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Guest Post: America: #1 In Fear, Stress, Anger, Divorce, Obesity, Anti-Depressants, Etc.
Submitted by Michael Snyder of The Economic Collapse blog,
The United States is a deeply unhappy place. We are a nation that is absolutely consumed by fear, stress, anger and depression. It isn't just our economy that is falling apart - the very fabric of society is starting to come apart at the seams and it is because of what is happening to us on the inside. The facts and statistics that I am going to share with you in this article are quite startling. They are clear evidence that America is a nation that is an advanced state of decline.
We are overwhelmed by fear, stress and anxiety, and much of the time the ways that we choose to deal with those emotions lead to some very self-destructive behaviors. Americans have experienced a standard of living far beyond the wildest dreams of most societies throughout human history, and yet we are an absolutely miserable people. Why is this? Why is America #1 in so many negative categories? Why are we constantly looking for ways to escape the pain of our own lives? Why are our families falling apart? There is vast material wealth all around us. So why can't we be happy?
Just look around you. Are most of the people around you teeming with happiness and joy? Sadly, the truth is that most Americans are terribly stressed out. Yeah, many of them may be able to manage to come up with a smile when they greet you, but most of the time they are consumed by internal struggles that are eating away at them like cancer.
So why is this happening? Is modern life structured in a way that is fundamentally unhealthy?
Below I have posted a short excerpt from a message that one of Charles Hugh Smith's readers named Kenneth Daigle recently sent to him. I think that it does a good job of describing the incredible stress that many people contend with on a daily basis...
Think about how our culture is now structured for the average adult: STRESS, everywhere you look--commuting in horrible traffic, as you want to scream in frustration--money stress, to pay rent/house note, tuition, utilities, gas, insurances, vacations, cable bill, rising food costs, and on and on and on--stress from family problems, divorce, delinquency, drugs, crime, infidelity, keeping up with the Jones, etc.
People have too high an expectation of what they should have out of life, and get overly stressed over it all. How does all of this manifest itself? A prescription drug culture (Zoloft, Xanax, etc.) that tricks people into thinking a pill will knock back the stress, when these drugs, in my opinion, only make things worse.
I am hearing more and more that people just want to drop out from it all, as they are reaching a breaking point, and have decided less income and dependency on entitlements will reduce their stress, and is not so humiliating, so giving up working becomes more acceptable, to KEEP ONE’S SANITY.
I know I am correct, from the feedback I hear every day, and the financial media does not see this like I hear it every day. People don't want to admit that they are too weak to deal with stress, so the financial pundits are not aware of this critical factor because they don't talk to Joe Sixpack.
Most Americans live lives of "quiet desperation" that are punctuated by moments of great crisis. We spend our prime years working for others (making them rich) in order to pay off debts that we have foolishly accumulated (thus making the banks even wealthier). When most Americans reach the end of their lives, they look back and wonder what they actually accomplished.
James Altucher published an incredible article the other day entitled "Why Do People Hate Their Jobs?" It did a great job of describing what life is like for the modern worker in America. The following are a few of the reasons that he says people tend to hate their jobs...
-Jobs are modern-day slavery. We are paid just enough to live and not more. You are punished if you ask for more.
*****
-We are often verbally abused on the job and we take it because we think it’s normal that people would yell at us.
*****
-The government gets up to 50% of your paycheck and then 10-20% of that goes to kill people on other parts of the planet, including our own children.
*****
-From 7am to 7pm you are either A) going to work, B) at work, or C) coming back from work. Hence, the times when you can be most creative are garbage-compacted into your cubicle.
*****
-When you are paranoid at a job, you are probably correct. THEY are, in fact, talking about you and backstabbing you right now.
*****
-You realize that all the dollars you spent on degrees to get you a job that will make you happy were completely wasted. You were scammed but you can’t let the next generation know how stupid you were so now you become part of perpetuating the scam.
*****
-Your spouse is tired of hearing about your job after six months. And you couldn’t care less about hers. Ten years later you wake up next to a total stranger. 40 years later you die next to one.
*****
-When you were a kid you liked to draw, and read, and run, and laugh, and play, and imagine a magical world. You’re never going to do any of that again.
*****
-Over time everyone is getting fired and being replaced by younger, cheaper, more temporary, more robotic, versions of you. You see this but are afraid to do anything about it.
And of course when we get home from work there is even more stress. In America today, we are witnessing a breakdown of the family unlike anything we have ever seen before. The United States leads the world in divorce and in single person households. We are having an increasingly difficult time relating to one another, and many of us drown our sorrows in our addictions. We are addicted to pills, to alcohol, to food, to entertainment, to sex, to gambling, to shopping and to anything else that will make us feel good and forget about our problems for a while.
The following is a collection of facts and statistics that prove that America is being absolutely consumed by fear, stress, anger and depression...
-Suicide has now actually surpassed car accidents as the number one cause of "injury death" in the United States.
-More U.S. soldiers killed themselves than were killed in combat last year.
-As I mentioned in another article, Americans will spend more than 280 billion dollars on prescription drugs during 2013.
-Nearly one out of every four women in the United States are taking antidepressants.
-The percentage of women taking antidepressants in the U.S. is higher than in any other country in the world.
-In 2010, the average teen in the U.S. was taking 1.2 central nervous system drugs. Those are the kinds of drugs which treat conditions such as ADHD and depression.
-Children in the United States are three times more likely to be prescribed antidepressants as children in Europe are.
-According to a recent article by David Kupelian, "one-third of the nation’s employees suffer chronic debilitating stress, and more than half of all 'millennials' (18 to 33 year olds) experience a level of stress that keeps them awake at night, including large numbers diagnosed with depression or anxiety disorder."
