Saturday, November 22, 2008

why i am not online much

teen live streams own suicide

malaysia bans yoga so as not to corrupt muslims- can we just get rid of stupid religions already?

family farms pulled us out of great depression- we are so screwed this go round

6 comments:

jmsjoin said...

Oh Betmo give me a hug! I know, I was looking at those stories this morning. It can get overwhelming watching this slide knowing you are powerless to stop it unless you realize that and just prepare for the ride1

WeezieLou said...

when i came home last night and checked the news, the story abt the online suicide absolutely stunned me. i've had a successful teen suicide in my family, long ago but always easily surfaced with news like this. the kids who egged him on.........i immediately shut down my computer, got into bed, hugged my partner, cuddled with my dog and cat and just cried. i still feel sort of in shock.

The Future Was Yesterday said...

"can we just get rid of stupid religions already?"
They give cover to even stupider politicians. Nothing like "God's
Will!:P"

"we are so screwed this go round"
(Re family farms). Being an old, ex-farmer (we plowed dinosaur turds under for fertilizer), it's been interesting to watch farming, defined as what one or more family members did for sustance, turn into Agri-business with supporting doublespeak. To shorten the centuries my story covers, agri-business was the Walmart of it's time. It would come in, buy out struggling farmer after another for pennies on the dollar, hire qualified help away from surviving farmers. In order to compete, farmers had to go in debt to buy hundreds and often thousands of acres, then go even deeper in to buy the earthmovers they call tractors now, and the supporting equipment.

I remember one farmer I worked for as a kid, and remained friends with up until his death. He went from providing a good life for his family on 180 acres, with only seasonal debt for seed, etc., to owning 1,500 acres at the time of his retirement, and an indebtedness of over 2 million. His kids took over the farm, but went bankrupt - they were too small to compete with the agri-farms in the area!

The teen suicide I'm sad to say, didn't surprise me the least. What is near epidemic in society, had to spill over on the web. The only question was when, and how. Others cheering him on speak of a lost generation.

Dave Dubya said...

And we have plenty of American Fundies who would love to ban the "Satanic" practice of Yoga here as well.

Yoga is a time proven system of physical and mental well-being.

Why don't they go after Scientology, or the many other American neo-religious cults?

Anonymous said...

There is always hope.

We can circumvent the Agri-Businesses by eating locally...by growing our own, and sharing with neighbors.

I remember growing up...one woman would grow zucchini...another tomatoes...another onions, etc...we canned together...often cooked together...

Buying in bulk with neighbors, and then spitting the product saves beaucoup bucks.

Refusing to purchase new clothes...and shoes...using 2nd hand stores, or better yet, trading with neighbors...passing on clothes our kids/grandkids grow out of, to the next kid in size, etc.

Children do not need so many clothes...a couple of pairs of jeans...and, at most, 5 clean shirts...2 pairs of shoes (one would actually do.)

It's amazing how much money we waste on things we do not need. We've allowed advertisers to convince us that we can't survive without shiny objects...and that cannot share anything, but must each buy stuff for our individual families (which are now nuclear...so there's not even sharing within extended families).

e.g. Why must everyone on the block have a lawnmower? Why not share one mower? 7 families could do it easily...and that's if they needed to keep the damned thing for an entire day.

billie said...

well, dave, my guess is because scientology has proven brain washing techniques in their 'vitamin regimens'- and not too long ago i profiled a cnn story on fundies in florida reaching out to scientology for techniques on recruiting and whatnot. anything to keep their power.