[sense of humor: temporarily missing.]
Mar. 2nd, 2004 10:17 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
reenkaI'm kind of embarrassed now. Sometimes I just get emotional over nothing, and I think I sound like a t00b. Like, someone with a big nose and suspenders, and, you know, a nasal tone. "Blah-blah-blahbity-blah". I need to write more H/D porn. Still wankery, but more fun.
In an attempt to pre-emptively redeem myself from my own wankery, I found Spooky Muffin(!) who does Evangelion fanart. Who cares, you might say, and okay, maybe no one does. But duh! Good fanart here. Make porn, not wank, etcetcetc. I should take my own advice. And also, that isn't porn ><
Still, this Shinji just sums up how I feel without all those rambly, pesky words. Also, he's gorgeous. Yum.
And yes, it's rather sad that I've been seeing all this anime when I could've been spending time much more productively, but then... eh.
In case anyone's concerned... no, no danger of me writing anime fanfic, heh. Thank god.
I've forgotten how truly -weird- fandom is. How fast the knowledge fades. I took a peek at my friends-of list and there's -another- wacked-out trollish journal. I mean... dude. I feel like we're living in our own parody. It's like a post-modern novel or something-- the fandom, I mean. It's all self-referential and meta up the wazoo, and I really wonder how anyone could -keep- from meta, 'cause fanfiction itself is referential and meta. Well, I've said that before, but... just... it's so weird when you're no longer talking about the books or movies. Talking about "the fandom", thinking about "the fandom", even knowing something called "the fandom" -exists-, just freaks me out right now.
The idea of an "entity" like that-- I can see how it'd be a microcosm reflection of (American) society at large, and American society at large is freaking scary, man, at least as of now. I can see how it could evolve, attempt to govern itself, attempt to make some fake silly "laws" or "edicts". That's what that latest journal possibly parodies, I dunno, haven't looked that closely.
You know what those journals remind me of? Those reality tv eliminate-the-weak-link shows. And maybe they're trying to go there, but the very idea of fandom paparazzi kind of blows my mind. Of course, reality tv freaks me out too. It's like we really -are- living in some sort of lite-version fascimile of 1984, except it's not the government that's Big Brother (as much), it's the media. And the fandom has its own media, its own propaganda machine, its own little cogs and wheels and wannabes and... it makes me almost physically sick.
I don't know if I'm just over-reacting or what, I probably am, but I can see it going there. I can see people creating pop media where there was none before. Like, if the corporate drones didn't oppress us, we'd oppress ourselves. And this is nothing, just random gurgles from the corners, I'm not saying it's a Big Deal, but I'm thinking more politically ever since I saw Michael Moore's gun movie on Showtime. That freaked me out, man. The Media Machine, the sheer implacable force of it and the way every "little guy" is complicit, is fake as plastic money just like the "big dogs".
I hate politics, really. Don't care if it's "real-life" or fandom or what, I just don't like thinking of the way people are when they're bidding for power, when they're jealous and envious and disenfranchised. The mob, that's what politicians utilize the power of, and I -hate- the mob (I don't mean criminals, I mean the masses). Maybe it's just that groups scare me in general, I don't know. I always felt like individual people are beautiful and when combined, they're... frightening. Unthinking. Not thinking frightens me. Not thinking and then -doing-. Going to war. Listening to hateful rhetoric.
There's good too, of course. My mother told me about that mayor in San Francisco who's started his own little revolution by marrying any gay couple that wants it... and I could just cry, even thinking about it, and I think it's silly that I ever thought that about people, because.... It depends on the leader, maybe. It scares me that it does, but it does. I firmly believe that people -want- to help each other, they want stability and peace for their families and simple companionship. A good life. People don't want to hurt each other. They just want their friends with them and everyone else to not bother them, to allow them to live.
My mother doesn't think gay people should get married. She thinks it's "weird". Why can't they just get a "civil union", she says.
So I went on a whole big impassioned speech on human rights & self-determination and the people seizing their own degenerated institutions, defining what those institutions meant, right now and not 500 years ago when women were property and men were the owners. Fairness, free speech, freedom from persecution-- those things mean so much to me, and I keep forgetting that because it's like the passion could burn me alive and I can't live, constantly butting my head against the will of the brainwashed masses. I can't deal that most people would be angry with -me-, would resist -me- if I tried to tell them what they didn't want to hear.