-Tens of millions of Americans use alcohol and drugs to numb the pain that they are experiencing. In the United States today, there are about 28 million Americans with a drinking problem and about 22 million Americans use illegal drugs.
-More people have been diagnosed with mental disorders in America than anywhere else on earth.
-There are also tens of millions of Americans that try to deal with anxiety and stress by eating. Of all the major industrialized nations, America is the most obese. Mexico is #2.
-Back in 1962, only 13 percent of all Americans were obese. Today, approximately 36 percent of all Americans are obese.
-Many people try to escape from the pain of reality by getting lost in entertainment. Incredibly, the United States is tied with the UK for the highest average number of hours spent watching television each week.
-The United States has the highest divorce rate in the world by a good margin.
-The United States has the highest percentage of one person households on the entire planet.
-According to the Pew Research Center, only 51 percent of all American adults are currently married. Back in 1960, 72 percent of all adults in the United States were married.
-At this point, approximately one out of every three children in America lives in a home without a father.
-For women under the age of 30 living in the United States today, more than half of all babies are being born out of wedlock.
-The United States has the highest child abuse death rate in the developed world.
-In the United States today, it is estimated that one out of every four girls is sexually abused before they become adults.
-The United States has the highest teen pregnancy rate in the world by a very wide margin.
-The United States produces more pornography than any other nation in the world.
-If you can believe it, there are 20 million new STD infections in the United States every single year.
-The U.S. has the highest STD infection rate in the entire industrialized world.
-It is estimated that about one out of every six Americans between the ages of 14 and 49 have genital herpes.
-Sadly, one out of every four teen girls in the U.S. has at least one sexually transmitted disease.
-The United States leads the world in eating disorder deaths.
-Nobody in the world gets more plastic surgery done than Americans do.
-Americans spend more time sitting in traffic than anyone else in the world.
-America has the highest incarceration rate and the largest total prison population in the entire world by a very wide margin.
Fear is one of the primary things that motivates the American people, and that is a very powerful weapon that can be used against us.
As I wrote about yesterday, those that commit acts of terror want to get attention and they want to create fear.
And that is exactly what the Boston Marathon bombing accomplished. It captured the attention of the nation for days on end, and it absolutely paralyzed the entire Boston area with fear.
When we allow ourselves to be terrorized, we actually encourage more terror attacks. When we give terrorists what they want, it just encourages more psychos to commit acts of terror. If you don't believe me, just check out the following links that I found posted on The Drudge Report on Monday...
*"3 Alabama hospitals evacuated after bomb threats"*
*"Connecticut Courthouse Evacuated After Bomb Threat"*
*"South Hills Village Evacuated After Bomb Threat"*
*"Rock Island neighborhood evacuated after bomb threat"*
*"Bomb threat forces evacuation of Seabreeze office building"*
The appropriate response to a terror attack is to refuse to be terrorized. Yes, we should also work to expose and punish the individuals, organizations and governments that are behind terror. But we should also not let terror change how we live our lives, and we should definitely not allow terror to be used as an excuse to rip our liberties and freedoms away.
Sadly, as Ron Paul has detailed, some of our politicians are already calling for "tighter security" in the aftermath of the Boston Marathon bombing...
Sadly, I expect this week’s tragic attacks in Boston to be used to justify new restrictions on liberty. Within 48 hours of the attack in Boston, at least one Congressman was calling for increased use of surveillance cameras to expand the government’s ability to monitor our actions, while another Senator called for a federal law mandating background checks before Americans can buy “explosive powder.”
I would not be surprised if the Transportation Security Administration uses this tragedy to claim new authority to “screen” Americans before they can attend sporting or other public events. The Boston attack may also be used as another justification for creating a National ID Card tied to a federal database with “biometric” information. The only thing that will stop them is if the American people rediscover the wisdom of Benjamin Franklin that you cannot achieve security by allowing government to take their liberties.
But no matter how much liberty and freedom we give up, we will never be 100% safe. Bad people are always going to do bad things, and unfortunately we are probably going to see some pretty nightmarish things in the years ahead as the world becomes even more unstable.
If we allow the bad guys to get us so frightened that we throw out the U.S. Constitution and abandon our liberties and our freedoms, then we are the ones who lose.
Yes, the years ahead are going to be tough. The economic collapse is going to accelerate greatly, there will be tremendous natural disasters, there will be war in the Middle East and there will be other problems that we cannot even conceive of right now. At the same time, the American people will continue to become even angrier and even more frustrated. According to a recent Pew Research survey, the percentage of Americans with a favorable view of the federal government is now at an all-time low. As the economy crumbles, there will likely be great civil unrest as people demand solutions. Unfortunately, our problems took decades to develop and they will not be solved overnight even if we did have good people in office.
So why am I saying all of this?
And why am I constantly warning about the coming economic collapse?
Is it because I want to create fear?
No, just the opposite of that.
I am a watchman on the wall.
In ancient times, a watchman would warn the people when the enemy was approaching.
When you receive the warning, there are a few different ways that you can respond to it...
#1 You can become consumed with fear and run away from the enemy. Unfortunately, cowards never get the victory in the end.
#2 You can dismiss the warning and pretend that the enemy is not approaching. But then when the enemy comes you will be completely unprepared.
#3 You can do everything possible to get prepared to face the enemy that is coming with strength and courage.
And that is how I would encourage all of you to approach the coming economic collapse and the other great problems that we will soon be experiencing as a nation.
Do not be afraid.
Instead, be strong and courageous and prepare well for the storms that are coming.
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"America, F#@K YEAH!
Here we come to save the mother f#@kin' day, yeah!
