Tuesday, December 23, 2008

Should We Suppress Our Every Whim?

I found this article via Instapundit (an addictive site for which I await updates at all hours). It's fascinating and quite well written (wish I could write so well).

The similarities between young and old Britain and American people are striking. Though I do suspect that if you went back 100 years there were people opining the good old days and the better spirit of the elders compared to the youth.

But have the Brits lost their "stiff upper lip"?

"Certainly, many Britons under the age of 30 or even 40 now embrace a kind of sub-psychotherapeutic theory that desires, if not unleashed, will fester within and eventually manifest themselves in dangerous ways. To control oneself for the sake of the social order, let alone for dignity or decorum (a word that would either mean nothing to the British these days, or provoke peals of laughter), is thus both personally and socially harmful."

Yet how is that different from young Americans? Though I would lower the age to 20-30 in the case of Americans because I *think* that by 30 or 40 people have started to mellow out. But I could be wrong about that and just drawing from my own biased life.

"as a consequence of this change in character, indictable crime has risen at least 900 percent since 1950. In the same period, the homicide rate has doubled"

Perhaps it is time for the Brits to reexamine their gun laws ... if the criminals knew that regular folks could defend themselves it would do something to decrease those crime rates.

The whole article is really fascinating and worth the read. =)

1 comment:

Sandee said...

Crime is up here and we can carry so I don't know. I think it's more a morals issue than anything else. I see a lot of parents that let the schools raise their kids. Little hellions in some cases.

Have a terrific day. Big hug. :)