BS: How strong is your humanity

Subject: BS: How strong is your humanity
From: Donuel
Date: 07 Dec 07 - 10:06 AM

Your humanity is not as strong as you might think.

It takes only 5 or 6 days for normal compassionate people to become vicious torturers. 30 years ago experiments where a flip of a coin determined if the subjects were to play guards or prisoners showed n film how easy this process is. The guards became vicious and the prisoners suffered nervous breakdowns.


This kind of evil is most likely to be expressed as a group or team but seldom by an individual. When one person is in a room they are certain to report smoke billowing from beneath a door but put 3 people in the room and each of them wait for someone else to do something which results in no action being taken by anyone.

This is how the shrieking damned as they climbed a pyramid of bodies
composed of their neighbors, friends and family to escape the Cyclon B, were laughed at by the Nazi guards outside. Or how air was sucked from thousands of lungs in Dresden or how the Japanese briefly saw themselves glow incandescent while the pilot above ate a Milky Way.
This is how American Abu Graib became the same torture chamber as it was under Saddam Hussein. This is how 5,000 people a year die mysteriously in police captivity away from other inmates.
This is how endless lines of Jews were so easily herded into cattle cars. This is how Jonestown Kool Aid was made.

This is how America can now invade, kill and torture while declaring democracy, justice, technical legalities and innocence.

What is most disturbing is the belief that you are immune from this group dynamic, you are not. Be it an armband signifying authority, a mass religious or political gathering or team, all the humanity one thinks they have can vanish in moments. ITs not just mob mentality, it can be as few as 3 people.

The one person who does go against the group to do the right thing is sometimes called a hero, a boy scout, a whistle blower and sometimes called a traitor.

This is how my "compassionate" neighbor who spends 12 hours a week in religious worship and workshops can call for the destruction of certain branded human beings and openly seek new members to join their cause. He does not see it as fear mongering, hate or murder, he sees it as not tolerating evil any longer. Yet he too thinks himself immune from the loss of his humanity.

I would hope that you might be the one who stands up to be the hero.
The facts are, the odds are against you.


(this short essay appears on the back of my painting of Dachau entitled 'TEAM'.)


.

Subject: RE: BS: How strong is your humanity
From: Donuel
Date: 07 Dec 07 - 10:10 AM

at the bottom of the picture appears:

             TEAM
together everyone achieves more.

Subject: RE: BS: How strong is your humanity
From: Bobert
Date: 07 Dec 07 - 10:34 AM

Considering the mankind has just come from the bloodiest centyury in history I find this not surprising...

We aren't teaching peace...

We aren't practicing peace...

We need a major cultural make-over... I am a firm supporter in the creation of a Department of Peace...

It's not as if mankind can't change... It's just that mankind hasn't... There are a lot of reasons for this... The first thread I started here in Mudcat back along, long time ago was about the Department of Peace... I'm not sure if it still exhists but there were some very interesting posts related to this subject...

I believe that with an ever interconnected world economy that war is a "luxary" that mankind can no longer "afford"... I believe there will be a change in our collective culture where militarism will be looked upon as something that folks used to do... It may not happen in my life time but there are things, such as creating a Department of Peace, that we can do as baby steps... It's going to be a long process but one that manmkind, if it is to survive, must go thru...

Until them, yeah, folks can ***easily*** be manipulated into a militaristic mode because that's the way the have been ***taught*** to respond...

B~

Subject: RE: BS: How strong is your humanity
From: Donuel
Date: 07 Dec 07 - 10:58 AM

The last time we had anything like a dept of Peace was the Marshall plan or Peace Corps. but I think your idea is a worthwhile New Dept.

Subject: RE: BS: How strong is your humanity
From: jacqui.c
Date: 07 Dec 07 - 11:28 AM

I sometimes wonder how I would react if my principles were put to the test. I think that we all think that we will be able to stand against the dark but, when faced with the possibility of torture and death I think that it would be very difficult to stand in disagreement.

From my own experience I know that I can take pleasure in the discomfort of someone who has caused trouble for me or mine and can get very catty with others at the expense of such a person. I don't think that it is a likeable trait but it is there and sometimes gets free range. How far that might go in circumstances like those that existed in Nazi Germany I've not really thought about too much - I might not like the answer.

Subject: RE: BS: How strong is your humanity
From: Donuel
Date: 07 Dec 07 - 11:31 AM

Your vigilence is good for the soul.
A telltale sign that your humanity is in peril is when you start to take pride in cruelty.

Subject: RE: BS: How strong is your humanity
From: Amos
Date: 07 Dec 07 - 12:01 PM

I cannot count the number of times I have opted to mind my own business instead of spending time and money in some charitable pursuit. I can be charitable on a one-to-one basis, but I have not been an altruist for decades. I think we are immersed in a culture which focuses more and more heavily on the protection of one's own body, as the primary activity, which really does subtract a lot of merit, virtue and flavor from the society. ALthough there are other ways of conduct, they are genrally considered the options of the young, usually with independent means of support. In any case the major thrust of agreement in society is individual and material. Altruistic impulses are rarely widely agreed upon.

So Donuel's question is an important one. Which way you choose when the chips are down is the result of patterns of choice made when things ar enormal; but everyone has wellsprings of strength somewhere in them, and it is an interesting question what does or does not open the access path to them.

