People tend to not think rationally when they’re upset, offended or outraged. I think that’s a major reason why atrocities continue to occur in this world. Because the people who could be doing something about it are allowing their judgement to be impaired by their emotions (ego) and seek vengeance, which only escalates the violence, instead of seeking justice, which isn’t always as satisfying, but usually helps diffuse and discourage further violence.
When people are upset, thinking rationally and critically feels impossible, and so they simplify things. Individuals who performed these horrible acts lose their individualism and are instead grouped under simple, easy labels such as religion, nationality, and other cliques whose membership is given rather than earned. Angry fools point a finger at an entire group of people rather than doing the work and focusing on the individual who is actually responsible. An angry mind is a lazy mind. It wouldn’t be angry if it wasn’t lazy, folks. If it was an open, curious, empathic and inquisitive mind, it would ask many questions instead of making many threats. The angry, lazy mind doesn’t want to understand, it just wants blood, but after a few months, the anger subsides and that lazy mind goes back to focusing on things that don’t actually matter in the grand scheme of things, such as TV, gossip, sports, politics, and the like. Then another atrocity hits the news and all of those silly time-wasters once again take a backseat as they get worked up all over again instead of trying to understand why these things keep happening. And their simple minds are easily encouraged to be outraged thanks to newscasters who are actually actors that know how to make a terrible event sound even worse thanks to vocal and facial training techniques, and news articles that hit all of the key words for maximum emotional provocation. The puppet masters continue to pull the strings and the puppets continue to dance without ever questioning how the news is delivered, just like they never question why these acts of evil have been committed since the dawn of time.
Some years ago, I made the conscious decision to stop allowing the news to influence my emotions. When I left my emotions out of it, I was able to understand what had occurred better, what had motivated it, and also recognize the manipulation of the news media, who stoke the fire and take advantage of people’s emotions in the time of tragedy in order to make a profit off of advertising.
My understanding wasn’t a pleasant one. Here’s a fair warning; when you seek understanding, you’re not always going to like what you learn. The angry mob uses words like “monsters” to describe these culprits. I have a other words. Weak. Gullible. Followers. Sheep. Easily influenced (not unlike people who become outraged by news stories). Lazy. Cowardly. These are people who were given labels such as religion and nationality and waved those flags proudly rather than choose their own identity and earn it with sweat, pain and patience over time. And there are MANY more people like that in the world. The atrocities won’t ever stop because cowardice, laziness and egoic pride over labels handed down instead of earned will be in human beings for a long time to come.
So what’s the solution? It certainly isn’t getting angry or outraged and demanding the blood of the other people who are in the same “club” as the perpetrator. The solution isn’t a simple one, and that will discourage many thanks to their deeply ingrained laziness. But if I had to sum it up, I’d say the solution is to be prepared & be appropriate. Threatening violence on someone who is not violent is not appropriate. Damning an entire religion for the acts of a few is not appropriate, because there are people in that religion who also find those violent acts inappropriate.
Trying to defend yourself when someone tries to hurt you or take your life or the lives of those around you when you haven’t physically prepared yourself for that type of situation is not appropriate. Many people will boast about what they would do in that kind of situation, but the truth is they don’t prepare for that type of situation. They don’t take care of themselves physically, they don’t train their strength, focus, and reflexes as a soldier, police officer or martial artist does for that kind of situation. They’re delusional, plain and simple. They think they’ll have their big hero moment when the gunfire begins, but the truth is they’ll freeze, possibly scream, and probably die.
I’m inspired by the men and women who train themselves daily to maintain calm and grace in the face of turmoil. It’s because of them that I no longer become outraged whenever the news breaks of another bombing, shooting or even natural disaster. It’s simply part of the training. When the shit hits the fan, Charlie Mike: Continue Mission. Getting emotional will cloud judgment and reflexes, and will prevent you from acting appropriately. Sometimes being appropriate is using these tragedies as a moment to train your self-control over your emotions. As with any training, if you do that long enough, one day you may find yourself in one of those tragedies, and while others panic, you could be the 1-in-100 that has honed your self control, reflexes, skill and strength in order to be appropriate and neutralize the situation.
Charlie Mike,
~Miro
