[meteorite-list] Time to Lighten Up Guys

From: j.divelbiss_at_att.net <j.divelbiss_at_meteoritecentral.com>
Date: Thu Apr 22 10:32:55 2004
Message-ID: <032720041449.11673.4995_at_att.net>

This is the Meteorite Central List...not Jerry Springer. The spats and attacks of this week are worthy of a couple no-holds bar cage enclosed wrestling matches. Some of the matches would have been quite fun to watch. Sheesh, there sure was a bunch of nonsensical banter going on. Let’s hope a new week and month bring different threads.(Note: Some of it was really funny...but sad)

Last evening while driving my way home from my job in the city of Reading PA, I was wondering if and why I/someone might be offended by Mark's cartoon about the Park Forest (PF) meteorite fall. Things I came up with included:

1. Characterization that my "burgh" near my city was a bad neighborhood...depicting guns and gangs...possibly true, maybe not?
2. That all black people steal money from the innocent white folk...in this case looking for meteorites. That is certainly not true. (I’m pretty sure all colors/races steal from each other)
3. That someone actually had a gun to their face or was robbed while hunting meteorites in a PF neighborhood. Don't know that either of these things actually happened or not...I doubt it did to the degree of the cartoon depiction. Though some claimed they felt threatened. (NOTE: Cartoons are usually satires that stretchhhhh the truth for a laugh)

So…was there bad taste in the cartoon. Sure…some of this stuff can be offensive to people. Especially to someone who lives near a city suburb like PF. Do these kinds of things exist in this world, and especially in the US. Damn straight it does. To think otherwise is quite naive.

As I said…I was driving home from work through the Reading hoods (always in top 25 most dangerous cities list) to my nice suburbia home. And I saw White, Black, Hispanic, etc. folks as:

1.Families with kids.
2.Couples walking.
3.People hanging out on doorsteps talking and looking
4.People probably selling drugs
5.Prostitutes looking for work
6.Possible gang members beginning to gather for the night.
7.Old folks trying to get home without an issue.
8.Little kids enjoying life.
9.etc. etc….life in a US city neighborhood

Now, for my nice neighborhood…well it is nice, but lately we have had windows shot out, break-ins to cars/homes, mailboxes smashed, bricks through car windows for fun, the usual I guess for a city suburb…like Park Forest I’m sure.

So please lighten everybody and accept us all: color, creed, opinion, and even humor attempts…like Mark’s cartoon. Now would that have been my cartoon….NO…mine would have attempted to depict the chaos of some of the following:

1.Dealers with pockets full of money…going “I’ll give you $1, 2, 4, 10, 20/g all at the same time”.
2.Local museum folk’s panic after they realize they won’t get it all for themselves.
3.Collectors from all over mad attempt to finds pieces of this meteorite fall (wish I would have been one)
4.Neighborhood folks scrambling to get their fair share of the $.
5.Complete newbies to meteorites, collecting their first owned meteorites…and becoming instant experts (yuk, yuk) in the field because they have collected real ones. (Lucky stiffs)

I guess I rambled on long enough with no real message other than to lighten up. In honor of the PF fall…I have copied my message sent last April 1 depicting my take on last years maddening fall in PF…enjoy.

John
http://www.pairlist.net/pipermail/meteorite-list/2003-April/036581.html
Received on Sat 27 Mar 2004 09:49:11 AM PST