America, F#@K YEAH!"
HOPE and CHANGE!!!! Yes WE CAN!
She woke up with hope, but only found fear.
America - #1 in paranoia
I'm sure the folks in Northern Mexico / Afghanistan / Iraq etc. are shedding tears right now over how tough life is for white Americans lol
Not to say life isn't tough for a lot of poor people in the US, but c'mon some perspective..
All of this is almost enough to make someone stop drinking...
Finally we are number one in something! Yupiiiieeeee!
Here's to numbing the pain !!!
Anyone got a lite ?
Fear, Stress, Anger, Divorce, Obesity, Anti-Depressants, Etc.
Who put the camera in my house?????
don't worry, everything but the etc is legal
I promised my wife I wouldn't watch female butts on the net tonite....your avatar just spoilt my promise.
I'll stop drinking when my still blows.
Hopefully I'll be standing next to it when she does.
Maple syrup whiskey, yum yum.
Another reason to own a pressure cooker.
Black Tahoes arriving in 5,..4,..3,..2
I'm not trying to jack this thead, but I wanted to share this with you guys. I think this is an appropriate post to do it. I just got back from a short trip to Guatemala, where we did some building.
You know that feeling you had when you came home from a youth retreat? Remember how amazing you felt Sunday night? Remember trying to tell your friends how AWESOME the whole experience was, and how they acted like they did, but you knew they were only being polite about, …”getting it?”
Yeah.
I feel like I know how the boy who cried “wolf” felt, because I have described too many life’s experiences as “awesome!” How was I to know, then, that this would happen? Note to self: try not to use “awesome” quite so much.
This time, however, might be a little different, because it is hard, no, impossible to even write this without tears welling up, my chest sort of constricting, and a myriad of images flooding my mind’s eye. And I will never be able to tell anyone about it. Because you have to be there. You have to see, hear, smell, hold, feel, taste and interact with it; you have to let IT hold YOU.
Enough. Here’s what I saw: I saw poverty. Phoo! I don’t mean “trailer park, we only have one TV and two cars” poverty… I mean… “we don’t have refrigeration” poverty. “Our whole village has one car” poverty. “Our turkeys and their chicks live with us in our one-room home” poverty.
I saw: 8- year old girls helping to slaughter chickens for the evening meal. Five year old boys playing with their favorite marbles in the dirt.
Hammers with no handle nor claw being treasured as brand-new Estwings. Front-end alignments being done over a dugout pit with long piece of rope and some 20 year-old K-Mart wrenches.
Children entertaining themselves for an entire afternoon with a bucket of bent nails.
Children watering the village cow from the same 50 gallon drum that they drank from and used for their laundry.
I saw the inside of a church, (they borrowed amps and speakers just for the occasion) with a poster hung on the back wall behind the pulpit. The picture on the poster was of a house with flowers in front of it… a pretty nice house, granted, but everyone reading this right now either lives in this house, or knows a minimum of 10 people who do. The meaning of this house? It is their mansion. In Heaven. Yes. The house you currently live in is these peoples idea of Heaven, their eternal rest. The culmination of all the goodness they can imagine.
I told you you wouldn’t get it. Not to sell you short, but here’s why: These people were happy.
I don’t mean “happy” like when you get a new car, or “ happy” because you got a raise, or “happy” because your conditions are favorable to you at the moment. I’m trying to describe a kind of “happy” most Americans will never have the privilege of seeing, much less experiencing. This is a happiness that permeates the human condition. It exists in spite of, not because of. It is a happiness that comes from knowing God, loving life for its own sake, and valuing relationship over anything material. You don’t believe me, but I was there. I saw it. I was, for six precious days, held by it.
The twenty –five or so residents of this little community had their very lives, quite literally, shaken to the core by a 7. 2 mag earthquake in November of 2012. Two residences in this particular tiny village were virtually destroyed through this event, both of them approximately 12x24 foot homes, each occupied by a Church of God pastor and his family. Yes, family. Yes, 12x24. One of the pastors’ homes is still standing, barely. It was the less damaged of the two, and by less damaged I mean that they were able to temporarily re-erect one of the fallen exterior walls.
Hopefully, there is a team to go back down this summer and rebuild this home. (If I suddenly go missing for another week, you’ll know where I am…) The other was a pile of adobe and rubble. That is the home that some of you sent me to go and help rebuild. “Help” in this case meant to partner with the pastor and his son, along with several other able-bodied members of the community to direct and enable the construction of his new 12x24 home. This endeavor was hugely successful, thanks to a God who loves to see His people work together, and several people whose joy is made complete by working together with God’s people!
On our last day the community prepared a feast for the six of us. They killed a lamb. They prepared several chickens.
This one meal cost more than a month’s wages, and never have I so sincerely thanked God for His provision. A few of us had brought some plastic toys we had bought in town as good-bye presents, and all the kids were busy all day playing with fifty –cent plastic trucks, bulldozers (there is a lot of dirt / dust there) and dolls.
You would have thought we had given each of them a hundred-dollar bill.
Tearful good-byes were said, eternal hugs finally ended, and we drove back to San Lorenzo for the last time.
Long good-byes are bad. Longer good-byes are much, much worse. We had been back at the “hotel” for only about an hour when the one community car from the little village came pulling in, and two ladies and nine children piled out of a Toyota Corolla. That’s eleven people, albeit small people. It seemed that the kids were inconsolable, and wouldn’t stop crying until they were driven lack to town to say “adios” one last time. I think it was the best and the worst I have ever felt. More hugs shared. More tears shed. More pictures taken. Then one of us got the bright idea to walk all of the kids to town and, instead of changing our local currency back to dollars, just buying each of the kids a new pair of shoes with what little was left. It was, after all, Friday, and Friday is market day where all of San Lorenzo is turned into a huge outdoor shopping mall… So kids claimed adults by grabbing their hands, and for the next two hours four of us and nine of them braved the crowded streets of San Lorenzo and went shoe shopping. On the way back, we saw a soccer ball for sale. We bought that too. The village didn’t own a ball.