I think it is very important to remember the secret demonstrated by Victor Frankl, and the Dutch Ten Boom sisters, during the Holocaust. There is on center the torturer cannot reach. But it is necessary to reach it yourself.

I only hope if the moment comes when a serious challenge of that sort appears, that I am capable of right choice.


A

Subject: RE: BS: How strong is your humanity
From: Rapparee
Date: 07 Dec 07 - 12:14 PM

Well, it depends on the circumstances and who I'm dealing with.

But seriously, it IS a question of great importance. Me, I'd like to see the Dept. of Defense go back to its original name: War Department. Then we can have a Peace Department as well -- the State Department doesn't seem to be doing so well in that area.

Subject: RE: BS: How strong is your humanity
From: Donuel
Date: 07 Dec 07 - 02:32 PM

edited and spell checked version

Happy holidays for miracles and savior births.
Our humanity is not as strong as we might think. It takes only 5 or 6 days for normal compassionate people to lose their way. 30 years ago an experiment, where a flip of a coin determined if the subjects were to play guards or prisoners, showed how easy we change. The guards began to take pride in cruelty. They became vicious while the prisoners suffered complete nervous breakdowns.
This reaction is most likely to happen with a group or team but seldom by an individual.
For example: When one person is in a room they are certain to report smoke billowing from beneath a door but put 3 people in the room and each of them wait for someone else to do something which results in no action being taken by anyone.

This is how Nazi guards were able to laugh at the shrieking damned as they climbed a pyramid of bodies composed of neighbors, friends and family escape Cyclon B. Or how air was sucked from thousands of lungs in Dresden or how the Japanese briefly saw themselves glow incandescent while the pilot above passively ate a Milky Way. This is how American Abu Graib prison became a torture chamber as it was under Saddam. This is how innocent people die in police detention and how blind vengeance turns endless. This is how millions of Jews were so easily herded into cattle cars. This is how Jonestown Kool Aid was made. This is how America can now invade, kill and torture while declaring democracy, justice, technical legalities and innocence.

What is most disturbing is the belief that you are immune from this group dynamic, you are not. With a uniform signifying authority, attending a mass religious or political gathering or a normal wholesome team spirit, all the humanity one thinks they have can vanish in moments. Its not just mob mentality, it can happen with as few as 3 people.
The one person who does differently than the group to attempt the right thing is sometimes called a Hero, a boy scout, a whistle blower or even a traitor. Those who go along may be called company men, loyalists, patriots or simply main stream. Certain small but influential groups actively polarize peaceful people in order to divide and conquer. This is how the saviors who simply call for peace may also become the martyrs. Humanity it seems is not in the business of saving their saviors. We deny them.

This is how my compassionate neighbor who might spend many hours a week in religious worship openly called for harm to come to certain neighbors in town. He does not see it as bigotry, fear mongering, or hate; instead he sees it as not tolerating evil any longer. He even takes pride in his call for cruelty as proof of his righteousness. Yet he too thinks himself immune from the loss of his humanity. His church believes that gays are attacking their family. While no such attack has occured or evidence of harm demonstrated the group insists upon a terrible retribution. As scape goats go I suppose gays are targets most safe to attack. The next scape goats are certain "other religions" then color, then perhaps you.

I hope you are the one who could be the hero. Not in fighting but in saving. I hope that you love your family and children and feel goodness for the families and children surrounding you. The fact is, the odds are against you. The only defense you have against all the hate and weapons in the world is your personal communication, your personal faith and your personal expression of love for your neighbors in this world. The defense against tyranny that we all share is within a healthy US Constitution.

Merry Christmas

Subject: RE: BS: How strong is your humanity
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 07 Dec 07 - 06:05 PM

The defense against tyranny that we all share is within a healthy US Constitution. Well, we don't all share that do we?

And it doesn't really seem that healthy for those who do share it, I mean as a way of immunising people against going over to the dark side and calling it the light.

It seems to me there are two different ways in which we can fail, if put to the test. On the one had there is a failure that comes from fear, because it takes courage to stand out against pressure and the possibility of threats. We should never be too confident that we will be able to do that, until and unless we face it, and I think most of us know that.

But there is also the failure that comes from an appetite to power, a desire to hurt other people, when we are given permission to do things which had always been forbidden - and that is the kind of thing that those experiments Donuel mentioned revealed, and that came out in Abu Ghraib. (Though I don't think any of us should be fooled by the claims that what happened there was out of line with what intended to happen - apart of course from the photographic evidence getting into the public domain).

In a way that last is more frightening in what it suggest about humanity. But I think and hope there probably is more we can do to protect ourselves in advance against this kind of failure and to recognise its seeds in us.

Every time I read people writing fantasies of hate about what they'd like to do to genuinely evil people - letters in the papers, posts on the Mudcat - I get a cold shiver up my back - it seems to me there goes another person who has opened themself to the enemy within.

Subject: RE: BS: How strong is your humanity
From: Amos
Date: 07 Dec 07 - 06:53 PM

Well, we all have an Inner Lizard (or maybe Komodo Dragon); the issue whether to train or betrained by him. And severe stress -- sleeplessness, hunger, pain and threat of death -- can bring out the most lizardly in anyone. What concerns me most is the unknown number of people who open the doors to their inner Lizard when times are relatively comfortable, for whatever reasons. I am thinking, for example, of the last presidential election in this country.

