Why Halloween is depressing
POSTED BY: MAL4PREZ
UPDATED: Tuesday, September 9, 2025 06:32
VIEWED: 15515
PAGE 13 of 16
Quote:
Originally posted by Magonsdaughter:Quote:
Originally posted by MAL4PREZ:
You've said a lot more than that yo.
Check again as to which statements of yours people are reacting to.
Okay, please tell me which ones.
Let's start with:
"Oh please, get your hand off your heart and stop singing Star Spangled Banner for a moment."
To which I have a strong urge to tell you to go fuck yourself. So really, go fuck yourself. This is such an incredibly bitchy thing for you to say and I'm now frightening close to losing all respect for you.
I know, you can't possibly be concerned over losing the respect of someone
"Dopey and Naive"
who has
"Never taken responsibility"
which you know about me... how? Just like you know about me that...
"you are powerful and happy to weild your power militarily, economically and culturally"
And let's not forget that you got what was a fun thread to turn nasty with the accusation:
"Revel in your cultural imperialism by all means. Empathy seems to be pretty difficult for you to manage."
Which wasn't said to me personally but certainly all your later posts show that you feel this way toward me, and that goes faaaaaar past a simple: "I don't like Halloween." So don't even think anyone's going to buy that victim card.
As to reading posts, you can't seem to grok that: "local business cant compete with huge multinationals like KFC, MacDonalds, Cripsy Creme" is not a hardship that you poor Aussies are going through alone. You can't get off your victim pedestal long enough to know that this shit has affected me, a dopey power-happy culturally imperialistic empathy-less American, just as negatively as it has you. So where's your empathy for me, you biatchy hypocrite?
Yes, you've pissed me off. Not because I'm defending America, but because you're being an asshole and assuming shit about me that isn't true, and clearly you've been poking your fingers in this thread from the beginning hoping to do nothing more than piss people off about this pet peeve. You have. Good job.
I mean Cheese and Rice, you actually said to me: "Oh please, get your hand off your heart and stop singing Star Spangled Banner for a moment"
And you claim that I am the one not reading posts?
Again: go fuck yourself.
I'm not leaving the thread, because it's mine, but I'm leaving you. You've made it clear that you're a whiney close-minded asshole and I have no interest in your victim playing.
And you'll probably still think I'm pissed over a little America bashing. Which shows two things: you don't know me *at all*, and you'll never get what I've been trying to explain to you.
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The French Revolution would have never happened if Marie Antoinette had just given every peasant an iPhone.
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Magons, as I wrote, I understand and empathize a LOT with what you've been complaining about, but even I am beginning to feel like you're tarring us all with a big brush.
The thing about being pro-war in particular kinda got to me. I'm 65; as long as I've been alive, most Americans have been against going to war...remember Vietnam?? Yeah, after we were hit massively on 9/11, people reacted viscerally, that might be rather easy to understand, and our damned military-industrial complex and the Bush Administration made the most out of it and ran with it. But that was a reaction, first, and second, it's governments and militaries who always want to go to war, they aren't "The People". Before you say "but you elected them", give a minute's thought to how military-industrial complexes WORK and how much influence they have over politicians, not to mention that, once elected, politicians often show a warlike aspect they don't mention when campaigning to be elected.
We really are an extremely diverse bunch, and the power and wealth isn't even SLIGHTLY uniformly spread out. Each state here can be vastly different from another mentally, and some of them are on opposite POLES even. We are 314 MILLION people with cultures who have evolved in completely different ways; Australia has a population of 23 million, and tho' yes, you're diverse, not nearly as diverse as we are.
Some of what you've written I agree with; some of what you don't like, we are victims of as well. While, as I said, I think it would be hard for a lot of Americans to see things with an outside perspective and fully understand what you're saying, at the same time I think you are viewing us through your own perspective, and making some false assumptions.
Just my two cents' worth. Mostly I guess I'm trying to say that what the world sees as "American influence" is actually the influence of a small group of powerful, wealthy people and doesn't reflect America or Americans as much as you think it does.
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America was Beautiful!
Eisenhower warns us of the military industrial complex.
"The potential for the disasterous rise of misplaced power exists."
Eisenhower Farewell Address - full
Ike warned us. Many people heard the warning, understood, protested.
I am not sure if we were ever a democracy. But by the time President
Eisenhower made this speech, I am pretty sure the average voter had
lost all influence.
As to the disparaties of wealth & power that we have now, I think of
it as returning to feudalism. Worldwide. ... Now what?
===========================
"All I suggest is a man hears what he wants to hear, and disregards the rest" ~Paul Simon
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Quote:
Originally posted by Oonjerah:
Ike warned us. Many people heard the warning, understood, protested.
I am not sure if we were ever a democracy. But by the time President
Eisenhower made this speech, I am pretty sure the average voter had
lost all influence.
