IS THERE A PROTOCOL FOR ONLINE WRITING, STYLE AND GRAMMAR?

IS THERE A PROTOCOL FOR ONLINE WRITING, STYLE AND GRAMMAR?

The subject has been tossed around much over the years that we have experienced the internet boom. The internet is without doubt  the largest river of human communication.  Hipsters and Gamers, Textors and Emailers, Bloggers and Videographers will all have a different answer for the basic question, “What is the appropriate grammatical standard for internet communications”?

Whether communicating in person, writing a letter or over the internet you should always take time to execute properly composed correspondence.  A gentleman who expects to be respected no matter what context he is in and who enjoys expressing himself in a smart, eloquent and effective manner will easily equip himself with this advice.  An intelligent man understands how to manage colloquialisms, especially those which appear to be mainstreamed by popular culture but which nonetheless fall short of qualifying as “Standard English”.  Typos, misspelled words, and simple grammatical errors speak as much to the kind of care a man has put into ones message as it does the kind of response, if any, he may ultimately expect.  Remember that although you may feel that you and your audience is more relaxed, you cannot control who will ultimately view media authored by you once it has been published in cyberspace.  I have never promoted any form of paranoia or self-deprecation related to externally loaded opinions of self, I am concerned that a man’s opinion of himself will serve to motivate him to choose the path of excellence regardless of how others might opine. 

It is my opinion that there are two vastly different categories of internet communication, the first being Formal, business e-communications and the second being informal e-communications.  Obviously the rules will vary between them but they are both bound to the simple principles of standard, proper and effective communication. 

For formal communications, i.e. business related and even some personal contacts one should straightway equip themself with Standard English grammar and this always includes these simple guidelines:

·         Always compose your correspondence on word or some other word processing program.

·         Always utilise spell and grammar check prior to sending out any document.

·         Always proof read your document especially before posting online in a group or as a formal response to an ad or post.  Spell check is not always infallible. 

·         Never publish a rough-draft or technically troubled media unless it is for instructional purposes.  And if so always clearly identify the media as a “rough draft” or as an “example”; always be sure to clearly identify the instructional purpose it is intended to serve.

For informal communications proper spelling and grammar should not ever be abandoned!  If one is going to abbreviate a word the proper standard abbreviation should be used but it is always much better to clearly express ones intentions using the finest English style possible.  The worst kind of internet experience is one where the author has so abbreviated, his message with slang, and other colloquialisms that it is rendered virtually unintelligible to any who are not included in his exoteric group of friends.  Remember first and foremost the purpose of communication is to effectively communicate!  When readers cannot identify with an abbreviated or abstracted concept they cannot possible read your mind or consult a dictionary, so they will never have a chance to understand what you, in your infinite wisdom intended them to comprehend.  Informal guidelines are:

·         Always compose your correspondence on word or some other word processing program.

·         Always utilise spell and grammar check prior to sending out any document.

·         Always proof read your document especially before posting online in a group especially in response to an ad or post.  Spell check is not always infallible. 

·         Never publish a rough-draft or technically troubled media without clearly identifying it as such and explaining its intent.

·         Remember that even if the post or subject you are responding to is informal proper grammar and syntax is always important.

Many readers are ticked off when they are looking for detail but get assaulted with what appears to be obscure generalities.  Take your topic of discussion seriously and sell it eloquently!  Here is a bad example of Internet communication:

“K den u bes b get’n ova here bro one.”  Or “Naw pa Aaight dats whuzzup!”  

While both of these responses are give some basic comprehensible information they will be frustrating to someone who has taken time to compose a well written response, he will feel that you did not take him seriously and that you did not take time to address him appropriately.  Also a gentleman must be careful that his written communications are age-appropriate!  For example:

TEXT, POST OR EMAIL SENT BY OTHERS:  “Hello Bruce, it’s me, Maurice; the weather has been so wonderful today that I have decided to come into town and will most likely be in your area.  I will have a college buddy of mine with me, his name is Oscar and I do not believe you have met him before.  I certainly would not want to impose on you so please let me know if you would like to meet or receive us today.  We plan to be in your area around 12:30 P.M. and I will be driving”.

RESPONSE #1:  “K, cool man just let me know.”

