What has happened to our society? Is EVIL growing?

When I was a 4 yr old kid, I clearly remember being 1 mile away from my home, riding bikes with my friends. I grew u in the DC/Virginia area, so it certainly wasn’t the country…and my parents NEVER worried, or at least from my perspective, I was never told to stay close to the home.

When my kids grew up, they couldn’t go two houses away without permission, from my home anytime. Of course when they got older we backed off the requirements.

Do you think evil has growing and goodness/decency is declining? Why have things changed so? Is the increase in divorce the reason?

And it has had a negative effect on the economy too…Crime is estimated to create $105 billion in medical expenses, lost earnings, and costs for victim services. Factoring in the intangible costs, such as pain and suffering and a reduced quality of life, brings the total estimated cost of crime to $450 billion annually

WHY?????????

OT

PS: Do you think the media is to blame? Or is it just reflecting society, I dunno?

Thoughts?


edit:added age to line 1

[edit on 4-3-2010 by OldThinker]

You can see the statistics here:

www.fbi.gov...

Crime in the United States (CIUS) is an annual publication in which the FBI compiles volume and rate of crime offenses for the nation, the states, and individual agencies. This report also includes arrest, clearance, and law enforcement employee data.

If this works...there is a sharp increase in the 60-80's

[edit on 4-3-2010 by OldThinker]

I think you have crime and evil confused.

One can be thoroughly evil; and yet, not be a criminal.

One can be a criminal; and yet, not be the slightest bit evil.

Perhaps you'll clarify ... crime or evil? WHICH one is the subject?

Thanks!

reply to post by OldThinker


To answer your question,yes evil is growing.This world is getting
worse everyday.

I also grew up at a time,when kids could play outside,go for long
bike rides,explore the woods in town,just enjoy being kids.Adults
would sit on the porches and watch the children play.Now,if adults
are watching children,it is assumed for nefarious reasons.

I think we are all to blame,not just the media.We allowed evil to
take control of everything.

1. We have no culture that could keep us from being money-grubbing whores.

2. We are destroying our environment. If it was a person, you'd call it murder or genocide.

3. We are slowly dumbing ourselves down into glorified talking apes with car keys.

4. People have holes in the middle where meaning should go. Black holes, that suck up everything around them.

5. We are not going to face reality because we're too busy with our own drama.

The Vikings, and other ancient people like Sumerians, Romans, Greeks, Aztecs, Japanese and Africans regarded the community, nature, spirit, and culture as sacred and meaningful. They knew all of life contains the spirit of cosmos, and thus, each one of us reflects a higher order of existence. Therefore they were also less judgemental and moralistic about many issues that we cover in taboo today (death, race, inequality, struggle, gender differences, war)--according to the ancients, reality was viewed as one coherent system, and not a polarized world where we separate the things that make us comfortable and popular over aspects of life that hurt or offend us.

In short, the traditional spirit is the way through which we learn to appreciate and understand the world around us in its entirety. We've been led astray by entertaining but hollow distractions that make us neurotic, puny and sentimental. Culture is what keeps society together and pushes it toward new goals. When we lose culture, we also lose social coherence, which means we become too confused and self-important to achieve anything of importance together. Ask yourself what we in the modern West have achieved the past 50 years, besides polluting our planet, rehashing old philosophy and art, increasing the rich/poor gaps, and sending thousands of people into foreign wars over corporate profits. We're a decaying empire, and we're coming down hard, but the harder we face reality, the more we reflect over our situation and long for a future where we can combine tradition with what we've got now.

The only way to save ourselves is to rebuild our culture and spirit. If we fail that, whatever's left of our traditions will become commerce for clueless consumers equal to ourselves.

I think it's a mixture of everything you can think of. but the main ingredients have to be Morales media and government. Just go to youtube and look at the top musicians (if you can call them that) look at there message and look at who is allowing it the same go's for entertainment video games etc. the Elitists that run this world want it this way. i think they see it as a form of population control until they can bring in there 1984 then cherry pick the ones they want or more like you will do the cherry picking for them.

No one is born Good or Evil you are conditioned by your environment to act accordingly to it. what you are witnessing is that "environment" being manipulated by "them". I think I've had a bit too many Guinness tonight....

Mr thinker, Yes sir you are correct, I to am tired of how our society has degraded to in such a manor. The things that are accepted today are truly amazing. Young girls are wearing more makeup, dressing much too alluring for their age, Sex and foul language are far too accepted in the general society as the norm.. Things are just outta control. But... what can we do about it?

[edit on 4-3-2010 by Lil Drummerboy]

Originally posted by Trexter Ziam
I think you have crime and evil confused.

