DwayneEMTP

Yeah...it's been a long time, maybe a year or more... Busy, could you do me a favor and remove the young man's name from your post, I'm not sure it was used before, but even if it was I shouldn't have used it now to make my point. Though if his name wasn't used (I can't remember now) he certainly was described to the point where it could really only have been one of our regularly posting members. If you can't edit it in time, my sincere aplolgies to my young friend. It wasn't my intention to use you to make my point...I just wasn't thinking. Dwayne

You know, I find it hard to believe that anyone here actually believed he was a medic. I've called him out a gazillion times about never posting in a medical thread without him making me look foolish...Nuf said there I think... As to the "let's lynch him without further information!!!" Crap...Haven't we been down this road with before? With our young EMT friend? Everyone was very excited to have a hate party...unfortunately the "oops" afterwards didn't come near to compensating him for dragging him through the mud... I have nothing but respect for you AK...But the "friend of a friend's" word that somedic should be disgraced and humiliated doesn't work for me here... I've never been a somedic fan, but some things are right...others smack of witch hunts... Have a great day all. Dwayne

"Though the front windshield seemed intact, the rear had a large crack." :shock:

Wait..wait... How do you report this amount of penetration on your PCR?

The driving may have been bad, but I think the couple in back are the ones that really blew it...

I mean this in the kindest possible way and hope you can take it in the spirit intended. I commend your attitude on not being privy to an unfair advantage, but right now your writing is causing you a very fair disadvantage... If it hasn't done so yet, it will hold you back. I know you can do better... Again...meant as constructive criticism, nothing more. Dwayne

Kudos to you for having the guts to ask a difficult, racially charged question! There is certainly nothing wrong with the question, and most here would not be offended. I've only applied once for an EMS job, and I know for several reasons I tested in the top 5% when applying, yet they hired the least intelligent, most socially inept two people in my class. Was it because I'm old(ish). Don't know...And after seeing who they hired, I'm not really interested in finding out. The important thing to remember is that though I felt much more qualified, it doesn't really matter what I think. It's their job, they created it, they can hire based on whatever criteria makes them money. I've heard a million stories from a friend of a friend who knows first hand someone's brother that has a Masters degree but got cheated out of the job at the Post Office by a black man with one tooth fresh out of prison after his assasination attempt on the president...but have never seen it. So for me it's simply a rumor. And I choose not to live my life pretending that rumors are facts. My guess is you were getting poor advice from people that choose to nurture excuses instead of successes. Follow the advice given by the many wise posters here...don't worry if it's true or not. Stay in school and put yourself in a position where they need to come after you instead of you after them. Good luck to you! I like your attitude! Dwayne

Point taken...

Ok, I'm thinking you're doing the whole haiku thing so we can't complain about your grammar! Quit it! I'm begging you for a complete thought!! Besides, it discriminates against those of us with an IQ below 30. Show some compassion. Dwayne

I'd like to propose a motion making it illegal to ever use, reference, or even accidently confuse, the "Wendys" in any form, audio, visual, written in these forums. Punishment to include personally correcting all spelling and grammatical errors in the forums for a period of one week. (most likely starting with this one.) (And no Wendy, (see, no confusion) you can't vounteer for this punishment)(And yes, I am making an attempt on the parentheses world record) Amongst the multitude of differences between you two, you don't ramble. As my motion hasn't been seconded and ratified, you are off the hook this time. Dwayne

Also, if you don't have them, and they're not required for medic school (though they certainly should be) you might consider anatomy and physiology prior to going. It will make life much simpler as well as give you increased insight into all you cover in school. Good luck to you. Dwayne

Hi hmmike! Welcome to the City! It sounds like you're off to a good start! Basic school can be pretty fun, but I'm afraid that you'll find that they most likely won't teach you all you'll need to know, and hopefully nowhere near everything you'll want to know, so study hard on your own! Do some searches on the City about "basic to medic" or the like and you'll find hundreds of pages dedicated to the subject. I went right from basic to medic school with no time on the streets and have found it amazingly challenging! If you plan to go onto medic, enjoy basic school! Once you make the change you'll know you just aint in Kansas any more. Try not to let the hosemonkey's attitude on grades and education rub off on you! Dwayne

