So this is how it is! A confrontation with the police in a library no less turns into torture! I don't know what to think is worse: The fact the police were blantantly abusing a citizen or the crowd of spectators that did nothing to stop it!
Report Police Abuse Here
3 comments:
You have seen the reports from other cities where the police have become the long predicted therapist of last resort, when some disabled person is not recognized as such and is shot dead, because the officer feared for his life.
Grays, and their Watts & Kings, Tiananmens where "An elderly woman tried to pull out a poster with apparently political material written on it, but police ripped it up and then took her away in a van.",
it will always be the crowd that sanctions, always the authoritarian figure that is empowered. that is the meaning of leadership; the people sanction authority to act in their name.
Deep down you know these things are demonstrated in 60's era psychological/ sociological studies. For instance that prejudice in can be created in the school room when a teacher declares brown eyed students inferior, and the students, hesitating, and jokingly begin to play their hateful little tapes, but too soon take them up in earnest. Again, you observed the tapes and read the reports of college student volunteers testing the prisoner / jailer relationship, where the 'jailer' was instructed to apply ever greater punishments to the 'prisoner'.
Consequently, we can clearly see it will always be the individual who is at risk against society.
The elite well appreciate these facts, me thinks. Entire protocols of social control orbit about this center of human behavior. Even single issue politics uses the inverse function. There, the socially conservative individual, disgusted by some reputed social evil, is drawn away from his/her best interests by revulsion with purported wide spread abuse within the group he/she/it might otherwise possess the greater affinity. The benefit in even this inverse case, goes to the wily manipulator of social opinion found is some position of authority.
it will always be we could stop a wrong, if only we acted, and it will always be that generally we do not act without some 'higher' sanction... unless we choose to pay the reaper.
is it paradox if the many give so few so much that inevitably the few feel emboldend to return so so little, that it is no longer just?
In anycase, because these social forces will always interact, great societies of Man always come to their Bostons &
Besides this is LA, Everyone (lol) there is grown accustomed to the state of occupation by now.
But you object ‘it happened at UCLA’? Have you spent any time there? Let me put it this way: OJ is a UCLA graduate, and Ronald Reagan got his start in politics just down the street in Orange county.... :clue:
at some point authority comes to believe they possess what was given, and believe the exercise of authority is legitimized on just the pretext... refrain to top of page.
good stuff pb,
y :wink:
Hey y,
I have spent time in SOCAL and I am a native of that bizzare land. Add to that I happened to live in OC during that famous spring when Rodney King uttered his famous words. Ironically the national gaurd was not stupid enough to try to 'occupy' LA because they had a bit of wit when it comes to urban confrontation. The looting and fires were an extrodinary coordinated effort which indicated the gangs were organized and formidable. Nonetheless the LA basin area can easily be considerd occupied, it just happens to be tenuous at best.
An element of the psychology you mention seems to be along the lines of taking responsibility. We all really don't want responsibility and when given a chance will pass it along. This seems to be the case when we make appeals to authority. I think more than anything this is at the crux of the mentality of social hierarchy. On the one hand the pratical aspects of hierarchal organization is quite beneficial but then comes that dangerous shortcoming. We pass the buck and wash our hands of our obligations and responsibilities. Sure it is a lot easier to do that but at what cost? Even worse is when the appealed authorities pass the buck to administrative bodies or other fictional abstract entities. In short everyone is relieved of their obligations while taking the actions of an automoton. This is the real danger and perhaps why one of our founders commented why many men loathed democracy: We want relief from responsibilty and the hard work it takes to make that perfect union. Unfortunately scoundrals are more than willing to take advantage of this circumstance and the masses are none the wiser. Ultimately it does lead to disaster and we submit to the cycle of unlearned histories.
The elites are aware of the psychology of the masses and the advantages they can take from it. What is unrealized are the detriments of their actions or lack of responsibilty. They, more than anyone else, have a higher duty of care for society by virtue of their position in the social-economic hierarchy. If they do not want that responsibilty then they are obliged to transfer it to someone who is willing to take that on. But don't counton it!
So what does this say about the level of the social-moral development of our society as a whole? To me it is self evident that we are stuck in the same old rut! History repeats and the course of humanity edges ever closer to oblivion. Those on the actual position to affect change seldom do and this is part of our problem. Even worse, like the follies of past aristocrats, they feel entitled to the benefits but not to the obligations. What can we lilliputians do? I guess work hard to set things right, scream at the injustices, and organize to affect said changes. Ultimately if we take responsibility then in essence we take back the power that is rightfully ours! Until then we are mindlessly following a pattern that has been long set in the course of history.
At the moment I can only say best wishes and good luck, because we need it! But there may still be hope that we can still pursue that utopian perfect union before we succomb to our lesser natures!
Thanks for the comment!
pb
y here:
just running through after i rediscovered you site when you posted elsewhere about the mad cowboy speech generator. So i wanna get back "home", but would like to underline your comment here, that
"Ultimately if we take responsibility then in essence we take back the power that is rightfully ours!"
i am immediately convinced you have configured the proper principle, but agree it is seeming to be limited in application without the authority hierarchy, which really is nothing more or less than a necessary evil to cure the occasional individual evil. [yes, i believe police work is still for the occasion and not the general state of man, much to the going absolutist train of thought] perhaps I might examine this a bit more with you right now, the part that is “seeming to be limited in application without the authority hierarchy”.
the principle is the correct one, yet even so, to get a general practice of any social principle, the issue becomes how to get each person to appreciate the general benefit of compliance with the rule without resort to some greater purpose. The problem is thus transformed to some introversion/extroversion axis system.
"the level of the social-moral development of our society as a whole", it appear to me, cannot rise much above its weakest link, some errant individual. In fairness i note here my assumption is that all law comes from the ‘rotten apple’ principle, that to remove the rotten apple is to save the barrelful, and its introduction is as a matter of extroversion: a force coming from the outside, in the greater society, to control that which is occasionally within some otherwise sound individual.
assuming this assessment of the rotten apple, what is the nature of your principle? i suggest it is an introverted principle, in terms of the wayward individual, all other social conditions having been equalized, naturally.
Such an equalized society has already taken responsibility upon itself for the general welfare of its individuals, and it seems to me such a society has a far lower threshold of resistance to the principle of individual responsibility expressed by the broader society.
as it is probably not possible in a non-engineered species to expect perfect conformity to such principles of responsibility, and not a principle likely guaranteed even in an engineered species, the overall issue of implementation should reduce to a 'tolerance', using the standard engineering definition of tolerance, a measurable number. Surprisingly, that tolerance will be some inverse function of the degree of social equity within the society, and not dependent upon the absolute number of individuals within the society. such an inverse relationship not dependent upon absolute numbers is rather contrary to present practice of the concept of overwhelming response and extreme harshness in enforcement. because the society does presently lack equity among individuals there is a direct relationship between the degree intolerance for principle of social responsibility and the need for hierarchical authority.
overall, if i am thinking correctly, what we have here is something of a proof that a laissez faire society is a self-defeating society to be remedied primarily by finding a just equity between all individuals.
it my thinking is correct your principle is awaiting application.
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