Libertarian Fiction is bad for you

[korwyn]

Last night, after we attended a screening of "True Grit", we rode the BART homeward.  When we left the station Ms. K & I watched a skate-boarder pull out a carving tool and start to deface the plastic that wraps the hand holds in the car.  So I walked over and told the guy it was not cool.  He looked at me and started again, so I told him again

Comments

[falzalot]

Well, in their defense, most people won't approach a young guy (presumably in shape) with a carving tool (=weapon). But if you're brave enough to do so, maybe pull out your cell phone and take his picture?

[korwyn]

Actually given the situation had he even started to move toward me it would have hurt, him not me. The fact was that it just irritated me to no end.

[thedukeatreides]

In instances like these (even though this case is relatively minor case compared to the one I reference), I tend to reference "Thirty-Eight Who Saw Murder Didn't Call the Police":

http://www2.selu.edu/Academics/Faculty/scraig/gansberg.html

Which you've likely read. It makes me mad every time I think about it.

Interestingly enough, it's illegal to not report if you know someone is going to kill themselves or someone else, but it's not illegal not to call the police if you see someone getting stabbed.

People also don't speak up when others say "that's so gay," or similarly horrible things. I think part of it might be that they don't know what to say when the other person says "lighten up." I know that happened to me when I told someone that he shouldn't say things like that. What does one do when the other person persists in being an asshole?

[korwyn]

The way I see it this is a function of a couple of societal conditionings. First, and probably foremost we are convinced that people who do things that violate our standards of civil behavior are somehow more dangerous than people who do not. Which is on the surface of it stupid since we know lots of mild mannered very dangerous people.

The second is the cultural expectation that we can / must allow people to go to hell in their own way. Honestly I am of the opinion that in many cases dialog only goes so far.

Oh, and the response to "That is so Gay" is "why yes, it is very cheerful.".

Let's have a tea party!

[learnteach]

Cranky Old Guys drinking Beer! If we call it a tea party, perhaps we can get funding.

Yeah, whatever for the fool. You did the right thing. Pity you didn't have a handy cattleprod. He was wasting your money.

And this morning, Sunday 7 am...

[gormflaith]

I was woken up for the second morning in a row by someone who decided it was appropriate to constantly honk their horn for 5 minutes until whoever they were picking up got into the car.
I actually got dressed to give the idiot some thoughts on the subject, but alas 5 minutes is not apparently enough time for me to wake from sound slumber to dressed in enough clothes that I'm comfortable yelling at the top of my lungs in my neighborhood in.
Thank you for pointing out to the idiot that what he was doing was not cool. He might stop to think about it next time.
Me, I've now got a box of very soft oranges by my front door, waiting for tomorrow's rude awakening ;-)

[emma7926]

I'll go with cultural and ethical responsibility.

Thank you for your efforts in maintaining a civilized environment.