far from anyone's idea of an enemy that anyone
could possibly imagine. But I do think that people are so much more guarded
and suspicious of anyone who is a stranger to them here -
and I don't enjoy it.

I usually think of it as just minding my own business.
I don 't usually suspect anything.

Quote:

In England - you can sit at a table in a restaurant and within five minutes
you will have made a new friend. It's just not like that here.

Thay r not supposed to do that.
Thay have a REPUTATION to live up to.
The English r supposed to be cold, reserved n distant, with stiff upper lips.
On the other hand,
I was uncharacteristically unNew Yorker 2 nites ago,
at a Friendly Ice Cream restaurant,
when I overheard a fellow chatting up his waitress across the aisle,
about the history of vampires, and I struck up a conversation with him.
( Its unNew York; I know, but I can do what I damn please. )
Now, I have a new email pal.

Quote:

Quote:

And I know it doesn't have to be that way.

Anyway - this is a great speech.
He was a great writer-

Do u know who wrote it ?

Quote:

Well, obviously I THOUGHT Robert F. Kennedy did.
Go ahead- burst my bubble- who wrote it?

Politicians, including the Kennedys,
do not pay their speech writers nor their speech editors,
to sit around idly, nor do thay tend to do their work FOR THEM,
as a general rule.

Quote:

Quote:

and I think more of a sincere humanitarian than his more famous brother.

Maybe; depending on how u choose to define it.
The Kennedys were not good Americans.
The ring of freedom -- personal freedom -- was alien to their minds.
The Kennedys held freedom in disdain.

Quote:

David - I don't define people by nationality.
I don't even know or care how a good American differs from a good Nigerian.
I just like good people with good ideas.

I was trying to make the point
that Americanism = FREEDOM: l 'aissez faire free enterprize libertarian individualism.
The Kennedys do not support that.
In that sense, regardless of where thay were born, thay r not Americans.
Thay have been very anti-American.

Quote:

He quotes Lincoln, hereinbelow, as follows:
"Among free men," said Abraham Lincoln,
"there can be no successful appeal from the ballot to the bullet;
and those who take such appeal
are sure to lose their cause and pay the costs."

I noticed on the Military Channel this morning that
Abraham Lincoln ordered the assassination of President Jefferson Davis
and the entire cabinet of the Confederate States of America
and sent a Union raiding party to execute the order.

The rebels intercepted the raiders and found out about Lincoln 's plot,
then retaliated, more successfully, against Lincoln.
Shud he have taken his own advice ?

Quote:

WOW! Now that's interesting and something I hadn't heard before. Obviously he should have.

He made this speech the day after Martin Luther King was assassinated.

Quote:

On the Mindless Menace of Violence

City Club of Cleveland, Cleveland, Ohio
April 5, 1968

This is a time of shame and sorrow. It is not a day for politics. I have saved this one opportunity, my only event of today, to speak briefly to you about the mindless menace of violence in America which again stains our land and every one of our lives.

It is not the concern of any one race. The victims of the violence are black and white, rich and poor, young and old, famous and unknown. They are, most important of all, human beings whom other human beings loved and needed. No one - no matter where he lives or what he does - can be certain who will suffer from some senseless act of bloodshed. And yet it goes on and on and on in this country of ours.

Why? What has violence ever accomplished? What has it ever created? No martyr's cause has ever been stilled by an assassin's bullet.

No wrongs have ever been righted by riots and civil disorders. A sniper is only a coward, not a hero; and an uncontrolled, uncontrollable mob is only the voice of madness, not the voice of reason.

Whenever any American's life is taken by another American unnecessarily - whether it is done in the name of the law or in the defiance of the law, by one man or a gang, in cold blood or in passion, in an attack of violence or in response to violence - whenever we tear at the fabric of the life which another man has painfully and clumsily woven for himself and his children, the whole nation is degraded.

"Among free men," said Abraham Lincoln, "there can be no successful appeal from the ballot to the bullet; and those who take such appeal are sure to lose their cause and pay the costs."

Yet we seemingly tolerate a rising level of violence that ignores our common humanity and our claims to civilization alike. We calmly accept newspaper reports of civilian slaughter in far-off lands. We glorify killing on movie and television screens and call it entertainment. We make it easy for men of all shades of sanity to acquire whatever weapons and ammunition they desire.

