WHy is it good to NOT CARE what others think?

[fowltemptress]

I like Madonna's music . . . well, some of it. That's all I need to know about her. But in my limited knowledge of famous people, I am aware of a couple of her little rebellions that should be viewed as something good. For example, her one music video featuring her and a black man together . . . that was absurdly shocking to many people, even though it wasn't exactly the newest of ideas. Still, it took interracial coupling and smacked people upside the head with their own silly prejudices, saying, "Look! It happens! So freaking what?" I would hope that's the sort of rebellion the media is thinking of when they praise her for her rebellious attitude. As for the sex she sells, I for one can't wait until sex is plastered across everything in America, so that it becomes commonplace enough that the puritan values monster can quit getting into a tizzy every time it sees some skin. When I saw that gruesome pornography of violence called Passion of the Christ, there were people with grade schoolers in the audience! Witnessing torture is fine, yet somehow sexuality and nudity is going to start warping their minds? If that's the case people need to stop breast feeding right now . . . those boobs cannot be good for the infant's sense of morality.
I just don't get it.

Oh, and happy birthday to anyone and everyone who's had a birthday recently . . . Madonna shouldn't be hogging ALL the birthday attention, now should she?

 

[BayCityBabe]

Madonna does care what other people think. She is astute enough regarding public opinion to be a pop icon. There is NOTHING truly rebellious about her. She is WAY too calculating to be rebelliuos.
Oh yeah, I love her.

 

[Reinbeau]

Quote:
People who ended up in prison whose relative moral standing may be debatable but probably not considered "bad":

Jeshua bar Joseph (AKA Jesus)
Martin Luther King Jr.
Henry David Thoreau
Nelson Mandela
Salem witch trial victims
John Brown
Susan B Anthony
William Wallace
Rob Roy
Andrei Sakharov
Archbishop Desmond Tutu
Elie Wiesel
Aung San Suu Kyi
Wangari Maathai
Shirin Ebadi

You're saying all these people and their causes and the reasons they went to prison were Bad? Really?

Just out of curiosity, do schools teach ethics classes anymore? Or is that also a thing of the past?

Intentionally stretching the point a bit, aren't you? Prisons are where we put criminals, the crimes typically are killing someone, stealing something, rape, assault and battery. Those are the types of crimes I was referring to, not political prisoners, that is pretty much way out of the scope of what we're talking about. Criminals are, but definition, Bad. I'm not going to go into the morals of the people on your list, they are totally different kettles of fish, and you know it.

 

[The Chicken Lady]

I wonder how our various life experiences and positions in the socioeconomic hierarchy of this country affect our opinions on this topic. Just something else to think about...

Completely unrelated to that...

Someone was writing about how we can't go through life thinking, "I'll do what I want and everyone else can do what they want; it doesn't bother me." They were SO right when they said that the choices we make affect other people, whether we intend for them to our not. Our society is set up to make this happen.

For example...

I pay into Social Security, so I'll be benefiting all of you folks who are about to retire in the next ten years because I'm contributing money that will end up in your pension checks. (My parents are in this group; I don't mind, really). However, studies have suggested that Social Security is broken, and people my age won't get Social Security when we are old enough to retire even though we're paying into it right now. I'm being affected whether I like it or not, and this scares me because I want to be able to survive when I'm old and can't work.

I'm a teacher. I spend hundreds of dollars every year of my own money for books and supplies for my students because the state can't afford to give our school the money it needs to fulfill every need. I only get $200 of it back in my tax refund; there's a cap. I buy pencils (etc.) for kids who own better shoes, jeans, and cell phones than I do because public schools like mine (low income) are supposed to provide for the need of every student that walks in the door. I'm affected because kids' parents choose to make sure their kids have the latest clothes and toys, but don't care to buy basic school supplies for their kids.

I pay taxes. Some of this money ends up in the welfare system. When I was a college student, I happened to work at a very nice grocery store. I was student teaching at the time, which is unpaid, and driving 45 minutes each way to the school where I was told I would have my internship. I made $30 a week. I lived off ramen and Kool-aid so I could afford gas and complete my education. Every week, families would come in to the store where I worked with fancy hairdos, manicured nails, etc., and buy loads of the best goodies... They'd come up to pay; I'd be practically drooling. Then they'd whip out the Bridge Card. That burned me like nothing else.

I think the only way you can go through life and not be affected by others' choices is if you live as a completely anonymous hermit in the mountains. Our laws and our government allow other people to affect us whether we want that to happen or not. To ignore other people's impact on our lives is ignorant, especially if other people's choices are hurting us by taking our money away from us while they live it up.

People who "work the system" make me sick, because I'm too proud to stoop to that level so eagerly. I'd grow a huge garden, cut my own hair and shop at thrift stores before I'd give in and go on welfare. I understand people who really are doing everything they possibly can, have cut every corner and still need assistance; that's who welfare was intended for. But people who buy Nikes every month, have manicures and fancy hairdos and cable TV, and are on welfare deserve a big mark of FAILURE in my book.

