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Season of Peace and Goodwill?

Otherwise known as the Games Room, think of this as a subforum of the social club reserved just for sociable icebreaker games. Beware - they can be addictive!
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pantodragon
Posts: 883
Joined: March 21st, 2013, 4:19 pm

Re: Season of Peace and Goodwill?

#21 Post by pantodragon » December 30th, 2013, 3:55 pm

Latest post of the previous page:

Ken H wrote:
Actually, I do enjoy Christmas a bit, even though I'm not religious. I only have fond memories of it, especially family get togethers and lots of good food. I don't recall any bullying or drunkeness at Christmas amongst our family and friends. My relatives never drank much anyway. I guess I'm fortunate in that.
People do blame the demon drink for the ills of Christmas but actually, I think it is the other way round: Christmas would be far worse without it. At least when you're drunk your aim is likely to be out so instead of a fatality, you merely get an injury. And then there are those who are sensible enough to drinkl themselves into a complete stupor so that they know nothing about Christmas until it's over! Oh happy days!!!

You don't recall any bullying or drunkeness? Hmm.......... Perhaps one of your family secretly worked for MiB and did a mind wipe on you all after the bloody noses got out of hand? Maybe you just forgot? Lots of people suffer nostalgic amnesia or are of the "It's a Wonderful World" fraternity and refuse to see anything bad. Maybe the adults performed out of sight of the children.........

.........or maybe YOU were one of the main stirrers, so YOU had a good time, even if nobody else did! Or it could be that family loyalty is so strong that you are in denial and would never admit that any of the domestic troubles happened in YOUR family. Or maybe you do not recognise bad behaviour when you see it --- such a common affliction nowadays. Children run riot and are indulged; adults behave appallingly and it's called "it's just her personality".

You may call me cynical. I just say that I go around with my eyes and ears open.

Captain Jean-Luc Picard's defence of humanity in the court of Q certainly fell short of realistic. One could see the rose-tinted gleam of something catching the light whenever he turned his head. He did love to admit that humanity was flawed, but only in acceptible ways, ways that made humanity all the more endearing and lovable.

I find there is more truth about humanity in the cartoon series The Perishers, though I have to say even that does not plumb the true depths of iniquity to which humanity has sunk. A film such as I Am Legend gets closer to the truth --- at least it does if you turn things around and realise that the hero, Robert Neville, is the romanticised version of humanity and the monsters that lurked in the dark and appeared in the night to rampage, enraged and lusting for blood are the realistic version of humanity.

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animist
Posts: 6522
Joined: July 30th, 2010, 11:36 pm

Re: Season of Peace and Goodwill?

#22 Post by animist » December 31st, 2013, 9:10 am

pantodragon wrote: People do blame the demon drink for the ills of Christmas but actually, I think it is the other way round: Christmas would be far worse without it. At least when you're drunk your aim is likely to be out so instead of a fatality, you merely get an injury.
even by your rather low standard of rationality, this is idiotic. Yes, I think there is a lot of neuroticism over unrealistic expectations regarding Xmas which may lead to violence and despair, and that drink fuels this - as does the fondly imagined Xmas institution of family reunions (and I remember a former colleague who told me that EVERY Xmas in Doncaster ended, for his family, in a barney). I would love simply to be able to ban this festival, but I think we are stuck with it. Panto, the enemy is not power, but commercial opportunism linked to human sentimentality. Christmas magically fulfils a human need, as did the supposed resurrection of that Jesus who kicked the whole thing off

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Sel
Posts: 811
Joined: January 3rd, 2011, 3:53 pm

Re: Season of Peace and Goodwill?

#23 Post by Sel » December 31st, 2013, 3:08 pm

Pantsy
Like you, I am aware that family violence increases over the holidays. Right now I am too lazy to research the articles in our local paper re:family violence. If I recall, drunkness contributes ot the violence but so do overly high expectations for the season and financial affairs.