Too often we honor swagger and bluster and wielders of force; too often we excuse those who are willing to build their own lives on the shattered dreams of others. Some Americans who preach non-violence abroad fail to practice it here at home. Some who accuse others of inciting riots have by their own conduct invited them.

Some look for scapegoats, others look for conspiracies, but this much is clear: violence breeds violence, repression brings retaliation, and only a cleansing of our whole society can remove this sickness from our soul.

For there is another kind of violence, slower but just as deadly destructive as the shot or the bomb in the night. This is the violence of institutions; indifference and inaction and slow decay. This is the violence that afflicts the poor, that poisons relations between men because their skin has different colors. This is the slow destruction of a child by hunger, and schools without books and homes without heat in the winter.

This is the breaking of a man's spirit by denying him the chance to stand as a father and as a man among other men. And this too afflicts us all.

I have not come here to propose a set of specific remedies nor is there a single set. For a broad and adequate outline we know what must be done. When you teach a man to hate and fear his brother, when you teach that he is a lesser man because of his color or his beliefs or the policies he pursues, when you teach that those who differ from you threaten your freedom or your job or your family, then you also learn to confront others not as fellow citizens but as enemies, to be met not with cooperation but with conquest; to be subjugated and mastered.

We learn, at the last, to look at our brothers as aliens, men with whom we share a city, but not a community; men bound to us in common dwelling, but not in common effort. We learn to share only a common fear, only a common desire to retreat from each other, only a common impulse to meet disagreement with force. For all this, there are no final answers.

Yet we know what we must do. It is to achieve true justice among our fellow citizens. The question is not what programs we should seek to enact. The question is whether we can find in our own midst and in our own hearts that leadership of humane purpose that will recognize the terrible truths of our existence.

We must admit the vanity of our false distinctions among men and learn to find our own advancement in the search for the advancement of others. We must admit in ourselves that our own children's future cannot be built on the misfortunes of others. We must recognize that this short life can neither be ennobled or enriched by hatred or revenge.

Our lives on this planet are too short and the work to be done too great to let this spirit flourish any longer in our land. Of course we cannot vanquish it with a program, nor with a resolution.

But we can perhaps remember, if only for a time, that those who live with us are our brothers, that they share with us the same short moment of life; that they seek, as do we, nothing but the chance to live out their lives in purpose and in happiness, winning what satisfaction and fulfillment they can.

Surely, this bond of common faith, this bond of common goal, can begin to teach us something. Surely, we can learn, at least, to look at those around us as fellow men, and surely we can begin to work a little harder to bind up the wounds among us and to become in our own hearts brothers and countrymen once again.

Quote:

I like it - don't you?

Tho I HAVE put some philosophical utterances up on my wall,
this one wud not be my choice.
I have some significant problems with it.
I 'll exegesize it tomorrow, when I have more energy.

Quote:

Today's not the day for me to talk about gun laws or lack thereof.
A very accomplished young lady (whom I didn't know) was found shot to
death on the street of a town I know intimately- her body dumped like a
piece of trash. She was twenty-two years old and the president of the
student body of UNC- Chapel Hill. I lived there and went to school there
and walked there many, many times - and to think that this kind of
violence has revisited a place like that and that someone like this
promising young woman has been claimed by it - just makes me sick.

That does indeed sound very sad.
This is how the Earth has always been.
We live in a violent universe.
Life is full of adventures and some of them r bad.

Perhaps u can take some solace
in the fact that when people die, frequently, thay don 't mind,
and have even objected to the efforts of people ( e.g., medical personnel )
who have rescued them from the jaws of death and brought them back.

Quote:

I understand that if she had been carrying a gun - she might still be alive.
BUT SHE SHOULDN'T HAVE HAD TO WORRY ABOUT THAT!!!

That is not the history of the world.
Even in your beloved England,
thay had Jack the Ripper.
That 's just the nature of the environment.

Quote:

She should have been able to go about her life without worrying
about being shot through the right temple by some maniac with a gun.

Chances r that she probably did not worry about it.

Quote:

I am so sick of reading about the murders of innocent people in this country.
It's not about guns for me - it's beyond that.

Quote:

It's just that violence seems to be everyone's answer to everything.
And everyone seems so quick to take offense and react.
And I do think that tendency seems peculiarly American.

From my observation,
this is NOT everyone 's answer to everything.
It just happens once in a while.

David

Quote:

I was a little child David.
I can't be sure, but I think
I was expecting that I'd be living in a world that was safe for me to live in.

U were RIGHT; no one ever shot at U.