A

Subject: RE: BS: How strong is your humanity
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 07 Dec 07 - 08:34 PM

The frightening thing about the Milgram experiment - which I take it was one of those Donuel was referring to - is that the people involved were not under any kind of "severe stress -- sleeplessness, hunger, pain and threat of death".

They had nothing real to gain by going along with the experimenters and doing what they had been told would involve inflicting torture and possible death on innocent victims, and nothing real to lose by refusing to do so. It was as if they were all geared up to become licensed torturers and killers, and were just waiting for permission to do so without fear of being punished for it.

And the assumption was that there is a very sizeable proportion of people like that - 60 per cent in fact was the proportion who seized the opportunity to "only obey orders" when it was offered to them. The obvious question is how far that was down to the nature of common humanity, and how far was this a refection of something in the particular society in which they had grown up, mainstream USA mid-20th century. And I'm not sure which is the more frightening of those options.

Subject: RE: BS: How strong is your humanity
From: Amos
Date: 07 Dec 07 - 09:20 PM

That's what the last election reminded me of -- the Milgram students-as-prison-guards experiment. The same hypnotic evildoing, mesmerized dumkopfery and blind oblivious stupidness ruling the minds of men...oy!!! Wodda miracle is man....



A

Subject: RE: BS: How strong is your humanity
From: Donuel
Date: 07 Dec 07 - 09:56 PM

McGrath I agree the US Copnstitution is far from healthy.

Amos please don't think that I have implied that it takes torture or hunger or sleep deprivation to make people do unspeakable things or allow dispicable acts to occur in front of them.

It merely takes; the granting of authority, a silent consent, to do as the Romans do, to follow the crowd, to do whatever is customary, to go with the flow.

The urge to conform in the human animal is seemingly more powerful than our normal grasp of civil humanity.

In a way we can see how the sadists we hired to run Abu Graib simply and naturally evolved into sadists with strong sexual overtones. Not an excuse but a reality.

The same goes for many war criminals.

Perhaps these people are distinctly different from the lone nut who runs amok and shoots up a school or shopping mall since the shooters begin with fantasies of retribution and powerlessness instead of having real ower to exercise.

Subject: RE: BS: How strong is your humanity
From: Sorcha
Date: 07 Dec 07 - 10:50 PM

I'm here with you all above. So, the next real question (as has been the real question for a long time now) is

What can we Little People actually DO about this? I know that I'm not the one to start a Movement (as Arlo said), and Cindy Sheehan damn sure tried. No news of her lately. Did 'they' beat her into the ground too?

Do we really need a Castro, a Che, in the United States now? And just WHO would that be? Sorry, I know I'm just not up to the job.

And Jacqui, I hear you too. I have been there. Revenge is bitter sweet. Usually I can hold my tongue or my actions but not always. It's the 'not always' that come back to haunt me.

Voting just doesn't seem to be the answer anymore, if it ever has been.

Communism and Socialism seem like great ideals, but in practice they haven't really worked much better than Democracy and Capitalism.

It really seems to me that Democracy--rule by the people--has seriously failed in the United States. We've been screwing up for over 200 years now. (Yes, I know that isn't long in the Grand Scheme of things) It IS better than Divine Right of Bloodline/Inherited Privlige but there just HAS to be something better.

Subject: RE: BS: How strong is your humanity
From: Stringsinger
Date: 08 Dec 07 - 05:29 PM

Sorcha, Cindy is still going strong. I receive info from her upon occasion. Remember that the general American news media has a blackout on not only Cindy but Edwards and Kucinich although Mitt, Huck, Rudy (sometimes Obama) and Hillary are routinely covered.

AS to whether Socialism, Democracy or Capitalism have worked, I think that in part they work quite well. Communism in its application tends to be totalitarian. But the post office, Social Security, and the promise of public health care are congruent with Socialist ideals.

Capitalism does work when it's regulated. Democracy is what originally built this country, albeit a modified form, but there nonetheless. Without democratic ideals, there would be no US Constitution.

I don't think any idea works on a grand scale but the application of these ideas can take place in specific instances.

Frank Hamilton

Subject: RE: BS: How strong is your humanity
From: alanabit
Date: 08 Dec 07 - 06:14 PM

That was one of the sanest political comments I have read on Mudcat.

Subject: RE: BS: How strong is your humanity
From: mg
Date: 08 Dec 07 - 06:27 PM

Have no delusions about your own superior morality in times of threat or torture. Most of you anyway..some people will somehow be true heroes no matter the conditions.   I have none about mine and I was trained at least intellectually to be a POW and I know I would have given in at some point. The green berets say we are 9 meals away from being savages. And someone said if someone has a bayonet in one hand and your baby in another you comply. I never ask myself why didn't people do more to save the people from the Holocaust etc...I know why...because if they did 10 of their family and neighbors would be killed. But I do ask myself why people do not do more when there is no danger..when you could save lives for 3 cents each a few years ago..it might be 10 cents now..just through Vitamin A pills...I ask myself why when there are people who will put themselves between those who would torture and kill the innocent and the innocent that others not only do not applaud them but castigate them and ridicule them and spit on them. Well, if we do that expect very hard choices that will come directly to you in the future...mg

Subject: RE: BS: How strong is your humanity
From: folk1e
Date: 08 Dec 07 - 07:21 PM

