Current Essays:
(a personal essay based on current thoughts and observations)
1. Changing Times Need to Change (2-5-2000)
2. Carry a Tree Branch, You Must Die (a look at a San Diego, Ca. Police Shooting) (3-2-2000)
Carry a Tree Branch, You Must Die!
It's a somewhat overcast February day in San Diego when all the sudden gunfire breaks out and a 40ish year old homeless man is left dead. Excuse me for not having all the intricate details. It's taken me awhile to actually post this essay and now it's very hard to find the actual news report; so I'm going from memory. I do think it's safe to say that the most important factual information is included in this essay - a man is dead, that much we know. Apparently what happened is that the Police got a call about a man wielding a 2 foot tree branch (looked more like a twig to me on the news) and he was causing some type of ruckus. From what witnesses said, he wasn't being violent. So, about 7 Police cars role up on the scene and Order the man to put the twig down. As you can tell from the title, the man is dead. The man turned toward the Officers and 7 of them fired at him and he died at the scene.
Okay. I thought we were living in this super-duper technological age where we supposedly were smarter than our ancestors and the wrest of the animals and bugs on the planet. But, to me this type of incident is completely unnecessary and brainless at the least. You can't tell me that the situation couldn't have been handled in a non-violent way? Let us go thru the list of the options the Officers had (at least as I see it):
1. Talking / Rationalizing / THINKING / Negotiating (could they have called in a psychologist? DUH)
2. Pepper Spray (This fits this situation most perfectly. I mean, really, if this stuff doesn't work, why do they carry it then?)
3. Bare Hands (I mean what happened to the days of ol' where bare hands could defeat a twig yielding man? Maybe we
are teaching our Protectors to Shoot, then ask questions later)
4. Tazer (surely electricity would have been a better accepted method of subduing than death, at least to the homeless man
it would have)
5. Baton (even a bump on the man's arm or hand is better than death. I'm sure he would have dropped the twig.)
6. Rubber Bullets (if we have to result to this, then we must be training barbarians to be our Proctors & Server, but
still better than death)
So as I see it, the Police stepped over all of these an opted to kill. I'm wondering if the 7 Officers were worried about getting too close to this smelly, old, homeless man so they opted for the more distant method of killing. I guess for them it was easier to stand several feet away (out of smelling distance of this old man) and let the bullets do the "dirty" work; no sense in getting "involved" or being "active" in this situation, just kill him and go about our day.
I was pleased to see how the San Diego citizens reacted to this shooting. The Police Chief had a public discussion regarding this use of "force." A few dozen people showed up to voice their opinions on this issue. It got so "heated" and the Police must have felt they didn't have a leg to stand on in this situation. So, what did they do? The Chief discontinued any "further" public discussions. Man, did that get the citizens angry. I guess the Police weren't ready to accept the backlash they so deserved for this horrendous misuse of deadly force.
Have we lost our way, our compassion, our brains? Is today's fast paced, internet connected, wireless enabled, fast-food, society becoming dumber and dumber? Seriously, we have lost touch with one another. God forbid the day when it's just easier to pull the trigger than it is to "take the time" to sit down, be rational, and handle the situation like humans with brains. I'm sure there are going to be those few of you who will be on the side of the Officers. You'd tell me about how much harder their job has gotten. How over-worked and unpaid their positions have become. How much more violent the criminals are that they are pursuing. And, what I'd say to you is sure, I agree with you. But can you honesty tell me that any one of those 7 officers were in direct danger of loosing their lives? I don't think you can. Deadly force is supposed to be used when you feel your life is being imminently threatened. I don't think a twig is reason enough, especially when they had other options to explore first.
(a personal essay based on current thoughts and observations)
How many of you are content with the way things are today, in this world? Honestly. I have to tell you that I am a happy person, because I am happy with myself. But, I am absolutely horrified when I see what is “happening to us” in this world and what we are becoming. This little essay will address some of the ideas that I have on my mind today.
What I mean by “happening to us” is a two way street, don’t get me wrong. Both Society and we as humans living on this Earth are both responsible.