PROPER RESPONSE #1:  “Hello Maurice, I am so pleased that you and Oscar will be visiting today and except for the fact that I do have an appointment with my automobile mechanic at 12:15 I would have lunch already grilling on the deck when you pulled up at 12:30.  If you can manage to wait for me to join you around 1:30 I’m sure you can just park at my house and we can all have a late lunch at Reajohn’s Barbecue Shack downtown.  If you can manage to arrive by 11:30 I will be glad to let you both relax at my place, you know my bar is always fully stocked and open or if you chose you can just hang out until we meet at my house.  By the way my address has not changed, it is 1527 North Suttler Place.  Please R.S.V.P.”

The first proper response was the more gentlemanly of the two and as such, the only proper one a gentleman would allow.  It acknowledges the receipt of his friends invitation to visit and also suggests a structured arrangement for coordinating the timing while the first response leaves these guests hanging in cyberspace.  Even though the best laid plans may go amiss the second set of plans has the best possibility of success.  Important also is the fact that the second response did not assume that the guests knew or remembered the correct address, an important factor in these days of personal navigation systems. 

The second message and response is for communication between two people who have just met online.  Tired, one word responses indicate a lack of interest or enthusiasm.  While one will not be expected to write a virtual novel it is nonetheless important to demonstrate some attempt to communicate facts and data that cannot otherwise be ascertained due to the displacement of the internet.

TEXT, POST OR EMAIL SENT BY OTHERS:  “Hello man, I just read your ad and checked-out your pictures; I was so impressed by them all.  I was pleased to find that we share many of the same hobbies and interests one of which is fine dining.  I am a “foodie” from way back and have always fancied I’d have a buddy to share my passion for food who would be company for me at the other side of the table.  By the way my real name is Butchie”.

RESPONSE #1:  “O.K. cool dude, so what’s good?”

PROPER RESPONSE #1:  “Pleased to meet you Butchie, my name is Bryant and I really appreciate your complements.  I am responding to you as much in awe of you as you are of me.  I think you are a handsome and intelligent brotha and I can see that we will have much in common not only with respect to food.  I was attracted to you and therefore your ad as soon I saw it.  I noticed that you are an avid baseball and football fan.  I have been collecting sports memorabilia since I was a kid and recently inherited my grandfather’s extensive sports memorabilia collection.  I look forward to discussing it over dinner sometime in the near future.  I am actually out of town until next Wednesday so I suggest that we chat while I am away to get a sense of each other and if all seems well by the weekend we should definitely make plans to meet face to face by Thursday or over the weekend. “

PROPER RESPONSE #2 “Please allow me to thank you for your complements Butchie, they are well received.  Let me also take this time to complement you as I see you are a very handsome and intelligent man.  I would like to politely decline your gracious invitation but again I thank you for what appears to be an honest complement.  Butchie let me conclude our correspondence by wising you the very best of luck in all endeavors as it appears you are a true gentleman and will make someone a very happy man”.   

If someone is gracious enough to give you a complement you as a gentleman must also take appropriate space to thank them.  If the complement is of a sexual nature then you must also thank them but if you are have not intention to take them up on their offer you must, as a gentleman, politely find some distinguishing quality of theirs to return the complement and then politely decline their invitation.  A gentleman is always transparent about his feelings, so if you are not interested find a polite way to communicate this.  Never send a rude or condescending response even if you are thoroughly disgusted by the person who complements and approaches you!  Even if you receive a rude or threatening response when the person discovers you are not interested find a polite word to discontinue the conversation and do not return any more correspondence to that person.  If the person persists then you might have to report them or block them but never stoop to base or ungentlemanly deportment even if you have clearly been disrespected. 

Whether communicating in person, writing a letter or over the internet you should always take time to execute properly composed correspondence.  Even when writing correspondence of admonishment one should always use proper grammatical form.  In life we will always use informal structure especially with close friends and family and this is both natural and acceptable.  Written correspondence should be fun and even when it is not it should be clear and well written.  History has preserved letters dating back many thousands of years.  Reading them today has allowed our generation a window into the past.  Think about this whenever you write.  Your writings may be preserved for posterity without you ever knowing it.  If they are to be read hundreds or even thousands of years from now I am sure you would want them to be clear and well composed.