 

[lurky]

Did anyone read in the news that Madonna is dating A-rod??? Do we call her 'Mod-Rod' now? I dont think she is all that bad. I think everyone is just jealous because she's cut

 

[fowltemptress]

Quote:
I'm curious what you think of the people in there on silly little drug possession charges? My neighbor used to smoke recreationally, never did anything near as awful as the people who LEGALLY drink, he didn't even distribute. He went to jail for that and came back a member of a gang . . . a gang he would have never come in contact with had he never been put in the system. Lovely.
Whether it's prison or a twelve step program, putting bad people with people who have made questionable choices is not a good idea. I'd be pro prison if I knew everyone in there was genuinely hopeless and would stay put, but I certainly can't be for a system that temporarily puts in bad people to corrupt the not-so-bad people who are constantly shuffling through. It makes me almost tempted to say put them all down . . . if only I weren't opposed to mass murder on a whim. I suppose I could justify it by grinding them up into chicken feed afterwords, but what are the odds of that going over well? Come on, you know the hens would LOVE fair turnaround for all the KFC's out there

 

[fowltemptress]

The Chicken Lady . . . My mother is a teacher. One thing I learned growing up with her is to NEVER become a teacher. I used to leave thank you notes on the last day of school for all my teachers, because I know what a thankless job it is . . .and my mom is one of the popular teachers with the students!
One of the things that really tears her up is seeing the kids whose families are on some sort of welfare or whatever leave their perfectly good jackets (sometimes the jackets look brand new) on campus. She used to return them repeatedly, but ended up just keeping them when it became clear the kids were determined to "lose" them. The reason? They could buy new jackets as long as they lost their current ones, or if they were damaged somehow. Some kids go through four or five new jackets a winter in this way, just losing a jacket as soon as they get tired of it. It blows my mind, some things.

 

[greenapple]

All depends on the situation for me, there are those that I care what they think, and there are those I don't care what they think. I try to treat others as I would like to be treated. I try to treat all with respect, even when they don't deserve it.
"Do what ye will, yet harm none"
I think political correctness has gone way to far. "You can please some of the people some of the time, but not all people all the time." So why should one care what others think of them, outside of the ones they care about?
I am not a social person, I have been accused of being racist, snob... because some judge me right away, and having troubles interacting socially with people, some tend to take me the wrong way. My response to being accused of hating someone based on something superficial has always been "I hate everyone equally" I don't hate anyone as I am not going to burden myself with all that negativity, but there are some I don't like and it has nothing to do with race, money... It generally has to deal with how they treat me.
The only things that cause me to not like someone and not care what they think is:
1.If they take a shower in perfume or cologne, or wear it around me after I have explained why I can't be around strong odors.
2. If they move to my area and start complaining about how we do things around here, and that is not how they do that up (insert northern state, not picking on any state, just the people that move here from predominately northern states / half back is the term I have heard used for this population in North Carolina), or complain about how "Floridians" do this or that, when they offending party is originally from the same state as the person complaining.
3. If they insist on saving my eternal soul because I do not practice their religion.
4. If they insist their way is the only way, and refuse to listen to anybody else.
5. If they treat me like I am some kind of idiot without any ability to think for myself.
6. If they use "no speak english" as an excuse.

It would be nice if we could all get along. But we all need to remember we are all animals, we are social animals, and can take lessons from our beloved poultry. Do you think the alpha hen cares about the hen on the bottom of the pecking order that knows her place, or is she more concerned about the one that is next strongest, or the one that doesn't accept its place in the pecking order? We all have our places on many pecking orders in our lives, some we are supposed to be on top, some on the bottom, and some we have to constantly fight our way to try to get to the top. We just have to remember which pecking order we are dealing with at any given time.

 

[seminolewind]

Quote:
Thankyou thankyou thankyou. Madonna is truly a remarkable person, and worked hard and come a long way to where she is now. AND kept her kids out of the spotlight.

I think most of this conversation about freedom depends on your interpretation of the word. I think Janis Joplin said it best "Freedom's just another word for nothing else to lose."
As for what other people think? If you worry too much about it, you will become paranoid, and have to take pills like xanax. If you don't care enough, you're an idiot.
The older I get, the less I care about what others think. If people want to think that I'm nuts, that's fine with me.

 

[chickens4jojo]

I think "caring" is usually manners and respect for others; not necessarily agreeing with them always or allowing them to control your actions as long as one is not harming others.

My dad always says, (maybe yours does, too!), "A person's rights stop where my nose begins!" And Vice Versa

I believe Madonna is an individual who is certainly not one I would want my daughters to emmulate in any way. She is not the only one to flaunt the mores of our society, but she is a good example of what the general media wants to feed our children~~and so few do control the media in the US.

For me, I will control what my kids see/read/hear~not the media moguls with their own agendas. And in this case, I am right to NOT CARE what others (media) think....... JMHO