In-grouping – Even Among The Rabbits

They know this is dangerous:

Thousands of volunteers for the Red Cross in the Netherlands say they are not prepared to help refugees, according to a confidential report in the hands of broadcaster Nos.

The organisation carried out a survey of 1,300 of its 30,000 volunteers and found around one in five was unwilling to work with asylum seekers. The reasons given ranged from “I’d rather see our borders closed” to “there is nothing for them here”, while others said most refugees are after an easy life.

The Red Cross is holding a meeting with officials from all 25 districts on December 15 in an effort to determine the full extent of the problem. The organisation is also developing a campaign based on the theme “Red Cross volunteers help everyone” to try to change people’s minds.

“It has to be clear that people who object to helping on principle can no longer be volunteers for the Red Cross, despite their work up to now,” Nos quotes the document as saying.

The Red Cross isn’t a bastion of Marine Corps-like personalities. This is like finding that 20% of the ACLU thinks Muslims are a problem in America. What is the percentage among the broader population? This would indicate there is a large portion of the broader populace that wants the refugees gone, and it is the part of the population which will not frown upon using violence to attain a meaningful objective. It is one thing if 80% of your pacifist hippies want something really bad. It is a wholly different thing when 80% of your aggressive, violence-prone individuals want something very badly.

I once was experimenting with Chinese herbs, and flipped the switch the Chinese would refer to as increasing liver yang. It is tough to explain the cognitive difference which a biochemical switch in the brain can produce. The best way I could describe it is that my brain, without my consent or desire, began aggressively scanning the environment for little things which irritated it, it compulsively focused on them, and it wouldn’t let me leave them alone. I had to get up and deal with them. I couldn’t sit still, and finally ended up irritated that I didn’t have a clear action to take, after eradicating all of my little irritations. It was a weird mix of mania, compulsion, and irritation, and as I ran around obsessed, I marveled at how different it was. I can understand how some people are like human dynamos, and compulsively driven to work.

I am increasingly understanding how the coming shortage and disorder is going to wear on human brains, molding them into similar action-driven, irritable cognitive patterns, and creating a subtle bother which will grow, until it will not allow these people to sit still. At the same time, I see the cognitive forces now holding everyone back, and I see how once the dam bursts and individuals begin acting alone, it will quickly turn to a flood. What would be normal action by each individual will turn to groups of individuals, acting together, with each individual driven to a manic craziness by the fact he is in a mob. I can see the insanity that will produce. It will go from cold to scalding hot, very fast, and anything will be possible.

Add in the Muslim angle, as well as the horrors you know will happen and be publicized on both sides, and it suddenly looks like a powder keg in search of a spark.

Apocalypse may be too weak of a word to describe what will happen.

I find myself very optimistic.