Talking To Yourself
Feb17
I will never, ever forget, roughly 12 years ago, when I got my first cell phone, and a wired microphone/earpiece for it. Talking to my first wife over it, at the mall, until one of the patrons alerted security that there was some weirdo talking to himself on the property.
My, how times have changed. Now we actually stop to see how someone talking to themselves is dressed before coming to a decision.
I post this video with no commentary. Please feel free to add your own down below.
With another video, of course
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CPNK0VspQ0M
Does anyone else think it seems a little strange for this show about guns to be filmed in SoCal?
As for that video, I would like to play Devil’s Advocate for a minute and say that the officer may have suffered from flash-bulb memory, which would explain why he thought he was on the floor. However, it looks super not legit and hopefully some heads in LA will roll over this.
This is why I recommend relegalizing all the drugs. It’s not just the powerful gangs that engage in illegal production and smuggling, corrupt the police, and menace the innocent during their battles in the streets. It’s also our huge prison system, militarized police, civil asset forfeiture, and on and on. Treating drug use, dependency, and addiction does far less harm and costs far less money than criminalizing it.
To paraphrase G. K. Chesterton, the free man owns himself. He can damage himself with either eating or drinking or other drugs; he can ruin himself with gambling. If he does he is certainly a damn fool, and he might possibly be a damned soul; but if he may not, he is not a free man any more than a dog.
I’d forgotten about that Chesterton quote. That’s a good one.
The “war on drugs” has long annoyed me. We increase spending, lose revenue, and increase crime all in the name of protecting people from themselves (and with little success). It’s perhaps the greatest failure of the nanny-state philosophy.
No the biggest failure of the nanny-state philosophy is the “War on Poverty”, the “War on Drugs” is a very close second.
First, second…? I guess it depends if you’d prefer to be impoverished, or imprisoned.
The “war on poverty” has certainly cost a lot of money, and I could even see an argument for loss of revenue, but I don’t see how it can cause violent crime. Drug trafficking leads directly to organized crime. (This was obvious with alcohol during Prohibition, and yet we somehow failed to learn our lesson.) To me, that makes it worse.
Also, I doubt there’s anybody who says, “you know what I’d like to be? Poor and hungry.” The war on poverty has laudable goals, if nothing else. As Arkanabar noted (by paraphrasing Chesterton), the “war on drugs” is ultimately about reducing freedom. Bad outcome if it succeeds and bad outcome if it fails; THAT’S a true failure.
The war on drugs allows criminals to buy politicians, while the war on poverty allows those politicians to buy votes. As far as I’m concerned, they’re both evil.
I’d never argue that either isn’t inherently wrong and even evil. I’m just speaking of levels of evil. 🙂
Evil is evil.
In this case, I think the more nuanced argument is that the violent side effects of the war on drugs are obvious, while the side effects of the war on poverty are much more hidden.
The war on poverty is one way the left has been able to buy votes *and* push their agenda. It’s a fundamental corruption of our political system on more than one level. It’s the sort of political corruption that leads to things like the “SAFE” act. It’s the sort of corruption that has turned many of our largest cities into quasi-third-world cesspits.
In both cases though, the result is evil.
There are some real bad apples out there. I wonder what excuse they would be using if we didn’t have this War on Drugs? A little community policing, actually getting to know people, would have headed all this off. Instead a single anonymous tip & circumstantial evidence outside the property led to a man’s violent death in his own home. Grrr… gotta address the SWAT/paramilitary mentality of Us vs Them that makes these all to common.
Know what grinds my gears? Cops using the word “civilian”.
What should they call them?
“Citizens”, “Fellow Civilians”, “Those we are sworn to protect”. A Civilian using the term “civilian” when the military is not involved is obnoxious. You’re not in the military, you’re a damn cop. Stop thinking you’re a soldier.
Same logic applies to the military: they too are “citizens”, “fellow citizens”, “those we are sworn to protect”. Why not grump about them using the word, too?
Meanwhile the dictionary saith
ci·vil·ian
noun \sə-ˈvil-yən also -ˈvi-yən\
1: a specialist in Roman or modern civil law
2
a : one not on active duty in the armed services or not on a police or firefighting force
b : outsider 1
I have to say, it looks like it’s you who are asking adherence to your own idiosyncratic meaning for the word, not them…
In which a man charged to serve and protect murders a citizen and then lies to cover his own ass.
Stone walls and steel doors, citizens.
I watched a lone woman that was stomping, weaving, swinging and swearing outside of the office. It looked like a pro wrestling match. Then I saw she was talking to a cell phone.
I don’t know if she had a real call or even a battery. Crazy doesn’t need a real connection to reality for craziness.