Quote:

By what reasoning wud anyone believe that it wud come to a halt in 40 years ??
No one even entertained the possibility.

Quote:

By a child's hopeful and idealistic vision of the world.
I guess I just hoped it would be different than it is.
Maybe it has nothing to do with reason.

Lemme get this straight:
if someone had asked u what u were thinking,
in your childhood, the correct answer wud have been
that u were hoping that violence wud end all of a sudden,
within the next 40 years ?

Quote:

Quote:

And I wonder if Americans know that people in other countries don't live the way we do in America-
afraid of our fellow countrymen (and even elderly women pushing grocery carts).

Do u know someone who is afraid of our fellow countrymen ?

Quote:

Yes, ME! As a woman, I've always had to be somewhat afraid of what
might happen to me in this country, and take precautions and be
hyperaware of what was going on around me.

There was a scandal in the press a few years ago
of a woman who got hit on the head, and seriously injured,
by a demented bum in the street, wielding a cement block, or fragment thereof.
Maybe thay have no demented bums in England or in Europe,
or no cement block fragments.

When I walk down the street, I have no emotion of any kind,
unless it relates to where I am going ( e.g., a good meal with good friends ).

Quote:

I don 't remember ever running into anyone of that description.
Obviously, one shud be careful where one goes
and always be properly well armed to deal with such situations as may arise.

Quote:

I have lived places where that is not the case at all -
or certainly not to the extent that it is true here.

I understand that since gun prohibition has been in effect in England
violent crime has gone up like a skyrocket, because it is so much safer
for criminals, especially burglaries of occupied homes.
I 'm not sure if I have the statistical backup for that conveniently at hand.
I have no plans to live in the land of my grandfather.

Because of your intense fondness for England,
that is probably the best choice.
U o it to yourself to cram as much happiness into your life as u can.

Got an English job ?

When r u leaving ?

Wanna have dinner again b4 u go ?

I think I'm about as far from anyone's idea of an enemy that anyone
could possibly imagine. But I do think that people are so much more guarded
and suspicious of anyone who is a stranger to them here -
and I don't enjoy it.

Quote:

In England - you can sit at a table in a restaurant and within five minutes
you will have made a new friend. It's just not like that here.

Thay r not supposed to do that.
Thay have a REPUTATION to live up to.
The English r supposed to be cold, reserved n distant, with stiff upper lips.

On the other hand,
I was uncharacteristically unNew Yorker 2 nites ago,
at a Friendly Ice Cream restaurant,
when I overheard a fellow chatting up his waitress across the aisle,
about the history of vampires, and I struck up a conversation with him.
( Its unNew York; I know, but I can do what I damn please. )
Now, I have a new email pal.

Anyway - this is a great speech.
He was a great writer-

Well, obviously I THOUGHT Robert F. Kennedy did.
Go ahead- burst my bubble- who wrote it?

Quote:

Quote:

and I think more of a sincere humanitarian than his more famous brother.

Maybe; depending on how u choose to define it.
The Kennedys were not good Americans.
The ring of freedom -- personal freedom -- was alien to their minds.
The Kennedys held freedom in disdain.

Quote:

David - I don't define people by nationality.
I don't even know or care how a good American differs from a good Nigerian.
I just like good people with good ideas.

I was trying to make the point
that Americanism = FREEDOM: l 'aissez faire free enterprize libertarian individualism.
The Kennedys do not support that.
In that sense, regardless of where thay were born, thay r not Americans.
Thay have been very anti-American.

Quote:

I like it - don't you?

Tho I HAVE put some philosophical utterances up on my wall,
this one wud not be my choice.
I have some significant problems with it.
I 'll exegesize it tomorrow, when I have more energy.

Quote:

Today's not the day for me to talk about gun laws or lack thereof.
A very accomplished young lady (whom I didn't know) was found shot to
death on the street of a town I know intimately- her body dumped like a
piece of trash. She was twenty-two years old and the president of the
student body of UNC- Chapel Hill. I lived there and went to school there
and walked there many, many times - and to think that this kind of
violence has revisited a place like that and that someone like this
promising young woman has been claimed by it - just makes me sick.

That does indeed sound very sad.
This is how the Earth has always been.
We live in a violent universe.
Life is full of adventures and some of them r bad.

Perhaps u can take some solace
in the fact that when people die, frequently, thay don 't mind,
and have even objected to the efforts of people ( e.g., medical personnel )
who have rescued them from the jaws of death and brought them back.