It's not that people can't do this; can't be kind to each other, can't respect each other's space. In other (Western) countries, there is peace within their own borders. In other countries, it's not like this. Yes, a lot of times there are other things, things America has that they don't, but they don't have this split, this awful hypocrisy woven through everything, this glib-faced smooth-tongued fakery that's just like sandpaper against my mind.
I saw that statistic about how there are only 39 gun-related homicides in Japan in a year, and I wanted to cry. It still makes me want to cry. They're people and we're people, so why are we so fucking different? What is it about this country that makes people so violent? So unhappy? So awfully, awfully unhappy and afraid? Why is it -us-, the -people-, who want to take away rights from each other, rights to conduct our private lives as we please? We aren't being ruled by a dictatorship here in the United States. We aren't being forced to eat hard bread and live two families to an apartment, not by the government, not the white folks, not yet.
This is a wide country, isn't it? So much room... so much potential....
I don't even know what I'm talking about, or why I'm suddenly so upset; maybe it's just because I don't understand. The people I meet-- they're, as one, good people. I haven't met any kind of "wrong sort" of people in my life, but then I don't think it takes the "wrong sort", that's the awful thing. Somehow... it's something else. Because my mother is a kind person, an intelligent person, too kind for her own good even. She called me a "liberal Democrat" and I wasn't sure what she meant by that, if she thought it was a dirty term. I think it's a dirty term. Bleeding heart, right. Out of touch with "harsh reality", can't see the forest for the trees. I'm like that, I know I am....
I've never been an activist. I'm no rabble-rouser, I can't stand the idea of winding people up, causing trouble and confusion and "furor". Some people like that, like the attention and publicity and chaos, but to me it just seems like an underhanded way to hurt people, to prevent them from thinking for themselves. I want to teach, but I don't want to preach. I hate it when people imply that's what I am, in this journal; preachy, unapproachable, impenetrable. I sit there and I hand down the truth, or maybe that's just what people are conditioned to see, I don't know.
People are bound to think you're self-righteous if they don't agree with you & you get on a roll, start speaking passionately without thinking, spouting things as they come to you, using your gift of rhetoric without thought for consequence. That's what I do-- I have my ability to use language and I do it without a second thought, throwing it around this way and that. That's what other people do, too, and they enjoy it, but I hate it. I could never -want- that, couldn't be out there telling people "the truth" about their society or the world. I can't tell you what you're doing is wrong; what's more, I -won't- tell you that. I refuse to tell you that. Perhaps I get rather self-righteous about that, too.
That's what being corrupt is, if you're part of the media. Using language without thinking, without considering your real impact on people. Everyone does it in their small way, but the media-- it reaches almost everyone. That's a frightening amount of responsibility. Is it extreme hyperbole to say that if I was, in fact, self-righteous, that would mean I'm (morally) corrupt? When looking for fault, I would always start with myself.
We-- us-- the people bound together by some sense of community on livejournal-- we have this power over each other. That's what being a known member of "fandom" means to me, why I don't like the idea-- having that voice, the implied ability to wield it. Everyone is published, everyone can be heard if they speak long enough and loud enough, online.
That's why reality tv, propaganda, current politics, paparazzi, all those things-- they're all in that corrupt area of mass communication. You can't really -avoid- distorting the truth, but when you purposefully do it, when you set out to brainwash people and make them believe blatant lies-- you are hurting them. I would even say you're enslaving them, taking away their basic, central freedom, the freedom of thought. And you'd think everyone would/could think for themselves no matter what, but that's another lie; it's not that simple. Thinking is a learned skill just like writing or reading. Without the right impetus and knowledge, people's capacity remains but their skills in practice atrophy and degenerate to the point where they mistake others' words for their own.
I don't know, maybe that's why people are talking about that "Passion of Christ" movie. On the one hand, I think it's ridiculous that a movie-- any movie-- could get anyone that uptight. It's... just a movie. And yet... it's all in what you bring to it, isn't it? On the one hand, there's my unshakable belief in freedom of expression which overrides anything and everything else-- but on the other hand, there are people who believe this story, believe that it is true, so one must tread carefully. We are dealing with truth. In a way, all art deals with truth, of course, but a "true story" without any veneer, that purports to be just that... that's a dangerous thing, yes. Few things have more power, really.
