Supposedly our national pastime is Baseball. I don't think so. Our real national pastime is building grudges! There are even professional grudge builders. They make a living through ranting and raving on either TV or radio. It's amazing because it's true! They are not necessarily from one end of the political spectrum, although right wingers like Limbaugh and Beck seem to get the most attention. Have you ever watched a so-called discussion on any of those TV News shows? Nobody listens they just shout each other down, interrupt and be sarcastic. I sort of like sarcastic I must confess.
It's not just political stuff that we love to get exorcised about. Remember that case in Florida, the woman accused of murdering her child? The furor over that reminded me of the pitchforks and torches scene from Frankenstein! There is nothing so invigorating as some good old fashioned righteous indignation! Being right is just so exciting, especially when you can focus your rightful pissed-off-ness on some poor slob who could use a good smiting!
It has been a while since we burned anyone at the stake, and that's good. Of course we are oftily fond of lethally injecting people here in Texas. Living on the island, I kind of like the bumper sticker which reads, "Galveston Island, Near Texas." Being near the beach may ameliorate grudge building to some extent. The ocean seems to calm people down.
Most movies and TV shows are about how somebody gets mistreated over and over until they finally build enough of a grudge that they go berserk and shoot the place up! Once they've done that everything is okay again (it's the hero, often a cop ala Dirty Harry, who goes berserk). Well in some martial arts movies they don't use guns, they just rip people apart with their bare hands (they are nonviolent gurus after all).
Shoot Baseball is way too passive to be our national pastime! We like Football because of the physical contact, hell it's more like physical assault! Believe it or don't but, Basketball was initially intended to be a non contact sport. Nowadays nobody would watch non contact Basketball.
None of this would even matter if it did not negatively impact our individual and societal growth. Grudge builders are not healthy happy people. Grudging societies do not create great works. Here we are in the 21st century and nobody has a flying car. We are not all brilliant and cultured. Why not? Maybe we have been spending way too much energy building grudges and shooting stuff up.
Just imagine watching some yelling match like the McLaughlin group and all of sudden they are listening to each other and saying stuff like "hmm you have a point there Monica." Of course Monica would have to settle down too. I do believe in miracles, but this one might take a while!
Russell
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