Out of the blue the above sentence popped into my head and it occurred to me that I'm not sure what you meant, but I have a tickle that it might be an imprtant thought. Is "them" society? Or those to be corrected? Or am I missing the point entirely? Dwayne

My wife points out that sometimes when I undertake these types of arguments that I assume that some things are a forgone conclusion, for instance, holding this woman responsible for her actions. I should make it clear that I'm not suggesting that because I don't believe that punishing her is the solution, that it follows that I also believe that there should be no consequences for her actions. We must protect society from her behavior regardless of the reasons for that behavior. Punishing her will not effect the future, only identifying the cause, and preventing those "wired" like her from offending in a like manner will do that. I agree that legally that would be societies only responsibility. But it's a waste of time as society is producing offenders at a much higher rate than we are able to lock them up. It's a feel good strategy that is failing terribly. In the scary land you live, when a suicide bomber successfully delivers his/her mayhem, does the military celebrate because he/she got what they deserved? Or do they instead recognize that if there is one, that may be evidence there are more? Don't they then dissect the person and device, pick each apart piece by piece in an attempt to deduce how and why this happened and then use that information to take steps to prevent another such occurrence in the future? Is the next dead baby so much less important than the next dead soldier? In the system that we use, that many here propose, we're supposed to celebrate the bombers death and then simply wait to see if it happens again. That's unacceptable to me. We have the tools to attempt protect the next baby, and the next soldier, not to use them is criminal. I can't accept that. It's beyond the will of our society perhaps, but the ability is there. Perhaps it's beyond their control for your world, and mine, but I'm working on our kids' world now...and it's doable. Not among friends. It's been my experience here that those that are easily offended seldom are very productive, and certainly not friends. Michael and I have had a few conversations where the only thing that kept me out of jail was that there is no "choke' function on my keyboard. Your thoughts and opinions are always welcome in my brain... Naw...If we both come away a little smarter we both win. Though we may have to admit that we didn't have the moxy to solve all of societies problems in a single thread...I'll try and live with that. I tend to believe that showing others how to have this argument, for this long, without evoking Godwin's law is a huge success of it's own! How to debate passionately, and aggressively, yet respectfully is a skill I'd like to pass on to kids...That in itself might resolve a few issues. Thanks for your thought ol' man! Come home safe! Dwayne

My story had two purposes. First..an attempt to be funny, which nearly always fails when I try to do it on purpose. Second, to show that though there is little correlation between the mentally challenged and those that are biologically sound, in both cases it is necessary to separate the behavior from the actor. Skinner, and those that came before him thoroughly proved that nearly any behavior can be altered, redirected or extinguished once it's isolated and understood. These behaviors are no exception. I am surprised though that someone with your love of scientific medicine would allow "shitty values" as a working diagnosis for such a serious issue, as those values are not the condition, but only a symptom. I'm curious if you're familiar with Skinners “autonomous man” theory? It describes your, and many others' attitudes pretty well. I'm curious also as to why you want to kill the thread? It seems to me that there has been some productive material here...what harm is it doing? And lastly, as to the "war is over" analogy, I couldn't disagree more. This lady flushing her baby, is related to kids killing themselves in drunken accidents which is related to the senseless murder our kids do to each other daily. We see it, we hate it, yet in the evolution of resolving these problems, instead of working to develop the next wonder vaccine...we choose to continue burning witches. Dwayne

It just occured to me...where are the opinions from all of the early posters? Were you just blowing smoke? Or have you had a change of heart? Dwayne

