USA is most violent industrialized nations on the planet

[David Boje]

Celso:
        You have a most interesting quote. I am writing a book bout the
violent spectacle of production and consumption. I came across a statistic
that between 1984 and 1994 60,000 U.S. youth were killed by hand guns. ).
Every day in 1994, 16 children aged 19 and under, were killed with guns
(National Center for Health Statistics, 1994). Firearms kill more people
between the ages of 15 and 24 than all natural causes combined (National
Center for Health Statistics, 1994). 
      For every American killed by a firearm in self-defense
                   63 commit suicide with firearms
               60 are killed in homicides by firearms
                    6 die in firearm accidents
                1 firearm death is undetermined

The United States has the highest rates of childhood homicide, suicide, and
firearms-related death among all of the industrialized countries; For kids
15 years or less it is nearly 12 times higher than among children in the
other 25 countries combined; Of the total homicides among children in the
world, 73 percent occurred among U.S. children.

This means it is safer to be a policeman than a child.  The saturation of
violent discourse in televison news ("if it bleeds, it is the lead story.");
violence is ok entertainment, but do not show the physical body (that's
sex); in advertising, violent discourse is becoming more frequent. The
long-term impact of children growing up watching thousands of hours of
violence, is that they role model what they see in the spectacle of
violence. According to the Center for Media and Public Affairs, the total
number of violent scenes in entertainment programming increased by 74% in
three years--from 1,002 in 1992 to 1,417 in 1994 and 1,738 in 1995--reaching
an average of nearly 10 incidents of violence per channel per hour during
the most recent season. 
When my son was in school in New York, there was a metal dectector.
According to a recent report issued by the Department of Education, over
6,000 students were expelled in 1996-1997 for bringing guns to their public
schools.  

In our predatory organization culture violent action is legitimated in a
media elevation of violent discourse. Violence in commercials also rose 30%
since 1992. Violence comes in at many levels of discourse, to legitimate
human violence against animals, ecology, in sport, children's programs, and
human interaction.  Clinton's quote does indded point to the hypocrasy of
predatory culture, saturated in discourses of violent attempting to now
control behavior.

david

 At 11:59 PM 4/22/99 +0200, you wrote:
>QUOTE OF THE DAY
>                 OR
>     THE LOGIC OF STATE VIOLENCE
>
>"We must teach our children to solve their
>problems with words, not with arms".
>
>(USA President Clinton's TV speech after
>the Colorado highschool massacre by two
>Fascist boys, during the NATO bombing
>of Serbia and Kosovo, and during
>continuing USA/British bomb raids in Iraq).
>
>Any minimally informed analysis will find
>that Clinton's words are NOT contradictory
>with the USA military aggressions.
>
>--
>Celso Alvarez Cáccamo             
>