So to answer the question posed by this article, “IS THERE A PROTOCOL FOR ONLINE WRITING STYLE AND GRAMMAR”?  the answer is unequivocally, Yes!  There has always been and will always be an overriding protocol and that is proper English!  Fads, Styles, Movements, all come and go with the wind.  A gentleman knows how to distinguish them and himself from them in the manner of his correspondence.  He understands that simply because something is currently in fashion does not make it credible…  A gentleman’s writing style takes years to develop, at some point he is confident with his command of the language or languages he knows and begins to take the skill of writing to a higher level of artistic expression.  That is the second nature that I am invoking in you…

FIN

Written by D. Vollin.

www.forthebrothas.blogspot.com  

WHAT TO DO IN CASE OF FIRE?

Breaking the chain of the transatlantic slave trade.

In just about every public building in these United States there is a common protocol for an emergency involving a fire.  When I was a kid in school there was always a notification posted in the hallways, stairways, in places of assembly and just outside of the elevators that read,

“What To Do In Case Of Fire?”

There was a list of instructions following this question all providing guidance for those who might be caught in what could be the most challenging moment of their lives…

Freedman and southerners argue over work contracts and wages during reconstruction.

For as long as I can remember the Black American Community has been in such a predicament! We have been under fire, we have been living in a burning house threatening our very existence but this fire has not been the textbook chemical combustion we studied in high school physics, it has been the continual threat of racism!  Racism is the fire that Black Americans must fight daily, we must wake up to it, we inhale its toxic smoke we feel the singe of its caustic heat, we experience the challenge it poses to our dignity and public image… we are a peoples who are constantly threatened with destruction by fire!  Growing up I remember my father’s famous saying he coined when I was a young boy.  I cannot count the times he has proclaimed this truth such that without any effort I can quote him here:

“WE BASK ON THE SEA OF APATHY AS WE SLOWLY DROWN IN THE FLOOD

OF INSTITUTIONALIZED RACISM!”

As a man of 50 years the prophetic words of my father stand out as undeniable truth!  I am awed by their clarity, their elegance of expression  so real evoking a balance of complexity and simplicity…

I find it most interesting that Black Americans can be so docile and naïve in the face of racism.  They expect it and understand it because they have gotten used to it.  Its effects outwardly appear to have been neutralized because they no longer fear it, they expect it and they know it. Black Americans simply find creative ways to transcend racism and move on. 

Black hotel workers were fired from this late 1880's hotel due to racial pressure.  Their jobs were then given to white workers.

But this is only a façade, it is no real solution at all because of the economic helplessness of the black community it does not matter if racism is feared or not it is a calculated inevitability.  Racism has been refined to a colorless, odorless poison that Black Americans consume at unawares through the consequence of poverty and ignorance and lack of empowerment; they don’t even recognize it when it comes fully robed to their door… 

For others who have had a better chance at beating the odds but find they have fallen victim to their own apathy and vanity blaming their woes on racism is a gross, ungentlemanly and cowardly claim.   For example, the saga encountered by Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas was a circus insulting to those whose lives were claimed by shameful sport of lynching.  In truth, the Black American community should have forced him to retract his spurious claim likening his media interrogation to a “Modern Day Lynching.”

We do not fear racism any longer the way we do not fear a cold or the loss of a loved one… we have become accustomed to racism… we accept it and accommodate it in our daily lives because we do not expect it to ever go away and because we do not know any other reality…  Because Black men are not stolen away in the night as they were before to be found in a riven, decapitated smoldering mass swinging from a tree in the morning we think that lynching has died.  But every time a black man is incarcerated, stripped of his citizenship, his right to vote and his right to freedom this episode plays itself out again and again and again.  We cannot leave a black man blameless if he falls into the traps of racism!  We must admit that it is a trap he should know well, he can see it and yet he walks directly into its jaws.  We have become blind and careless in the face of racism cursing the white man for setting traps we are foolish enough to walk inside of.  Clearly we have become numbed by racism.  Racism imbibed in gradual doses from adolescence to adulthood has built up our immune system to its threat, not to it its effects.  The result is that we have dropped our defenses, left the battlements unmanned.  In my father’s words again:

“WE BASKED ON THE SEA OF APATHY AS WE SLOWLY DROWNED IN THE FLOOD

OF INSTITUTIONALIZED RACISM!”

