Pick and choose grief

[Governor Tarkin]

2 hours ago, Seymour M Hersh said:

 

You're clearly not "reading between the lines" and are also not inventing a narrative arc to suit.

 

All the good stuff. 

[Nookie Bear]

1 hour ago, Bozi said:

The Sri Lanka bombings are awful, it's a place that holds a special place for my wife and I. I proposed in the Sri Lankan jungle and absolutely love the place, we stayed in the Cinnamon Grand on our last night there and its was exceptional. 

 

But this isn't the first time Sri Lanka has been criminally overlooked. The Boxing day tsunami killed ten times as many people in Sri Lanka that in Thailand... But.. You know... Thailand was full of Europeans so Sri Lanka was overlooked 

 

For the same reason you love Sri Lanka, Thailand is a hugely popular destination for Brits, especially places like Phuket that were hit hard. 

 

 

[i8hibsh]

Brits were killed in Sri Lanka that in itself should make us feel an affinity.

[Bozi]

58 minutes ago, Nookie Bear said:

 

For the same reason you love Sri Lanka, Thailand is a hugely popular destination for Brits, especially places like Phuket that were hit hard. 

 

 

Not disputing that, just that I was horrified when I went to Sri Lanka and realise there were that ten times the amount of victims there. 

Arugam Bay is massively popular with Western tourists because it is brilliant for surfing, it was completely wiped out with the tsunami. So it's not because of the popularity of a place.... 

[Nookie Bear]

10 minutes ago, Bozi said:

Not disputing that, just that I was horrified when I went to Sri Lanka and realise there were that ten times the amount of victims there. 

Arugam Bay is massively popular with Western tourists because it is brilliant for surfing, it was completely wiped out with the tsunami. So it's not because of the popularity of a place.... 

 

I totally get what you’re saying. 

 

 

[shaun.lawson]

The OP can often be, um, rather insensitive in his language... but this is a good thread. Very thought-provoking - and I agree with his essential point 100%. I find it disgusting tbh.

 

We have a pecking order when it comes to tragedy. We also have a pecking order when it comes to illness. If someone has cancer, everyone rushes to support them, express their horror etc... but that's not true of all serious or life-threatening illnesses at all. Nor is it with all forms of disability. Nor is it with mental health, as opposed to physical health.

 

Quite how it's so difficult to grasp that we're all just human beings on this planet, with a lot more in common than what divides us, I've never quite understood. I guess the answer is that humans are essentially tribal. That's why bullying happens at school and in the workplace; it's even why gossip happens, because gossip is usually about someone seeming 'different'. 

 

Someone mentioned the 2004 tsunami above. It took the British media several days to wake up to the fact that it wasn't all about British holidaymakers. It was about the deaths of 250,000 people. It's absurd. No tragedy and no death is somehow more important than any other; human tragedy is human tragedy.

Edited April 22, 2019 by shaun.lawson

[Cade]

Grief is an emotion.

 

Emotions are, by their nature, subjective.

 

There is no formula which dictates which event is worthy of mass grief and which is not.

 

End of thread.

[ri Alban]

It's very sad, but so are Drones killing Arabs. 

Edited April 23, 2019 by ri Alban

[i8hibsh]

8 hours ago, Cade said:

Grief is an emotion.

 

Emotions are, by their nature, subjective.

 

There is no formula which dictates which event is worthy of mass grief and which is not.

 

End of thread.

 

 

Should emotions not be private then and not advertised to someone's 4,000 'friends' they have barely met.

 

I mean who doesn't feel sadness when they hear about some jihadi scumbag or far right scumbag murdering innocent civilians? Very few people is the answer. But why must you advertise to the world your sadness?

 

It always seems to be the tragedies that are more 'in vogue' that these people seem to compete in the grief wars for.

 

A celebrity dies and someone just has to start an "RIP" thread fillled with nauseating platitudes about how much the person meant to them and how much they loved them even though in their previous 20k posts they never once mentioned them. Surely they would at least mentioned this 'strong love' at least once in casual or deep conversation.

 

I know the term 'virtue signalling' is over played now by the right but it really is spot on. People signalling to the world how virtuous they are. I see it like a plane coming in to land and the plane is the social media world. You have the wee guy on the tarmac with the two red lights signalling it in. Well, those red lights are the person's latest post of sanctimony and wishes for the world to take notice.

 

Pathetic and so so desperate.