The village. Didn’t. Own. A ball. Here’s the part where I preach, just a little.
How did America get this way? Where did we go wrong? Where has our joy gone? When did our happiness become so conditional and circumstantial? When did we forget how to have a favorite marble, a favorite game, a best good friend? When did we lose sight of the magnificent simplicity and importance of … Life? When did the “stuff” and veneer of our culture overwhelm our sense of dignity and the value of simply living? It can be done. I hope we don’t have to learn the hard way.
I have looked into the eyes of a child who has nothing, and seen… Everything
Awesome. I cried reading it. You lived more in those 6 days than most bastards do their whole lives here.
Maybe, instead of being obsessed with keeping up with the Joneses, that folks help others, actually play with their own kids--heck they may find they CAN recapture some youth and vigor.
I have a friend who was treated like that in a India. He was so moved by the experience of the happiness of truely innocent children and unselfishness of thier parents he made then his family, despite his large family here in the states. He provides a private education for these kids and treats them like family.
If Tyler would give me picture-posting privileges, I'd throw a couple up. It really completes the story.
Thank you. That was an unexpected pleasure.
Thank you for that post.
The Path of the Righteous is constantly Beset upon all sides by the Inequities of the Selfish and the Tyranny of Evil Men.
Blessed is he who in the name of Charity and Goodwill leads the Weak through the Valley of Darkness for he is truly his Brothers Keeper and the Finder of Lost Children.
Ezekiel 25:17
You have experienced the profound effect of service to others releasing us from the bondage of self
Thanks, Knuk.
Samuel Jackson couldn't have said it better.
Not bad.
ok!. thank you so much for that. I am engaged in the quest back to find that simple place. It is so difficult to break through the STUFF.
Many of us are sick. I have seen working the steps change lives. God is there if you are willing.
Having spent the majority of my gainfully unemployed (stole that term from Jim Rogers) years in parts of the world hoping to one day be called "developing", I've seen plenty of the same thing. Unfathomable poverty and squalor. Maggots pouring out of untreated wounds in small children. Maladies owing not to ignorance or laziness, but simply to accidents of birth.
I'm a much hated guy around these parts for failing to embrace the death culture, but the reason is because of what my time in "hellholes" taught me: the folks there face a thousand terrible things in a day and perhaps one good thing...they grasp and cherish that one good thing and simply deal with the bad. They go out of their way to enjoy.
Forget America as a comparison; just look at this site. "The Economic Collapse Blog" is the source of this article. Sounds slightly....negative. Look at the other articles and note the common theme. By all means read through the comments under most any article. All anger all the time.
What you see here is the opposite of what my experience taught me to do. Folks here will see a hundred good things and one bad thing, then embrace that bad thing to the exclusion of anything even slightly positive or upbeat, as if the Universe owes them perfection. They even go out of their way to find negative things, often embracing the most outlandish theories simply because it makes them miserable and fills some bizarre need.
I'm no Pollyanna or Little Marie Sunshine, but I do believe that when faced with a challenge you just deal with it. Then while dealing with it, don't forget to find something to enjoy.
You hate this site because you see a bunch of people who are awake and aware of what is really going on but are not doing enough to satisfy you. Meanwhile each of us in our own way are doing what we can. Yet rather than lead by example or share ideas about what can be done, you just sit here and throw rocks.
If you have something worthwhile to share, feel free. I am all ears. But stop ridiculing.
Love the site, commenters not so much. Yea, everything sucks. The Universe is unfair. Woe is you. Personally, I've addressed the unfair Universe in ways I thought I might be able to handle and correct. Flipped the bird to "god" and dealt with Birth Lottery losers. Spent years and tons of my "ill-gotten gains" doing it. Directly. The details are unnecessary to reveal. It seemed more useful than just bitching and moaning all the live long day, but if that works for you, so be it. That is what I think "can be done". Was that "worthwhile" to share?
If your "solution" is stacking shiny metals, boxes of bullets and freeze dried turkey tetrazini, then you don't get it (in my opinion). Go wallow in self and you'll never smile.
You are a legend in your own mind.
Poor retort. That's the easy way of not actually trying to do something positive. You asked for a solution, I presented one possibility. You didn't like it. That's your problem.
"Personally, I've addressed the unfair Universe in ways I thought I might be able to handle and correct. Flipped the bird to "god" and dealt with Birth Lottery losers. Spent years and tons of my "ill-gotten gains" doing it"
Oh yeah that was your example. Thanks for the actionable advice.
Get help.
personally I think you are being too easy on them chindit13..... this IS fight club after all...........
Can't you just go away you nasty man?
No. I'm on retainer. Contractual obligations and all that.
Perhaps you'll look in the mirror and ask that lady why she needs to wallow in misery and seek out darkness, unfettered by anything or anyone who dares to have a positive thought.
You wouldn't have made it during the Depression/WWII/Genocide years, or WWI/Spanish flu years, much less during the various Plagues. You don't have the cojones to stand up to real adversity, since the current environment has you at wits end. You're weak. Is it "nasty" for me to say that?
and you pick on weak people? What does that make you?