Quote:

I understand that if she had been carrying a gun - she might still be alive.
BUT SHE SHOULDN'T HAVE HAD TO WORRY ABOUT THAT!!!

That is not the history of the world.
Even in your beloved England,
thay had Jack the Ripper.
That 's just the nature of the environment.

Quote:

She should have been able to go about her life without worrying
about being shot through the right temple by some maniac with a gun.

Chances r that she probably did not worry about it.

Quote:

It's just that violence seems to be everyone's answer to everything.
And everyone seems so quick to take offense and react.
And I do think that tendency seems peculiarly American.

From my observation,
this is NOT everyone 's answer to everything.
It just happens once in a while.

That's why I can't live here anymore. I am tired of viewing others and having them view me, as the enemy. And I know it doesn't have to be that way.

Everyone has differing perceptions and experiences. It seems ours are almost always different from one another's Soz- no matter what the subject - so I'm not surprised that you perceive this differently from me as well.

But I think if you were to read the newspapers here and compare them to British newspapers over a period of a year - you'd see why my perception might be different than yours.

I read British newspapers for three years.

I've read American newspapers for the past six months. I'd have to say in the past six months, I've read about more random violence occurring in all regions of the US than I read about in three years in England.
It seems to be a daily occurrence here, while in England it is more of a shocking exception to the rule.

That's a big factor in how my overall perception has evolved.

But it doesn't matter to me how anyone else sees it or feels about it.
Not to be rude - but I'm simply stating how I feel about it and what I've decided my solution for my family is in response to the way that we all feel. (And yes, my daughter has said she does feel safer knowing she can go to school or the mall or church without getting shot- she reads the newspaper too).
My son has stated that he feels England is less inherently racist. That's another subject - but it's also important to me (seeing that I put him in the situation of being interracial) that I provide a place for him to live if I can, where he feels more comfortable.

I don't think people who choose to live in America are wrong in any way. I can fully acknowledge that what they're doing must be what they've decided is right for them.

I'm just doing what we've decided is right for us.

I'm leaving this country, because I've found another place where I enjoy living more.

And a very real part of why I enjoy living more in England is that I do feel on a day to day and minute to minute basis- safer. I feel that there is more of a community spirit and people are more caring of each other - even strangers- and less likely to be violent toward one another.

This is very important to me, as I do enjoy spending time walking outside by myself- every single day.

And so, when I can do that without feeling afraid for my personal safety - I feel more at home and much freer in terms of what is available for me to do and still stay safe.

I don't think David gets it, and I don't know if you'll get it either Roger, because you're both men- but as a woman in this country- there are things I don't allow myself to do (such as walk alone after dark or in certain isolated places) that I DO allow myself to do other places.

When I first moved to England I liked to walk up on the moors- but there was a steep hill to climb to get up there and not many people wanted to go with me. I told someone that I wished I could go up there more often and they asked me why I couldn't. When I explained that I didn't think it was safe to go alone, they said, "Of course it is - as long as you take a mobile - so that if you trip and sprain your ankle you can summon help - nothing will happen to you up there."

They were amazed that I thought another person might come along and hurt me.

That's the last time I had cider.

aidan wrote:

I'm leaving this country, because I've found another place where I enjoy living more.

And a very real part of why I enjoy living more in England is that I do feel on a day to day and minute to minute basis- safer. I feel that there is more of a community spirit and people are more caring of each other - even strangers- and less likely to be violent toward one another.

This is very important to me, as I do enjoy spending time walking outside by myself- every single day.

And so, when I can do that without feeling afraid for my personal safety - I feel more at home and much freer in terms of what is available for me to do and still stay safe.

I don't think David gets it, and I don't know if you'll get it either Roger, because you're both men- but as a woman in this country- there are things I don't allow myself to do (such as walk alone after dark or in certain isolated places) that I DO allow myself to do other places.

When I first moved to England I liked to walk up on the moors- but there was a steep hill to climb to get up there and not many people wanted to go with me. I told someone that I wished I could go up there more often and they asked me why I couldn't. When I explained that I didn't think it was safe to go alone, they said, "Of course it is - as long as you take a mobile - so that if you trip and sprain your ankle you can summon help - nothing will happen to you up there."

They were amazed that I thought another person might come along and hurt me.

I 've never considered this b4,
but I guess that with the English being so cold and aloof all the time,
thay probably have a permanent rape rate of ZERO per year, right ?