| Currently in Novosibirsk: |
 |
| Novosibirsk Webcams |
|
|
| Our visitors: |
|
|
| Just a clarification on the tech toys and a little rant |
| Saturday, October 07, 2006 |
First off I just wanted to say that Stef and I are not the Amish or anything. No offense to you Amish out there but since they don't believe in technology I guess there isn't much chance they're reading this blog anyway, so I guess I could say anything I wanted about you. But I wouldn't, you guys are basically harmless, and I do like your horse drawn carts.
But I digress...
We're also not some anti-any-toy-that-isn't-educational or anything like that either. But some of the video games out there are just ridiculous. There's an entire genre that has to do with crime, but not from a "you're the police and you solve the crime" side but instead actually has the player as the criminal stealing cars, shooting people, etc.
Our desire is to just have our kid have fun and play games that help him/her to learn and grow, using their mind to both discover the really cool things in the world and to (at least try to) be a cool person and not cause harm to others. I'm not saying love everyone in the world, I personally have a dislike for most of my fellow Americans, but I don't try to harm them. I just realize they're pretty stupid and let them meander through life as they see fit.
This leads me to another rant that's somewhat tangent to the crime video games thing.
The second amendment (that's the "right to bear arms" one) was written over two hundred years ago when the power to enforce law and the will of the government was almost exclusively done at the end of a musket. The concept that our forefathers wanted to insure was that IF the government that they themselves were creating every got out of hand and tried to take away our liberties (okay, okay, I know that's actually happening now but not the extent that the forefathers meant), that people, ordinary people, should be able to take arms against the unjustified government and rebel.
I know it's hard to believe, but our country and most other advanced nations have actually grown somewhat past that concept that armed revolt is needed at times (or could even work, since our country is just too large for something like that to happen). The need for that amendment is just not of value any longer and causes far more harm than the potential help (since the likelihood that the help occurring is literally impossible).
People feel that the Constitution is like some ten commandments from God or something and can't be altered. Of course even if it were, it's good to remember that even good ol' Moses broke the tablets. Anyway, there is a very good quote that I'm afraid I forget from whom that goes...
"The people wrote the Constitution and the people and rewrite it."
Unfortunately there's another great quote from Oliver Wendelll Holmes that sums up both an inherent problem of democracy and more importantly the Pandora's box of changing the Constitution (even though my very point above would recommend that action).
"I always say, as you know, that if my fellow citizens want to go to Hell I will help them. It's my job." |
posted by Steveg @ 9:14 AM  |
|
| 1 Comments: |
-
What? You can't find anything educational about Grand Theft Auto Vice City? :) I'm kidding of course - those types of video games disturb me! We got our kids V-Smile, which has age appropriate educational video games that teach all kinds of things like letters, colors, classification, etc. Pretty cool, and much better than Pong (which is all I had to play at their age).
|
| |
| << Home |
| |
|
|
|
| About Us |
|
Contributors:
Our Story:
I'm Steve and this is my wife Stefanie. This is our story, mostly seen through my eyes, of the journey to create our family by adopting a child from Russia.
|
| The Great Snowsuit Swap |
Donate your old snowsuits or other one time use items to other adoptive parents at:
|
| Previous Post |
|
| Archives |
|
| Powered by |
Original template design by Isnaini Dot Com
|
| Thoughts |
"The two greatest obstacles to democracy in the United States are, first, the widespread delusion among the poor that we have a democracy, and second, the chronic terror among the rich, lest we get it."
Edward Dowling
|
|
What? You can't find anything educational about Grand Theft Auto Vice City? :) I'm kidding of course - those types of video games disturb me! We got our kids V-Smile, which has age appropriate educational video games that teach all kinds of things like letters, colors, classification, etc. Pretty cool, and much better than Pong (which is all I had to play at their age).