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Do we live in a culture of unrealistic & therefore unwarranted fear?

How do you tell?

atheist 8 Feb 24
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8 comments

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Yes, we are controlled through fear, every day I see stories about new weapons, global tensions.

The masses are controlled through fear but I don't buy into it. Perspective, I am more likely to die in a car accident than at the hands of a terrorist and I don't fear my car. Korea will never offensively use a nuke. They are just posturing, saying, this is what we are capable of so back off and think twice about attacking us or we can respond. We have 24/7 media coverage of all the bad shit going on. We are inundated with it. I refuse to be intimidated that way. Now if I see a bear on my deck through the sliding glass doors, I will crap my pants. One ate a bunch of my neighbors chickens last fall.

@ollieberry There is a cliff with a lighthouse above my fave surfing spot, when about 12 I would go their first, if I could see sharks I wouldn't go in, excellent views, almost always saw sharks. In my late teens I would just go and surf, but after would go up for a look, and see the sharks swimming under my mates, where I had just been. So I stopped going up for a look, my argument is I was 4000 times more likely to be killed driving to the coast. I raised my kids on this and they still use the argument, the problem is shark attacks are rising rapidly these days.

@atheist my grandfather had gingivitis he lost all his teeth.

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NO, quite the opposit.

the devil's apprentice lol

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I don't think all fear is unreasonable, it's what appears to be a complete unwillingness to confront those fears. It seems there are those in our society who are willing to sacrifice everything in order to be protected from anything and everything that could harm them. Whether it's guns or warning labels about coffee being hot.

@atheist I think most fear is unreasonable. It's usually a projection of things that never happen. In various ways, I'm afraid of heights, so I bump up against that fear when I can. You either let the fear control you or you don't. I don't want it to control me.

@atheist Maybe peace of mind. Mostly, for me, it's proving something to myself. I got up and walked the roof of my house a few days ago. Made me nervous, but I was determined to do it. And, I didn't die!

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Yes. Crime statistics are way down historically speaking yet so many people are terrified to leave the house,or interact with people different than they are. Look at the #metoo movement. Men like Weinstein and Larry Nasar are getting taken down and rightfully so. Men who(I'm assuming here) never molested an underage girl are terrified to ask women out on a date because of this? Extreme overreactions and grossly magnified threat are signs that fear has shut down your thinking process IMO.

@atheist as a general rule. I don't think it's any accident that we're taught to fear every damn thing. Call me a conspiracy theorist but a poorly educated,fearful populace is a lot easier to control

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We live in a culture of fear: period. Fear of others, fear of brown people, fear of black people, fear of terrorism, fear of being gunned down in school, fear of nuclear war, fear of abandonment, fear of commitment, fear of the future, fear of dying, fear of natural disasters, fear of the relatives, fear of disease, fear of being looked down on, fear of sweating under our armpits, fear we won't get the latest iPhone before everyone else, fear of farting in public elevators... We're consumed with it. Of course fear sells ad time, and has taken over our media.

All those things are definitely within the realm of possibility, but we've opted to respond to our lives from fear instead of looking for, as Steven Pinker called it, "our higher angels." Fear is meant to show us that something could be threatening us, but it's only supposed to be there when the threat is present. We've kind of turned everything in life into a new threat.

Well said.

2

Absolutely. We are programmed to fear anything and anyone that is different. We are programmed to fear not measuring up to others' expectations. We are programmed to fear.

Turn off the damned TV. Give yourself a break. You ARE good enough.

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I think in our modern society people can be conditioned to be afraid of almost anything.

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We used to be afraid of thunder and limited to talking to only the 20 or so individuals in our immediate clan, so...

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