We want to go a step further in the hurting case.
Contemporary western society is exposing itself to a degree making it very easy to observe what is going on. The internet has no sense of shame, even perversions expose themselves making it possible to better understand.
Now we have the phenomenon of pain related life drafts. Actually they emerge in saturated societies, in which, as my grandfather used to say, "people are so overfed that they do not know what to do in their stupidity".
Pain related life drafts are for instance tattooing and piercing.
A growing number of younger people have an affinity to it. Obviously the backround message to the public is: "look, I am able to take lots of pain!". Such kind of deliberate pain takers belongs to a publicly sanctioned subculture and is fairly acknowledged.
Other forms go into more or less pathological directions. There are for instance so called "scratch kids", mostly teenage kids who scratch their skin in order to feel pain. Attentive observers can often see scars at the lower arms.
Some people suffer from anorexia nervosa or bulimia nervosa.
The backround is similar - a person needs pain in order to feel him/herself. Pain is an indicator of being alive. The dark side of it is the neurotransmitting pattern. Taking pain as sign to be alive becomes a normal attitude difficult to get rid of.
In recent years different forms of perversion have begun to attract people in the field of sexuality. Even teenagers are firm with forms of hard sex practices. Meanwhile in Germany news papers are full with private sex adverts.
Perversion is nothing else than hatred in erotical form. Obviously some people do need pain in order to escape boredom, to create drama and to feel relief after pressure. It sounds insane, but pain is an intelligent dramaturg.
Self-chosen pain plays a big part in psychology of religion. Some choose it to interfer the divine. Some see it as part of their penance. Generally spoken pain serves as strong indicator feeling alive.
I suppose even a forum like this is attracting people playing with self-chosen pain. They need for instance fights - in this case virtual fights, but this is better than nothing.
Finally I want to say that using pain as life indicator is not the best way going through life. Normally pain lovers need to look for victims, and not seldom victims look for somebody to abuse them. The play between victim and abuser might be really exciting, but it leaves always demages at the end, demages on both sides.
Again I ask for gentle consideration...
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Oh yeah!
But they have no Krispy Kreme...
We have still a sky without clouds, though it was cloudy this morning... Look here, this is my new town, webcam on the market place: http://www.zwickau.de/de/tourismus/stadtansichten/webcam.php?PHPSES...
I feel pretty well, had a long walk lately...
Great observations Tert. I had a foster son that went behind my back and had his tongue pierced. When I asked him why he did it, he said it was to prove to his friends that he was tough and could take the pain. I told him that if they were really friends they would not want him to do something that is very painful and very dangerous for his health. I asked him if they had pierced tongues too and he said no, they didn't dare. He just wanted to be the big man. He got an infection and almost lost his tongue trying to prove how he was such a "big man". Sick society with sick views. I also knew a young man that used to slice his arm with his knife and his arm looked like it had gone through a garbage disposal. He said that he was so angry with his parents that it made him feel like he was hurting them when he cut himself. He finally stopped doing it because his parents were so wrapped up in their own stuff that they never even noticed he was doing it. I convinced him that when he felt the frustration with his folks he should do something that would help him in his adult life so he started volunteering at the Boys Club and helped the kids who were latchkey kids (kids whose parents were never home after school or on weekends due to working) and that made him feel better and he did not self mutilate anymore because he wanted to set a good example for those kids.
True what you say about sometimes people taking their own frustration and need to hurt someone out in web forums by picking fights and being rude and belittling, have seen that before. Also true that people seem to feel a need to be a victim too....all being played out on forums...Probably not the best way to promote love for all and not the way to a higher light quotient. Something we all should think about. Great insights, great post.