Sums up today's USA for me

Quite unbelievably there is another execution is scheduled for tonight with the same drug.

It hasn’t been halted yet.

https://news.sky.com/story/firing-squad-execution-of-mass-killer-nidal-hasan-to-be-livestreamed-pentagon-says-13596660

I wonder how they will get round the awkward little fact that all the livestream platforms have rules which forbid content that shows people being killed.

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I think that’s barbaric. So is the death sentence, but letting people watch it is just sick IMO.

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Yes, it’s like what they would do in a town square in Iran.

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Or in C19th UK: the last public execution was 1868.

But whether the US is more or less civilised than Iran …

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I decided some years ago that USA was a dangerously barbarian place and never to set foot on it.

One ambition I still have is a solo transatlantic passage on my boat, so I would have to turn round and come back without a landfall or land somewhere else.

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The USA is a huge country. I find posts like this quite annoying. Go there, travel, meet the people. Then express an opinion based on first hand experience.

Gus

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I lived in the US and travelled from coast to coast. I still disagree with the death penalty and what they’re doing currently.

Tough for you you find it annoying. I’m an observer of USA since they were kicked out of Vietnam and see no reason to change any of my analysis. The idea that we need to travel everywhere is colonialist, damaging, selfish, and wrong.

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There exists in the USA a weird version of Christianity. It has been extensively researched over the years.. So many people attend church in the US each week, far more than in most if not all European countries , that it leads us to believe they are more Christian. But they are not, attendance at church does not equal religiosity. People go to church for secular reasons.

Robert Bellah talks about civil religion in the US, he argues that rather than praising God, most in the US are praising American society itself. It’s an interesting thesis and has been developed by others since his original work.
I wouldn’t read the book, but a precis of it makes his point.

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I’m sure many of the people are wonderful, as are many Chinese people, but I wouldn’t want to go there either under their regime.

Let’s not forget that fully 1/3 of the US electorate remain supportive of the tangerine tyrant and all that he’s doing to the country.

I recognise that, as an old white man, I wouldn’t have too much to worry about but, in the original spirit of woke, I’m not content to tacitly support what’s going on there right now by visiting and spending my money there.

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Done that, travelled East to West and North to South, got loads of tee-shirts. Have more than a dozen American friends ( all left the US, 4 within the last 3 years) and am very good friends with a professor , still working in the US, but planning to move to Europe.

And, from my experiences , it is not a place I want to live.

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That really does depend on where and why you travel.
Applying your beliefs, presumably as a person who has chosen not to travel anywhere, ever , to the actions of others, without even knowing them or their motivations is rather dogmatic.

No, that’s a false dichotomy.

I am a citizen and experienced life there for 68 years. This is disgusting. Of course you can find many decent people there, but the fact that there are enough sickos to elect and maintain this administration with its purpose to bring the country and the world back to the 19th century is vile.

It is still a land of opportunity for many who are mainly young, ambitious, lucky and preferably white. That description does not fit a lot of people and as I got older, includes me.

I would argue it is not Christianity it is Old Testament pre Christian

My wife asked if I would watch an execution. I answered ‘No’…and then thought, ‘What if it was Putin, or Netanyahu, etc?’
The fact that I asked myself this question made me realise I’m not really the ‘good’ person I thought I was.

What is?
I find we need to make use of the quote facility on here.( see my previouscomment error)
I’m easily confused.

I think to tar a whole nation on the actions of a few is wrong. The US has a population of over 340 million made up of many different ethnic groups, only 1/3 of those eligible voted for him in 2024

As stated previously, I have many American friends, and have travelled extensively in the US. But I don’t want to live in any country with the death penalty and definitely not one where executions are public. It says a lot about the current administration, I can’t see it improving Trumps ratings.