As to the disparaties of wealth & power that we have now, I think of
it as returning to feudalism. Worldwide. ... Now what?
This may be weird, but every time I watch the opening to the Watchmen I cry when JFK gets shot. I'm not much into the rest of the movie, but the first time I watched that opening scene it just hit me what a turning point that was. I was born a decade later so I don't really know, but it seems we were on a good path then, and that bullet changed the course. It brought in Nixon and young Cheney and all that has followed them: the rise of Money as earned by the 1% as God.
It makes me terribly sad to think of what might of happened if the vision of JFK had led us through the 20th century, rather than that damned corporate commercialized military industrial system of designed obsolescence.
I am just old enough to remember what America was like when local business had not yet been destroyed by the chains. I know exactly what has been lost. I resent it, and I resent the fools who let it happen. But I also pick up stuff at Home Depot now and then, because there is no other option. I resent this most of all.
*---------------------------------------*
The French Revolution would have never happened if Marie Antoinette had just given every peasant an iPhone.
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If anyone watches The Crazy Ones (Go SMG!) episode 7 ironically started with a USA/Aussie encounter that's really funny. From both sides, I think.
I'm enjoying this show. Gods help me, I fall for Robin Williams every time, since the days of Mork. (I had real bona fide Mork and Mindy moon boots until they fell apart 3 years ago.) He's so damned funny.
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The French Revolution would have never happened if Marie Antoinette had just given every peasant an iPhone.
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Robin Williams has a series?! Where do I find it?? No, cancel that, I'll look it up...
Sorry, I don't watch TV per se anymore; I watch old stuff (mostly British series) on Roku and occasionally Daily Show or Colbert on On Demand. I can't remember the last time I saw a commercial or watched "live" TV, so I've obviously missed some stuff.
I'm a hard-core Williams fan. He used to show up at comedy clubs unannounced and do a set when he lived here in the City, and I've been in awe of his brain since pre-Mork and Mindy. I never forgot one of his lines from ages ago, that "Blaming Ronald Reagan for the state of the country is like blaming Ronald McDonald for the state of your hamburger". Worked for Bush, too... ;o)
And yeah, Oonj, I agree. I "met" Ike--he flew into Kabul once (of course I was only 10 or so, no memory of it)...the only thing I remember is that they had to make find a way to pave the "runway" well enough that his big plane could land on it. But I admired the man when I grew up and looked into him, and he had more than that one warning which has since come true.
Mal4, I'm sorry, but I disagree. We've painted Kennedy with the Hero Brush, and he wasn't all that great in reality. I think we just were fairly naïve as a country back then, and information wasn't as readily available as it is now--and as for when things started changing for the worse, for me it was Nixon when we started getting cynical and REALLY mistrusting the government...for good reason, of course. But if you read any book that makes a serious effort to be objective, I think you'll get a wake-up call about Kennedy. JMHO.
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Quote:
Originally posted by Niki2:
Magons, as I wrote, I understand and empathize a LOT with what you've been complaining about, but even I am beginning to feel like you're tarring us all with a big brush.
The thing about being pro-war in particular kinda got to me. I'm 65; as long as I've been alive, most Americans have been against going to war...remember Vietnam?? Yeah, after we were hit massively on 9/11, people reacted viscerally, that might be rather easy to understand, and our damned military-industrial complex and the Bush Administration made the most out of it and ran with it. But that was a reaction, first, and second, it's governments and militaries who always want to go to war, they aren't "The People". Before you say "but you elected them", give a minute's thought to how military-industrial complexes WORK and how much influence they have over politicians, not to mention that, once elected, politicians often show a warlike aspect they don't mention when campaigning to be elected.
We really are an extremely diverse bunch, and the power and wealth isn't even SLIGHTLY uniformly spread out. Each state here can be vastly different from another mentally, and some of them are on opposite POLES even. We are 314 MILLION people with cultures who have evolved in completely different ways; Australia has a population of 23 million, and tho' yes, you're diverse, not nearly as diverse as we are.
Some of what you've written I agree with; some of what you don't like, we are victims of as well. While, as I said, I think it would be hard for a lot of Americans to see things with an outside perspective and fully understand what you're saying, at the same time I think you are viewing us through your own perspective, and making some false assumptions.
Just my two cents' worth. Mostly I guess I'm trying to say that what the world sees as "American influence" is actually the influence of a small group of powerful, wealthy people and doesn't reflect America or Americans as much as you think it does.
I'm talking about America the powerful nation, not the individuals. I get that a lot of Americans oppose war and hate multinationals and fast food.
I'm sorry I've come across as offensive, but you see, I'm genuinely shocked at the hostility that I've encountered because of my feelings around Halloween. And I'm genuinely shocked that the notion of America as a cultural and econically superpower in the world and the impact of that on other countries seems to be hard for a few posters to comprehend and/or take responsibility for. I'm getting that perhaps what would be common conversations for Australians, English, French et al on these sort of issues, may not be common for Americans>? I dunno. People seemed quite taken aback by my comments and I got quickly dismissed as being an American hater.
