The Use Of The Word, "lynching" In The Media.

[khairyexpat]

Thank you Tex.

Full heartedly agree with each and every signle word you wrote.

Thank you.

 

[jp]

I'm glad I found someone who can see what I can't see.

I can't speak for Matias. But I think I recognise some of his arguments. I'll have a go at your questions...

1. There is no "why". For people with a desperate need (for money, to buy drugs) their victims are simply a means of obtaining what they need. If someone was starving to death we would understand their actions if they stole food. Hunger is a powerful motivator. So is drug addiction.

2. They do. At the moment there is big advertising campaign promoting free resources to help people out of paco addiction. Easier said than done though.

[background=rgb(252, 252, 252)]3. I don't think this is necessarily the case. My partner was robbed in a first year here by a street kid. He grabbed her camera and ran. She chased after him, and he ran into a crowd of police who beat the shit out of him. Over the next few months we had to keep going back to the police station at very stages of his processing. A legal and judicial framework exists, but the police force here tend to go for the easy targets. They aren't capable of pre-empting drug related crime or violence. I'm not even sure we'd want them taking a pre-emptive role in things. [/background]

4. Its not so much cruel as an attempt to understand things through the eyes of the perpetrator/addict. They are acting to feed an addiction, that's it. Rationality, consequence, morality etc don't come into it.

5. Of course. But managing addiction and problems arising from addiction is extraordinarily difficult. As is dealing with the ugly realities of the drugs industry.

There isn't much point blaming a drug addict for a lack of moral fibre. But equally I don't think there' is much point is viewing them as a victim. They are a problem - a social problem, and like any other problem they need a solution instead of hand wringing or moral posturing. And sadly, there are no easy solutions.

 

[khairyexpat]

JP ... many many thanks.
I needed to hear your answer.
Couldn't agree with you more.

Appreciate you taking the time to explain.

 

[EricLovesBA]

1. Why does a helpless woman (or any one) have to be subjected to acts of violence in the process of loosing her purse, her phone, her necklace, ... for the needs of the young on drugs
2. Why does't the gov. create programs to address and help cover the needs of the young on drugs.
3. Why is it OK to ingnore the problem as if it doesn't exist? The young on drugs enters Police station, shortly leaves with nothing changed, not for him, not for the helpless old lady .. nobody wins.
4. Ain't it cruel to accept that the young on drugs has nothing to loose so it OK for him (but not for me ... I have a house and a job I am afraid to loose)
5. The young on drugs needs professional help, .... not iPhone or moto

I just got through reading Matt Ridley's The Red Queen. Some years back I read Dawkin's Selfish Gene. Both these books open the eyes a little wider to something we really don't like to admit. We're apes. We have rational thought and logic, but their purpose may be mostly for competing sexually with one another. Power and status drive serve the same purpose, which is the main reason we are driven to compete for "stuff" - money, iphones. The idea that we are demarcated from nature, that we are civilized, that some ism will solve all our problems is really quite a stretch. Society, like nature, reaches a balance. Not a static balance, but a dynamic state of equilibrium. Life is a jungle. It has taken most of my life to begin to understand that apes in general do not make rational choices. We are motivated by emotion and instinct first. Any attempt at driving an ideal through rational thought is going to take a lot of energy and finesse. Meanwhile, society, its rules, and the enforcement of those rules fall into the statistical equilibrium of what most people want - a life without effort, to not have to spend too much time creating systems, making decisions, or working. We are not created equal. We share a sense that we should be treated equally but we are not the same, including our most basic instincts, even down to large variations in our instincts or predispositions for selfishness or altruism, passivity or dominance, etc. From these differing innate characteristics we further add different environmental influences - different states of nurture. We are taught to recognize our sameness, but in reality we are incredibly diverse. Each of us has our own idea of what utopian system would fix the ailments of the world, but in the end, we imagine that system from the perspective of ourselves. What would be the ideal ism for a world of clones of me? So my answer to your questions would be - yes, I agree - it would make more sense if everybody respected each other, if drugs were legalized and resources made available to treat drug addiction, to provide support for people caught in cycles of violence, victimization, or addiction. That would be the logical thing to do. But apes aren't driven by logic. They're driven by their underlying instincts and emotions, with involuted logic and ego sitting on top, rationalizing that it is in charge. Motochorros, the people who lynch them, and the people who fail to help them escape their destructive path are just carrying out everyday monkey business.

 

[Gringoboy]

They have motorbikes apparently.

[Edit]

To be fair Matias I see what you're getting, but you can't explain crime purely in terms of poverty and exclusion. Crime happens at all levels of the economic spectrum. There will always be people with motivation and opportunity to take what doesn't belong to them.

To be fair, the motochorros are using stolen motorbikes to steal other motorbikes from people who saved and saved to buy that bike in the first place.
Now who's the victim?

 

[jp]

The motochorros. Have you seen the quality of the motorbikes they have to steal?

I blame Christina/Obama/Socialism

 

[ajoknoblauch]

The motochorros. Have you seen the quality of the motorbikes they have to steal?

I blame Christina/Obama/Socialism

I blame Ayn Rand.

 

[PhilipDT]

I've been avoiding this thread since I saw matias's first post. I just didn't have the energy for yet another protracted session of telling matias why he's an idiot.

Glad to see that the rest of you have things under control.

 

[Gringoboy]

I often think that people like matias are sent here to balance the argument.
But to be serious, who do we think we're kidding?
Violent crime (read: inseguridad) simply hasn't been tackled head on.
There is no zero tolerance and now it's a war out there.
And posts like that of Tex are all very well, but in fact most people couldn't give a rat's a**se if you're hungry and you steal by whatever means.
Either way, you're going to get your head kicked in by Bronson wannabees who have absolutely no support from local law enforcement.

 

[ajoknoblauch]

I've been avoiding this thread since I saw matias's first post. I just didn't have the energy for yet another protracted session of telling matias why he's an idiot.

Glad to see that the rest of you have things under control.

I think Matías means well, but he's very naïve.