Re: Media and Violence

From: Wade Smith (wade_smith@harvard.edu)
Date: Fri Apr 26 2002 - 21:18:39 BST

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Date: Fri, 26 Apr 2002 16:18:39 -0400
Subject: Re: Media and Violence
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From: Wade Smith <wade_smith@harvard.edu>
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    On Friday, April 26, 2002, at 03:52 , Steve Drew wrote:

    > Yes it degenerated in to a bloody shamlbes over time as people
    > sought to out
    > do each other in staging ever more lavish productions. The
    > people had been
    > desensitised to the extreme violence in the games. They had
    > been told by
    > their leaders that the games were good, and made attendance virtually
    > obligatory.

    This is putting the cart before the horse. Nobody ever needed to
    be told that the blood of the alien or the stranger was a 'good'
    thing, or ever needed to be 'desensitized' - whatever the hell
    that means.

    Being told by leaders as a necessary part of the entertainment
    is, IMHO, bull pucky and liberal whining apologetics for the
    basic human fact that we like killing 'Them', and always have,
    and always will.

    Extreme violence was always part of these spectacles. Tribes
    throughout history have brought home the bones and the blood and
    the separated sinews of the peoples over the hill. Nothing was
    desensitizing them of the need to cleave flesh from bones, and
    limbs from torsos.

    - Wade

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