I don't know where I'm going, no. I'm just all... scattered and emotional right now; went to a really powerful poetry reading by a guy who grew up in the 40s and 50s black America. He has a stunning -voice-, and he's a really strong poet, and I could -feel- what he was saying. But as strong as his voice was, as passionately as he spoke-- he was speaking, reading, only of himself, from himself. It was his voice and no one else's. I listened and I -heard-, but I wasn't overwhelmed. Instead, I was drawn out. I feel stronger, somehow, more alive. That's what art could be. That's what art -should- be.
I don't know how to get there. I -certainly- don't know how to help others get there. All I know is that it's like a haven to me; like heaven, even. A unity without conformity; a voice that's strong and clear and passionate that resonates and shakes things up but leaves them clearly and unmistakably what they are even as they're growing into what they could be. Helps people grow in its influence but allows every listener their own beat, their own texture, their own tune in the shifting, moving harmony of the reader and the writer. The harmony of understanding, of kinship. I speak, you answer. You speak, I answer. We speak, we speak, we speak; we sing.
Together, we live......
~~
...Okay, that was really kind of self-indulgent and semi-disturbing maybe, wasn't it. Er. -.- *shuts up at last*
In an attempt to pre-emptively redeem myself from my own wankery, I found Spooky Muffin(!) who does Evangelion fanart. Who cares, you might say, and okay, maybe no one does. But duh! Good fanart here. Make porn, not wank, etcetcetc. I should take my own advice. And also, that isn't porn ><
Still, this Shinji just sums up how I feel without all those rambly, pesky words. Also, he's gorgeous. Yum.
And yes, it's rather sad that I've been seeing all this anime when I could've been spending time much more productively, but then... eh.
In case anyone's concerned... no, no danger of me writing anime fanfic, heh. Thank god.
I've forgotten how truly -weird- fandom is. How fast the knowledge fades. I took a peek at my friends-of list and there's -another- wacked-out trollish journal. I mean... dude. I feel like we're living in our own parody. It's like a post-modern novel or something-- the fandom, I mean. It's all self-referential and meta up the wazoo, and I really wonder how anyone could -keep- from meta, 'cause fanfiction itself is referential and meta. Well, I've said that before, but... just... it's so weird when you're no longer talking about the books or movies. Talking about "the fandom", thinking about "the fandom", even knowing something called "the fandom" -exists-, just freaks me out right now.
The idea of an "entity" like that-- I can see how it'd be a microcosm reflection of (American) society at large, and American society at large is freaking scary, man, at least as of now. I can see how it could evolve, attempt to govern itself, attempt to make some fake silly "laws" or "edicts". That's what that latest journal possibly parodies, I dunno, haven't looked that closely.
You know what those journals remind me of? Those reality tv eliminate-the-weak-link shows. And maybe they're trying to go there, but the very idea of fandom paparazzi kind of blows my mind. Of course, reality tv freaks me out too. It's like we really -are- living in some sort of lite-version fascimile of 1984, except it's not the government that's Big Brother (as much), it's the media. And the fandom has its own media, its own propaganda machine, its own little cogs and wheels and wannabes and... it makes me almost physically sick.
I don't know if I'm just over-reacting or what, I probably am, but I can see it going there. I can see people creating pop media where there was none before. Like, if the corporate drones didn't oppress us, we'd oppress ourselves. And this is nothing, just random gurgles from the corners, I'm not saying it's a Big Deal, but I'm thinking more politically ever since I saw Michael Moore's gun movie on Showtime. That freaked me out, man. The Media Machine, the sheer implacable force of it and the way every "little guy" is complicit, is fake as plastic money just like the "big dogs".
I hate politics, really. Don't care if it's "real-life" or fandom or what, I just don't like thinking of the way people are when they're bidding for power, when they're jealous and envious and disenfranchised. The mob, that's what politicians utilize the power of, and I -hate- the mob (I don't mean criminals, I mean the masses). Maybe it's just that groups scare me in general, I don't know. I always felt like individual people are beautiful and when combined, they're... frightening. Unthinking. Not thinking frightens me. Not thinking and then -doing-. Going to war. Listening to hateful rhetoric.