Everything and the only thing that lady knows about me is that I hold opinions that in many instances differ from the mainstream sheeple-think on this site. She attacks me not because I attacked someone else, but simply because I fail to adopt the same views with which she finds comfort on this site. She finds difference of opinion a personal attack. How the heck did that happen? The same thing happens to anyone here who posts an opposing view, as the site has become an echo chamber where opposing views are not allowed (except, thankfully, by the site owner).
Scroll through any article. See what happens when someone dares have an independent thought, expressed in a way that attacks no one personally. Immediately come the accusations of "shill", "quisling", "disinformation agent", etc. The first shots are always fired by those who would have universal groupthink here.
If you are honest with yourself you will see that. geekgrrl fired at me. I fired back. Fight Club.
Chindit, all I know of you is what you've posted. You consistently defend the status quo, and I consistently attack it.
Your avatar does seem apropos, though, like you were 80 years behind the times, dreaming about a world that doesn't exist anymore.
Chindit, you have no idea what you are talking about. I have already been to hell and back, and I would venture a guess that I have a bigger set of balls than you do.
What's with you and the Gonzales hating on this guy? Is see nothing at all that anyone should be upset about, unless... It's just an acute form of class envy. The universe is a meticulously fair mechanism. I am a little harsher than chintz maybe, at least in your eyes. Seeing the hatred pouring from your fingertips, it's more than obvious your lot in life. Is deserved and self made. I'm living here in china, and getting pretty wealthy, in a pretty relaxed manner. I pay my workers fuck all, but at least better than the competition, so they are happy, and think I'm a great guy. I'm writing this from an upscale coffee shop on Wednesday afternoon. I woke up today at 11, after staying up late fucking around. Across the street, there is a beggar woman with a baby, yet I feel no pity for her. I practice meditation, yoga, and pranayama daily, in the march toward what you would call enlightenment, which has taught me one valuable thing: we all pick what we want to experience, so just kick back and enjoy the ride. You chose to be a miserable wretch, so be true to yourself and your experience, and become the most rancid, miserable wretch you can be.
Chet's and peace.
This piece of shit iPhone 5 fucks up everything. I said fonz, not Gonzalez, and cheers, not Chet's.
This guy is on here frequently ridiculing people but never provides any examples of how he does anything different.
That could be because he does not do anything much different ...
But I don't see him ridiculing anyone today?! I noticed you said he preys on weaker people above. Do you mean there are children frequenting this site? I kinda doubt it. This is a little indicative that perhaps you have at least a mild case of inferiority syndrome. This needn't be the case though. Say to yourself that you are capable of anything. Even if you are some fat, chronically unemployed guy, you can work on changing that reality as soon as now. Realize nothing comes easy in life, and that there is no safety. There is no insurance. You are certain to die. Embrace these facts of life, then get out there and do something...anything. Leave the country, walk to Tierra del Fuego, go to the wilderness and grow a huge harvest of pot to sell. Rob a liquor store, if you think you can get away with it. The bottom line is this: authority wants you to feel like a victim. Most Americans do. Break the hold you have on yourself, and like tupac said" make a million or die trying". Actually money is not everything, but you get the idea. Any action is better than no action, you're gonna die, so what the fuck are you waiting for?
"If your "solution" is stacking shiny metals, boxes of bullets and freeze dried turkey tetrazini, then you don't get it (in my opinion). Go wallow in self and you'll never smile."
That is a half ridicule half ad hominim attack.
"You don't have the cojones to stand up to real adversity, since the current environment has you at wits end. You're weak. Is it "nasty" for me to say that?"
It's pretty fucking stupid to say that, since they don't know each other. It sure sounds like ridicule to me.
It sounds like he has some serious delusion of grandeur.
"You chose to be a miserable wretch, so be true to yourself and your experience, and become the most rancid, miserable wretch you can be"
Looks like that Yoga and meditation is not payin off pal. You sound like a disgruntled asshole. But keep telling yourself your workers love you and you are a great guy.
Oh it's working out just fine thank you. The less I care, the more that falls into my lap. By the way, I don't think that guy was actually picking on you (which is funny, in that you defend the fact that you are weaker!). He was tring to wake you out of self pity. You're never really oppressed unless by yourself. I understand the western economies are in shambles and getting worse. But who cares? You can still do whatever it takes to make your own life a success. Maybe you have to break laws in the process. So fucking what. Do laws really mean anything? It like the story of the elephants driving the stakes that keep them chained up at night. I hear in your writing and others, a sense that you are waiting to be saved. It's not gonna happen. Only you can save you. And regarding my workers, you may be right... But who gives a fuck? They haven't the intelligence, or the long sightedness to make lots of money. They, like the permanent underclass in America, are to attracted to shiny shit, and so full of self, that they are afraid to take on real risks in life. Although they have the least, they are too attached to that little bit of shit, and are too afraid to risk losing it. Fuck them.
so you are not enlightened in any way, just apathetic and apparently lucky. Good for you. I have no problem with it.
I also agree that whatshiname was not picking on me. As he said, it's fight club. Maybe he should be aware that he is a hypocrite. Maybe it helps him along his path and gets him out of his delusional state.
" I understand the western economies are in shambles and getting worse. But who cares? You can still do whatever it takes to make your own life a success. Maybe you have to break laws in the process. So fucking what. Do laws really mean anything?"
I pretty much agree with that. Your path to that conclusion is a bit different though. But whatever works for you.
By the way "But I don't see him ridiculing anyone today?!"
No argument that you were wrong there I guess?
"You're never really oppressed unless by yourself."
Oh really? So when the sheriff comes and evicts people from their homes, they are self-oppressed?
You have a very odd profile here. A member for 2 years and 26 weeks, and your first post was on 1/3/2013?
That is exactly the sort of thing I would expect from an intelligence agency.
So let me take this opportunity to give you the finger, and hopefully I blew your cover.