The obvious answer is that my humanity is very strong ..... it, however may not agree exactly with what the general perception of humanity is!
Humanity is not simply being altruistic (admirable as that may seem), nor is it being wholy individualistic. The truth as is usual lies somewhere in-between!
Until recently we have had a major war every generation, with the result that the survivors have a healthy aversion to war in general, and to war with their involvement in particular. More recently the advent of modern media allows us to experience some of the effects of war, pestilence, fammine etc without having any personal involvement in it. This has the effect of de-sensitising us to the otherwise shocking events we see daily. How many care about some african civil war that does not affect us directly? If , on the other hand, it is a local shooting where we know eather the people involved, or the place, we are very interested!
There is also a marked difference between actions taken by an individual on his own and one in a (large ) group.
Humanity is red in tooth and claw, and is also capable of completely selfless acts. This is one of the things that make us so interesting!

Subject: RE: BS: How strong is your humanity
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 09 Dec 07 - 12:41 PM

The puzzle isn't why people aren't ready to be heroes - in fact it's more the other way, why so many people do in fact find the strength and independence to be heroes in those kind of situations.

But the other mystery is how it comes about that there are other seemingly ordinary people who, seemingly of their own volition, are ready to do unspeakable things to other human beings. And the Milgram experiment suggested that, at least in that time and place, such people were a majority.

And then you think of what happened in Ruanda a few years ago - no sophisticated Nazi murder bureaucracy, just neighbours authorised to kill neighbours of a different ethnic group, and promptly doing just that. And you wonder how safe any of us are from our neighbours or from ourselves, if that is really what human beings are like. (And then you think, yes, but even in that time and place there were those who did in fact turn out to be heroes, at the risk of, and even at the cost of, their lives.)

Subject: RE: BS: How strong is your humanity
From: Amos
Date: 09 Dec 07 - 12:52 PM

I think, in the ultimate analysis, the answer lies in whether an individual has taken the ownership of his mind and heart, or left it to the determination of outside forces.

No matter how benign those external determinants may be, the moment one signs over to them the native sovereignty of self-decision, he has stepped onto the oiled slope of becoming --all nicely unwitting -- a good German or a Rwandan citizen wielding his pangi through a neighbor's throat.


A

Subject: RE: BS: How strong is your humanity
From: autolycus
Date: 09 Dec 07 - 03:06 PM

From my limited experience as a psychotherapist, vast numbers of people avoid taking THEIR responsibility. It's safer to let someone else be responsible for all sorts of reasons.

When things aren't ok, it'll be someone else's fault (blessed relief), we won't be criticised or blamed, we won't feel bad about ourselves, we can get on with being critical of them , of the other.

It gives us licence to be victims, to feel helpless, even to be fatalistic. Not to mention a ready outlet for our anger.

We think we'll be in less danger. While simultaneously being frightened of all the evil in the world.

And if we're in a situation like working for a government department,or a a corporation, or for somebody else; or reliant on government (through benefits, tax concessions, subsidies, grants, government contracts,and so on), then we'll be looked after, and let others make the big(ger) decisions.

We don't want to know, either, how much we create our world.

may I , well i just will, recommend "Listen,Little Man" by Wilhelm Reich. About how we imprison ourselves.


Disheartening to think it is "civilised", "cultured" societies that have done some of the worst we've seen in the world.

(I could write a book :-)????)

    Ivor

Subject: RE: BS: How strong is your humanity
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 09 Dec 07 - 06:42 PM

The trouble with that, Ivor, is it can easily drift only into "look after number one". I'm not disagreeing about taking responsibility - but taking responsibility means taking responsibility for other people as well.

Not too surprising that it's " 'civilised', 'cultured' societies that have done some of the worst we've seen in the world" - those terms tend to be used to mean technologically sophisticated societies (though of course that's not at all the same thing), and advanced technology makes it much easier to kill large number of people. But Ruanda showed you don't actually need that, if the will is here.

Subject: RE: BS: How strong is your humanity
From: autolycus
Date: 10 Dec 07 - 06:58 PM

This is very difficult stuff. We all struggled with it on my therapy course.

Mcgrath, you demonstrate some of the probs.

"taking responsibility" - I was careful not to say that but "take THEIR (or your) responsibility", a different thing.

The line of taking responsibility for others is very dodgy - where's their own responsibility, if you take it over? You can render others helpless or irresponsible for taking resp. for them. It depends, yes we parents do/did for our children.

As for the technology point, if those societies were truly civilised, then the technology would be used in a civilised manner. it hasn't been. So the status of advanced nations as civilised I question and doubt.


"To hell with culture as a sauce on an otherwise-stale fish." (Sculptor Eric Gill)

Ivor

Subject: RE: BS: How strong is your humanity
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 10 Dec 07 - 07:18 PM

Taking responsibility for other people shouldn't mean taking it from them, but acting responsibly towards them.

When you stand up in a crowded train to give your seat to someone who needs it more than you do, you are taking responsibility for yourself, acting responsibly towards the other person, and also towards the other people around by inviting them to do the same.

Maybe we'd do better to go back to using "civilised" just to mean a culture where cities are important. Used that way it becomes pretty self-evident there are no grounds for assuming a connection with "humane" behaviour.

Subject: RE: BS: How strong is your humanity
From: Ebbie
Date: 10 Dec 07 - 10:15 PM

I have a question/comment on a separate aspect of taking responsibility.