Jess, Annie, Michael, Ak, Hammer...man, you guys restore my faith in human nature. When I made my first post on this thread I sent a PM to some friends saying something along the lines of "Hey, I just said we need to study this woman instead of stone her! Come watch, it's going to be a bloodbath!" But as often happens, you've proved me wrong. Kat, though I disagree with you nearly point for point, it's pretty cool you spent the time to explain your opinion to the rest of us. I long for the day when the majority of society will be of the opinion that you can hate the behavior without hating the person performing the behavior. Not because hating the subject is morally wrong (maybe it is, maybe it isn't) but because it's simply unproductive. As an example. Some of you know I have a 10 y/o autistic son. The other day he decided to go across the street and check the mail while I was on the phone in my office...naked. (Him, not me) I heard the door, ran out to find him in the living room without his clothes, a normal day in my household. Until the police showed up. The lady officer knocked on the door (this was several minutes later, I was back in my office) and my son let her in...yeppers...still naked. She said " A neighbor complained about a boy from your house being outside naked...I'm guessing that might be him there...and when she tried to make him go inside she said (and I quote) "He gave me the most evil look, it sent chills down my spine!"" I explained that he was autistic, that the best that we can tell he has no concept of hate, or "evil", or rudeness, or so far...issues with being naked. She asked if she could speak with him, I said "of course", so she said slightly firmly "young man, you shouldn't be outside naked! He said "Yeah...I'll go get some underwear" At which point she said "Well, that didn't seem very evil", laughed, said she would spread the word there was an autistic child in the neighborhood in case he ever got lost or hurt, and went to have a chat with the neighbor. I took immediate action by sending a letter to everyone on my street saying "I understand some of you may have seen my son naked this afternoon. I would just like to say that it would be unfair to make any assumptions about the penis size of his father based on a single sampling from one prepubescent child" (Yeah, ok...I didn't really do that) My point is, had this been a "serious" behavior instead of simply a little boy running around naked, what have we gained by putting him in jail if our true intent is to prevent this behavior in the future? Doesn't it make more sense to say "Hmmm. This boy behaves differently. He predictably exhibits X type of behavior. Perhaps based on this understanding we can learn to prevent X behavior in this boy. Plus, we seem to have a group of people that exhibit these same types of behaviors. Could it be that what worked on him will work on them as well? Isn't it possible that based on this logic that soon the scourge of naked autistic kids could be eliminated not only for the mental well being of my one neighbor, but for prudish neighbors everywhere? (Besides, who really wants a prison full of laughing, naked kids?) My neighbor hated my son's behavior. But she chose also to hate the person exhibiting the behavior, when in fact, the behavior and the "intent" of/for the behavior had almost no relationship. (He has no concept that nakedness in public is bad, as well as having no concept of purposely attempting to offend the neighbors) It's time to separate the two for the purpose of productivity. Yikes, FireEMT177959, you're really going to hate this post! Perhaps you can tell there's a giant thunderstorm here and I'm feeling a bit reflective (stop it Michael). Also a little giddy from having time to post again! Going to run all...Have a great day! Thanks for sharing your thoughts. Dwayne

Man, that will keep me fed for a while. It seems like I was trying to say something like the partial quote above...it just doesn't have the same impact in 86,000 words with typos and misspellings... Pretty cool contribution...thanks! Dwayne

katbemeEMT-B, no need to be sorry. Your feelings are common and I'm afraid that as long as you deal with what 'seems to be' instead of what is there is little we can do to change them. For example “The courts are willing to plea bargain and give her a cake walk of a sentence if any at all." Where have you seen this? I'd love to see the cases where this is happening, could you reference them for us? It's not my intention to discredit you, but to attempt to convince you that hearsay is not data. It's hysterics. Also, "I am tired of ALL criminals getting off because they weren't in their right mind." Surely you don't believe that. It's difficult to have these discussions when you speak in generalities and don't say what you actually mean. And if in fact you do believe that ALL criminals get off..then I'm not sure I have the tools to make a dent in your thinking. Also, these types of discussions are a great example of why education outside of your chosen field of study is important. It difficult to explain my point for two reasons. First, it's evident that you have no background in psychology, behavioral psychology specifically. Second, most of your arguments come straight from the nightly news...It's tough to have a debate when you seem unwilling to step outside of the diatribe used by most unthinking folks. Hearsay is not data. I apologize if this sounds rude. My intention is to be clear, not unkind. From your many posts I have come to believe that you are a kind, smart and good, person and mother. You just seem to be towing the company line on this issue and the company is turning out defective wigits. I'm truly not on the attack here. I'm afraid I don't have many posters' knack for saying what I mean in a smoother more elegant way. My intention is to try and get us on the same page, as I'd like to continue this discussion with you, but I'm not sure how to do that exactly. Also, though your reply to what you said was my post was very thorough, I don't believe it really addressed any of the major points from my post. I appreciate you thoughts and look forward to your replies! Dwayne

Thanks for the info! I'm on my way as we speak! (Just teasing...you left out the "when") Dwayne