There's good too, of course. My mother told me about that mayor in San Francisco who's started his own little revolution by marrying any gay couple that wants it... and I could just cry, even thinking about it, and I think it's silly that I ever thought that about people, because.... It depends on the leader, maybe. It scares me that it does, but it does. I firmly believe that people -want- to help each other, they want stability and peace for their families and simple companionship. A good life. People don't want to hurt each other. They just want their friends with them and everyone else to not bother them, to allow them to live.
My mother doesn't think gay people should get married. She thinks it's "weird". Why can't they just get a "civil union", she says.
So I went on a whole big impassioned speech on human rights & self-determination and the people seizing their own degenerated institutions, defining what those institutions meant, right now and not 500 years ago when women were property and men were the owners. Fairness, free speech, freedom from persecution-- those things mean so much to me, and I keep forgetting that because it's like the passion could burn me alive and I can't live, constantly butting my head against the will of the brainwashed masses. I can't deal that most people would be angry with -me-, would resist -me- if I tried to tell them what they didn't want to hear.
It's not that people can't do this; can't be kind to each other, can't respect each other's space. In other (Western) countries, there is peace within their own borders. In other countries, it's not like this. Yes, a lot of times there are other things, things America has that they don't, but they don't have this split, this awful hypocrisy woven through everything, this glib-faced smooth-tongued fakery that's just like sandpaper against my mind.
I saw that statistic about how there are only 39 gun-related homicides in Japan in a year, and I wanted to cry. It still makes me want to cry. They're people and we're people, so why are we so fucking different? What is it about this country that makes people so violent? So unhappy? So awfully, awfully unhappy and afraid? Why is it -us-, the -people-, who want to take away rights from each other, rights to conduct our private lives as we please? We aren't being ruled by a dictatorship here in the United States. We aren't being forced to eat hard bread and live two families to an apartment, not by the government, not the white folks, not yet.
This is a wide country, isn't it? So much room... so much potential....
I don't even know what I'm talking about, or why I'm suddenly so upset; maybe it's just because I don't understand. The people I meet-- they're, as one, good people. I haven't met any kind of "wrong sort" of people in my life, but then I don't think it takes the "wrong sort", that's the awful thing. Somehow... it's something else. Because my mother is a kind person, an intelligent person, too kind for her own good even. She called me a "liberal Democrat" and I wasn't sure what she meant by that, if she thought it was a dirty term. I think it's a dirty term. Bleeding heart, right. Out of touch with "harsh reality", can't see the forest for the trees. I'm like that, I know I am....
I've never been an activist. I'm no rabble-rouser, I can't stand the idea of winding people up, causing trouble and confusion and "furor". Some people like that, like the attention and publicity and chaos, but to me it just seems like an underhanded way to hurt people, to prevent them from thinking for themselves. I want to teach, but I don't want to preach. I hate it when people imply that's what I am, in this journal; preachy, unapproachable, impenetrable. I sit there and I hand down the truth, or maybe that's just what people are conditioned to see, I don't know.
People are bound to think you're self-righteous if they don't agree with you & you get on a roll, start speaking passionately without thinking, spouting things as they come to you, using your gift of rhetoric without thought for consequence. That's what I do-- I have my ability to use language and I do it without a second thought, throwing it around this way and that. That's what other people do, too, and they enjoy it, but I hate it. I could never -want- that, couldn't be out there telling people "the truth" about their society or the world. I can't tell you what you're doing is wrong; what's more, I -won't- tell you that. I refuse to tell you that. Perhaps I get rather self-righteous about that, too.
That's what being corrupt is, if you're part of the media. Using language without thinking, without considering your real impact on people. Everyone does it in their small way, but the media-- it reaches almost everyone. That's a frightening amount of responsibility. Is it extreme hyperbole to say that if I was, in fact, self-righteous, that would mean I'm (morally) corrupt? When looking for fault, I would always start with myself.
We-- us-- the people bound together by some sense of community on livejournal-- we have this power over each other. That's what being a known member of "fandom" means to me, why I don't like the idea-- having that voice, the implied ability to wield it. Everyone is published, everyone can be heard if they speak long enough and loud enough, online.
That's why reality tv, propaganda, current politics, paparazzi, all those things-- they're all in that corrupt area of mass communication. You can't really -avoid- distorting the truth, but when you purposefully do it, when you set out to brainwash people and make them believe blatant lies-- you are hurting them. I would even say you're enslaving them, taking away their basic, central freedom, the freedom of thought. And you'd think everyone would/could think for themselves no matter what, but that's another lie; it's not that simple. Thinking is a learned skill just like writing or reading. Without the right impetus and knowledge, people's capacity remains but their skills in practice atrophy and degenerate to the point where they mistake others' words for their own.
