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logansrogueI just saw Bowling for Columbine for the first time. Some of you may ask, what took me so long? Answer? I don't know. I don't know why it took me so long, I guess some part of me didn't run to watch a documentary about something so awful. After watching it, I knew why it took me so long to see it, but I'm glad I did.
It was a very open, honest, no-bullshit view of a very controversial subject. But the violence and fear that I saw in that documentary really highlighted the fact that a society based on fear and distrust cannot survive. It can't. We as a species thrived because we formed communities, we supported each other, and as such, we beat out evolution, beat out disease, beat out injury. I see a lot of people use force as an answer to force, and the older I get, and the more I see, the more obvious it seems to me that it only makes bigger piles of dead people.
It was a good documentary. It was a hard-hitting documentary. I cried. I was mystified. I wished that Michael Moore would leave poor frail Charlton Heston alone. But I guess, he wanted answers. Here's a man leading a national organization in the most influential country in the world. He owed the world some answers, really.
The older I get, the more I see that there are very simple answers to things, and people just don't want to listen, because they're too afraid, too greedy, too cowardly. It's not easy to say, "I will not strike back." It isn't.
Try it. Try to exist without thinking in a retaliatory manner. If someone says something mean to you on the internet, or bags your clothes, or treats you like shit - try not to retaliate. That's really hard. It's an effort, isn't it? But it's a key, it's a key part of changing the cycle of fear that people all over the world are or have slipped into, particularly in America.
I made a decision a long time ago that I would behave differently. I used to be very retaliatory in my affairs on the net, and with people in general. I tell you, I was a very unhappy person. There are a whole range of problems that people are faced with every day. If people just stopped, for one moment, and thought about others, just for a moment, they'd me surprised at the difference it would make.
Sure, you're probably wondering what the hell every day dealings have to do with big gun shoot outs, but isn't that where it starts? Isn't it the little things that turn into big things? It's the little things that seed the big things and people stand there saying, "Where did this come from?!"
There's a tired old cliche, about 'love' being an answer to a lot of problems. It seems to be the understated basis of the New Testament (no, it's not just all about Jesus being the Big Bouncer into heaven - He wanted us to take care of each other damn it - people seem to ignore that part entirely), and a thread in much of the wisdom that humanity has documented. The most brilliant, peaceful and gentle man of recent years changed a country not with guns, but with a will and a purpose. When I learnt about Gandhi, something in me changed. I felt as if an eye inside of me was opening, and I saw something new.
What I don't understand is how other people cannot understand this simple concept: Don't hurt people. Just don't do it. Under any circumstances. Of course, people will say, "What if someone is threatening your family?" Well shit - if that other person was taught not to hurt people too, it wouldn't be a problem, would it? And if I lift a weapon, I'm teaching the young kids around me that it's okay to do that too. And then, like a terrible ripple, the entire generation believes that hurting is right. And then you really *do* have something to fear, because it's how people solve the problems.
But if someone is brave, if someone is brave enough to drop the damned weapon, drop the fear, stand up for what they believe in and stand down in a fight, then shit - someone else might do that too.
Michael Moore has done a wonderful thing. He showed us the face of death and fear and the vulture-like consumption of that fear through media. It's a powerful and clear message. It shows what happens to a society when certain thought processes and mentalities are rife throughout and entire culture. It's frightening, it's certainly scary.
I'm certainly not going to take any unwarranted risks in my life. Sure, I lock my doors at night, I don't go walking down the street alone at night, but I don't distrust my fellow human beings. I'd rather smile and recieve a frown than to stop smiling altogether.
I've been told that I leave myself open to being hurt, to having my country invaded by terrorists, to losing my culture, to being mugged and beaten up because I refuse to be afraid, and at the same time, refuse to be violent and retaliatory. It's not something I restrict to day-to-day survival. It's a decision I've made that permeates through everything I do.
I try to face all conflicts I'm faced with with fairness and understanding. I look at those in worse positions than myself with mercy and sympathy, and those with more than myself, good will because I know that in every life we all have and don't have different things.
You can bet your pretty arses that I've slipped up. I've narrowed my eyes at rich people, I've walked past charity workers and not given them ten cents, that sort of thing. But I don't stop trying to be a better person. I don't stop trying to behave better.
Cause if I behave better, someone else might think, "Wow, that's good of her. I should do that." They'll forget about me, personally, but the act will live on.
Why am I thinking this way? Because *other* people have been brave enough to act in a unexpectedly fair manner, and before them was someone else, and before them - it's not just a chain, it's a wave. And really? I'm happier to exist this way. I know that even if it's just a handful of people that my behaviour has benefited, that's a handful of people that weren't benefitted before.
