Tear gas for the huddled masses | By Mark Morford

[madokie]

Fun fact: Violence fetishizes itself. Worships. Adores itself with psychotic levels of megalomania and self-aggrandizement – sociopathic and chilling and face-slappingly obvious throughout all of human history. You know?

Of course you know. Like attracts like. Antagonism and hate, fear and panic feed off each other like combustible parasites; as soon as one ignites it’s often only a quick leap until everything explodes and people are dead and no one knows what the hell just happened.

Peace and calm, on the other hand, are a little more… challenging. Because they are not loud, abrasive, screaming for attention and headlines, vomiting up from the ugly depths of Fox News and hate radio, because they do not offer the falsely satisfying rush of adrenaline and bloodshed, cultivating calm requires a deeper level of patience, intelligence and heart.
Don't think this could happen to you? Think again.

This is also, of course, terribly ironic. Because when brought forth correctly (or even awkwardly, or clumsily, or in any way at all) peace and calm spread even more quickly, and with far better, longer-lasting results, than violence. Peace grows, evolves, inspires tolerance and love and hope. Violence never learns. It only corrodes.

http://blog.sfgate.com/morford/2014/08/18/tear-gas-for-the-huddled-masses/#26011101=0

[longship]

1. An easy R&K for Morford.