As a personality I tend to be mouthy, even confrontational, not paying too much mind to consequences. (It's a copout, no doubt, but as any good Saggie I feel that if *everyone* reacted as I do there would be far fewer misunderstandings. *g*)

But being as I am, I don't understand - at all - why some very nice people I know do NOT speak up, even in the face of blatant wrong. Invariably they later say something like: I didn't want to get involved. Or they'll say: I almost said something.

Ha, I say. Why *don't* they?

Subject: RE: BS: How strong is your humanity
From: autolycus
Date: 11 Dec 07 - 01:50 AM

Taking responsibility for someone is, for me,(or should i say FOR ME?), quite , quite different from acting responsibly towards someone.

So I think it illegitimate to have them mean the same thing.

"Maybe we'd do better to go back to using "civilised" just to mean a culture where cities are important. Used that way it becomes pretty self-evident there are no grounds for assuming a connection with "humane" behaviour. "

That seems to me playing with meanings to get the result you want. You thereby give yourself a get-out for the inhumanity at the heart of 'advanced societies. I'm not prepared to do so. Even if it gives me (or should I say ME?) a massive ptblem in wishing to defend culture.

Several answers, Ebbie.

One obvious one - we're not all Saggies !!

Others, fear, cowardice, wanting to keep the job, raking their fantiasies of what the outcome would be for reality, wanting to be thought 'nice', having been crushed by parents for speaking out or up,....

no doubt others here can give any number of other reasons.

A part of the 'humanity' agenda is to grasp the fact that others, 'the other' just is not me, you, us. They have different psychologies, histories, knowledge, understanding, abilities, reasons for being here, etc. eyc. etc.

A great deal of our way of life works against 'knowing', believing in the sheer inescapable reality of others, and respect for them. We are more likely to see others as parts of ourselves projected, or as things to be manipulated or ...............


And Saggies notoriously trample all over others, often in a very friendly manner, withjout realising they're foing any such thing!!


Got to make off for work.

Ivor

Subject: RE: BS: How strong is your humanity
From: Grab
Date: 11 Dec 07 - 06:07 AM

Ebbie, it's simple - fear of consequences. If you're more afraid of the consequences than of your conscience, then you'll sit and do nothing.

This is somewhat enhanced, I think, by living in cities or other large communities. The "unwritten rules" for trains show clearly that for people in very restricted conditions, the only way to respond is for everyone to pretend that everyone else isn't there. And once you've constructed your shell, I think what happens outside it becomes less relevant to you.

Graham.

Subject: RE: BS: How strong is your humanity
From: GUEST
Date: 11 Dec 07 - 07:23 AM

There are hardly any excesses of the most crazed psychopath that cannot be duplicated by a normal, kindly family man who just comes in to work every day and has a job to do.
   A man who knows that, knows everything he needs to know about people.

- Terry Pratchett.

Subject: RE: BS: How strong is your humanity
From: 3refs
Date: 11 Dec 07 - 10:23 AM

Two quick stories, one that have kind of caught me off guard recently and the other, which I saw yesterday, kind of reinforces the group or mob mentality theory, ! I think both pertain to the original post.
An old friend that I have known for over 40 years, was one of the most miserable, nasty pricks you ever had the misfortune to have for a friend. As youths, we played hockey together. I was back-up to him as goalies and was lucky enough to realize at an early age I was never going to don the #1 jersey, so I became a defenseman instead. He was without a doubt the best goalie I ever shared the same ice with and that includes several N.H.Lers. He was, unfortunately, one of the few who could transfer his on-ice attitude to the golf course. Full contact golf, with the odd fist fight thrown in, was not out of the question! In the summer months, he also played Baseball(as a pitcher), I played Lacrosse. I thought it was safer than having him throwing balls at my head during batting practice because he was just as much the PR on the ball diamond as he was anywhere else. There is no "I" in "Team", but there is an "M' and a "E" and that was him.
I hadn't spoke with him for a couple of months, when he phones me up last week. As soon as he said "Hello Rick" I could tell there was something different. 2 or 3 minutes later, I regained my composure and peeled myself off the ceiling. I was stunned! I couldn't believe it was the same person. He'd had an epiphany. He had taken his mother to church on a Sunday and instead of coming back to pick her up, he decided to go in. He told me that he looked around the inside of the church and the whole place seemed to be talking to him. Hymns and especially their numbers had special meaning to him. The verses that were chosen for the sermon that day seemed to be directed right at him. He spoke with someone after the service and he has now devoted his life to Christ. Just like that!!!!
I heard him belly laugh during our conversation more than once and I couldn't tell what decade it was when I last heard him laugh like that. He is alcohol, pharmaceutical and tobacco free for the first time in 30+ years.
Our philosophies differ on religion, and I'm hoping that he can at least if not compromise just a little, have the ability to accept that I may have a different slant on things. One thing is for sure, the new him sounds much more tolerable than the old one!
I believe that as a group, the people who were in that Anglican Church the day my friend had his rebirth had some effect on what happened to him.