However, I find it objectionable that you belittle those who have never experienced this dreadful upswing. I, for one, grew up in a family that had awesome Christmas dos complete with great food, sing-alongs and a general sense of well being. Not all of my family has beem so fortunate.

My younger daugher is the victim of violent spousal abuse and will live with the emotional, physical and financial scars for a lifetime. That abuse always escalated during or after any special event.

From your reaction to those who had happy experiences with holidays, I have to assume yours was not a happy and peaceful life. My sympathies to you as no one deserves to suffer violience and hatred. But please, realize that those who have never witnessed this behaviour have no reason to understand how pervasive it can be in someone else's life. They are not naive...they are fortunate and know it.

Have a Happy and peaceful New Year.
"The good life is one inspired by love and guided by knowledge." Bertrand Russell

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pantodragon
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Joined: March 21st, 2013, 4:19 pm

Re: Season of Peace and Goodwill?

#24 Post by pantodragon » January 3rd, 2014, 2:52 pm

animist wrote:
even by your rather low standard of rationality, this is idiotic. Yes, I think there is a lot of neuroticism over unrealistic expectations regarding Xmas which may lead to violence and despair, and that drink fuels this - as does the fondly imagined Xmas institution of family reunions (and I remember a former colleague who told me that EVERY Xmas in Doncaster ended, for his family, in a barney). I would love simply to be able to ban this festival, but I think we are stuck with it. Panto, the enemy is not power, but commercial opportunism linked to human sentimentality. Christmas magically fulfils a human need, as did the supposed resurrection of that Jesus who kicked the whole thing off
Another golden solution to the problems of the world from our resident intellectual giant, animist: ban Christmas so that instead of letting rip and releasing some of the pent-up bad feelings, force people to bottle them all up until one day the lid blows off and the whole woprld goes balistic. My solution, the age-old solution: let people run amok at least once in the year. Do you know the origin of the word "amok"? It comes from Malaya where it was understood that social restriction caused feelings to get bottled up and that these needed to be released once in a while. Therefore everyone was allowed to "run amok" every so often and incurred no penalty for their misbehaviour. The Japanese also have a sensible approach to such matters when they install blown-up dolls, images of the bosses, in special rooms where the employees can go and beat the living daylights out of them.

"commercial opportunism linked to human sentimentality" --- really, animist, you must get past taking such a simplistic and superficial view. You remind me of the way people used to shave the mouldy bits off their winter meat carcasses. That's ok if the bulk of the meat is ok. But the carcass that we call society is rotten right through its core --- shaving off a few mouldy bits on the outside is a waste of time.

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pantodragon
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Joined: March 21st, 2013, 4:19 pm

Re: Season of Peace and Goodwill?

#25 Post by pantodragon » January 3rd, 2014, 3:19 pm

Sel wrote:
My younger daugher is the victim of violent spousal abuse and will live with the emotional, physical and financial scars for a lifetime. That abuse always escalated during or after any special event.

.
I am sorry to hear that your daughter was a victim of abuse. Even more sorry to hear that she is unable to deal with it. This is common. From shellshock to child abuse, psychiatrists will dope you to the eyesballs and psychologists will try and change the way you think, and assorted therapists will impose whatever is the latest fashion in therapy upon you, and not a one of these will do one damned bit of good. These things can be dealt with such that one recovers totally. The past need not be carried around with one.

Bradley_5
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Joined: February 4th, 2014, 5:28 am

Re: Season of Peace and Goodwill?

#26 Post by Bradley_5 » February 17th, 2014, 9:41 am

Thanks for the post!

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animist
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Joined: July 30th, 2010, 11:36 pm

Re: Season of Peace and Goodwill?

#27 Post by animist » February 17th, 2014, 10:19 am

pantodragon wrote: Another golden solution to the problems of the world from our resident intellectual giant, animist
only just noticed this, Panto, but thanks anyway

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