Edited April 23, 2019 by i8hibsh

[Governor Tarkin]

12 minutes ago, i8hibsh said:

Pathetic and so so desperate.

 

Seldom has a truer word been spoken. 

[ri Alban]

10 minutes ago, Governor Tarkin said:

 

Seldom has a truer word been spoken. 

Yet, his own virtue signalling continues. Otherwise you wouldn't know what he thinks.

 

That's pathetic.

[ri Alban]

26 minutes ago, i8hibsh said:

 

 

Should emotions not be private then and not advertised to someone's 4,000 'friends' they have barely met.

 

I mean who doesn't feel sadness when they hear about some jihadi scumbag or far right scumbag murdering innocent civilians? Very few people is the answer. But why must you advertise to the world your sadness?

 

It always seems to be the tragedies that are more 'in vogue' that these people seem to compete in the grief wars for.

 

A celebrity dies and someone just has to start an "RIP" thread fillled with nauseating platitudes about how much the person meant to them and how much they loved them even though in their previous 20k posts they never once mentioned them. Surely they would at least mentioned this 'strong love' at least once in casual or deep conversation.

 

I know the term 'virtue signalling' is over played now by the right but it really is spot on. People signalling to the world how virtuous they are. I see it like a plane coming in to land and the plane is the social media world. You have the wee guy on the tarmac with the two red lights signalling it in. Well, those red lights are the person's latest post of sanctimony and wishes for the world to take notice.

 

Pathetic and so so desperate.

Duck! Otherwise your hypocrisy will slap you right in the face.

 

As for MSM , People were on holiday and Newspapers were full of post attack news.

Today will be full.

[AlphonseCapone]

Is the problem folk expressing their grief about one thing over the other or feeling grief about one thing over the other? 

 

I can't understand why anyone would care about the first or be confused about the second. 

Edited April 23, 2019 by AlphonseCapone

[i8hibsh]

34 minutes ago, AlphonseCapone said:

Is the problem folk expressing their grief about one thing over the other or feeling grief about one thing over the other? 

 

I can't understand why anyone would care about the first or be confused about the second. 

 

Not confused. I know exactly what these people are.......fake people.

 

I give you the first as I should switch off, sit back and light up a spliff and let the world pass me by but it really really grates on me Alphonse. Genuinely can't deal with people walking the moral high ground, we all care a tad but no-one that much. At the end of the day we are all just a bunch of *****.

[Rab87]

16 minutes ago, i8hibsh said:

 

Not confused. I know exactly what these people are.......fake people.

 

I give you the first as I should switch off, sit back and light up a spliff and let the world pass me by but it really really grates on me Alphonse. Genuinely can't deal with people walking the moral high ground, we all care a tad but no-one that much. At the end of the day we are all just a bunch of *****.

To a point, I think you are claiming some moral high ground too.

 

The way I see it, unless another person's actions are causing someone emotional or physical harm, why should we care what they do? Allow folk their grief, even if it is faux.

[AlphonseCapone]

53 minutes ago, i8hibsh said:

 

Not confused. I know exactly what these people are.......fake people.

 

I give you the first as I should switch off, sit back and light up a spliff and let the world pass me by but it really really grates on me Alphonse. Genuinely can't deal with people walking the moral high ground, we all care a tad but no-one that much. At the end of the day we are all just a bunch of *****.

 

Believe it or not I used to be a lot like you. I'd get myself fuming at other folk for the way they behaved or even meaningless things like when my ex would watch x factor and I'd get all ranty at how shite it was and the stories were emotional claptrap etc. 

 

It took a lot of effort at first but I just forced myself to not care about things that were essentially harmless, now I can watch shite reality TV and just laugh at it. There are some topics, serious ones, where it's a lot harder. But what I am saying is, just trying disengaging from things that piss you off and you might find it helps mellow you out. Life's too short to waste it being pissed off. 

[southcap]

And yet not a single person gives a **** that a WHITE TERRORIST murdered a journalist In the UK at the weekend.

 

Rather play racial politics about foreign incidents .

 

You are as tedious as the 'light a candle for NZ' types.

 

I do see a pattern forming though.

 

Brown on Brown terrorism = meh

White on Brown Terrorism = meh

White on white terrorism = meh

Brown on White terrorism = foaming at the mouth.

 

The pattern is repeated the same over and over, every time there is polarising incidents around the world.

 

Just admit it, you are white supremacists.