"Borat", that moron from Kazakhstan. I tried to watch the movie, and yes I did find some of it funny, but for the most part I thought it was not worth watching. So I haven't seen it from start to finish. Yesterday my youngest son brings up this thing on "Youtube". It's Borat singing a Country and Western song that he wrote about his country. He's preforming in Texas I think and it must be "Talent Night" at the bar! He's introduced and is warmly received by the patrons. He starts to sing the most horrible song you ever heard "In my country we problem, and the problem is transportation". The camera pans the room to show the "hurry up and get off the freakin stage look" on most of the people faces! He starts the second verse of the song and the look turns to one of disbelief. "In my country we have problem, and the problem is the Jew" with the chorus
being "Throw the Jew down the well". Before the song is done, all those looks of disbelief have turned to laughter and most are singing along to the chorus. It wasn't funny, but it certainly was eye opening to see how fast a crowd can turn their thought patterns around!

Subject: RE: BS: How strong is your humanity
From: Amos
Date: 11 Dec 07 - 10:34 AM

With all due respect to Pratchett, that is pure codswallop. One datum, even though it may be relative true, is not a full understanding especially of something as complex as "people".

Responsibility, by its nature, tends to lift one up into larger spheres of knowing causation and willing participation.

One manifestation of this is that as an individual becomes more responsible, he starts taking other points of view into account. This ability to be pan-responsible is an extension of a lower step on the same ladder, being 'responsible for self alone'. You can see this growth in the maturation of young people (when they are healthy) for example.   You see it also when someone joins a new company as he or she acquires more awareness of the dynamics of the place.

Going down the spectrum from full responsibility to limited responsibility to completely madcap irresponsibility, the reverse happens -- one abandons taking responsibility for more than one's own view and defends it against others instead of being able to responsibly understand multiple vectors. Then one is left defending one's own responsibility against all others, and is on his way toward less and less responsibility.

The inability to communicate runs alongside the same spectrum -- and is often sympotmatic of it, in that one can't communicate into areas or about things for which he has abandoned all responsibility.

A

Subject: RE: BS: How strong is your humanity
From: autolycus
Date: 11 Dec 07 - 11:27 AM

and Pratchett's not original.

I don't do Latin but, ahem, "Homo sum: humani nil a me alienum puto". Tr. 'I am a man: nothing human is alien to me.'

Terence (c.190 - 159 BCE) in The Self-Tormentor, line 77.

I accept that a quotation is not a proof.

However, never have I come across a better way of making greater sense of others (mark, only, better) than by doing what so many won't do, exploring myself, with others as witnesses, sounding-boards, responders with integrity.

The more I went on, the more other people became more comrehensible.

I don't think we can come close to knowing another except by being them, which is impossible.


    Ivor

Subject: RE: BS: How strong is your humanity
From: autolycus
Date: 11 Dec 07 - 12:12 PM

P.S. just found this in my common-place book.

"I observe myself and so I come to know others."

    Lao-Tse, (a Taoist, ususallt given as author of Tao Te Jing), quoted in "A Life of One's Own" by 'Joanna Field'


   Ivor

Subject: RE: BS: How strong is your humanity
From: Amos
Date: 11 Dec 07 - 12:45 PM

Well said, Ivor.


A

Subject: RE: BS: How strong is your humanity
From: Donuel
Date: 11 Dec 07 - 05:15 PM

I have been on a NYC subway when a well dressed black man in a suit fell unconscious. His wire glasses bent against the floor and his briefcase fell as his body rolled back and forth across the aisle as the train took curves for about 30 seconds. People looked away and feigned ignorance. I was the only person to break out of the group conformity and went to his aid and eventually pulled the emergency cord.

Again the group dynamic of conformity was to do nothing.

Subject: RE: BS: How strong is your humanity
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 11 Dec 07 - 05:37 PM

What I've found is that when one person breaks with "the group conformity" by acting in a considerate way, a kind of domino effect can happen, and others do the same. For example when it comes to offering seats on crowded trains. Not always, but quite often. The group dynamic is, for a moment, changed.

People may look as if they are frozen into immobility, but sometimes the ice can shatter. It's a kind of catalytic process.

Subject: RE: BS: How strong is your humanity
From: Donuel
Date: 12 Dec 07 - 09:02 AM

Here's to shattering the ice McGrath!

__________________________________________________________________
The idea I have has been treated in great novels from time imemorial yet when one thinks of the story of the last supper where Jesus speaks of the human condition of conformity and tells everyone that they too will "deny" him. In his case the ice shattered too late to save his life. Of course his case was complicated by imperial political opression by Rome and temple conformists who sought to curry favor and power by pushing for cruxifiction.

The twist that was put on this story was to forgive everyone for their conformist nature that resulted in murder by saying Christ now forgives everyone... however it applies only to those who pay and obey the new church.

Thise early apostles missed a great opportunity to see the weakness in humanity when it comes to group "herd" behavior for what it is and teach a gospel to overcome this weakness instead of just saying its OK god will forgive you later.

The otherwise sweet evangelist neighbors across the street became active hateful bigots who seek to destroy FAGS and abortionists sooo easily and naturally by group dynamic conformity they too expect others to do so in as little as a week of indoctrination.

I too saw my self falling prey to hate mongering for several days following 9-11. Then I saw the controlled demolition and other inconvenient truths.