One can be thoroughly evil; and yet, not be a criminal.

One can be a criminal; and yet, not be the slightest bit evil.

Perhaps you'll clarify ... crime or evil? WHICH one is the subject?

Thanks!

I think crime is the effect and evil is the cause...

So I guess its both.

Thank you for the post friend!

Originally posted by mamabeth
reply to post by OldThinker

 

I think we are all to blame,not just the media.We allowed evil to
take control of everything.

What was that statement?

"The only thing for evil to prevail is for good men to do nothing"

reply to post by Bringer


Good points friend!

Enjoy the Guiness



OT

@ the OP, I'd like to share this with you.

en.wikipedia.org...

Make sure you read Cohen's take on the subject.

reply to post by concernedcitizan


CC, appreciate the time and thought here!

I wonder HOW do we rebiuld culture and spirit? Very interesting words you use!

Originally posted by EMPIRE
@ the OP, I'd like to share this with you.

en.wikipedia.org...

Make sure you read Cohen's take on the subject.

Cohen has some good points...how do we translate/reconcile the steep increase from the 60 to 80's...economically the USA was booming in the 80's, right

reply to post by Lil Drummerboy



LD, thanks for the post and that you see what I see.

What I do about it is work hard, help the poor, when I can and pray...

OT

Originally posted by OldThinker
... crime is the effect and evil is the cause...
So I guess its both.

Thanks, okay ... I'll base my answers on "heinous" crimes then.

I think that based on population ratios; it is near the same or happens a tiny bit more often.

I think we have increased awareness now; and better access to news and information.

I think when we were younger; the most heinous was hushed up more. Remember when NOBODY said anything bad about a President, even though he had a voodoo mistress and mafia friends? Now, we are more open to be able to talk about things like when Bush 43 was arrested for coc aine. So there are different social standards now. When we were younger, the 12 year old girl who was forcibly abducted and raped by a total stranger was the BAD person and the rapists were not prosecuted ... afterall they would say, "men will be men" or somesuch other excuse.

So, now we can see the bigger picture now whereas in the older days, things were taboo to discuss, even in the media!

Now, with that said, I do feel there is a slightly higher ratio (per population) of heinous crimes and I attribute that to the media glorification of criminal acts - even though it's negative attention. Some people thrive on negative attention ... particularly those who only received attention when they were naughty ... therefore it's conditioning.

Further, those "collectible famous murderer" cards in the 80's aggravated the situation, due to the same effect I mentioned above.

Obviously, all of the above is just my opinion.

Great topic though! Thanks!

[edit on 4/3/2010 by Trexter Ziam]

Originally posted by concernedcitizan
1. We have no culture that could keep us from being money-grubbing whores.

Actually the culture is exactly that, money, sex and violence. Thats our culture these days.

Originally posted by _Phoenix_

Originally posted by concernedcitizan
1. We have no culture that could keep us from being money-grubbing whores.

Actually the culture is exactly that, money, sex and violence. Thats our culture these days.

Here's one for you...

Societal STRUCTURE drive Societal BEHAVIOR, which define CULTURE.

Could culture merely be the fruit/outcome/result of behaviors?

I can't really agree with you, because I am too young to decide on the matter. But living in a big city with many cultures, I can easily say that at times I could be worried walking a mile. I think that the problem is not that evil is growing, but that society forces many to do evil. If you are going to compare today's stats to yesterdays, then remember that the world 50 years ago was very different.

I'm sure you do remember. Lets use the 1960s for an example, many ethnicity's were segregated. This probably made the majority of the populace keep to themselves, and got by. Now today, many places are diverse, but many more are just ethnic neighborhoods. Some of those have more political power, or live in a better area than the others. This could make the other ethnic neighborhoods feel as if they have the short end of the stick.

That in itself could create many problems. But this is probably just a minor reason for the rise in crime/evil. Another reason could be that many people today just don't think twice. Why? Good question.

The media could play some role in things.

Just some observations from a 17 year old's perspective.

Originally posted by Trexter Ziam
.....Now, with that said, I do feel there is a slightly higher ratio (per population) of heinous crimes and I attribute that to the media glorification of criminal acts - even though it's negative attention.....

Here's one to ponder, friend...

Since prayer was removed from public school classrooms in 1962, we have had a six-fold increase in violent crime, our divorce rate has tripled, births to single mothers have increased five-fold, the teenage suicide rate has tripled, and SAT scores (standardized college entrance test) have dropped 80 points (approximately 10%). The removal of prayer may not be the only cause of social ills, but the negative trends are certainly a symptom of the spiritual decline which is at their root.

more: www.thewordout.net...

Is this relevant here?

OT