Gun culture or parenting culture?

[frigidweirdo]

There's a difference in attitude. Many foreigners enter the US with the thought that they can make it. Many in inner cities have the thought that they can't. What they see around them tells them that this is the case.

The question is how do you change such a situation? Well, you start by getting people out and then the cycle can stop. But when you too many single parent families unable to bring up their children then you have a problem already. No, the answer isn't the throw money at the parents, but the answer is in education.

The biggest difference between situations like my father, foreigners who come here, and our poor is that they didn't have government pandering to their situation. The hungrier you are, the harder you will work to eat. My father joined the military just so he could have breakfast, lunch and dinner. He didn't have that at home, so it was worth going to Korea and fight for a year.

When he married my mother, he promised her that the one thing he would never allow to happen-even if it meant his life, was that his family would ever go hungry like he did. His childhood impacted his life so dramatically. In fact growing up, every Sunday was steak day. As kids, we were so sick of steak we didn't eat it very much when we got older.

Don't tell me children who have cable television, internet access, plus school, really believe there is no way out of poverty. They know there are ways out of poverty, but why learn about them? Mom does pretty good! We eat well, live in the suburbs, mom stays home and talks on her Obama phone with her friends. We eat bags of Cheetoes in front of the big screen all summer in the air conditioning. Why work to get out of that?

If you want to reduce poverty, cut down on government aid. Make a law that states if you want any government assistance, you have to be fixed first male or female. No more having kids while on the dole.

That will reduce poverty, but nobody has the guts to actually do those things because the liberals would cry bloody murder.

Of course, but the problem is that you have a society which isn't willing to simply let everyone go, and fight it out for themselves. A hard detox could create more problems than it solves. There are ways to change this without going there. Yes, welfare should be changed, but also education to be more logical to the needs of society.

Yes, it would create a lot of problems at first, but like with any other problem, people look for solutions. If you already have a solution to your problem, then there is no need to look for another solution. The problem has to address you, not the other way around.

So, you have two choices, you can try and solve the problem without creating loads more problems, or you can just go create more. Which is better?

How do you solve a problem by ignoring what caused the problem in the first place?

Look, we've had a war on poverty for over 50 years now. Statistics show that there has been very little change with the poor in over 50 years. Why? Because we tried to solve the problem without creating more problems. It didn't work in the past and will never work in the future.

Okay, so we tried that and it didn't work. So what's the solution, to keep trying? The one thing we never tried is tough love. Our politicians don't have the heart for it, the public doesn't have the heart for it, and the media will certainly never have the heart for it. Oh, don't get me wrong, we came close. It was called the Welfare Reform act and was quite successful. But instead of focusing on the success, we abandoned it and decided to go back to the status quo.

So let's do it your way and see what happens in another 50 years.

I didn't say ignore the initial problems in the first place though, did I?

Yes, the "war on poverty" etc hasn't been a success. This is the reason why we're having this conversation in the first place, and what I'm suggesting are alternative ideas of how to make it work. Again, we know it's not going to happen because of the electoral system in place which leads to two partisan parties who are more interested in "winning" than doing good for society.

 

[Ray From Cleveland]

I didn't say ignore the initial problems in the first place though, did I?

Yes, the "war on poverty" etc hasn't been a success. This is the reason why we're having this conversation in the first place, and what I'm suggesting are alternative ideas of how to make it work. Again, we know it's not going to happen because of the electoral system in place which leads to two partisan parties who are more interested in "winning" than doing good for society.

And I'm not suggesting any ideas that would make it work?

 

[frigidweirdo]

I didn't say ignore the initial problems in the first place though, did I?

Yes, the "war on poverty" etc hasn't been a success. This is the reason why we're having this conversation in the first place, and what I'm suggesting are alternative ideas of how to make it work. Again, we know it's not going to happen because of the electoral system in place which leads to two partisan parties who are more interested in "winning" than doing good for society.

And I'm not suggesting any ideas that would make it work?

I think you're suggesting ideas that may not work, but definitely would cause lots of problems before they might work.

 

[talksalot]

I found a local gun story that I wanted to share because the accused is a minor. Kids with guns are not all that unusual (especially here in Cleveland) but what I found most telling is the response of the mother.

In short, this kid was arrested for having BB gun in a public park (very similar to the Tamir Rice situation) a year earlier. The judge went easy on the kid, but now the 16 year old was busted having a real loaded gun. Here are some quotes from the mother:

"He has to learn the right way. I can't stop him." When the I TEAM asked where he got the gun this time, his mother said, "I don't know. Don't know. He was using it for protection. He was walking down the street and people would shoot at him. Nowadays, that's what you need for protection. I don't consider it a good thing."

That mom says she did talk to her son before the Parma BB gun incident and after it. Didn’t matter. She said, “Kids these days need to learn their own lessons. He's learning his lessons."

Teen caught with BB gun at Parma park now busted with gun; mom says she can’t stop him

With the path this kid is on, it's more than likely he'll be dead or in prison for murder the next decade. Then the left will blame the guns.

Another thing that struck me: she said "I don't know, and I can't stop him." Not "We can't stop him" as if there was a father figure around. This woman practically justified her son illegally carrying a likely stolen gun underage. When he gets older and arrested for shooting somebody, I'm sure the mother will once again respond to a news interview by saying "My baby didn't do nutting wrong, he's a good boy." If he gets gunned down in the street, well........then I guess he "learned his own lessons."

There is more to it than a parenting problem. There's a society problem.

In what world do kids think they need weapons to protect themselves? Well, in a society that is failing to protect people, to instill morals into kids and all of that.

The right love to say how it's the parents' fault. The problem is that the right will also push the very same parents to work 80 hours a week so the rich can get richer. They also don't place any responsibility on schools to help deal with all the issues out there. So, the right essentially like to create the environment for this kind of thing, and then bitch and moan that the parents aren't doing anything about it.

According to the LEFT, women who stay home and raise their kids are FREELOADERS.

According to the RIGHT, they're cattle.

Lefty women have actually used the term "freeloader" for stay-home moms. Who says women are cattle?

To social conservatives, women aren't much at all.

I'm a social conservative and I'm a big deal.