Unfortunately the same cannot be said for racists… they are empathically paralyzed against those they perceive as enemies and philosophically motivated to harm them through racism, they are interminably locked in a closed box of anger and hatred from which they will never mature except in the amplification of their hatred for those they deem inferior.   In them racism is creative and tireless… ignoring them is only a sweet invitation for them to impose even greater stresses upon us… They hate everyone who is not them, they do not respect Black Americans or anything that race has achieved!  They delight in the pain and suffering of those who cannot or will not defend themselves against their insane and unwarranted psychosis… they feel entitled to do so by reducing other races to the level of sub-human existence… racism is a sickness similar to that of a rapist, a child molester, a serial killer… The lust and hunger racists have for evil is nearly inexorable.  But because it it ultimately mortal we know it can be assuaged and even cured.

The League Of Revolutionary Black Workers fought for union rights of Black and White employees in  the  Detroit  automobile factories.

The only defense against racism is to be consistently strong and organized. Those who seek to fight racism must meet it peacefully with a clear show of strength at all fronts challenging it in ways that will not allow its cancer to bear fruit!  But to do this takes organization, solidarity, cohesiveness, cooperation, family, brotherhood, charity, sensibility, community, ethics, all of the characteristics that drugs, ignorance, incarceration and other factors have stolen from the black community since the late 1960’s to the present.    Many Black Americans gave up the sanctity of their hard-bought communities to drug dealers, thugs, criminals, prostitutes, hustlers, and murderers who turned them into cesspools of fear and despair.  Lacking any hope or direction of their own they forcefully denied everyone else the right to peaceful self-determination in effect carrying out the primary directive of the very racists who cursed their existence and doubted their ability escape the clutch of the racists noose.

These Black workers in a northern factory at the turn of the century were paid equal wages to the guild workers.

In the end the greatest challenge of the black community at large and Black Americans in specific is not to allow the depravity and hatred so typical of racism to pervert us.  We must not imitate racism by imposing the same bias against other human beings.  We must not begrudge other races from enjoying the fruits of America.  We of all should know better.  The weight falls upon us to set the example for decent folk to follow.  We must be the bigger man!   We must not serve back the same bitterness as we are served by racists.  Our legacy of struggle in America shows that we can achieve success through peaceful and intellectual solidarity.  The time to unite to effect positive change is not when our civil rights are being threatened because the vigil and battle for peace and freedom is a never ending battle.  We must stop blaming our fate on the white man an on racism because we have the power to overcome racism and live in harmony with all races.  All white men are not enemies! Together we both fought and died for racial equality in America.  Now it is time for the Black community to wake up and take full responsibility for itself!  Yes, racism exists but it is powerless in the face of determination and unity.  What the black community must do is to take a good hard honest look at itself and do the hard work of repair and rejuvenation. 

 The first step is taking responsibility for our own deeds!  The second step is identifying the obstacles to our social and economic progress.  The third step is identifying clear goals and objectives toward rebuilding our communities and families, our economic and social networks.  The fourth step is developing a plan to implement these goals and objectives.  The fifth step is galvanizing ourselves to implement the goals and objectives establishing stable and sustainable think-tanks to assist in the universal task of realizing these plans.  The sixth step is to establish a coherent system to monitor the development and growth of community, social and economic programming utilising our think-tanks to develop policy and strategy for the future.  The seventh step is to devise a way to ensure that the established network remains culturally relevant and responsive to social and economic trends and remains sufficiently decentralized that it cannot be overly institutionalized; that it does not become invested in its own preservation at the expense of natural, positive evolution. 

So if anyone ever asks what to do in case of fire you can tell them that the fire has already been burning and is now in danger of totally consuming the house, the yard, the neighborhood and the business district; all that is held dear.  Tell them that this fire is easy to put out, it requires that Black Americans wake up and blame no one but themselves for their current predicament!  Tell them that all we have to do is to stop:

BASKING ON THE SEA OF APATHY AS WE SLOWLY DROWN IN THE FLOOD

OF INSTITUTIONALIZED RACISM!”

FIN

Written by David Vollin (Son) and William Vollin (Father)

O’ER THE SWEETNESS OF TIME…

Black American Civil War Soldier 

When on July 4, 1776 Black Americans, both freedmen and enslaved, found their liberties to have been bitterly betrayed, even after every Black man who was able fight risked his mortal life toward the same goal… sweet freedom!

Black Loyalists fought for their freedom during the American
War for Independence from Britain.

