How to make people even more stupid?
You may (not) have noticed the attempts of the people in control (no, I'm not talking about politicians but about the big money-mongers) to make people more stupid by shoving all kinds of bizarre stuff into their heads via television.
There is another path they're going, though. Another way to influence your mind and make you nice, dumb and docile. It's called safety.
You probably think I'm nuts, because safety is good. Safety saves lives, safety needs to be!! I agree.
But there are many levels of safety, and the one I'm talking about is a sneaky one. It is the kind that makes you dumb. A while ago I was riding my bicycle through some fields. I don't own a mountain bike, it's just a city bike, and the ride was rough, but hey, it was nice outside. I don't wear a helmet. I don't have knee- nor arm protection. In short, I don't wear any safety stuff. A bit further I saw two kids having fun on an outdoor trampoline. Around the thing were lots of nets to make sure that the kids wouldn't fall off the bouncy and hurt themselves. That was what triggered this post.
People have no way of learning that they can get hurt any more, if it's up to the people in control. I used to fall off my bike, hurt myself and learnt my lesson: that was stupid, don't do it again. A modern, helmet-wearing and fully padded cyclist can run into a speeding truck and get away unharmed. Lesson learnt? Wrap yourself up and you can hit a speeding truck with no damage to yourself! These kids on their trampoline? Lesson learnt? They'll never fall off, never get hurt and never will learn to take care - because there's a net around them.