I make no apologies for my comments on America being a powerful cultural, economic and military force in the world. That is a reality and that impacts on other nations. Doesn't mean the impact is all bad, as I have already acknowledged, nor that other nations are not doing the same thing, just not as powerfully yet. I think in another 50 years the influence of the US will have signifantly waned, and CHina and India will be more powerful. And I'm not at all sure that this will be a good thing.
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Quote:
Originally posted by MAL4PREZ:
"Oh please, get your hand off your heart and stop singing Star Spangled Banner for a moment."
To which I have a strong urge to tell you to go fuck yourself. So really, go fuck yourself. This is such an incredibly bitchy thing for you to say and I'm now frightening close to losing all respect for you.
Oh come on, you've been pretty hostile towards me. You've been using strawmanning my arguments constantly. "You don't like Halloween because you think America is EVIL" statements. Really? The only thing I can think of to cause this reaction is because I've wounded your national pride. THAT's what that statement was about about. Stop getting defensive because you think someone is criticising your country, and actually try to understand the intent.
Quote:Not evil though, huh? And yeah, dopey and naive kind of seeped into the national image thanks to Ronnie Raygun and Dubya. I'll never forget his wide eyed disbelief after 9/11. "These folks really hate us?"
"Dopey and Naive"
Quote:
"Never taken responsibility"
which you know about me... how? Just like you know about me that...
Which is EXACTLY what you've accused me of during this thread. So I thought you were referring to this argument, not me personally. Wonder why you thought I was doing anything else to you.
Quote:
"you are powerful and happy to weild your power militarily, economically and culturally"
And let's not forget that you got what was a fun thread to turn nasty with the accusation:
Well again, not you personally??? Really, did you not know that I was talking about the 'you' as in 'America;? Can you really deny thatAmerica does wield power militarily, economically and culturally?
Quote:
"Revel in your cultural imperialism by all means. Empathy seems to be pretty difficult for you to manage."
Which wasn't said to me personally but certainly all your later posts show that you feel this way toward me, and that goes faaaaaar past a simple: "I don't like Halloween." So don't even think anyone's going to buy that victim card.
yeah that was a bitchy snipe at Byte. I was totally pissed off at her for her 'suck it up, you grinch' attitude. Just like your pissed off with me now. I could have worded it better, but perhaps the sentiments are there underneath.
Quote:
As to reading posts, you can't seem to grok that: "local business cant compete with huge multinationals like KFC, MacDonalds, Cripsy Creme" is not a hardship that you poor Aussies are going through alone. You can't get off your victim pedestal long enough to know that this shit has affected me, a dopey power-happy culturally imperialistic empathy-less American, just as negatively as it has you. So where's your empathy for me, you biatchy hypocrite?
I have probably said 'it's not just about Australia' a number of times now for you to realise that. I've not even said that i find it hardship inducing to have so much of things American outside my very door, but that it causes me some sorrow to feel culturally swamped by it. I get that you may not like multinationals, but if I apply the same logic that has been applied to me, "tough shit. get off your arse and do something about it." Not a very pleasant way to respond either is it? And yes, I do think you've demonstrated not just a startling lack of empathy, but you've been incredibly attacking towards me.
Quote:
Yes, you've pissed me off. Not because I'm defending America, but because you're being an asshole and assuming shit about me that isn't true, and clearly you've been poking your fingers in this thread from the beginning hoping to do nothing more than piss people off about this pet peeve. You have. Good job.
I think somewhere back you wrote about
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Quote:
Originally posted by G:
I think it's hopeless trying to convince you of these things though. We had a similar dead end conversation concerning Zero Dark 30. You didn't think the movie went far enough, wasn't critical enough of US military, and I thought it actually did and did it very well. So yeah, we've had similar discussions.
Was that you? did you have another name then? Yeah, I don't like zero dark thirty and thought it was an offensive movie. I think you probably accused me of America hating then too, didn't you?
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Bullshit Magons. As I thoroughly explained above, you said a helluva lot more than an innocent: "I don't like Halloween". If you actually bothered to pull your head out and read posts responding to you, you would have noticed that a lot of people agreed to a large degree. My first responses to you were to acknowledge the many annoying aspects of it.
But that's not what you were after. You continued to bitch and moan and get personal and insulting, and I only cut you down after that singing the anthem bullshit you pulled.
I challenge you to find any direct quote from my posts that was anywhere close to blind patriotism. Go now and look.
Unless you're too busy fucking yourself. Which you should be.
*---------------------------------------*
The French Revolution would have never happened if Marie Antoinette had just given every peasant an iPhone.
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