We braced ourselves for the perilous battle that lay ahead.  The nation played out its long, emotional debate with the fate of those Black Americans who had been institutionally enslaved and disenfranchised by the policies of a nation, the wealth and power of which a free slave labor economy incontrovertibly launched into global super power status only 85 years after the birth of America.  Then as now many Americans were in denial regarding the great contribution Black men and women had made toward the rise of this great economic power largely because of their guilt, or ignorance since the success of the nation had been realised in great part through the unimaginably intense, inhuman, physical and psychological labor of others conveniently segregated by the mirage of divine right.  Black American slaves invisibly took on the real work they were unwilling to take on themselves…  In their hearts they knew slavery and the equally sinister system of racism conjured up to make it appear just in the conscience of men was singularly evil but the selfish nature of men who lust more for power than equality continued to ignore freedoms calling at the  door…

Black Civil War Soldier with his family.

Black men fought again, in the second war of racial vainglory… By then millions had already died enslaved that might have otherwise raised the tri-colored flag of this nation to inestimable glory.  Because of this bloody war Black men and women were, albeit reluctantly, given their freedom and for a brief time, equality as men…

The 13th Amendment freed Black Slaves.

In reconstructed America freedom was suspended upon a precarious pendulum, a meter of socioeconomic equality that was permitted to swing backward due to a combination of fear, animosity and lack of core leadership on the part of those who were newly freed and those who had newly freed them.  In this time the lions share of responsibility fell on congress to implement all measures required to fulfill and enforce the promise it had made with the men and women it recently freed from bondage...

Reconstruction Election
Ticket

Reconstruction Election
Ticket

Black Americans not being accustomed to the way freedom was defined in the law books of this country enamored of but betrayed by their newly acquired liberties watched in horror while each of them was spirited away beneath the pall of a white hood.  The first Black members of congress elected during reconstruction were gone!

Black American Congressmen Elected During Reconstruction

 The freedoms Black Americans fought and died for during the Civil War were gone!  The vengeful, criminal and immoral fist of the traitorous south had prevailed!

The First Black Man To Vote After The Civil War

But this injustice could not have launched if the north had not also blown wind into its sails! The sons of America lay rotting in their graves as if for naught for surely, though the blind have often denied it, the American Civil War was fought over the issue of slavery and the racial equality of Black men…

Valiant Black Soldiers Fought Against
The Criminal Rebellious South
For Freedom.

So dear did the seditious south hold slavery and the ideal of racial supremacy to Black men, they were willing to risk all in order to secede from a union they had also bitterly fought to create!  Over the entirely of Americas brief history the issue of race has torn it apart and prevented it from becoming the great nation it was envisaged to become…

Civil War Soldier

Yesterday, January 20^th, 2013 the first Black American president took the second oath of office before the world.  On this day, January 21^st 2013, Americans gather on the mall to experience this marvel firsthand.  For some Americans the issue of racial equality has not yet been solved but when Barack Obama walks out to be sworn in as president of The United States they shall have got their answer!  The laws of this land are ideals and it is up to the people to live up to them.  I do not like to draw significance to our president’s race when otherwise discussing his deeds because anyone of any race can theoretically be president.  But in America where race has always played such a key role in the way we live I mark the presence of a Black American president as a milestone.  We breathe a similar air to those who marveled at the first black congressmen during reconstruction.  Our eyes see hope and progress.  Like them it is imperative to keep vigilance a close companion for all Americans are not the friends of our equality or for that matter, the equality of All that call themselves American.  Since our unique struggle in this nation has borne us to this place the burden lay chiefly upon Black Americans to safeguard the bright torch of freedom if not for those who died without ever knowing its flavor, for those who have not yet been born to its sweetness.  For freedom is sweet but it is a thing that is bought with much pain.  America is healing itself slowly, certainly, but it has only come to live up to the great promise of its framers o’er the sweetness of time…

Civil War Soldier

Written  by David Vollin

A THOUGHTFUL CRITIQUE OF "DJANGO UNCHAINED"

DJANGO UNCHAINED ANSWERS THE RACE QUESTION THAT RECENT FILM “LINCOLN” LEFT DANGLING…

 

An excerpt from my review of Django:

 