I don't know, maybe that's why people are talking about that "Passion of Christ" movie. On the one hand, I think it's ridiculous that a movie-- any movie-- could get anyone that uptight. It's... just a movie. And yet... it's all in what you bring to it, isn't it? On the one hand, there's my unshakable belief in freedom of expression which overrides anything and everything else-- but on the other hand, there are people who believe this story, believe that it is true, so one must tread carefully. We are dealing with truth. In a way, all art deals with truth, of course, but a "true story" without any veneer, that purports to be just that... that's a dangerous thing, yes. Few things have more power, really.
I don't know where I'm going, no. I'm just all... scattered and emotional right now; went to a really powerful poetry reading by a guy who grew up in the 40s and 50s black America. He has a stunning -voice-, and he's a really strong poet, and I could -feel- what he was saying. But as strong as his voice was, as passionately as he spoke-- he was speaking, reading, only of himself, from himself. It was his voice and no one else's. I listened and I -heard-, but I wasn't overwhelmed. Instead, I was drawn out. I feel stronger, somehow, more alive. That's what art could be. That's what art -should- be.
I don't know how to get there. I -certainly- don't know how to help others get there. All I know is that it's like a haven to me; like heaven, even. A unity without conformity; a voice that's strong and clear and passionate that resonates and shakes things up but leaves them clearly and unmistakably what they are even as they're growing into what they could be. Helps people grow in its influence but allows every listener their own beat, their own texture, their own tune in the shifting, moving harmony of the reader and the writer. The harmony of understanding, of kinship. I speak, you answer. You speak, I answer. We speak, we speak, we speak; we sing.
Together, we live......
~~
...Okay, that was really kind of self-indulgent and semi-disturbing maybe, wasn't it. Er. -.- *shuts up at last*
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2004-03-03 12:23 am (UTC)::pouts pathetically::
For the record, I love your passion. I mean, I can't always (rarely ever) think of a response, but I feel like you just make me think, and that's a good thing, yeah.
no subject
Date: 2004-03-03 03:57 pm (UTC)And also, thanks :D If I can make you think, then my work here is done~:)
no subject
Date: 2004-03-03 03:18 am (UTC)<3!
no subject
Date: 2004-03-03 03:52 pm (UTC)and so are you.
<3
[/sap]
no subject
Date: 2004-03-03 10:22 am (UTC)And I feel the same way when people are talking about something I agree with, really, when it's just more emotionally manipulative. It's one reason I know I could never really be an activist or anything. You need to believe in your cause to the point where converting people is the most important thing.
It's like somebody was saying recently that the trouble is if you think it's important to respect other peoples' views, you have to remember the other side doesn't agree with that and they're going to do anything they can to make you believe like they do, including lying or intimidating (and they might not even call it that because they're spreading "the truth"). So how can you compete against that? You think the truth should be enough, but it isn't.
And nobody can really give you truth anyway, because it's always connected to their voice. The idea that that movie is giving people the truth is incredibly scary, not just because maybe certain things aren't at all the way they happened (and certainly aren't always recorded as having happened) but because the movie is manipulating certain emotions more than presenting truth. So people then think the emotions it draws out are the truth, when maybe it's just the power of persuasion. Or something. Did that make sense?
no subject
Date: 2004-03-03 04:20 pm (UTC)I think that's an interesting thing, about voice... I mean, I can definitely see that, though... you know how the liberal arts & postmodern critic types all look down at science because it tries to give truth while pretending it doesn't -have- a "voice". I mean, enough people have said that there -is- no truth without a "voice", that all truth is, basically, colored. Subjective. It's interesting to think what postmodernism would have to say about propaganda. I mean, I think Heidegger wouldn't condone it, but.... It's hard to draw lines in the sand, in a way, since enough people don't -want- to look beyond the surface because that's more work than they need to do. Or something.
Especially when we're talking about social issues (and not hard science), it's pretty difficult to say there is a single "truth". But then you have people consciously lying and misleading and being fake, which is something else again. I mean, there is the difference between "truth" and "sincerity" there, and it's really the huge lack of sincerity that bothers me so much. Breeds paranoia more than lack of "truth", 'cause if anything, who really cares about -that-, generally?
