New study/experiment. Uber conservatives now get a diagnosis?

[DanaC]

By pure happenstance one person who did not view this man as some sort of disturbing social leper, came into his proximity. Had Cicer not done so, someone else might have helped...or not. Again, to me these things are too big, too societal in nature to be left to the vagaries of human kindness. That one guy isn't just one guy. He is one visible example of a person in trouble or in need. There are many, almost countless others in most wealthy cities of the industrial West.

[TheMercenary]

Originally Posted by DanaC

By pure happenstance one person who did not view this man as some sort of disturbing social leper, came into his proximity. Had Cicer not done so, someone else might have helped...or not. Again, to me these things are too big, too societal in nature to be left to the vagaries of human kindness. That one guy isn't just one guy. He is one visible example of a person in trouble or in need. There are many, almost countless others in most wealthy cities of the industrial West.

And for that one act of kindness should be surely praised and emulated. But the problem is "Then what?". Did they take the poor homeless man home with them? Did they empty their bank account and make is life truely better? Did they buy them dinner? What about dinner the next day? Did they take them to the doctor to see if they needed medication? Did they buy them the needed medication? Are they going to supply the needed medication for ever since the poor guy obviouly can't work? Did they take them home or get them some place where they could shower? And what about all the other homeless friends he has? What about them? Where does it end?

You can't have rescue fantasies about all the bad in the world. Just do little bits here and there and try to make a difference. Are you willing to sacrifice the well being of you and your family to help every single person in the world that needs help?

[9th Engineer]

Gosh. In this deeply fractured society, it is now an option to believe that the other side is not just incorrect, not just wrong, not even just stupid, but actually broken.

Believe what you want. And then get ready for the twister.

We can't survive like this. We can't function like this. We can't live our lives believing that everybody else is a broken, sick fuck. It's not gonna work. We can't educate our children, we can't defend ourselves from enemies, we can't help the unfortunate.

Yesterday we had a study showing that almost all adult men avoid lost, crying children in malls. Why: they expect they will be charged with being a pedophile.

We simply can't go on like this. It won't end well.

The people who believe differently than you are perfectly normal people. Someday, you may need to ask them for help. What will be the result? Will they help you? Someday, they may ask you for help. Will you help them?

How are we going to come together? Especially if there comes a time when we really need to?

Welcome to the world of my generation. This doesn't even come close to scratching the surface of the conclusion most of us who've taken a good look around have come to. You're right, as a 21yo there's no way I'd ever get close to a crying kid in a mall. The new golden rule is 'no good dead goes unpunished' we've known that from middle school. You also should never try to give someone CPR because you can become implicated in their lawsuit if things don't go well. Everything is now somebody else's fault, and so your #1 priority is to avoid involvement with other people in trouble.
In my honors classes in highschool we used to laugh half-heartedly about all sorts of morbid jokes about how we were working until 2am each night so that we would be good cows for the party kids and weed smokers to milk and abuse once we grew up. You've created a generation where the intelligent are turned into cynical society haters, because that's what we've learned from school, the news, domestic policy, and everyone else sitting on the rung above us.
You know what we learned in health class in middle school? You should have seen the scared faces in the class when we covered the risks of sex. I'm not just talking about STD's here, we guys got to learn how we were legally screwed if a girl ever decided to file charges for anything. And then the next day our teacher carefully explained to the girls about how they should contact the authorities if they ever felt like they were being harassed or pressured in any way (not just sexually, just in any form). In HIGHSCHOOL!! You think I was going to risk an automatic criminal record if a girl and I had a falling out and she decided to be vindictive?
Guess what? My generation is out there with full knowledge that anyone they don't intimately know has the power to fuck up the rest of their life. I could list dozens of people I know who I've traded stories with about this shit. Assume other people are just good, normal people? Not on your fucking life!! Go and watch Brady Bunch reruns for that period in history. I'd like to send out a big fucking thanks-a-million for the society we're inheriting here.

I didn't see that post before, but you want to know what your kids think? A bunch of my friends and I from the honors organization on campus once actually toasted to faith in those we don't know, then we all grinned and almost spilled our drinks laughing. It's broken? You better fucking believe it.