"As recent film release, “Django Unchanined” opened up before me I experienced all of the trusted hallmarks of an epic Tarentino film: a 1970’s aesthetic, realness and depth of field; a hyper graphic depiction of death and dismemberment; an ironic humorous digression to humanize the villains; a nitty-gritty 1970’s stlye in your face language; morbidity served up as undeniable humor; the distinctly rich, soulful flavor of blacksploitation a la carte; astute attention to detail and an iron-clad plot with surprises galore… But what I did not expect was an eloquently developed proof that the assumptions of racial superiority used to justify slavery and racism are utterly bankrupt.  As such Django did the job that its contemporary film, “Lincoln” did not complete!  This begs an argument regarding what exactly is the role of an historical drama?  Is it acceptable to merely present a dramatisation of the facts as they are, typically, only loosely known or conjectured or does the director have a larger role to interpret the facts while telling a story and bring it full circle to the present?  Most importantly is Django an historic drama at all?  I will let the viewer answer this question but I will interject that unlike Lincoln, the character Django and his story are not historically verifiable.  In my opinion the genre in which I would comfortably place Django is that of an Historical Fiction."

 

READ THE FULL REIVIEW AT: 

http://thestoriesofblackmen.blogspot.com/2012/12/django-unchained-answers-race-question.html

EDITORIAL: THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN WEAPONS AND VIOLENCE...

MOURNERS AT RECENT MASS SHOOTING IN CONNECTICUT

 

No matter what side of the argument you are on there is one fact that those who oppose and defend gun control laws must surely agree upon; every weapon in existence has the potential to wield violence…

UNDER THE NAZI REGIME OVER 11 MILLION INNOCENT PEOPLE WERE MURDERED

 In Connecticut the death toll rose again when an unexpected assassin murdered his parents then took his anger to a local school murdering innocent children and adults.  This incident touched me personally because I was a teacher and come from a family of educators.  When I was a teacher I narrowly escaped being shot by a student who had stolen a gun from home or elsewhere and bought it to school perhaps with the intent of shooting me or one of my colleagues... Fortunately, one of the kids came to me and told me of the incident and I was able to notify the school police in time for the child to be apprehended before any violence occurred.  Unfortunately these innocent people were not able to be forewarned and they, like me were totally unprepared for the possibility of such an encounter.  It is sad but we must be prepared to be able to meet violence with some form of resistance... But what choices do we have?  In our search for peacefulness we do not wish to become the very thing we fear... Our august president, Mr. Obama, was deeply moved by the incident as any man of conscience would be.  In such times our troubled country looks to our president for guidance and hope...  In such times our president is the voice of reason...  He and his congress are the focal point of our biggest question: "How Do We  Prevent This Tragedy From Happening Again?"  Given time and thought I do not doubt that Obama will have a viable solution but will Americans take time to listen or will they allow themselves to be distracted by the many other cares and trifles of the day?

President Obama mourns the deaths of innocent students and teachers at a Connecticut School

 

It is a beautiful but I daresay naïvely, civilized fantasy to assume that people will be capable of the utmost discretion and maturity while they are in possession of firearms.  Those who lived through the first 50 years of the Cold War know very well the potential of weapons, and who says that the Cold War has officially ended; rather it appears to have morphed into a dangerous game of hide and seek.  Though an entirely separate story, the arms game is more than a fantasy played out during a couple hours of a 007 Flick, it is a haunting threat to the existence of civilisation as we know it!

THE COLD WAR CONTINUES IT'S THREAT OF MASS DESTRUCTION...

 

In many respects advocates of gun control have gone way too far in their zeal to rid the earth of violence… for it is not only due to guns, (their primary focus), that Americas homicidal rampage has raged to unprecedented heights.  Furthermore, it is unfair to say that every person who owns firearms is a potential homicidal maniac. 

GUN CONTROL COULD LEAVE INNOCENTS AT THE MERCY OF UNSCRUPULOUS CRIMINALS?

 

It is also unrealistic to assume every gun owner intends only to use it for recreational hunting; the last time I was in the Brooklyn I didn’t see any game animals, large or small walking up and down Atlantic Avenue! Notwithstanding, the licensing process for firearms is a covenant our local governments make with individuals binding them to lawful and humane and responsible use of their weapons, we must honor and respect an individual’s rights under the law.  It seems that the problem is not with gun control in terms of limiting an individual’s right to possess firearms rather it is the responsible use, and management of firearms that deserves the most attention.  Gun control advocates should not try to take guns from Americans nor deny them the right of possession.  What gun control advocates should focus on is education and development of policy that would implement more responsible husbandry, for instance:

1.       Require firearms to be stored in locked tamper-proof safes and firearms of semi-automatic and automatic status to be dismantled with key elements stored in separate safes with separate codes.