Subject: RE: BS: How strong is your humanity
From: wysiwyg
Date: 12 Dec 07 - 10:16 AM

From my experience earlier in life as a home daycare provider, I can honestly say that children start out in life as cooperative, compassionate human beings with a strong sense of justice. The culture in schools tends to pit them against one another competitively in the classroom and on the playground. That's where they develop hierarchies based on power and where they start to be willing to mistreat one another (and be mistreated by one another) in the effort to gain in power in the cultural environment where they find themselves; rewarded behaviors gain additional rewards and their sense of wrongness about it is dampened to the point that they forget life ever was or could have been different. As they grow up they impose these modes of being on younger ones, until eventually they take their place in the adult "dog eat dog" world. This is the legacy of injustice we give our children as their first inheritance.

So IMO the quesiton is not "How strong is your humanity?" but "What has to be done to humane persons to make them act out (and accept) inhumanity?" Studying it among adults is like asking why a horse runs about madly without considering the fire they're running from.

We say, "Kids can be so mean," but we don't usually ask how they get that way; we accept it as if they are born that way. They weren't.

For more, see "internalized adultism" at www.rc.org.

~Susan

Subject: RE: BS: How strong is your humanity
From: GUEST
Date: 12 Dec 07 - 10:27 AM

We say, "Kids can be so mean," but we don't usually ask how they get that way; we accept it as if they are born that way. They weren't.

Disagree. They were born that way. They were born to be pack hunters, to whom anyone outside the tribe is an enemy to be enslaved, tortured for amusement, and killed. And the other members of the tribe are rivals for dominance.

It is possible to bring children up to act in a way more "civilized" than that. But it takes work. It doesn't just happen.

For some people religion seems to help with the process. Sometimes it makes things worse.

Peter

Subject: RE: BS: How strong is your humanity
From: autolycus
Date: 12 Dec 07 - 10:30 AM

I'd agree except i wouldn't put it all on schools. In fact school is a bit late in the day.

   There is first the influence of parents and other family relations. Continuing a chain of influence from generation to generation.

   And all are influenced by the culture we live in which is riven by competitiveness, an essential part of it all. We live in the mainstream and get 'all against all' thrust thru us, or we are on the margins. Something already affecting our parents and other carers. And a society that rewards insensitivity and treasting others as, e.g., a 'cost' - to the economy or to society.


   Ivor

Subject: RE: BS: How strong is your humanity
From: Donuel
Date: 12 Dec 07 - 10:40 AM

I don't think schools have a grand scheme to indoctrinate and train kids to be uncaring competative automotons. However it does happen.
Mostly the schools are run with policies for the convenience and well being for those who run the schools. Stand in line quietly and march is usually the first group drill.

There are great examples of no put down programs that help curtail conflict and help resolve conflicts. This is real work as Peter says.

There are also Zero tolerence and police state tactics practiced in schools.

Subject: RE: BS: How strong is your humanity
From: wysiwyg
Date: 12 Dec 07 - 10:56 AM

Mostly the schools are run with policies for the convenience and well being for those who run the schools. Stand in line quietly and march is usually the first group drill.

Yes, it start with stuff like that (and teachers with the best intentions), but ultimately schools serve the prevailing economic system, not the child. The system needs "employable" workers, not people whose sense of justice would change the system.

No, babies are not born brutes.

~S~

Subject: RE: BS: How strong is your humanity
From: autolycus
Date: 12 Dec 07 - 11:27 AM

And babes learn fastest in the earliest seconds, minutes, hours, days, weeks and week and weeks, months and months, and the odd year before they get to school.

Which is, imo, a reason teachers have such an uphill task.

   Ivor

Subject: RE: BS: How strong is your humanity
From: Midchuck
Date: 12 Dec 07 - 01:27 PM

GUEST 10:27 was me. They dumped my cookie again and I didn't notice. Cookies don't last around here any longer than they do at our house.

Peter

Subject: RE: BS: How strong is your humanity
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 12 Dec 07 - 01:35 PM

You need to adjust your browser, Midchuck. It's not "they" dumping the cooky. It sounds as if you've got the browser set so it dumps it.

Subject: RE: BS: How strong is your humanity
From: Donuel
Date: 12 Dec 07 - 01:45 PM

WSYetc We are in perfect accord.

My cookie got dumped at a moment when it felt deliberate along with my post being removed from the no gods thread. It seems someone in admin may have thought my (mel brooks) joke was blatant antisemitism, which it was not and removed the explanation but not the joke.

but then again coincidence and browser settings make a perfectly acceptable hypothesis for disappearing cookies.

dear *<];^}> help yourself to the cookies

Subject: RE: BS: How strong is your humanity
From: Donuel
Date: 12 Dec 07 - 02:02 PM

bobad's excellent link about moral psychology serves this topoc well...

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/09/18/science/18mora.html?ex=1347768000&en=eeca8d0cdc299aa0&ei=5124&partner=permalink&exprod=permali

Subject: RE: BS: How strong is your humanity
From: wysiwyg
Date: 12 Dec 07 - 06:58 PM

Donuel, thanks, but I am not often in perfect accord with anyone, so I wouldn't assume that we are, too fast.

Ivor, yes, I agree that babies learn far more in their earliest months (and far more quickly) than people may realize; they get a foundation there but once they hit group dynamics, they hit whatever foundation the other kids have gotten as well as the grown kids who run the system and who have accumulated their own dose of brokenness; a lot of bad stuff has been distilled by then for the young ones to confront without their parents nearby to reinforce the good stuff-- it can overwhelm much of the best of the early parenting unless and until hard work is done to reclaim that foundation.

