Fear Frenzy 2015-155

The quality of fear is unknown; it drops from the Internet like a fire tornado in full fiery force. It is many faceted, and convoluted in its makeup. The Media feeds off this feeling and spreads the tentacles far and wide for their own reasons….

Why do we feed on this occurrence? Why do we listen to the “loop” of news casts over and over of the same things that they present to us?

So, what is fear? When we fear something or someone, we have an emotion. We see a threat, usually by living beings or things. When this threat happens, things happen.  Our feeble brains change and our organs, some of them, change in their makeup.

What do we do? We have a change in behavior and we do something or do NOT do something to hide or get away from the thing or event that makes us fearful. We “perceive” this as a risk to our health or lives and see danger to our status of living, to our security, our wealth, or anything of value.

This is a normal reaction. We do have reactions to normal perceptions, which can even cause paralysis and maybe this fear is judged as rational that is thought of as an appropriate thing or irrational which is inappropriate and therefore becomes a phobia.

The constant news on CNN or network TV stations on a continual basis about ISIS threats is an example of a phobia.

Does anyone really think a battalion of ISIS terrorists are going to storm the nearby mall and shoot it up? Hey, it COULD happen, and so can a fiery fire tornado occur too.

TWO civilian people, residents of California, plotted, planned and initiated a provoked attack on a nearby business and killed and wounded many people. They were of the Muslim religion and now everyone is concerned about the influx of ANY Muslim into the country. I will not pick on Mr. Trump alone, but will include him into the mix of those advocating a law that would prohibit Muslims from immigrating into the U.S.A. temporarily.

This is insane!! Yes, it IS, and I repeat IS, possible that some bad, misguided Muslims could come into the country and do harm, but that is true for anyone coming into the country, not just Muslims.

We have enough home grown jackasses that have ideas that are not good and they call themselves by many names and believe many things. The low life guy that killed the 9 people in the church in Charleston S.C., is an example of this. That was about race, not about religion.

FDR, or Franklin D. Roosevelt, stated in his inaugural address in 1933, “We have nothing to fear, but fear itself”, and that is the whole of it. I think people running for office or any party could remember the below quote by FDR (with the underlining by myself):

“So, first of all, let me assert my firm belief that the only thing we have to fear is…fear itself — nameless, unreasoning, unjustified terror which paralyzes needed efforts to convert retreat into advance. In every dark hour of our national life a leadership of frankness and of vigor has met with that understanding and support of the people themselves which is essential to victory. And I am convinced that you will again give that support to leadership in these critical days.”

So, I say to those politicians of today, read the above and become leaders of men, instead of creators of chaos and fear. I say, quit trying to get votes by making paranoia a way of life. I could say to the TV companies, to quit this mindless continued portrayal of fear mongering that you harbor in the quest for ratings.

 

Den Betts