LOL.
He's said he's going to leave on at least one occasion, and I invited him to do so. And yet he keeps coming back to insult and denigrate the people on this site. When I object to this and ask him to leave, that makes me a wretch? LOL. Get a life dude.
Fantastic post.
I think the problems with Americans fundamentally is rooted in poor diet and lack of exercise. It is nearly impossible to feel good- before thinking you feel good, when health is so out of whack. Of course, there are many other variables that lead to our structural imbalances. Namely, we as a society have lost a sense of community and belonging. People are tools of transactions rather than energetic treasures whose facets are enjoyed by others.
Thanks for sharing.
I agree with you that diet has a great deal to do with it. Nietzsche pointed this out over 100 years ago.
I'm grateful for your story and it reaffirms for me how much I've neglected my own spiritual development and how pathetic our mainstream culture and media has become. We are both the criminal and the victim in our collective and personal diasporas.
tomatoes -
As I was reading the original post, there was so much that I wanted to say. Most of it having to do with how leftism directly leads to many of the ailments so perfectly listed in the article.
But now, all I want is to ask you to give me an address that I can send a few bucks to and donate to that village. I will throw them some money, send clothes/shoes/toys/tools... whatever you ask for brother.
Bythe way -
I grew up with a favorite toy and a dirt mound. No cable tv. but never thought I was underprivileged. (I'm only 41... not 100 btw)
Now my boy is 10 and lives in a 4500+ Sq ft home with nothing lacking. nothing.
He will read your post when he wakes up tomorrow.
Universal struggle, it's not just you and I.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_ZbbUh421_Q
Very moving. Reminds me of my personal thought processes over the last few years.
The world's going to hell and full of evil fucks that want to ruin lives. I'm still going to have a good time and be positive in my local and social life. :)
mtomato2,
Truth spoken. Thank you for the light. Those who junked your eloquent post; live in darkness.
+ 1tril mtomato2. I've thought about this post over and over again the past week.
A powerful and staying message. Thank you.
on second thought, no...
I remember in the 1980s the writer's writer John Updike, commenting on the small but gradual improvement in all things... of course, he never understood the cancerous growth of government.
"Progressive "small but gradual "improvements" in all things. It's a miracle that some people can still think clearly after 50 years of institutionalized disinformation.
hmm.. I seem to recall something about an ulcerated sphincter somewhere..
USA! USA! USA!
Gidas...LIETUVA!!!
McDonalds, F#@K YEAH!
Wal-Mart, F#@K YEAH!
The Gap, F#@K YEAH!
Baseball, F#@K YEAH!
NFL, F#@K YEAH!
Rock and roll, F#@K YEAH!
The Internet, F#@K YEAH!
Slavery, F#@K YEAH!
F#@K YEAH!
Starbucks, F#@K YEAH!
Disney world, F#@K YEAH!
Porno, F#@K YEAH!
Valium, F#@K YEAH!
Reeboks, F#@K YEAH!
Fake Tits, F#@K YEAH!
Sushi, F#@K YEAH!
Taco Bell, F#@K YEAH!
Rodeos, F#@K YEAH!
Bed bath and beyond (F#@k yeah, F#@k yeah)
Liberty, F#@K YEAH!
White Slips, F#@K YEAH!
The Alamo, F#@K YEAH!
Band-aids, F#@K YEAH!
Las Vegas, F#@K YEAH!
Christmas, F#@K YEAH!
Immigrants, F#@K YEAH!
Popeye, F#@K YEAH!
Democrats, F#@K YEAH!
Republicans (republicans)
(f#@k yeah, f#@k yeah)
Sportsmanship
Books
-T Parker
Not on your last nerve I hope.
Be calm and slave on. F#@K YEAH!
Wow, look at the freedom fighters.
What kind of guts does it take to say FUCK on Zero Hedge?
What the hell is wrong with all you wankers?
Ooops, I think I just went poopy in my undies.
If even your own speech is controlled by fear, how the baby raping, fucking hell are you ever going to free your government approved minds?
I've just been watching 'Idiocracy' on one of the satellite channels here in the UK. It seems to say it all really.
DavidC
I try to focus on the positives, as you can see.
But to each their own. ;)
('Brazil' can't be far off.)
Maybe the government will do a war on stress... the solution will be of course to put drugs in tap water... Then the BEA will do a ``special stress reduction revision`` for the GDP! GDP to the moon!
Will?
See you at the buffet bitchez.
And the shrink's office, too.
Much of the social history of the Western world, over the past three decades, has been a history of replacing what worked with what sounded good.
~ Thomas Sowell
FORWARD SOVIET!
When, exactly, are the Dicks going to fuck the Assholes? Because I've been waiting and I haven't seen it yet.
Apparently someone hasn't seen "Team America."
Damn .... those stats are appalling.
Empire in decline.
Obama is really doing a great job, isn't he?
are you talking about hos golfge?
I have a combat bag of assault golf clubs, if you're interested.
I know i am repeating myself, but again, they are breaking down and destroying in an all out attack - the physical, mental and spiritual.
.
Its all being perverted and turned to shit...our bodies, our minds and our morals.
.
When I see this sort of thing happenning i know for sure I am not no dying fuckin ape and that i have an external soul.
Alpha test for dominance. if you are smarter than a sex crazed chimp you have nothing to worry about. Don't show your hand. Find the others.
The drones in Boston, mindlessly chanting "U-S-A!" while cheering the black-clad bringers of martial law, made me want to projectile vomit.
This country, long past its prime, now excels at exactly one thing: excess. It will inevitably be crushed by the sheer weight of its own collective ego.
It was eerie to watch people chanting "USA" after the capture of the alleged terrorist.
