Gavin McInnis on Baby Boomers

[Kinser79]

(05-22-2016, 07:17 AM)Danilynn Wrote: It's not so much that I want to see it burn, so much as it seems inevitable.

I can't speak to your experience with managing wild areas, you may not have much experience with that but I'm a member of a hunting association which maintains several thousand acres of reserved land for wild life. Every couple of years we conduct control burns to keep the woods and especially the swamp when it dries out from catching fire. I stress the swamp especially because the soil conditions are ripe for peat which is a precursor to coal (it would turn into coal if buried and put under pressure and some heat for a couple million years). The reason we do this is two fold, it allows for new growth which is what the deer and other animals like to eat (indeed in Florida some native species of trees won't even germinate unless a fire has passed through the area) and it clears away a lot of the undesirable undergrowth.

Like a Florida swamp that hasn't been properly managed (and the Seminoles themselves used to do the same back in the days) becomes over grown and chokes off the life force (for lack of a better phrase) of the swamp/woodland so to society needs to have periodic burn over periods to burn out the weeds. The great oaks will survive, and you'll lose the weaker pines but they will be replaced by newer younger stronger pines (seriously pines only live around 2 or 3 centuries anyway while oaks will live 2 or 3 millennia) and their seeds that survive the squirrels and what not won't germinate without fire to open the cones.

Our society is much like that now. We have "gitcha vine" and poison ivy choking off the trees, we have saw palmetto covering the ground choaking off the lower level plants. We need a burn--preferably a control burn because if we don't have one nature will provide her own, and it may burn down people's houses, be difficult to control even kill.

Quote: And the foreplay is tedious, do it already so we can rebuild it.

I can't speak for others, but as for me I'm young enough to be a Jr Officer still. I want to get it over and done with already. Every year of delay only makes the fire that's coming worse.

Quote:Most especially the welfare thing. Charities at a local level not affiliated with the government do it a lot better and with much more dignity and compassion and less waste than what the government does. I have been involved in numerous charities in my little city. My church bought out an acre of land in conjunction with other churches across all denominations of Christianity and planted with all the youth groups a garden. All the food goes to the food banks, or did. Until the government stepped in and said that we couldn't give that out because it was "unchecked food of unknown origin", same with the safely preserved and processed deer meat, and safely preserved produce from other people's surplus out of small family backyard gardens.

It isn't just charities. I ran into a spot of trouble selling boiled peanuts--had to relocate past city limits to be able to sell them. It isn't something I highly recommend, but when jobs are scarce it is something you can do to get up some money and it isn't taking a hand out. Apparently a peanut stand counts as a restaurant. Hell these days police shut down lemonade stands that children set up like it is some sort of plague or something.

It is unfortunate that the government had to stick its nose into your church's pantry. I'm no Christian (I gave up on that a long time ago, blame my preacher father if you must) but when given the choice between being preached at about the evils of the world and how everyone who doesn't follow an exact theological line is going to burn in eternity (because that is apparently what loving gods do) or actually doing something about the world's problems I have a feeling that Christ would prefer the latter.

I have a feeling that their language was cloaked in safety to the public and what not. The truth of the matter is that your church was providing food to people through a source they don't control. I've had to fight tooth and nail with my city over the fact that I have taken salvaged bath tubs and turned them into planters. This year I have peppers and tomatoes like always and even an experimental patch of some heir loom popcorn. It makes me wonder what they would do should a famine happen. Where would these people get their groceries should the oil stop flowing, I'm willing to bet these same neighbors would want to be my best friend just like they were during Hurricanes Charley, Francis, and Jeanne back in 2004. I was the only person in a five block area with a chainsaw and a machete (and no I won't loan them out). And that was just a micro taste of the hell that can break loose. My Uncles went down to Miami after Andrew and to New Orleans after Katrina, people don't realize it but they are literally a three days away from anarchy. Once the water goes putrid and the food runs out that thin vainer of civilization comes right off.

Quote:So now, each youth group, just delivers this to people who used to come to the pantry. We still have it, but none of what we can give is really nutritious stuff. It is mostly canned and boxed crap that we are allowed to give out. So yet again, gen x, the main bulk of the people who run this little pantry had to come up with a way to get food to people to "rich" to get food stamps, but too poor to actually buy their food, mainly seniors and millies just starting out, and a few families.

Nice work around there. In my case I just happen to know people who need a little extra help with food--particularly meat, one of the good things about having the maternal side of the family down here since the end of the 1950s. Daytona still has a black middle class (I'm meaning teachers, doctors, lawyers, professors and business owners) probably because we also have a Historically Black College. When I go hunting if they need any I make a note of it and once the animal has been dressed and the meat frozen I'll take it over to them.

We've been experimenting with a time bank style barter system to help people in our church. people who need say a plumber, but can't pay, donate however much time the plumber spends doing their work to someone else who needs it. We have seniors who donate it back in the form of driving youth groups around to donate food to our secret list of who needs the garden and deer meat and fresh caught fish. Or babysitting for the sweet young couple who's baby is sick and they need to work, and daycare is out of the question because of an ear ache.

Quote:My town is black, white and Mexican. And between the 12 churches of varying size, we have kept this place from falling into oblivion. Our town is actually re-vitalizing slowly in areas. But it has taken the stubborn, tattooed, weird hair-colored gen x that didn't play well with others to do it after infiltrating the church ladies and men's groups in numbers high enough to break it from social hour gossip society to one of action.

Sounds like what my BF has told me about his church. I asked him what they thought of him growing up and he said he said "It is somewhat ironic, the purple haired, liberty spiked safety pen through his nose kid ended up being a main leader in the men's group, I'm sure the older men hate me though cause I insist we actually do stuff."

Quote:People come to us way before they go to government agencies after say, a house fire, an unexpected death with funeral costs. The reason why is because we fix it. We scout around and organize whatever needs doing and see that it gets done, locally. Our food bank is never hurting because of the way we run it. We have the government appeased with how it appears, and the community taken care of by how it actually gets done. We even have a totally free clothes bank, and furniture stored all over in everyone's sheds, barns, and garages, that is free for people truly in need after disaster. And here's the kicker, the government nearly killed our food pantry, for the sin of growing fresh food and giving it away to people who are hungry.

As they should. In all seriousness I've often thought that the government, particularly the federal government does too much--meddles in things that they should. We need them to stop wars, end plagues stuff the states can't do. The states need to do most of everything else, and for things that are within my immediate realm...I can handle that. We've lost that as a country, I'm told that during the Depression seeking help from family, friends and one's church was the first course of action. I think to a large extent we've lost that as a country. We've lost that because if we are dependent on the government it makes it easier to atomize communities and makes it easier for them to control us. Where people fear their government, and it is much worse if they are dependent on the government, there is tyranny. Where the government fears the people there is liberty.