Young Men are Becoming Video-Game Playing Goofballs

[the Black Hunter]

Here's another interesting thing i've noticed that i'll relate in the resurrection of this thread:  even though the video games are pretty much inmitigated violence in many cases, the kids that do this shit have no stomach for real-world, practical violence.  Like killing and gutting a chicken, for instance.  There is no real-world translation as far as I can tell.

I wonder what will happen to all these utterly soft boys who grow into utterly soft 'men' once things get really tough.  A rash of suicides is my bet.

[JohnLudi]

Here's another interesting thing i've noticed that i'll relate in the resurrection of this thread:  even though the video games are pretty much inmitigated violence in many cases, the kids that do this shit have no stomach for real-world, practical violence.  Like killing and gutting a chicken, for instance.  There is no real-world translation as far as I can tell.

I wonder what will happen to all these utterly soft boys who grow into utterly soft 'men' once things get really tough.  A rash of suicides is my bet.

They will die of dehydration or water-borne diseases...like most people, except probably a lot faster.

[the Black Hunter]

Here's another interesting thing i've noticed that i'll relate in the resurrection of this thread:  even though the video games are pretty much inmitigated violence in many cases, the kids that do this shit have no stomach for real-world, practical violence.  Like killing and gutting a chicken, for instance.  There is no real-world translation as far as I can tell.

I wonder what will happen to all these utterly soft boys who grow into utterly soft 'men' once things get really tough.  A rash of suicides is my bet.

They will die of dehydration or water-borne diseases...like most people, except probably a lot faster.

Perhaps you're right.  My partner has a son - a very big, good-looking and very nice boy, very smart, with tons of potential, but like most primarily urban kids, very lazy and very, very soft - who got a simple sliver in his palm and ended up with blood poisoning.  My hands have been a more or less constant host to cuts, lesions, scrapes and splinters in association with distinctly unhygenic conditions since I was half his age and i've never fallen victim to such a thing.

[JohnLudi]

Here's another interesting thing i've noticed that i'll relate in the resurrection of this thread:  even though the video games are pretty much inmitigated violence in many cases, the kids that do this shit have no stomach for real-world, practical violence.  Like killing and gutting a chicken, for instance.  There is no real-world translation as far as I can tell.

I wonder what will happen to all these utterly soft boys who grow into utterly soft 'men' once things get really tough.  A rash of suicides is my bet.

They will die of dehydration or water-borne diseases...like most people, except probably a lot faster.

Perhaps you're right.  My partner has a son - a very big, good-looking and very nice boy, very smart, with tons of potential, but like most primarily urban kids, very lazy and very, very soft - who got a simple sliver in his palm and ended up with blood poisoning.  My hands have been a more or less constant host to cuts, lesions, scrapes and splinters in association with distinctly unhygenic conditions since I was half his age and i've never fallen victim to such a thing.

Yep...I tend to get all kinds of scrapes and cuts and only recently have I used sanitizer or hydrogen peroxide on them...never a problem though.

In all seriousness, I do think that if it is a situation of catastrophic failure (as in the electrical grid goes down and municipal water stops running from the taps), there will be a mass die-off within mere weeks, primarily from the dehydration and sickness mentioned...and from exposure if it were to happen in the cold months...and burns and smoke inhalation as a close third in that case (as people set fire to pretty much anything to stay warm).

That's why I'm not too worried about the whole MZB scenario...if it gets THAT bad, most people will just not last that long.  If you can't find and treat water, you are dead.  Period.  And only a tiny fraction of the population knows how...and the rest don't want to know and don't care.  At one point I thought about buying a bunch of Katadyn filters for friends and family, but the more i thought about it I figured (knowing them as I do) most of them would just sell them at a garage sale or on Ebay.

I figure for the people who actually prepare and know what they are doing, it will be a waiting game of a few months at the most, if the water and power infrastructure can't be resurrected.

[hisbeatnik]

Can't talk anymore... gotta get back to my WoW game 

[Tinfoil Hattie]

In all seriousness, I do think that if it is a situation of catastrophic failure (as in the electrical grid goes down and municipal water stops running from the taps), there will be a mass die-off within mere weeks, primarily from the dehydration and sickness mentioned...and from exposure if it were to happen in the cold months...and burns and smoke inhalation as a close third in that case (as people set fire to pretty much anything to stay warm).

That's why I'm not too worried about the whole MZB scenario...if it gets THAT bad, most people will just not last that long.  If you can't find and treat water, you are dead.  Period.  And only a tiny fraction of the population knows how...and the rest don't want to know and don't care.  At one point I thought about buying a bunch of Katadyn filters for friends and family, but the more i thought about it I figured (knowing them as I do) most of them would just sell them at a garage sale or on Ebay.

I figure for the people who actually prepare and know what they are doing, it will be a waiting game of a few months at the most, if the water and power infrastructure can't be resurrected.

That is a chilling dose of truth.  Even though things are shitty, real doom can seem abstract.  This really hit me.

[JohnLudi]

In all seriousness, I do think that if it is a situation of catastrophic failure (as in the electrical grid goes down and municipal water stops running from the taps), there will be a mass die-off within mere weeks, primarily from the dehydration and sickness mentioned...and from exposure if it were to happen in the cold months...and burns and smoke inhalation as a close third in that case (as people set fire to pretty much anything to stay warm).

That's why I'm not too worried about the whole MZB scenario...if it gets THAT bad, most people will just not last that long.  If you can't find and treat water, you are dead.  Period.  And only a tiny fraction of the population knows how...and the rest don't want to know and don't care.  At one point I thought about buying a bunch of Katadyn filters for friends and family, but the more i thought about it I figured (knowing them as I do) most of them would just sell them at a garage sale or on Ebay.

I figure for the people who actually prepare and know what they are doing, it will be a waiting game of a few months at the most, if the water and power infrastructure can't be resurrected.

That is a chilling dose of truth.  Even though things are shitty, real doom can seem abstract.  This really hit me.

When I think about how incredibly divorced we are from the basic sources of our physical welfare, and how so few possess the knowledge of how to discover and utilize those sources...and then I think of a situation where the usual means of obtaining those sources is permanently removed, it really scares the hell out of me. 

I remember reading the other day about the level of understanding of the natural world that British schoolchildren currently possess.  A significant percentage of them seemed to think that sheep laid eggs.  I certainly can't imagine that Americans are doing all that much better, though I'm sure in both cases things probably improve with age and further exposure to the world...but after meeting so many tens of thousands of people over the years, I have come to the conclusion that that improvement is probably only incremental and that the system we have created is one that allows the majority of people to lead lives of comfortable ignorance from cradle to grave.


When that system falls apart, all that will be left is the ignorance.


 

[the Black Hunter]

  Even though things are shitty, real doom can seem abstract.  This really hit me.

Yes.  And this is the historic precedent if you examine the records, Roman times etc.  No one believes there's something really bad happening.  And then one day it happens... to them.  And many of them will still be idiot enough to reflect, "We never saw it coming!"  To which the only legit answer would be, "No - you never saw anything.  Epitaph: You looked, but you never saw."  Sums up most of my generation.  Sums up most of our civilization.