Once, a boy rode past me on a bicycle, seeing me dressed up as a pirate - badly. He shouted at me, "Fucking HIPPY!" My first reaction was stunned disbelief, and then the second reaction was to watch him ride by, wondering why he was so mad because I was dressed differently. My third reaction was to shout at him to go fuck himself, but it's probably better that I didn't say it in hearing distance - he might have decided to beat me up. In the end, it was better to let the boy be an arsehole. I figure that karma will do its work and someone will give him shit for wearing a certain brand of cap that went out of style some months ago.
I could be proud of this reaction, because my most immediate reactions weren't vengeful, even if I felt vengeful. My most immediate reaction was bafflement - why would someone want to do that? I could be proud of that, but - somehow, I know I can't be. Because I'm lucky, I had the right upbringing. It's not something to be proud of - to not smack someone for annoying you. It's just the way things should be.
People should just be nice to each other. Call me a sap, call me a raging optimist or say that I have my head in the clouds, but tell me you don't wish that sometimes? Who doesn't?
Well, the answer to that starts with us, as individuals. It's not in guns, it's not in who might blow us up, it's not in what poor impoverished bastards in Afghanistan may or may not be plotting against their own governments. We are accountable - every single one of us.
Bowling for Columbine was a film that left me changed, just as I was changed after I'd learnt of Gandhi's work. I saw the flaws in the making of it, I saw the stylistic elements, the way Michael Moore had crafted it.
But I also saw the glaring truth. I'm very glad I did.
It was a very open, honest, no-bullshit view of a very controversial subject. But the violence and fear that I saw in that documentary really highlighted the fact that a society based on fear and distrust cannot survive. It can't. We as a species thrived because we formed communities, we supported each other, and as such, we beat out evolution, beat out disease, beat out injury. I see a lot of people use force as an answer to force, and the older I get, and the more I see, the more obvious it seems to me that it only makes bigger piles of dead people.
It was a good documentary. It was a hard-hitting documentary. I cried. I was mystified. I wished that Michael Moore would leave poor frail Charlton Heston alone. But I guess, he wanted answers. Here's a man leading a national organization in the most influential country in the world. He owed the world some answers, really.
The older I get, the more I see that there are very simple answers to things, and people just don't want to listen, because they're too afraid, too greedy, too cowardly. It's not easy to say, "I will not strike back." It isn't.
Try it. Try to exist without thinking in a retaliatory manner. If someone says something mean to you on the internet, or bags your clothes, or treats you like shit - try not to retaliate. That's really hard. It's an effort, isn't it? But it's a key, it's a key part of changing the cycle of fear that people all over the world are or have slipped into, particularly in America.
I made a decision a long time ago that I would behave differently. I used to be very retaliatory in my affairs on the net, and with people in general. I tell you, I was a very unhappy person. There are a whole range of problems that people are faced with every day. If people just stopped, for one moment, and thought about others, just for a moment, they'd me surprised at the difference it would make.
Sure, you're probably wondering what the hell every day dealings have to do with big gun shoot outs, but isn't that where it starts? Isn't it the little things that turn into big things? It's the little things that seed the big things and people stand there saying, "Where did this come from?!"
There's a tired old cliche, about 'love' being an answer to a lot of problems. It seems to be the understated basis of the New Testament (no, it's not just all about Jesus being the Big Bouncer into heaven - He wanted us to take care of each other damn it - people seem to ignore that part entirely), and a thread in much of the wisdom that humanity has documented. The most brilliant, peaceful and gentle man of recent years changed a country not with guns, but with a will and a purpose. When I learnt about Gandhi, something in me changed. I felt as if an eye inside of me was opening, and I saw something new.
What I don't understand is how other people cannot understand this simple concept: Don't hurt people. Just don't do it. Under any circumstances. Of course, people will say, "What if someone is threatening your family?" Well shit - if that other person was taught not to hurt people too, it wouldn't be a problem, would it? And if I lift a weapon, I'm teaching the young kids around me that it's okay to do that too. And then, like a terrible ripple, the entire generation believes that hurting is right. And then you really *do* have something to fear, because it's how people solve the problems.
But if someone is brave, if someone is brave enough to drop the damned weapon, drop the fear, stand up for what they believe in and stand down in a fight, then shit - someone else might do that too.
Michael Moore has done a wonderful thing. He showed us the face of death and fear and the vulture-like consumption of that fear through media. It's a powerful and clear message. It shows what happens to a society when certain thought processes and mentalities are rife throughout and entire culture. It's frightening, it's certainly scary.