2.       To have GPS technology embedded in semi-automatic and automatic weapons.

3.       To exempt historic firearms from being locked in safes but limiting access to ordnance.

4.       Registering ammunition and sales so that shells, casings, etc. can be more easily tracked to the original purchaser.

5.       Regulating sales of arms and ordnance for tracking.

6.       As part of arms regulation, developing a detailed psychological dossier on every registered owner of firearms including their family, roommates, etc., as a mandatory exercise on an annual basis and each time they re-locate.  All weapons and ordnance should be registered to a permanent address.  Each time an owner of firearms moves they would be required to re-register both firearms and ordnance. 

7.       A virtual database of firearms retailers and owners should be publicly accessible to taxpayers.

8.       Schools, employers and other institutions must do a better job of documenting the potential for mass violence.  People should not be profiled but if there is any reasonable cause to suspect a person might be prone to commit a crime using firearms, some law official should investigate.  This is a common practise with child abuse, it does not mar a parent’s record but it does set up a precedent for historical analysis.

 INNOCENT CHILDREN WERE VICTIMS OF CRIMINAL EXPERIMENTS DURING UNDER THE NAZIS... UNPRECEDENTED CONTROL OF INNOCENTS WAS ACHIEVED THROUGH THEIR  FEAR OF GUNS...

 

We live in a time with an unprecedented ability to gather and store data but if such data is simply left sitting in a database it is ultimately of no use.  An interactive database that has the ability to link chain incidents such as with a school could have the ability to predict problems early on.  We need to look more into developing such interactive programs in order to be more proactive about gun related crimes.  If you have seen the film, “Minority Report” you know that the whole idea of “Pre-Crime” borders on sheer fantasy but it does hold promise for those criminals that exhibit distinct patterns of violence.  

MARTIN LUTHER KING JR. WAS KILLED BY AN ASSASSINS BULLET

 

 

Whether such technology can predict seemingly random crimes such as the one that occurred in Connecticut recently is uncertain.  Random crimes are anomalies that truly require more intensive means of examination in order to anticipate and prevent.  But we run the risk of profiling innocent people which is equally unacceptable as our need to gain early insight in the potential for violence of any kind.

VICTIMS OF THE ST. VALENTINES DAY MASSACRE

 

Whether you believe in gun control as a means of preventing violence or not one must agree i there are other factors having nothing to do with gun control that lead to acts of mass violence using firearms.  In most cases the problem appears to be one of mental health.  Whether a criminal who is mentally ill chooses to express their violence using a baseball bat, chemical weapons, firearms, bombs, knives or a bow and arrow is purely a factor of their choice. 

MISSILES FROM THE EARLY COLD WAR ERA...

 

We live in a time when crimes involving weapons with the potential of mass destruction are very real.  It could be intuited that people who create computer viruses are potential mass murderers because they seek to hurt people in groups rather than focusing on a one time singular target. 

SANDINISTA GUNMEN

 

Our paranoia might lead to the kind of profiling that violates the civil rights of individuals who intend no harm whatever, so we must be careful moving forward.  Banning guns is clearly not the solution to crime it is a poorly thought out reaction that would appear to be meaningful only to someone who has not really devoted much thought to the problem at all. 

PRESIDENT ABRAHAM LINCOLN WAS KILLED BY THE ASSASSIN JOHN WILKES BOOTH

 

When a homicide has occurred film crews interview victims and by standers who deliver commentary based on emotion.  We cannot take the emotion out of a homicide and we should not attempt to remove it… What we should do is gather ourselves when we have had a chance to process the horror of the crime so that we can develop successful strategies to help identify problems in their formative stages and to make it difficult for criminals bent on violence to elude detection while they carry out a premeditated crime. 


There is definitely a direct relationship between weapons and violence.  Human history has documented the reality that weapons are used to render humans docile through fear at the threat of moral injury.  Weapons used in this manner have the ability to paralyze even the strongest of men without one shot being fired.  This is the technique common to tyrants, criminals and psychopaths. 

INNOCENT MEN MURDERED BECAUSE OF THIER RACE...

History shows us examples of how fear has been manipulated to murder and oppress billions of human beings.  Guns and the treat of mortal violence was used to achieve the ends of the American Slave Trade from the 17th Century through the 19th Century; Hitler used guns to murder over 11  million Jews and other innocents during the 20th Century;  Uganda has employed a series of genocidal enterprises including innocent homosexuals from the 20th Century to the present... the Klu klux Klan has used guns  to murder and oppress Black American men and women for two centuries... Wnenever anger, fear and ignorance find tehmselves in the same place there is little doubt that some form of violence will ensue...



