[frostfire]

Originally Posted by nmap

I would contend that fully 90% - about 270,000,000 people - are, by and large, perfectly nice folks who want to lead a good life and have no desire to hurt anyone. And at least 50% - 150,000,000 or so - would, I think, qualify as "good people".

But you see, Rangertab1 - it isn't about their merit as people, nor mine, nor anyone else's. It is about the external forces which may drive their behavior - and that of billions of other perfectly nice people. Therein lies the problem.

If you're interested, perhaps we could start a new thread on the subject. Please PM me if you'd like to do that.

Originally Posted by The Reaper

90% of the nice Americans are about 72 hours from reverting to savages.

Take away electricity, clean water, flush toilets, comms, wheels, a full cupboard, a universally accepted currency, and stores full of things to buy and watch what happens within days.

See Katrina for examples.

TR

As usual, TR beat me to it and go straight to the point.

As the saying goes, "the true measure of a man is how he treats someone who can do him absolutely no good." Most folks are good people when life is nice and gooey. Why woudn't they: Seek pleasure, avoid pain. Under duress (and extreme stress), true character shows up. This won't apply to QP's, but I think the rest of us should attempt to evaluate our character, and establish a baseline to improve upon by exposing ourselves to (hopefully controlled) stress, be it psychological, emotional, physiological, and so on. To toughen the mind, and developing intestinal fortitude, so to speak. When things really go south, not only you want to be around dependable/competent people, you want yourself first, to be dependable.

“You gain strength, courage, and confidence by every experience in which you really stop to look fear in the face. You must do the thing you think you cannot do. Then you are able to say to yourself, 'I lived through this horror. I can take the next thing that comes along.”
~Eleanor Roosevelt