Solving Some Social Problems Quickly

I've been traveling around the United States a bit lately. Everywhere from Miami to Minnesota and some places in between. Did a bit of people watching and local paper reading. Saw quite a few underlying themes in the problems we face today.....First off was the (fairly obvious to me) exclamation from a local police department: that the number one reason kids are increasing petty crime, disrespect to authority and vandalism comes from "the kids are strangers to us". Bingo! Nice point. Our transient culture and anonymous lifestyles breed crime. When everyone knows everyone else's business people behave themselves. A very annoying way to live, yes. But also safer. It's a trade off...
Secondly, from California to the South, to right here in Alaska, there were quite a few "pissed off gunmen" Holiday shootings. They are pre-meditated and aggressive. Here too I see a chapter from the book of obvious. Video games and violent media. I know everyone HATES this scape goat. They deny it like crazy--because it threatens their entertainment. But study after study shows that like it or not the media, Internet and video games do affect us (at least some of us) to normalize otherwise deviant behaviors. I'm sick and tired of people defending their right to violent entertainment, and other perversions. The science is there buddies. Our brains do internalize the stuff--chemical changes happen during arousals and adrenaline peaks. We normalize what we see (real or not--it's still there). It's really no different than being in a war torn country--it's stuff we're not supposed to see. Humans can be quite boring creatures--but give them lots of sick ideas and a few individuals are likely to see a light bulb go off.
Of course violence has been around for a long, long time. But I'm not talking about wars and tribal battles here--I'm talking about these "extreme revenge fantasies" or playing gangster.
Glamorization of deviant lifestyles is certainly the media's problem. I mean come on--what recent movies, video games or rap videos celebrate good students? Working hard? Achievement? No. They glamorize revenge plots, violent shootings and figuring out how to keep your pants halfway on your ass. How do they keep those up by the way???
As long as our kiddos celebrate being bad over being good we are doomed. Enough said.

The Kids in America

Let me begin, by stating --yes, I know not all teens are ever the same. And for every bad seed, there are plenty of good citizens...But I can't help but tie three little news tid-bits together into one tidy rant & rave...
So here goes: In the past week three little news stories caught my eye. 1- The teen girls in Minnesota who got their jollies by taunting elderly patients in their care (including sexually). 2-The trend of "sextext" or whatever I spelled wrong there--but the "quaint" little hobby of sending naked pics of yourself to others, supposedly 20% of teens (admit) they have done so. And #3- That finally a bigger & better study came out saying what I knew all along--teens ARE in fact influenced by what they see on TV, movies, internet etc.. (duh)
These cute little news items are a pretty nice picture of what happens in a country like ours. A place where the media & internet are god and when kids have more disposable time and income than in any other time in history. (re: a license to be immature brats)
The parents of these kiddies have gone to school, worked hard and chased the American dream to raise their kids in prosperity--but why I ask? So they can become little snots who don't even care about their school work (96% admit to cheating at school) and obsess about each others sexual organs? In this age of Youtube, insta-porn and millions of TV & movie options, all we do is raise little perverts. I mean 20 years ago it was unimaginable that girls would sexualize the experience of working with Alzheimer's patients. Sure, there have always been deranged loons out there, but for girls to brag about it--has shown a strange "normalization" in teen society today.
So, I don't have the answer just yet. Maybe a ton of censorship would be a nice start-- and secondly, growing up a little. But that's wishful thinking.

The Economic Catch Many Americans Don't Understand

A few months ago I saw some interviews with "Average Joes" (what a cliche at this point) but anyway, they were asked about their economic concerns. Ironically, it wasn't their retirement funds, or job security that bothered them--it was high gas, heat and other prices.
The irony here is that the high gas prices are a sign of a GOOD economy, not bad. Thus when the average working man can't afford heating oil--it's really because our oil-based economy is doing so well (increased demand)!! So now that we are in a so called "economic down turn" average Jane is looking around and saying--well this isn't so bad, my gas prices are much better...
So when you start talking about "boosting the economy" what you are really saying is: get oil demand back up, so the working man gets pinched again. Never ending cycle isn't it??