I’ve long told my wife that if I ever go stark-raving mad, she should get me a Bluetooth earpiece with a big obvious light on it and tell me I need to wear it to protect myself from the aliens (or something). That way I can walk around raving to myself and anybody seeing me will also see the headset and think “man, I wonder what he and the other person are talking about” and not “time to get the men in white coats”.
*Native Californian reads alt text and cackles maniacally*
*Native Californian reads alt text and cackles maniacally*
Yeah. 😀
*person who lived in SoCal for 5 long years reads alt text and laughs out loud*
Nothing wrong with talking to yourself, it’s violent disagreements & behaviour that people should be concerned about and that can happen no matter who your talking to.
That video: enraging, but unfortunately not surprising. If you bust in with that much believe in your assumptions your bound to see what you came to see, even if it isn’t there.
http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2013/09/06/white-dallas-man-shoots-8-year-old-black-boy-in-the-face-as-he-plays-tag/
Nothing like a crazy white fucker waving his iron penis around at people and then shooting a kid (8 years old in the face) because he’s fucking looney tunes. Yeah, I don’t believe that background checks would have prevented this from happening at all…. (FACEPALM)!!!!
SoCal gives tax incentives and shows are made where the taxes are cheaper. Everyone in the U.S. likes guns even cops like guns. Now victims of gun violence are angry and mad about the misuse of guns. Another thing that makes me mad is that background checks are not a bad thing. What is a bad thing is the 7 day waiting period. If they can instantly verify if someone is a legal resident then a background check should not take 7 days.
Also, we as a country do need to start addressing our lack of mental healthcare. Crazy people that want to harm themselves or others need to be locked up for their own and the general public’s safety. The problem is that there are levels of crazy. I am ok with you talking to yourself because sometimes that is the way to get the best answers.
I am not okay with the idea of someone that angry screams and yells at people because that can escalate into physical violence. Fists can kill but we have not disarmed everyone.
Seriously, I am a liberal to the core but, the rational discussions that people have here make me hopeful for the future. Everyone on this discussion board and grant himself are the best at getting the point across that having a gun is as normal as having a car. An automobile can be as dangerous as a gun and this is the reason that there are laws limiting the use of automobiles. The NRA is not the best spokesman for gun enthusiasts because they come across as fucking nuts. Screaming and yelling with blood in your eye might get public attention but it gets you the wrong attention.
Cops and politicians need mental health screening before ever touching guns or having power over other citizens. I’d say they are a safety problem for the country than all the mass shooters since Columbine. Until then, I worry if my dachshund needs body armor.
A dachshund in body armor is an incredibly cute mental image. Helps that dachshunds are almost always cute anyway.
I don’t think I’d worry about getting body armor for a dachshund. When it works correctly, body armor just turns penetrating trauma into blunt-force trauma; In the case of a dachshund it seems likely to me that such blunt-force trauma would be fatal (breaking the spine and/or causing organ damage).
I pretty much agree with everything you said, except one point; that point I agree with in principle but disagree with in practice, and is enough of a hot-button issue for me that I can’t help but comment on it.
As presently implemented, background checks are a bad thing. So long as the ATF is able and willing to make copies of Form 4473s and enter them into a database, NICS serves as de facto gun registration. If that’s ever solved, then background checks will become not only acceptable, but desirable; I’d love to know that every gun (legally) sold is sold to somebody who’s (believed to be) able to safely own it. On the other hand, as you noted, 7-day waiting periods are pointless.
Absolutely agreed on the NRA; they seem to be shifting more and more to an extreme, which hurts public perception. I think they’re confusing a hardline policy with a hardline attitude. Convincing people that gun owners are safe, sane, rational people is a much harder task when the most visible pro-gun organization isn’t acting sane or rational. Things like “…from my cold, dead hands” are great rallying cries for gun-owners, but they aren’t the people who need to be convinced, and those cries make non-gun-owners perceive gun-owners as obsessed. I think we’ve “compromised” enough as far as gun control, but we can take a strong legal and lobbying stance without needing rhetoric.
As someone who started working in a gun store part-time last fall, I have to say that I REALLY don’t like our background check system.
Part of it is that I disagree with it ideologically (I agree with Codrea: “Anyone who can’t be trusted with a firearm cannot be trusted to live without a custodian.”), and part of it is that the amount of time we spend dealing with background checks is simply bullshit.
