The Western world has become ...

[Grizzly]

The Western in particular, American world has become* ...

Finish this sentence with a thought, word, comments or links..

Here's mine:

[Elvis]

confused.

[Harvey]

The embodiment of evil. The British empire killed around 19 million in India alone. The American empire may have killed nearly twice that number globally since World War 2 if we listen to the less conservative metrics. Both of these western paragons allow the Nazi's to be perceived more accurately as naive and purist dilettantes, without the finesse or the guile for the long haul. It's a story of untrammelled greed, of dead souls creating dead souls at home to create the merely dead everywhere else. Latterly to return their monstrous project from Latin America and the Far East and Africa and The middle East where they've been honing their techniques for centuries, to begin the final stages of eating themselves in their own homes and schools. A cursory glance at this forum over the last 19 months is as good a lens as can be found to demonstrate how this evil is managed, against the sentiment of those who know about it, but against their will? The mass graves in Texas were discovered in 2015, long before the latest figure head, long before the outrage against it. I admit, I'm a part of it. So are you.

https://steemit.com/syria/@caitlinjohns ... e-to-syria

[82_28]

That is what flummoxes me. Sure a part of it, but react against it. I am not going to lie, but I cried a little today a few times in fact, at my utter powerlessness to stop cruelty and bigotry in its tracks. I really always thought I could stop it and I did! But not this time. I honestly do not know if people want to hear a further rant about this totally fascist morphing of this country they can already see for themselves. I do not know whether it is in anyone's interests to hear me say I fucking told you so, twenty fucking years ago. But I did and really got a bunch of people to feel like heels for treating (somewhat) helpless people with racist intent. Now, I would never because I would bring attention to their overall safety and possibly summon a grave danger totally out of my control now.

So I got to thinking about it and I don't know if I realized if it was real or not, but this is how it starts. I began to doubt my personal and even collective power for the first time. The doubt. The should I? Could I even? I think I discovered where this shit begins.

I hope to motor through this doubt, because that is what provenance requires.

[peartreed]

Here in Canada we often use the old analogy of our proximity to the USA as sleeping next to an elephant. We feel your every move as it impacts us as bed partners. Up until recently that mutual relationship had been mostly good, despite upheavals.

However, since Trump hit us with new tariffs for “security” reasons, turned on us at the G7, insulted Trudeau and reneged on the joint communiqué with the allies there while flying off to schmooze and bond with the North Korean tyrant dictator, the elephant we slept beside has become rogue and dangerous.

All of your international trade and foreign relations are in jeopardy with your President’s precipitous policy changes and your domestic crises compounding them.

The entire Western Alliance has reacted as we have, seeing the ghost of the fascism we all defeated in the last world war begin to rise again from our shared bed sheets.

Within Canada we are watching with alarm as America transforms under Trump. Along with the world, we are wondering what can now be done to tame the beast.

[kelley]

this is beyond irrational

thanatos is strong

we've lived thru the tipping point at the end of the last century* and the damage is done

RI is a record of much if not all that's happened since


*i remember reading the great edmund o. wilson's 'consilience' in the late '90s and thinking 'yes of course'

we're so so so far away from even imagining such a premise now and i'm pretty sure it's too late regardless

[kelley]

[ dubz ]

[Cordelia]

.....increasingly seen for what it is, all-consuming.

[liminalOyster]

A ding dong ditch with a flaming bag of shit at the doorway to the cosmos.

[Grizzly]

Study Confirms Most Psychopaths Live in Washington D.C.

by Joe Jarvis via The Daily Bell
https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2018-06-18/study-confirms-most-psychopaths-live-washington-dc
Murphy also included the District of Columbia in his research, and found it had a psychopathy level far higher than any other state. But this finding is an outlier, as Murphy notes, as it’s an entirely urban area and cannot be fairly compared with larger, more geographically diverse, US states. That said, as Murphy notes, “The presence of psychopaths in District of Columbia is consistent with the conjecture found in Murphy (2016) that psychopaths are likely to be effective in the political sphere.”

Surprised? I didn’t think so. But still, fun to get some scientific confirmation.

