"Offense" is a cottage industry in this country

[MrScorpio]

A game that everybody plays.

Some people play to offend, while others play to be offended.

It never surprises me whenever it becomes a topic of any discussion.

I figure it this way, if anyone bothers to look hard enough, they're going to find something to say that they're offended about.

Of course, this is something borne from the lack of real democracy and equality that all of us are suffering from.

If that wasn't the case, and life in America was really as good as the fantasy projects us to be, does anyone really think that we'd be so offense happy?

So in lieu of fixing real problems. I guess that's all that some of us can do.

[izquierdista]

1. Yours is a thoroughly offensive post

Belittling people's right to be offended. You sir, are no gentleman! :hide:

[Fuzz]

2. I am in agreement.

[Fumesucker]

3. A lot of us are convinced that the real problems won't get fixed anyway..

And it get old squabbling over things that will never change.

I know I'm pretty close to just stopping posting on GD until after the election.

[madmax]

5. I'm pretty close to saying

fuck it. I'd do more good donating money, time and a lot of sweat at the local animal shelter, or food bank.

I know, fight the good fight don't give up but, it wears one down.

[pipi_k]

4. You've pointed out something

that I've known for a long time, which is that some people virtually LIVE to be offended.

And if others aren't just as offended as they are, there must be something drastically wrong with them.

Because, you know, the mark of a truly "good" and "moral" human being is the ability to be offended by just about everything.


I've even known people who got offended FOR others, even when those others they were offended FOR weren't offended themselves. Like those people who weren't offended were too stupid to be offended, so the perpetually offended have to do the job for them.

[MrScorpio]

7. You just put your finger on exactly how the game is played

It truly is a game and those are the rules.

For example, some people wonder out loud if people like Gingrich and Limbaugh actually BELIEVE in the shit that they actually say.

I say that that that's never the point of their bullshit. The point is ALWAYS the fact that they've said something to draw attention to themselves. That's their bread a butter.


Getting "offended" is just playing into their money grubby hands. What should happen is that their bullshit should be dismissed as just that, bullshit.

And the proxy offended should just get a life.

[SidDithers]

9. You've nailed it...

"The point is ALWAYS the fact that they've said something to draw attention to themselves. "

It's all about drawing attention to themselves. Driving hits to their website, or getting their article picked up and distributed by more and more outlets. Outrage sells.

Good thread.

Sid

[snagglepuss]

14. I absolutely love your comment that "the mark of a truly "good" and "moral"

human being is the ability to be offended by just about everything."


Hilarious and spot on.

[Bozita]

6. Professional offendees - the rightwing answer to the professional left

[Bluenorthwest]

8. Actually, rude and dismissive treatment of others, while not

an actual industry for most, seems to be an ego need to most human beings these days. In a rude and base society, a wise person will be well offended, sir, and I myself am offended by the casual religious bigotry of may Democrats against gay people, including the President, because bigotry and discrimination are offensive. A person who is not offended by intolerance and war and poverty is not really a person at all.
I guess you look at hungry Americans, and are not offended, at injustice, and are not bothered. Is that something to be proud of, being emotionally shut down and jaded to horrible things?
Or is this another coded message for a group you are afraid to name? More bait for 'those people'? Whatever.

[Fumesucker]

10. Well said..

If you aren't offended by what's going on in America these days you're either dense, numb or one of the major offenders.

[MrScorpio]

11. You know, if you're looking for a fight on the Internetz, that's your prerogative

But really, I was quite aware when I wrote the OP, that anyone could see whatever they wanted about what I wrote and feel anyway they feel about it.

I was merely making a general observation.

So, If you're wont to attach some kind of "coded meaning" to what I said, go for it.

I just really don't feel like playing along right now.

[pipi_k]

12. I think a major problem is...

that too many people don't know how to choose their battles.

Yes, there are some pretty awful things going on in this world that deserve offense.


Then there are other things...relatively minor...where someone might make an unfortunate statement or use a word (or words) without really thinking...

and rather than focusing on larger issues, there will always be the Perpetually Offended right there to jump on the unfortunate word or careless statement while they accuse the person who said the word/statement of being something he or she is NOT. Yeah...sometimes people say dumb things, but that doesn't mean he or she is a "bigot"...actually a term I'm starting to loathe, since I see it thrown around with such abandon at just about anyone who says/thinks/does something that looks in the least bit suspicious to the people who feel they're better than everyone else by virtue of the fact that they're always so offended by things.

[Lyric]

15. +1

You said it.

[snagglepuss]

13. I believe a comment in the Guardian about internet rage is apropos,

"The internet just reveals the depth and extent of the seething, impotent, underbelly of inadequacy and rage which exists in the 21st Century."

[MrScorpio]

17. That sums is up perfectly

Thanks

[lunatica]

16. Self pity is the best kind because that way you know it's sincere

There's a lot of whining too. Repetitive and seemingly endless dragging out of the entire litany at every new offense.