So, my first topic in this category is Genetically Modified Foods. Has anyone even questioned this? My thoughts on this idea: does it really make any sense to change the very structure of a living organism to suit our needs? We are actually introducing a completely new organism that has never existed on this planet before. Take for example genetically modified corn, which produces its own pesticides. Well, I don’t know about you, but maybe having pesticides sprayed on the outside of food (like they have been doing for years & years) would be a little bit better, because you can “wash” this off before you eat it. Humm, when the pesticide is “built-in” that makes for a more difficult scenario. Who knows what this "new compound" will do inside the human body. Or what it would do in any creature’s body that happened to eat the corn. Any long term studies on this yet? What I mean by long term is at least two generations. That way you could research the effects of any possible transmission. I’m not here to solve the problems; I’m just hoping that the few of you that come across this page will begin to “awaken” and to see that we must do something constructive here. We as humans love the idea of playing God, but let me say that it will come back to get us in the end. In the example above, we are dealing with the entire food chain – yeah don’t forget about the things that might eat some of the corn that has dropped off onto the ground and so on. So, I say let us all forget the long-term studies, the research, the grant proposals, the new patents on these crops and get back to the basics here. If the problem is in the "pests", they why are we modifying the food? Come on, no one can possibly sit here and tell me that there are just millions more of these "pests" than there have been in the last hundred years that we've been farming using other techniques of pest control. Please don't mess with my food. Give us the choice at least. And, let me know which of my foods are modified so that I can act as a conscientious consumer.
The second thing on my mind today is common sense and caring. Where did all this suddenly go? I do believe that we all need to start and care about each other, this planet, this planet’s contents, etc. You know, living in California kind of exemplifies this idea of the Bigger and More Wasteful something is, the Cooler I look. All of this is at the expense of each other and this planet, but hey, you look cool in your SUV. I'll use this as my example here: SUV’s / Trucks. I mean how much Bigger can these things get? Let’s take a look at what an impact this has on us as a whole.
First off, these SUV’s cost more than most cars. The building and buying of these overdone, oversized, resource-consuming beasts is at odds with the conservation and support of this very planet. How much metal, rubber, wire, paint and plastic do you think takes to build this kind of Truck? Now compare that to say, a small to midsize car like the Honda Civic. First of all, on some of the BIG SUV’s, one tire could yield two of the Civics tires, is this a waste of rubber? The Civic probably gets twice the gas mileage, is this a waste of other natural resources that can’t easily and readily be replaced?
Ok, if that’s not enough to get you thinking, then what happens when the BIG, BAD SUV’s meets the Civic in an accident? I think the poor family – mothers, fathers, children don’t really have too good of a chance for survival. I don’t know about you, but I’m wondering how serious the accidents were back in the horse and buggy days. Or how much trouble you could get into just walking. To me this BIGGER, BADER, BOLDER, stuff just doesn’t make any sense.
I mean here in California, take San Diego, I’ve seen dozens of these HUGE SUV’s driving around without even a scratch on them. To me, that just says “oh, yeah, I just drive this to and from work, you know, the 1 hour commute I make.” I bet you can ask the owner, “So, you must find that 1-ton SUV mighty helpful when you make the trip up the mountain to help bring back the trees for cutting fire wood for winter.” No, they don’t use the TRUCKS that way. No, the SUV’s belong in areas where they are HELPFUL and USEFUL. Give them to the rescue crews that work in the mountains in the snow and mud. Or let the real hard working farmers have them, they can really "use" them. I bet if you take a look at all the places that would really require an SUV, you’ll see farmers, hunters, etc. all driving around in white, rusted-out ¼ ton 1963 Ford trucks. Not the Wasteful SUV’s w/ the tinted windows and 20 disc cd-changers with the mobile phone mounted front and center with the built in speaker phone. Hell, most, if not all SUV’s I see don’t even come with a mounted gun rack in the back – and they cost $40K. My God man, what are you paying for? Are you paying to suck our world dry? Are you paying to use up our natural resources? Are you paying to kill others? Yeah, basically you are and I’m not going to pay for that. I drive a ’90 Honda civic, 37 miles to the gallon, seats 2, no airbag, just wheels with an engine that gets me where I need to go. Anyone think I’m missing out on anything by not having an SUV? Hum, I don’t think so.