I’ll give you an example of something that happened within the last three months:
A guy came in to buy a gun; He and I went through the process of picking one out, and after he had decided on one, I got him paperwork. Once the paperwork was filled out, I checked it over and went to call in the background check. Busy signal. Wash, rinse, repeat for at least 15-20 minutes before I finally got through to the automated system. I entered his info, confirmed that the system spat out the same info he had given, and the system dumped me into the operator queue. After another ~35 minutes an operator finally picks up; I verify some more information for her, and she puts me on hold again while she runs the check. I wait another 15 minutes for the operator to get back to me; She reads me off an approval number, which I copy into the 4473 and then confirm with her. We terminate the call. I then finished filling out the paperwork, and was in the process of having it checked over by another employee when my boss walked up to me and handed me a phone. Guess who it was! The operator I had just spoken to! Apparently she had fucked up; she said something about having read the number off the wrong screen, and that THIS guy (the one in front of me) was actually a denial……
That’s also to say nothing of the fact that the state has also recently rolled out an electronic background check system that apparently gets confused by little things like multiple middle names….
As it stands, I’ve seen how much time this background check system wastes, and the fact that there is still a large degree of human error present. In short, it’s as much security theater as is the TSA. While my objections are largely principled (i.e. I don’t think the exercise of a fundamental right should be subject to getting the government’s permission), there are plenty of other good arguments.
On the topic of mental health, I largely agree too: We need to seriously reform our mental health system in this country. That being said, I think a large problem with the current system is that we punish people seeking care by permanently barring them from possessing firearms. Not every case of mental illness is permanent; The fact of the matter is that MOST of us will be affected by something that could be classified as “mental illness” at some point in our lives. Hell, I never saw anyone about it, but the wreck (drunk driver vs me) that totaled my first car almost certainly left me with a mild case of PTSD (I had a few flashbacks while driving, and one was especially bad). Had I gone for treatment, there’s a chance (although it’s fairly unlikely in this case) that I could have ended up a prohibited person, and all for something extremely minor. THAT is wrong, and it needs to be fixed.
As far as the NRA goes, I have my own issues with the NRA. I’m a life member, and a certified instructor (basic rifle/pistol/shotgun, muzzleloading rifle, and RSO); That said, I have MAJOR issues with the NRA’s political activity. MAJOR issues. Without getting into too much detail:
*My state’s ILA rep does not work with my state’s active grassroots groups; he seems to like to work alone, and he has a very “inside the beltway” mindset. This is not the only state that has a problem with this particular rep. Every time I have ever tried to address this with NRA/NRAILA I have been ignored, lied to, and patronized.
*There seems to be a mutual dislike between the EVP-for-life (read: the frenchman) and the NFA community. The frenchman seems to be all too willing to throw the NFA community under the bus.
*The NRA likes to advocate for mandatory training, at least so long as states select the training offered by the NRA… This is an obvious conflict of interest, and more than that I believe that it is counter-productive. (to be clear, I’m not talking about legislating mandatory training of everyone in schools, which is arguably constitutional; I’m talking about mandating training only for those wishing to exercise a right).
TLDR: We can certainly agree that the current background check system is broken, even though we might not agree with whether or not it should be continued. We can also agree that the mental health system is broken, and that it must be fixed. We can also agree that the NRA does not always act in the best interest of gun owners.
You know how I know he didn’t have a dog?
At least they all went home at the end of the shift.
Sack up nancies, wear your blue uniform, walk up and ring the fucking doorbell and wait for an answer. Worst case the eeeeevil drugs get flushed* and are “off the streets.”
* combine prob. cause for a warrant and the lack of need to play CallofDuty-leet wannabe and smart investigators could even block the sewer so tne drugs are recoverable.
Yeah, California is crazy. We’ve heard it every week we’ve all been alive. Yawn.
At least in California we don’t find black men dead in a field, beaten and throat slashed, and have the county sherrif and coroner list the death as “drug overdose”.
From a European perspective, all you US folks are crazy. Thankfully, it’s often a good kind of crazy …
Anyway, IMHO Failure To Fire is better than failure to communicate …
Love and peace — and, whatever (happy shooting?)
Being’s how my husband is a long-haul truck-driver, I went ahead and got the requisite headset so I could talk to him as frequently as he wanted me to, without whatever I was doing having to screech to a stop every time he called.
At first I tried the ear-bud type, which made my ear-canals sweat and itch in our hot summer climate.
So I got the over-the-ear type. It seemed alright, but after a while I noticed what was to be the beginnings of the worst and longest ear infection of my life.
Gordon has just had to accept that–now that the horrific mess is finally gone–I’ll not be wearing one again. Pretty much ever.
My hearing, since then, has continued to improve, from the damage it apparently had suffered from the long-term infection.. Which is funny because I’d always thought hearing loss was permanent.