Dumb fucks don't realize that it can happen to them if they get out of line.
http://www.usnews.com/news/articles/2013/04/23/boston-bombing-changes-la...
WTF?!? Are these people insane? According to Rand Paul, of all people, a drone strike on someone who robs a liquor store is now perfectly fine? We should have used a drone against Dzhokhar Tsarnaev because he was merely a suspect in a crime?
H. L. Mencken said, "Democracy is the theory that the common people know what they want, and deserve to get it good and hard." Deep down, people apparently want to live as slaves in a fascist state.
Dark times ahead my friend......
They want "safety", and think they can force/trust someone else to carry it out and organize it for them...
I saw multiple contingents of military and police today, like 5 plus vehicles a piece, in a 10ish mile drive i think i saw 30+ le/military/fed land vehicles, I'm convinced somethings up.
Yeah, I live near an airport where the National Guard operates an Army Aviation Support Facility, and it could be a matter of simple training exercises, but there have been more "black helicopters" flying around than usual. Who knows? I've stocked up on tin foil just in case!
I wish i could short a tinfoil vix.
liike shutting down a major shipping route type of exercises?
Back in November or so, I predicted (doubtful that I'm the only one) that there would be a drone strick on US soil within six months of the inauguration. We still have about 2 months left.
+ 1 Blotto
Very perceptive, it is our spiritual souls under attack.
...ummmm...ditto to you...soul is spirit...and "they" can't touch it...change it...nor diminish it...
Yes, Blotto
For we have all the temporal items we can imagine and yet are dying.
It is thus the spiritual element in life become lacking.
Welcome an atheistic society's ravages.
By which I do not mean to infer anything religious.
Simply, that nobody cares about the universal teachings of God anymore, of Natural Laws (...to assume the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and Nature's God entitle them...) the manifest null set between good and evil, right and wrong, practicing a life based upon principles rather than personalities....
Not only do too few care, we have as a society become subsumed in a temporal principle-less void and thus, doomed.
everthing is about concurring something from day one. marketing the need to concur or be dominant, noticed, cool, hip and fit in with all the cool hip sheeplesters. I want it? never asking/ wondering if it makes any sense. subconsious needs from brainwash marketing... and the stress of it all, for what, junk, double junk, then clutter for what? people forget that they even have everything they need because they just feel a need and buy moar. crazy man, crazy...fuzy warmth from a new thingy. fucking crazy. look around for one day and look at the idiots and what they drive- a fucking suburban to buy a couple bags of groceries and of course be cool sitting up high in their huge fucking vehicle getting shit mileage-idiots, pick-ups same deal.
clothes, gizmos, cylinders doing everything that all the headaches to keep it working properly. electric everything from china built to self destruct in less than a year crap. electronics, you name it bunch of happines stealing shit that distracts us from the real pleasures of life. fucking idiots; and i say ha ha - you get all the stress you deserve..
less is more.
long less
short moar
and yes, long golf balls soon as homeland security just bought 160 billion titlest hollowed(the dimples)balls...
FUBAR....
Obama is not the decider in my life...........
Obama is just finishing up what Reagan started.
Progressives and malaise go together like vultures of a feather. O is doing the job he was born and bred for.
Americans are stress-out crazy people! Take their guns away!
STRESS: OOOOOHHH!!! I DON'T KNOW WHICH DOGNUT I'LL EAT FIRST!! THE FROSTED WITH CHOCOLAT SPRINKLES OR THE GREACE POWER SUGAR COATED ONES...L oooohhhh!!!!
yeah....
FREE OBAMA PHONES FOR EVERYBODY!!!!
YEAH!!!!!
OBAMA WILL PAY YOUR BILLS!!!!
Every time you misspell "dog-nut," I laugh my ass off.
Chocolate frosted dognuts are a delicacy in some circles.........
laughing too as when we were kids it was the only way to say it...
dognuts bitcheez
and
long stress
:)
I'll try better next time :)
Obamafones cost over $2 BILLION
http://www.newsmax.com/US/obama-phone-costs-billions/2013/02/12/id/490022
If you're not paranoid.
.
You're not paying attention.
Are you saying most of the World is still asleep? I'd have to agree.
Paranoia is the fear of unreal wierdos.
Who has time for unreal wierdos when so many real ones are out there?
-Odd Bodkins (Hugh)
At least you guys are still number 1 in certain stuff...
We're # 1, we're #1 ...
We're #1 at being full of #2.
Drone attacks for certain............
pick a shooter and we'll battle... Americans arenT the best gamers in the world you know...
Maybe we're not gamers but we play the world like a fiddle and make them believe all sorts of bullshit. Hollywood and our MSM lead the charge.
Sequester
"Orwell does America"
... by none other than, "PEPE EsCoBaR"!!! [4/23/13/]
http://www.atimes.com/
He is a damn good writer.
What?
He gave up drug running?
Some, most or all of the above. Thank you for asking. Now what implementable social/political solutions can be adopted at the society level. And please lets not have any of the "look within yourself and change yourself" dribble. Yes, people need to self actualize some change, but what we are tallking about here is what we can change as a country that cares about all its people.
3/10, the avatar isn't blatant enough, also, your parlance is missing the procedural tone of a lifetime bureaucrat. For further points you would have to more directly attack Christianity; evangelism, and traditional protestant faiths. Overall i was unenthused.
U-S-A!U-S-A!U-S-A!U-S-A!U-S-A!U-S-A!
Reading that long list of personal and social dysfunctions one would think the US population is seriously mentally ill.
<Welcome to the Insane Asylum.>
How did I know you would be here?
12 step program to self awareness
Chew some valerian root and get more exercise.