Do you all think we as a society are heading in the right direction? I question that every time I hear random things like: “Well alternative medicine has cured this persons cancer, etc., but there is no scientific study to document how this works..” Uh hum, excuse me. THE PERSON NO LONGER HAS THE PAIN / DISEASE, ETC. what study do you need? Even if it helps only 1 person in 100, that 1 person is cured. Give it up. The Western philosophy of medicine basically states that, “once a method is documented and repeatable, then it’s science and we can try it.” Take for example Chinese medicine. Their philosophy is that “we don’t care “HOW” (in the Western sense) this particular treatment works, we just know it does, so we will keep doing it.” Whose idea is better? I don’t know, but I’d give anything a try if I were faced with an “incurable” disease, etc. based on a Western medicine diagnosis. Another example of something I don’t think too highly about is the use of chemotherapy as a cancer 'treatment" via the Western method. I mean does that work? Sure it may kill the cancer while it’s killing the person. But we think: “Let’s just play God enough and hope that the person survives this “killing” treatment and the cancer doesn’t.” But have we lost the patient in the process? Quality of life should be the goal in some instances, especially if you look at the horrible side-effects of chemotherapy.
We all need to band together and usher in a new era of compassion for each other and this world we live in. We must not forget that we are but a grain of sand on this earth and we do not control it, but must be in harmony with it. The Earth has its ways. If we become too much of a nuisance for it, new incurable diseases will appear, earth changes will start to happen and we will start to die out in this process of the Earth cleansing itself. Hasn’t anyone noticed the strange weather we’ve been having for the past two years? Who’s to say that it’s us creating this or the Earth itself, but all I know is that if we know we are doing something to this environment, we must make changes now. Not 10-20 years from now – the time it would take to do another damn study on this or on that. Please, use common sense. If you see a frog with two heads and 5 legs in a pond next to a factory spewing toxic chemicals into the atmosphere, let’s do something about the factory. Let’s not spend any more of our tax money investigating this second head and fifth leg. The problem doesn’t lie there. Come on people we have common sense. We don't have to examine the hell out of everything just to see what is fairly obvious.
We need to have compassion for each other. Please, if the speed limit is 65 and someone in front of you is going 65, don’t ride their ass and then suddenly whiz by them yelling obscenities at them. What does that say about you? Take a look at yourself, the speed limit is 65 and if you were going 65 you probably wouldn’t be riding their ass. Try compassion, patience, love for one another. Please don’t scratch peoples cars with keys, don’t steal stuff, don’t break into houses, cars, businesses, don’t set things on fire, and please don’t kill each other or animals. If you have these urges, please take a moment and think about what a difference you can make. The power truly lies inside you to NOT do these things. Take pride in the fact that you have that much control. Don’t push your bad day, bad marriage, bad job, etc. onto an innocent person or persons. It’s not their fault and even if it was, its not your place to play judge, jury and executioner. We are all bigger than that. That’s one of the greatest gifts we all have, the ability to self-analyze. We can be rational. We can control our behavior and don’t let anyone ever tell you anything different.
If you’re looking for something to do, why don’t you try a Random Act of Kindness. Pay for the car behind you on the toll bridge. Let that person in front of you when they are entering or exiting the freeway, etc. Hold open the door for people behind you. Say “Thank You” and “Please” every chance you get. Hug friends and family as often as possible. Call old friends to say Hi. Let the person who is behind you in line at the store with only 2 items go ahead of you if you have a full cart. I can tell you that these Random Acts of Kindness perpetuate themselves. You let the guy behind you in line go first, then He goes home and kisses his wife and hugs his children and shares with them what you did. They all go to sleep that night with happy thoughts. They all wake up feeling rested and happy and He then sees a person trying to merge in on the freeway on his way to work. He remembers what you did for him last night; letting him in line, He lets this person in front of him, and He is happy about that - it goes on from there. But, keep in mind that if you respond or act in non-compassionate ways to others, this will also transfer over into their lives. Perhaps the man you cut off in a rage goes home upset, ignores his wife, grabs a glass of vodka to numb the anger inside, kids come up to say "Hi" to their daddy and he yells or slaps them, all because he had a bad day. Humm. It goes both ways folks. Make the right decision.
If this essay just gets you to think for 1 minute, then my time in writing this was well worth it. Because somewhere on a neurological / chemical level this has changed you. Your brain is no longer the "same" as it was before you thought about this. You've started on your way.
All these small acts say a lot about who you are and what you are. We were all born with a caring, loving, and compassionate soul. We should take advantage of that and use it. Show it off to the world and say by your actions, “This is who I am."
PS: for something fun and interesting, notice how may hits the search engine finds when you click on the SUV link above (more than 10,000) and then notice how many are found under Random Acts of Kindness (more than 1,000) - I do wish it were the reverse, where there is more kindness going on than SUV selling. Let's change that.