[Unknown user]

 

10 minutes ago, AlphonseCapone said:

 

Believe it or not I used to be a lot like you. I'd get myself fuming at other folk for the way they behaved or even meaningless things like when my ex would watch x factor and I'd get all ranty at how shite it was and the stories were emotional claptrap etc. 

 

It took a lot of effort at first but I just forced myself to not care about things that were essentially harmless, now I can watch shite reality TV and just laugh at it. There are some topics, serious ones, where it's a lot harder. But what I am saying is, just trying disengaging from things that piss you off and you might find it helps mellow you out. Life's too short to waste it being pissed off. 

 

Bingo

[southcap]

13 minutes ago, AlphonseCapone said:

 

Believe it or not I used to be a lot like you. I'd get myself fuming at other folk for the way they behaved or even meaningless things like when my ex would watch x factor and I'd get all ranty at how shite it was and the stories were emotional claptrap etc. 

 

It took a lot of effort at first but I just forced myself to not care about things that were essentially harmless, now I can watch shite reality TV and just laugh at it. There are some topics, serious ones, where it's a lot harder. But what I am saying is, just trying disengaging from things that piss you off and you might find it helps mellow you out. Life's too short to waste it being pissed off. 

Can't feel righteous if you don't have a 'cause'.

[redjambo]

3 hours ago, i8hibsh said:

 

 

Should emotions not be private then and not advertised to someone's 4,000 'friends' they have barely met.

 

I mean who doesn't feel sadness when they hear about some jihadi scumbag or far right scumbag murdering innocent civilians? Very few people is the answer. But why must you advertise to the world your sadness?

 

It always seems to be the tragedies that are more 'in vogue' that these people seem to compete in the grief wars for.

 

A celebrity dies and someone just has to start an "RIP" thread fillled with nauseating platitudes about how much the person meant to them and how much they loved them even though in their previous 20k posts they never once mentioned them. Surely they would at least mentioned this 'strong love' at least once in casual or deep conversation.

 

I know the term 'virtue signalling' is over played now by the right but it really is spot on. People signalling to the world how virtuous they are. I see it like a plane coming in to land and the plane is the social media world. You have the wee guy on the tarmac with the two red lights signalling it in. Well, those red lights are the person's latest post of sanctimony and wishes for the world to take notice.

 

Pathetic and so so desperate.

 

Honest question. If I feel grief at a case of innocent human beings being murdered by ****wits, how do I express this without being accused by you of "virtue signalling"? Sometimes certain events happen and I just don't want them to pass without expressing my opinion on how much I feel it is a tragedy for those involved and that I wish the world were a better place. On those occasions, I don't want to carry on and act as if nothing has happened, I want to at least say "this is an awful thing, why the feck do humans act like this?" Much in the same way that I also like to express my support for good news (gay marriage legislation, human rights advances etc.).

 

Unless you know a person well, you won't know whether they are genuine in expressing grief or not, so can't accuse them of virtue signalling, or of being pathetic and desperate. Social media is just that, it is an extension of us sitting in a pub and having a chat, where we would almost definitely talk about the subject.

 

However, I do agree that generally as a society we are very West-biased in our grief.

 

As two asides, "virtual signalling" is a neologism I detest (mostly because it is used by people to replace real argumentation), and also I personally wouldn't be upset when a celebrity dies, except if that celebrity was contributing actively to making the world a better place (and that doesn't include entertainment in my books).

 

[Governor Tarkin]

3 hours ago, i8hibsh said:

 

Not confused. I know exactly what these people are.......fake people.

 

 

Edited April 23, 2019 by Governor Tarkin

[shaun.lawson]

3 hours ago, i8hibsh said:

 

Not confused. I know exactly what these people are.......fake people.

 

It takes one to know one.

 

i8: you're a character on here. A comedy character. You've played this role for as long as I can remember. No way, no way on Earth, are every single opinion you've ever expressed on this website things you truly believe 100%. Some of them are, sure; but others, you just to say to shock and provoke. 

 

Plenty of people do that online. It's no big deal. It's just that... it makes you fake. Fake as ****. The only way you wouldn't be is if, by some impossible to imagine miracle, you're every bit as batshit in real life as you are on here. And sorry buddy, but I just don't buy that. I never have.

[Auld Reekin']

1 hour ago, shaun.lawson said:

 

It takes one to know one.

