Strong families with strong faith

[ssurgul]

While watching channel 12's (KPTV) news out of Portland, I was finally able to organize thoughts about what is so very different up here versus down in CA, where I left just a couple of months ago.

One of the Challenger kids was being interviewed. That, for those who like myself hadn't heard of it prior to tonight, is used to refer to those people who are children of one of the Challenger astronauts from 17 years ago. She was saying that she attended the Columbia memorial services and met one of the kids of some of the Columbia astronauts. Yadayadayada, she ended by saying the latest kids were part of strong families with strong faith.

Strong faith.

Ever since moving up here, I have been slightly uncomfortable with the mass media. I'm not terribly comfortable with it normally, but it's been even worse lately. And that's precisely why. This is a rather conservative area/community. And, I was warned of this from various folk. There are a number of rednecks to be found here, on any street, in any neighborhood. Rednecks thrive in conservatism. Conservatism thrives on rules and regulations, and some profiling and other delights like that. Religion thrives on the same thing. What does all this mean to me? A more structured society.

That is quite a difference from CA, the land of extreme liberties/freedoms for everyone, even those that have no legal or legitimate business living in the Country or State. Where anyone is entitled to everything from the State, and from the public at large, regardless of their hygeine or even ability to communicate in the standard language of the country. (I know there is not a National language set at this time, but it really would make things a LOT easier and cheaper if there were.) Up here, though, it's vastly different. Walk into somewhere like Taco Bell, and the counter help, even if they look decidedly hispanic, actually speak perfectly clear English/American. They can take a simple order; they're very polite; they actually seem to want to assist you. I guess there are a very few shining points in family values after all.

Comments

[brigus.livejournal.com]

I don't know if you're being purposefully simplistic here, or if you really think that's the way it is, but "liberals" are as controlling as "conservatives", they just have a different agenda. Economic freedom is as important as social freedom, and we are decidedly lacking the former in California. I guess it's a matter of priorities, but I prefer a "middle ground" that is fraught with freedom on all fronts.

*nod*

[ssurgul.livejournal.com]

I was, absolutely. I'm far, far more Libertarian than I am either, as I much prefer Economic Freedom coupled with Societal and Social responsibility and actual liberty. I was simply reflecting on the rather stark differences between here and there. Having been there for 5 years, and loved most aspects of the life down there, it's just a readjustment of levels to be here, and be surrounded by a more home-grown mentality.

And believe me, I'd very, very much hate it if the Liberals controlled everything, just as much as I'd hate if the Conservatives ran the show. I'm so in favor of scrubbing it all, and letting the people run their own lives, it's scary. But then, that's just a pipe dream of someone who honestly believes that if most of the sheep pulled their heads out of their neighbors' asses, and realized they don't really need to be told what to eat/watch/sleep in/wear/do/play with, we'd all be about 1000% better off.

And, I really do hope your neck and back start feeling better soon. If they don't, and you happen to find your way back up here again, let me know. I have a massage table, and oils, and I'm not afraid to use them both.

[tastyeagle.livejournal.com]

I used to believe in the Libertarian system, and I still lean towards that direction. Unfortunately, people are greedy and will stop at nothing to screw the guy next to him out of his last dollar.

Just like communism in its ideal form sounds like a great way to run a society, so does Libertarianism. But just as Communism was corrupted before it was implemented, so would Libertarianism. I'd be afraid that large corporations would simply supplant government as the tyrants of society (then again, they pretty much are, already).

I still lean towards 'more' freedoms, and with those freedoms, more responsibilities. But for some reason the people that make up society continually ask government to tell them what to do and to enforce it to the letter of the law either on one end of the spectrum or the other.

[windmist.livejournal.com]

Interesting... I find that Portland has more of a charismatically open mind than anywhere else I have lived, including the Bay. This city, as Kiji so expertly put it, has soul. People here are among the most friendly and accommodating you will find anywhere, I believe. Some of them actually give a shit about you--imagine that!

Now, in retrospect, when you do find rednecks or religious nutballs around here, they tend to be fanatic! It is just bizarre, considering that Oregon has some of the lowest chuch-going population in the nation.

[osiris831.livejournal.com]

Word. Over the past few years, I have slid from the "Libertarian" corner of the field a long way towards the "Liberal" corner. (If you're familiar with the "World's Smallest Political Quiz" (http://www.self-gov.org/wspq.html) from the Advocates for Self-Goverment (http://www.self-gov.org/).)

My main reason for this is the accelerating concentration of wealth and power. The U.S. is now a kleptocracy, where the power of the government is used to enrich the richest 1% at the expense of everyone else. (Need some examples? Open a fucking newspaper... which is probably owned by one of a very small handful of Big Media corporations.)

I've been saying for quite some time now that corporations have now supplanted human beings as the dominant life-form on the planet. I'm as anarchocapitalist as the next guy, but a market with players the size of McDonald's or Microsoft in it, is not a free market no matter what the rules are. These huge concentrations of wealth and power are creatures of the state (the corporation, as an "artificial person", was created right here in Silicon Valley by an 1886 court case called Santa Clara County v. Southern Pacific Railroad (http://reclaimdemocracy.org/personhood/santa_clara_vs_southern_pacific.html)). As things stand now, the state is the only entity capable of peacefully correcting the domination of our lives and our planet by these behemoths. (I'm betting on the more violent solution.) I am not in favor of getting rid of the state until it has been used to break up these monsters. Yes, I'm talking about redistribution of wealth. What the state has taken away (by granting immortality and other special rights to corporate "artificial persons"), the state must give back, before I'm through with it.

In short, the path from the status quo to a free society leads, unfortunately, through a period of massive governmental redistribution of wealth. Or it leads through bloody revolution. Bush, Ashcroft, and Associates are leading us in the latter direction. ("Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable." -- JFK)