Has the world gotten angrier?

[harmonics101]

I think technology has a lot to do with it, specifically, computers and mobile devices. Everyone wants it yesterday. Folks like me (in the tech field) are sure feeling it. I'm thinking 6 more years and I'm out of this rat race ,

H

[delaorden9]

Originally Posted by jpd

Whew! Mega violence. But do you sense more anger?

It is no more about anger but a total twist in the principles of how a civilized society should be. We are living something really weird, disgusting, literally a bandit's country. Sadly true.

Originally Posted by kydave

I heard this on NPR last week; something on the order of 160 +/- deaths by firearms EVERY DAY in Brazil! Virtually all of these are homicide, as opposed to accident or suicide.

Wow!

Yes sir, you can believe it. And it is getting worse. It all has to do with the kind of government we are living in here these years.

[tbeltrans]

Originally Posted by El Diablo

I am friends with a very successful MMA fighter. He fights in the UFC and, if you watch UFC on television from time to time, you've probably seen him fight. He is a former champion in his weight class.

It pays, and it can pay a lot. That's why he's done it. He's provided very well for his family; certainly much better than if he'd worked a 9 to 5.

I don't see that as "angry", though. That's the sport. That's the point; to fight.

I think what's more indicative of people being angry are fights in hockey games and bench clearing brawls in baseball games. The point of neither of those sports is to fight, yet it happens with regularity.

No, I have never seen this sort of thing before except in a movie starring Charles Bronson. It was some Saturday afternoon movie years ago and I would have never thought we would see it in "real life". I remember my mother watching Monday night boxing when I was little. Howard Cosell was the announcer. My mother, normally a quiet thoughtful woman, would be yelling "Hit him!" "Put him down!". She was a completely different person. It was scary at the time and would probably be fascinating to watch her as another adult. I suppose it is better to pay somebody else to do it for you. So maybe those fighters do the public a real service in that if most fighting is done vicariously by an audience, fewer of that audience will do it themselves.

Tony

[Otterhound]

Originally Posted by tbeltrans

No, I have never seen this sort of thing before except in a movie starring Charles Bronson. It was some Saturday afternoon movie years ago and I would have never thought we would see it in "real life". I remember my mother watching Monday night boxing when I was little. Howard Cosell was the announcer. My mother, normally a quiet thoughtful woman, would be yelling "Hit him!" "Put him down!". She was a completely different person. It was scary at the time and would probably be fascinating to watch her as another adult. I suppose it is better to pay somebody else to do it for you. So maybe those fighters do the public a real service in that if most fighting is done vicariously by an audience, fewer of that audience will do it themselves.

Tony

You mom was able to release her anger in a non destructive way .
So much of this has been lost for myriad of reasons .

[ewalling]

Originally Posted by tbeltrans

I suppose it is better to pay somebody else to do it for you. So maybe those fighters do the public a real service in that if most fighting is done vicariously by an audience, fewer of that audience will do it themselves.

Art and performance have served this cathartic end for over a thousand years. Perhaps the ideal is fake fighting as in movies, though. That way we wouldn't have two individuals actually pummeling each other to lunchmeat for the sake of our stress levels.

[jpd]

Originally Posted by delaorden9

It is no more about anger but a total twist in the principles of how a civilized society should be. We are living something really weird, disgusting, literally a bandit's country. Sadly true.

Time to vacate?

[lukybob2]

Originally Posted by RobertD0

I feel that the proliferation of devices and the notion that we can communicate in 140 characters or less has isolated people and made it more difficult to react appropriately in face to face situations.

Sometimes I'll say more than a few words to someone and they'll look at me with a blank stare as if they can't handle that much information at once.

That's why I don't do social media. I guess you could say I'm anti-social media - and all the tweets I need I can hear through the open windows to our garden.

People need to drop their devices, the virtual life they've accepted, look up and reconnect in real life, IMO. It's much easier to be angry anonymously.

Isn't this forum part of the social media?

[Irish Pennant]

In the Dustin Hoffman movie "Hero" he was trying to explain "life" to his son. Paraphrasing "Life has many layers and we all exist on one of those layers......"

I guess it depends on which layer you live if you see things have become more violent. There's more to the perception than just writing it off as a portion of the population being pixilated from over pixelation.

[tbeltrans]

Originally Posted by ewalling

Art and performance have served this cathartic end for over a thousand years. Perhaps the ideal is fake fighting as in movies, though. That way we wouldn't have two individuals actually pummeling each other to lunchmeat for the sake of our stress levels.

I think there is a big difference between art/performance (i.e. an art gallery, a music concert, a play, etc., though certain movies and certain types of rock concerts seem to really cater to the violence-loving crowd) and two people beating each other up for entertainment of paying customers. However, that said, there is certainly a long history of bare-fisted boxing in this country (the US and probably many other countries), with people taking bets and prize money going to the victor, well before boxing gloves were introduced. A lot of people seem to be drawn to this stuff for some reason.
Some people like to fight, others would like to but can't/won't, so watching somebody else do it for them is probably sufficient.

Tony

[ewalling]

Originally Posted by tbeltrans

I think there is a big difference between art/performance (i.e. an art gallery, a music concert, a play, etc., though certain movies and certain types of rock concerts seem to really cater to the violence-loving crowd) and two people beating each other up for entertainment of paying customers.

I disagree. Watching Batman, or Indiana Jones, or James Bond, etc. beating the crap out of someone will satisfy the same need to purge violent emotions as watching a boxer or one of these newer, gloves-off creatures taking an opponent apart. The biggest difference seems to be that while one form of entertainment is relatively harmless, the other, most definitely, is not.

[tbeltrans]

Originally Posted by ewalling

I disagree. Watching Batman, or Indiana Jones, or James Bond, etc. beating the crap out of someone will satisfy the same need to purge violent emotions as watching a boxer or one of these newer, gloves-off creatures taking an opponent apart. The biggest difference seems to be that while one form of entertainment is relatively harmless, the other, most definitely, is not.

No reason to disagree. I included movies as an exception to what I was saying about art/performance.

Tony

[Steve DeRosa]

Are YOU talkin' to ME????????

[El Diablo]

Originally Posted by ewalling

I disagree. Watching Batman, or Indiana Jones, or James Bond, etc. beating the crap out of someone will satisfy the same need to purge violent emotions as watching a boxer or one of these newer, gloves-off creatures taking an opponent apart.

No, it won't, for the simple fact that one is "make believe" and the other is very, very real.

[ewalling]

Originally Posted by tbeltrans

No reason to disagree. I included movies as an exception to what I was saying about art/performance.

Tony

Sorry, I missed that!

[ewalling]

Originally Posted by El Diablo

No, it won't, for the simple fact that one is "make believe" and the other is very, very real.

I said that in the sentence immediately after the one you quoted.

Looks like we're all misunderstanding each other at the same time!