Well, at least Michael Moore was sincere (I -think-), which is why I think he came off better than a lot of the pepole he'd "interviewed" (more like, set up). It's at least clear (to me) what his agenda was, which is always comforting, whereas what the other people do is actually do what they can to -hide- their agenda. I mean, I was really disturbed by his tactics, but then, I don't know if there is a moral high ground one can even -take-, and remain effective. So I'm confused, I guess. What would be an acceptable loss, an acceptable degree of corruption?
In a way, emotions are always "true", but... I think if people are going to believe something wholesale, you can't entirely blame the source, 'cause I think in general people believe the things that -fit- them, the things that click with them on some level. There -are- things people -won't- believe, no matter how emotionally they're put. So a good "expose" would be something that engaged both one's mind and one's emotions, 'cause most people simply don't listen if only their mind's engaged. Which is prolly why this program is on Showtime & not PBS.
Or maybe it's just too hard to force people to think, and all you can depend on is counter-programming, 'cause no one knows how to deprogram. Is there even such a thing? How would you go around stripping away the layers of societal lies within a single show? I mean, it really goes much much deeper than most people can imagine, and I think the program did show that, 'cause -everyone- was lying (if only to themselves) to some extent, and if you looked, you could definitely -see- that.
I think people can't give you the truth, but they can -show- you the truth, you just have to see it for yourself, whatever -that- means, 'cause whatever you see is bound to be colored with your particular biased perception. But. One would need to train the mind to a certain sort of discipline, I think, some sort of practice of comparing and contrasting and questioning, which is what I think science gives you.
But yes. heheheh. Of course you make sense, to me anyway~:)
no subject
Date: 2004-03-03 10:23 am (UTC)2) excellent post.
3) I know it's nit-picking, but I just had to comment on this:
I saw that statistic about how there are only 39 gun-related homicides in Japan in a year, and I wanted to cry
This statistic is actually misleading. It's probably true, but what it doesn't take into account is the fact that in Japan, by and large, private citizens are not allowed to possess guns (some details (http://www.davekopel.com/2A/LawRev/Japanese_Gun_Control.htm)), and Japanese laws allow for some pretty intense search and seizure policies. This does cut down dramatically on the number of murders, but I would venture to attribute that (at least in part) to lack of opportunity rather than an absence of societal ills. According to statistics found here (http://www.guncite.com/gun_control_gcgvinco.html) (and I make no claims for the impartiality of the data), approximately 45% of murders in the United States do not involve a gun. That compares to 98% in Japan. We do still have a murder rate that's nearly ten times higher, but some of that is *because* of the freedoms we allow ourselves: the freedom to own a gun, or a switchblade, or the right to privacy that prevents search and seizures even when someone *shouldn't* own a weapon. Whether or not these freedoms are "right" or "wise," they provide people with opportunity.
So I'm not saying that it's not horribly depressing that Americans kill as frequently as they do, or that I don't agree with most of the things you're saying. But in a crime investigation you need motive and opportunity to label someone a suspect. Without one, the other means nothing. My point I guess, is that this particular statistic speaks do a difference in opportunity between Japanese and Americans, not necessarily a difference in motive, or societal dysfunction. Sometimes it is important to keep facts in the appropriate context, and to look past the surface to gain perspective.
no subject
Date: 2004-03-03 03:41 pm (UTC)I mean, the European countries all had 200-300 murders per year according to those statistics, and then there's Canada, which does give you access to guns in K-Mart or whatever, but also has a much much smaller gun-murder rate & also seems saner in general. I mean, I don't really think Canadians or the Japanese are "saner", exactly (ha), but... yeah.
My guess would be that it's mingled lack of opportunity and a general sense of restraint in the culture. They're nowhere near as hair-trigger, it seems to me. Then again, I think both in Canada & in Japan, there's a lot more ideological stability. The people by and large aren't in flux in terms of what they believe-- even if they're being brainwashed, it's not an uphill battle; it seems stable. I don't see any revolutions any time soon, whereas I can't really say the same for this country. I suppose I'd call them "peaceful" countries, even if they -did- have a much higher gun-muder rate than they do; then again, I'd call -most- countries more peaceful than the US.
Yeah, I've heard a lot of jokes made by Americans themselves about how if America has a problem, "we just blow people up". Heh. -.-