SouthernJess, great post! At some point we have to change the questions the majority are asking. Right now= "How do we punish these behaviors?" Some day (hopefully) = "How do we prevent these behaviors?" Have a great day! Dwayne

Punishment isn't working, and in the form of prison, is never going to work on these types of behaviors. Punishment is a lousy way to educate, that's been a proven scientific fact for ages. When it works, which is seldom, it's effects are very weak, and it needs to be applied (the severity is incidental in most case, the timing vital) at the time of the behavior and then removed immediately when the behavior is extinguished. We're unable to do that in these situations. The problem with punishment is that it sometimes appears to work (superstitious reinforcement for the punisher) and it feels good! People like it. It allows them to continue to believe they are doing something useful, when in fact they are replacing intelligent thought with this feel-good pack behavior. What do they call that again, when you continue to do the same thing over and over again, expecting different results....? Also, when punishment does work, it effects decisions. It allows you to choose one of the life skills you've developed and use it, instead of any of the other tools in your mental toolbox. Do you believe she woke up in the morning and said "I don't think I'll have this baby today, but if I do, I suppose I might as well deliver it by myself in a dirty bathroom and then try and flush it down the toilet." Me either. She ended up in a situation, probably starting long before she actually got pregnant, for which she had no tools, no skills. There is nothing rational about this girls story or behavior. We need to stop pretending that this child was hurt simply because of this one girl's decisions. There are a ton of people responsible for this tragedy, those that caused her damage, and those that allowed her to end up here without having better options, that we should be looking at. Should we take steps to make sure, now that she's been identified as a danger, that she can't damage other human beings? Of course. But we should do so with a heavy heart, knowing that her failure is a black mark on the report card that addresses our function as a society. Not with this celebration of "yeah! burn the witch!" Hating her is easy, fun for many, but lazy. Keep your head down Dust...We look forward to getting you home safe! Dwayne

Of course there's a reason. Like Chris Rock says "there's a reason for everything. There's a reason to push a 90 year old man down a flight of stairs! Just...Don't....Do it!" We don't understand her reasons possibly. But nothing happens without a cause, it's time to identify this one and eliminate it. You didn't mention what those mothers that murdered their babies said. After all that's what we're talking about. Not abortion. Two radically different behaviors. The way the War on Drugs has eliminated illegal drug usage from the U.S.? Perhaps you mean the way the death penalty put a stop to murder? As in my post above, this is blind, hysterical thinking. How many people that you live your life around would you say are capable of attempting to flush a child down the toilet? I'd say the number is about zero around me as well. So doesn't that cause you to believe that this woman is somehow different from those that you would consider normal? Perhaps broken? That maybe you have no idea what's best when dealing with people this far out of your scope of experience? I would like to offer you what you so flippantly deny this lady. The psychological defense of justifiable outrage and heartache in regards to putting forth this unrealistic argument. You're absolutely right. Though your solutions have been tried against other, like behaviors, and have failed. Don't you think it's time to think our way out of this box instead of continuing to attempt to punch our way out? Punching feels better! Punching gets everyone on your side, cheering and waving their flags of indignation...it just isn't working. The booming prison industry is proof positive that we need a different answer. You are very much correct. Were you and your kids born with this, or was it a learned and reinforced behavior? If you have no example for it then how are you able to choose it? And if you never had a chance to choose it, does that make you a monster, or a pitiable, damaged person? And if the latter, shouldn't we do what's necessary to prevent others from suffering the same fate? Though I sometimes have stong opinions, I'm not pretending that they are answers. But perhaps our debates can be the catalyst for answers in the future. Thanks for your thoughts. Dwayne

I'm afraid I'm not very skilled at beating around the bush.... The above type of postings seem to be becoming endemic..And the IQ of the posts following them normally drops to near zero. A sign of this, I believe, is that I see our "council of elders" members disappearing and resurfacing on other sites...It's a little hard on my heart. We seem to be hitting a point where we need to simply surrender our -EMS- forums to senseless flirty nonsense, which seems to invade every new person's post, or any question in the BLS arena. Or we need to put PMs back in our mailboxes and get back to the business of learning in the forums. The world is in desperate need of senseless flirty nonsense! Don't get me wrong...but must we infect EVERY thread with it? Have a great day Spenac. Dwayne