RELIGION IS OFTEN INVOKED TO JUSTIFY VIOLENCE AGAINST HUMAN RIGHTS...

The stream of gun inspired violence has broadened and has bought the country to its knees in grief... But it is not the guns who have loaded aimed and fired themselves at whatever fear they chose to kill away, it was a man!  Men are the key, the bridge between guns and violence, the solution lay within us...

NAMELESS VICTIMS OF NAZI VIOLENCE FOUND IN AN UNCOVERED MASS GRAVE AFTER THE ALLIES LIBERATED EUROPE...

 

FIN

Written by David Vollin

Administrator: For The Brothas Virtual, Intellectual, Cultural Salon

Follow FTB at: www.forthebrothas.blogspot.com 

 

RETAIL/WHOLESALE

 

WILL TECHNOLOGY CHANGE US?

Humans may finally be bridging the technical lag between the internet revolution and mid twenty-first century culture; this might account for the huge disparities such as unemployment and it might start a trend toward a decrease in human population or manifest in other ways as yet unforeseen.  One thing is certain, technology has revolutionized civilization in the past and will continue to change the way human beings live in the present and near future. 

Whilst watching the manic speed of traffic early one morning before daylight I realized how very different we were from our ancestors who lived before the invention of the automobile.  Considering the average rate of transportation outside of a train was probably 5-25 mph, since most people were on foot most of the time unless they had a horse or lived in a major urban area like Manhattan, Boston, Paris or London things necessarily moved quite slowly.  Then as now most people lived outside of the city but what has dramatically changed man is the automobile, it has allowed what was once rural, subtopic or suburban regions to thrive like a city while maintaining a higher residential to commercial density than a city.  Fewer people can get to more places quicker reducing the need to employ more people at specialized localized tasks.

The internet has done globally what the automobile has done locally, allowing commerce to instantaneously shrink the market and therefore the workforce required to maintain it.  Computer databases with smart features enable vast quantities of clerical personnel to be eliminated from payrolls.  We are getting closer to the development of computer management systems that manage themselves… I know an amazing colleague who prides herself in memorizing every file she encounters.  Doubtless these unique skills were nearly flawless 20 years ago but as the years accumulate, unlike computer software; her memory begins to fail… We seem to be pressing the issue in this science fiction morality play with its epic man versus machine theme as if it were inevitability…

Eager to rid my mind of this Keynesian Supply/Demand theory that hovers relentlessly above my better reasoning I nonetheless find a startling attraction to the way in which it appears to parallel human cultural evolution.  I cannot help but wonder if, as we move to more automated, computer driven processes the need for human reproduction will drive a distinct drop in human population on a global scale but starting in the most developed, technologically advanced regions of the globe.  Up to the present human population has continued to expand as if we are all preparing to populate rural farms that would require a vastness of hands…  As the cost of commodities such as food and housing continue to skyrocket around the globe humans will find it prohibitive to add more mouths to an already inadequate budget for survival, or will they?

Over the past 20 years as American corporations have outsourced services to Asian countries technology has been developed that could soon replace the outsourced jobs.  For example, interactive customer service programs we have glimpsed in the form of voice command features on our smart phones, smart cars, smart households, etc., would eliminate the need for foreign outsourced customer service agents since the computer program would work virtually free.  While I personally feel that it unethical to replace humans with machines in most instances my weariness will undoubtedly be overlooked by huge profit driven corporations looking to make a firm foundation in the first quarter of the twenty-first century world economy. 

More efficient fuel sources, Faster vehicles, and a host of now theoretical physics possibilities might one day hurtle the 21^st century forward by many millennia literally overnight.  I like to think that human beings will set a precedent and begin to closely analyze the effects of our rapidly morphing technology on human culture, heretofore we have let the rocket speed urgency of modernity distract us from paying homage to this all important variable.  We cannot any longer ignore it!  Progress does represent a price to humanity and at the outset the goal of modernity was to free mankind from the machine not to transform him into it!

FIN

Written by David Vollin

Administrator: FOR THE BROTHAS VIRTUAL, CULTURAL INTELLECTUAL SALON

Follow it at: www.forthebrothas.blogspot.com