Does the land of the free have gay marriages?
Between this post and the other one you made about your "friend", I'm starting to get the impression that you're more than a little homophobic.
Repressing something perhaps?
This internet community is above PC devices i.e. homophobic. Please refrain from their use.
And you're gay.
only in the old fashioned sense!
lol, I was drawing a parabole with the apple stock based on the french vote...
Only repression is zany humour. I have no personal interest in gay trends.
So...is france ahead of USA on this gay marriage thingie?
Come on, dude. Bruce can't marry Bruce. Who wears the dress?
Who wears a dress anymore besides female impersonators?
So I guess this means...mission accomplished?
it's not that the financial pundits don't talk to joes sixpack. they don't give a fuck about him.
"There's a reason that education sucks, and it’s the same reason it will never ever ever be fixed. It’s never going to get any better, don’t look for it. Be happy with what you’ve got. Because the owners of this country don’t want that. I’m talking about the real owners now, the big, wealthy, business interests that control all things and make the big decisions.
Forget the politicians, they’re irrelevant.
Politicians are put there to give you that idea that you have freedom of choice. You don’t. You have no choice. You have owners. They own you. They own everything. They own all the important land, they own and control the corporations, and they’ve long since bought and paid for the Senate, the Congress, the State Houses, and the City Halls. They’ve got the judges in their back pockets. And they own all the big media companies so they control just about all the news and information you get to hear.
They’ve got you by the balls.
They spend billions of dollars every year lobbying to get what they want. Well, we know what they want; they want more for themselves and less for everybody else. But I’ll tell you what they don’t want—they don’t want a population of citizens capable of critical thinking. They don’t want well informed, well educated people capable of critical thinking. They’re not interested in that. That doesn’t help them. That’s against their interest. You know something, they don’t want people that are smart enough to sit around their kitchen table and figure out how badly they’re getting fucked by a system that threw them overboard 30 fucking years ago.
They don’t want that, you know what they want?
They want obedient workers, obedient workers. People who are just smart enough to run the machines and do the paperwork and just dumb enough to passively accept all these increasingly shittier jobs with the lower pay, the longer hours, the reduced benefits, the end of overtime and the vanishing pension that disappears the minute you go to collect it.
And now they’re coming for your social security money.
They want your fucking retirement money; they want it back so they can give it to their criminal friends on Wall Street. And you know something? They’ll get it. They’ll get it all from you sooner or later because they own this fucking place. It’s a big club and you ain’t in it! You and I are not in the Big Club. By the way, it’s the same big club they use to beat you in the head with all day long when they tell you what to believe. All day long beating you over the head with their media telling you what to believe, what to believe, what to think and what to buy.
The table is tilted folks, the game is rigged.
Nobody seems to notice, nobody seems to care. Good honest hard working people, white collar, blue collar, it doesn’t matter what color shirt you have on. Good honest hard working people continue, these are people of modest means, continue to elect these rich cocksuckers who don’t give a fuck about them. They don’t give a fuck about you. They don’t give a fuck about…give a fuck about you! They don’t care about you at all, at all, at all.
And nobody seems to notice, nobody seems to care.
That’s what the owners count on, the fact that Americans are and will probably remain willfully ignorant of the big red, white, and blue dick that’s being jammed up their assholes everyday. Because the owners of this country know the truth, it’s called the American Dream, because you have to be asleep to believe it."
long live g.c.
I can't edit my post but I should have added that the quote was from George Carlin. My apologies.
That is why only fair and imbalanced news from ZH is so important.
If there's anger, shame, and hopelessness when you reflect on the world around you, there's much to take comfort in the fact that your sentiments are shared. Not only by your immediate neighbours but all around the world. We're all getting screwed by the criminals without borders, the big business interests, and since you and many others here are all aware of it, I guess that makes us bros.
We are #1 in PORN.......at least thats something...
I assume it is porn that is propping up California?
I don't know about California, but at this point it's the only thing propping up my "thingee"
At least by US standards when a single nipple on TV already counts as.
I'm overwelhmed by banksters and crooked politicians Monsanto, big pharma and a toothache.
Line 'em up like that and the toothache don't seem so bad.
Yeah, I'll go with toothache for the car, Bert.
This either proves that you can 'prove' anything with statistical claims, or that I'm the luckiest, smartest man in America. *kof*
At the end of this miserable little rant, all you got is,
"Do not be afraid.
Instead, be strong and courageous and prepare well for the storms that are coming."
Ok then, and thank you to the "watchman on the wall'.
Can you say delusional?
Can you say... shove your mealey mouthed, passive- aggressive, little cunt comment up your silly little ass? I hate men who think its very clever and witty to write comments like women. You're disgusting. Consider killing yourself.
meh... with the immigration bill we'll have more societal fabric than we know what to do with. Just keep switching populations until we find one that fits the economomists' models. Much easier than switching models.
Exactly. For example if you want your obesity and teen pregnancy rates to go up, you just add more Mexicans!
I am currently in Mexico. I think I have seen only maybe 1 fat person since I have been here. Most the folks around me could not afford to be fat.
The idea of fat lazy Mexicans is complete horseshit at least in Mexico.
The article states that Mexico is second behind the US in obesity. With "hispanics" being the fastest growing population in the US, it stands to reason that they are contributing to our increase in the rate of obesity. Some of the statistics mentioned in the article reflect changing demographics in the US. If 10- 20 million Scandinavians immigrated to the US, statistics would show that Americans are getting smarter, taller and more blond.
Elke Sommer, where are you when our demographers need you?
We're on the DSGE model. It was created to calculate perpetual change, much like the personalities and bi-polar tendencies of our citizens.