 

i8: you're a character on here. A comedy character. You've played this role for as long as I can remember. No way, no way on Earth, are every single opinion you've ever expressed on this website things you truly believe 100%. Some of them are, sure; but others, you just to say to shock and provoke. 

 

Plenty of people do that online. It's no big deal. It's just that... it makes you fake. Fake as ****. The only way you wouldn't be is if, by some impossible to imagine miracle, you're every bit as batshit in real life as you are on here. And sorry buddy, but I just don't buy that. I never have.

 

[cheetah]

3 hours ago, shaun.lawson said:

 

It takes one to know one.

 

i8: you're a character on here. A comedy character. You've played this role for as long as I can remember. No way, no way on Earth, are every single opinion you've ever expressed on this website things you truly believe 100%. Some of them are, sure; but others, you just to say to shock and provoke. 

 

Plenty of people do that online. It's no big deal. It's just that... it makes you fake. Fake as ****. The only way you wouldn't be is if, by some impossible to imagine miracle, you're every bit as batshit in real life as you are on here. And sorry buddy, but I just don't buy that. I never have.

 

 

It sure does.

 

Oh shit this could go on and on and ...

[shaun.lawson]

4 minutes ago, cheetah said:

 

 

It sure does.

 

Oh shit this could go on and on and ...

 

 

[Governor Tarkin]

3 minutes ago, shaun.lawson said:

 

 

 

He is as batshit, Shaun.

[shaun.lawson]

58 minutes ago, Governor Tarkin said:

 

He is as batshit, Shaun.

 

To paraphrase Bill Parcells: "Look - this is not a place for well-adjusted individuals!" 

[ri Alban]

9 hours ago, i8hibsh said:

 

Not confused. I know exactly what these people are.......fake people.

 

I give you the first as I should switch off, sit back and light up a spliff and let the world pass me by but it really really grates on me Alphonse. Genuinely can't deal with people walking the moral high ground, we all care a tad but no-one that much. At the end of the day we are all just a bunch of *****.

Speak for yourself.

[ri Alban]

58 minutes ago, shaun.lawson said:

 

To paraphrase Bill Parcells: "Look - this is not a place for well-adjusted individuals!" 

Feck the Giants!

[Mikey1874]

It's pretty normal.

 

30 / 40 Iraqis were being killed every day by suicide bombers around the time of the bombs in London in 2005. 

 

 

[Governor Tarkin]

3 hours ago, Mikey1874 said:

It's pretty normal.

 

30 / 40 Iraqis were being killed every day by suicide bombers around the time of the bombs in London in 2005. 

 

 

 

My brother was working in Baghdad at the time. Reckons it was utterly horrific. Used to count the bodies floating down the Tigris every morning. The odd attrocity notwithstanding we lead sheltered lives. I'm very thankful for that. 

Edited April 23, 2019 by Governor Tarkin

[ri Alban]

6 hours ago, Governor Tarkin said:

 

My brother was working in Baghdad at the time. Reckons it was utterly horrific. Used to count the bodies floating down the Tigris every morning. The odd attrocity notwithstanding we lead sheltered lives. I'm very thankful for that. 

There's plenty of shite that happens here, that the news doesn't cover. Whether that's on purpose or not, is down to opinion. 

#LondonMatters

[Governor Tarkin]

5 hours ago, ri Alban said:

There's plenty of shite that happens here, that the news doesn't cover. Whether that's on purpose or not, is down to opinion. 

#LondonMatters

 

There is nothing that happens hear that the media doesn't cover that even comes close to the almost daily slaughter of post Saddam Iraq, post Taliban Afghanistan, Northern Pakistan, Kashmir, etc. 

 

 

[ri Alban]

6 hours ago, Governor Tarkin said:

 

There is nothing that happens hear that the media doesn't cover that even comes close to the almost daily slaughter of post Saddam Iraq, post Taliban Afghanistan, Northern Pakistan, Kashmir, etc. 

 

 

Aye, cause the savagery in these places are all true.  People are killed here every day, either stabbed, shot, battered, poisoned, or starved to death/suicide by  Tories.

[Governor Tarkin]

46 minutes ago, ri Alban said:

Aye, cause the savagery in these places are all true.  People are killed here every day, either stabbed, shot, battered, poisoned, or starved to death/suicide by  Tories.

 

Tens or thousands killed in sectarian violence across Iraq and Afghanistan. Millions displaced. 

 

Are you honestly putting that on a par with what's happening in the UK under the Tories? 

 

Things are far from ideal here, but come on. Really?