Psychos are drawn to power. It is not just that power corrupts, it is that already corrupt people seek power. Government is the best industry to be in for someone with no morals.

The study is called Psychopathy By State, conducted by Ryan Murphy. He surveyed samples from the lower 48 states and Washington D.C. to find the prevalence of personality traits which correspond to psychopathy.

The personality traits generally corresponding to psychopathy are low neuroticism, high extraversion, low agreeableness, and low conscientiousness.

Of course, D.C. came in first by far. But as he notes, that this is not exactly a fair comparison, as it is a city being compared to entire states. The study finds that urban areas, in general, correspond to more psychopathic personality traits.

Another interesting finding is that a higher concentration of lawyers predicts higher psychopathy prevalence. I kid you not.

So removing D.C. can you guess which states come in the top three? I bet you can.

Connecticut
California
New Jersey

New York ties for the fourth highest concentration of psychopaths among U.S. states. Interestingly, it ties with Wyoming… which I would not have expected. But the author notes there was a relatively small sample surveyed from Wyoming.

The least psychopathic states are:

West Virginia
Vermont
Tennessee
North Carolina
New Mexico

And it should not be surprising that the main correlation was that state with the lowest percentage of people living in urban areas also had the lowest concentration of psychopaths.

Perhaps psychopaths need to be around more victims, or constantly switch out their friends and acquaintances as they become wise to their antisocial behaviors. Note that antisocial does not mean loner, it means lacking empathy, remorse, and behaving in a manipulative way that hurts others.

It is possible that psychopaths are more easily recognized and ostracized in smaller communities and rural settings. Since humans could speak, gossip has been a regulator of social behavior. This has its benefits and detriments of course.

But to be clear, the paper is not so much identifying where all the psychopaths live, as much as identifying general population traits which correspond to psychopathy.

This certainly leads to a higher frequency of psychiatrically identifiable true psychopaths. But it also means that a large percentage of the population behaves in a somewhat psychopathic manner.

While a very small percentage of individuals in any given state may actually be true psychopaths, the level of psychopathy present, on average, within an aggregate population (i.e., not simply the low percentages of psychopaths) is a distinct research question. While empirical operationalizations of psychopathy frequently treat it as a binary categorization, the Hare Psychopathy Checklist (Hare 1991) treats it as a spectrum. The operationalization of psychopathy found here is consistent with psychopathy as thought of as a spectrum.

The study concludes:

Areas of the United States that are measured to be most psychopathic are those in the Northeast and other similarly populated regions. The least psychopathic are predominantly rural areas. The District of Columbia is measured to be far more psychopathic than any individual state in the country, a fact that can be readily explained either by its very high population density or by the type of person who may be drawn [to] a literal seat of power (as in Murphy 2016).

Hailing originally from Massachusetts, I can attest to the highest corresponding personality trait being “Temperamental & Uninhibited.” Where did you think the term Masshole came from.

If you aren’t a psychopath when you enter the state, you soon become one from the traffic alone. And I wonder if just being in such close proximity to people makes it a necessary adaptation to care a little less about how your actions affect others.

There are just too many variables, so you become numb to the plight of others, and just need to get the hell out of this traffic jam before I go insane!

But if you feel held captive among psychopaths, maybe it is time to start on your two-year plan to free yourself.

You don’t have to play by the rules of the corrupt politicians, manipulative media, and brainwashed peers.

p.s Just didn't have the energy to format the above the way it should have been...

[Cordelia]

O for a voice like thunder, and a tongue
To drown the throat of war! - When the senses
Are shaken, and the soul is driven to madness
Who can stand? When the souls of the oppressed
Fight in the troubled air that rages, who can stand?
When the whirlwind of fury comes from the
Throne of god, when the frowns of his countenance
Drive the nations together, who can stand?
When Sin claps his broad wings over the battle
And sails rejoicing in the flood of Death;
When souls are torn to everlasting fire
And fiends of Hell rejoice upon the slain
O who can stand? O who hath caused this?
O who can answer at the throne of God?
The Kings and Nobles of the Land have done it!
Hear it not, Heaven, thy Ministers have done it!

William Blake


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X0zyYbsLJ1M