~Susan

Subject: RE: BS: How strong is your humanity
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 12 Dec 07 - 07:53 PM

In adult life we're a mixture of a disposition to help other people and a disposition to ignore or even harm them - and it seems to accord with experience to say that we start out with that kind of mixture.

How we balance out those is presumably affected by what happens to us along the way, and how the people around us act - but to assume that we're naturally sweet all the way down seems a bit too optimistic.

Midchuck's little pack animals ("GUEST 10:27) aren't the whole story, but they're a big element in it.

Subject: RE: BS: How strong is your humanity
From: autolycus
Date: 13 Dec 07 - 02:29 PM

Not just by "what happens to us along the way, and how the people around us act" , but also about "hard work .. done to reclaim that foundation".

My point about reasons against self-exploration and self-understanding is the general unwillingness to do that hard work.

Blaming schools, others, bigots, other children, conformists, psychopaths is easier than doing that hard work. We prefer 'easier' to 'hard'.

   Ivor

Subject: RE: BS: How strong is your humanity
From: wysiwyg
Date: 13 Dec 07 - 02:41 PM

I agree that blaming the past can stand in the way of overcoming it, but a step in overcoming is to sort out formative experiences and re-evaluate them. That can lead to at least a temporary orientation of outwardly-aimed blame, in the effort to assign resposibility around all the relevant parties and experiences (including one's own poor decisions), on the path toward boundaries and personal responsibility. To take responsibility for the whole shebang without that sorting out just reinforces the inability to think clearly and creatively about one's change process.

~S~

Subject: RE: BS: How strong is your humanity
From: autolycus
Date: 13 Dec 07 - 04:42 PM

In my 9 Dec. 3.06 post I put "vast numbers of people avoid taking THEIR responsibility".

I precisely (and loudly) talked about what responsibility I meant, and NOT about all.

Of course, many tend to read the one as the other, or make them the same.

I'm making them different.


Ivor

Subject: RE: BS: How strong is your humanity
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 13 Dec 07 - 04:50 PM

"What happens to us" - when I say that, of course includes what we do ourselves, and to ourselves, as well as what other people and other aspets of our environment contribute. All the events of our life in other words.

Subject: RE: BS: How strong is your humanity
From: autolycus
Date: 15 Dec 07 - 05:41 AM

' " What happens to us" - when I say that, of course includes what we do ourselves, and to ourselves, as well as what other people and other aspets of our environment contribute.'

    I for one really required that comment. I would never have guessed that meaning.

    'What happens to us' to me means being in a passive place, like 'what has been done to us'. It's the species of phrase used by people to express their inability to act.

    That shows in a close-up, jusat how very easy it is for misunderstandings to arise.


   

   I am all too aware how difficult it is for us to make much headway in raking OUR responsibility. So we prefer to read/understand 'OUR responsibility' identically with 'THE resposibility', which we also then equate with being 'the one to be blamed' or critised, the one thing we seek to avoid - hence blaming.

   When we blame, we let ourselves off all hooks.

   And if the other does the same, we have, if nothing grander, arguments.

   Ivor

Subject: RE: BS: How strong is your humanity
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 15 Dec 07 - 07:27 AM

What I mean is, what happens to me is a series of events throughout my life - but my decisions (among other things) will shape those events.

An example of where what looks like a disagreement is in truth more of a misundersanding.

Subject: RE: BS: How strong is your humanity
From: autolycus
Date: 15 Dec 07 - 09:41 AM

And see how easy it is to happen.


    Ivor

Subject: RE: BS: How strong is your humanity
From: George Papavgeris
Date: 16 Dec 07 - 02:27 AM

Unfortunately I have seen or heard of no evidence about the causality of this willingness to be a hero - or otherwise. Nothing to indicate that the education levels, or parental guidance, or peer group advice, or social standing, or how much one has to lose from it, are more or less likely to lead to the heroic decision when the time comes.

And I've seen in my own lifetime plenty of evidence to support the belief that humanity is only skin-deep in the vast majority.

Like all of us, I hope that when the test comes, I will prove equal to it; but the statistics are stacked against me.

All we can do meanwhile is just pray that we won't have to be so tested, and meanwhile try to be understanding and fogiving, if not accepting, of those that fail theirs.

Subject: RE: BS: How strong is your humanity
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 16 Dec 07 - 03:27 AM

"How strong is your humanity"


deep core integrity and strength of body and mind and purpose..


[and a bit comfy bagpuss silly when i'm on the weekend cider..]


call me old fashioned..!!!???


a lot of modern corporate media culture brain f@cked people would call me uncaring and 'not normal'..



well.. errmm.. actually they do..


even the mrs..


.. but.. i'd depend on me in a post nuclear winter foraging for food
in the ashes of civilisation scenario..


bet you'd like to be my mate then you radition burned starving f@ckers
with your magnetic impulse fried dead ipods and mobile phones..

Subject: RE: BS: How strong is your humanity
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 16 Dec 07 - 06:55 PM

How about your high-tech computer and internet connection?

Subject: RE: BS: How strong is your humanity
From: autolycus
Date: 19 Dec 07 - 04:06 PM

I've just reread WYSIWYG's last post and realise I partially misread it.

   On de udder hent, correctly apportioning blame is still what I'd rather not encourage. I agree about taking personal resposibility, tho' I reckon that's a far harder task than most of us are prepared to do fully.

Ivor