I'm certainly not going to take any unwarranted risks in my life. Sure, I lock my doors at night, I don't go walking down the street alone at night, but I don't distrust my fellow human beings. I'd rather smile and recieve a frown than to stop smiling altogether.
I've been told that I leave myself open to being hurt, to having my country invaded by terrorists, to losing my culture, to being mugged and beaten up because I refuse to be afraid, and at the same time, refuse to be violent and retaliatory. It's not something I restrict to day-to-day survival. It's a decision I've made that permeates through everything I do.
I try to face all conflicts I'm faced with with fairness and understanding. I look at those in worse positions than myself with mercy and sympathy, and those with more than myself, good will because I know that in every life we all have and don't have different things.
You can bet your pretty arses that I've slipped up. I've narrowed my eyes at rich people, I've walked past charity workers and not given them ten cents, that sort of thing. But I don't stop trying to be a better person. I don't stop trying to behave better.
Cause if I behave better, someone else might think, "Wow, that's good of her. I should do that." They'll forget about me, personally, but the act will live on.
Why am I thinking this way? Because *other* people have been brave enough to act in a unexpectedly fair manner, and before them was someone else, and before them - it's not just a chain, it's a wave. And really? I'm happier to exist this way. I know that even if it's just a handful of people that my behaviour has benefited, that's a handful of people that weren't benefitted before.
Once, a boy rode past me on a bicycle, seeing me dressed up as a pirate - badly. He shouted at me, "Fucking HIPPY!" My first reaction was stunned disbelief, and then the second reaction was to watch him ride by, wondering why he was so mad because I was dressed differently. My third reaction was to shout at him to go fuck himself, but it's probably better that I didn't say it in hearing distance - he might have decided to beat me up. In the end, it was better to let the boy be an arsehole. I figure that karma will do its work and someone will give him shit for wearing a certain brand of cap that went out of style some months ago.
I could be proud of this reaction, because my most immediate reactions weren't vengeful, even if I felt vengeful. My most immediate reaction was bafflement - why would someone want to do that? I could be proud of that, but - somehow, I know I can't be. Because I'm lucky, I had the right upbringing. It's not something to be proud of - to not smack someone for annoying you. It's just the way things should be.
People should just be nice to each other. Call me a sap, call me a raging optimist or say that I have my head in the clouds, but tell me you don't wish that sometimes? Who doesn't?
Well, the answer to that starts with us, as individuals. It's not in guns, it's not in who might blow us up, it's not in what poor impoverished bastards in Afghanistan may or may not be plotting against their own governments. We are accountable - every single one of us.
Bowling for Columbine was a film that left me changed, just as I was changed after I'd learnt of Gandhi's work. I saw the flaws in the making of it, I saw the stylistic elements, the way Michael Moore had crafted it.
But I also saw the glaring truth. I'm very glad I did.
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(no subject)
Date: 2004-02-02 03:01 am (UTC)I still haven't seen Bowling... I really need to.
Sure, you're probably wondering what the hell every day dealings have to do with big gun shoot outs
There was a tale in the customers suck community about a guy who got his shotgun and shot up a burger joint. Why? Because his FRIES WERE COLD!!
That sort of irrational anger really worries me.
(no subject)
Date: 2004-02-02 03:13 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2004-02-02 03:23 am (UTC)I saw Bowling in Feb 2003 at a cinema in Lancaster full of students. I found myself caught between absolute anger and hysterical tears. Fortunately they cancelled each other out and I just sat there shaking instead.
My peace came not from Gandhi, but from someone a little more close to home: John Lennon. I remember reading a book about him (Lennon by Ray Coleman) and realising that this was a man who had been violent and chose to try and be better. I promised him then that I would try to be more like that too, that love is the answer and something learned also from men like Dr King and Gandhi and Mandela that you can always walk away from a confrontation instead of be violent, that you never have to resort to violence.
Like you, I'm totally imperfect. But just like you, I'm trying.
Love you!
(no subject)
Date: 2004-02-02 04:04 am (UTC)I smile at strangers on the train. I say "bless you" when people sneeze, even if they're complete strangers. But I'm definitely not perfect - yeesh, I'm one of the most argumentative people I know. Still, I'm doing my best. And if I can do it, maybe that will make someone else want to do it too.
So yes, thank you for this post. I do think you're a raging optimist, but I also don't see why that should be a bad thing. :)
The Darkness
Gues few i hug out in a bar with on Sunday...
(no subject)
Date: 2004-02-03 12:11 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2004-02-03 09:56 pm (UTC)