Not so silent witness - the morals of a couch potatoe

I don't know where to start. Am struggling with a cold virus so may meander about but watched the 2 latest episodes of Silent Witness. I knew from the 1st episode that it was going to be difficult and at times I almost wanted to switch the tv off because I thought I couldn't handle it but it was so poignant and so relevant I wanted to stick with it.

The storyline was about black on black youth gang killings in deprived estates in London. The scenes, and goings on, were horrific. Girls being gang raped as an initiation process, young men trying to break away with no hope of doing so and generations of neglect and brutality (with society having a rather detached view of it all)whilst young people's identities are pretty much forced on them (often by elder youths from their own cultural backgrounds)...fighting and killing to exist. For me when youths are killing each other..with a moral baseline that seems to revolve around torturing for supremacy, I feel that society is pretty much fucked.

I cried all the way through and I am relieved, on some level, that I did because if I had been able to watch that...and not be so cut up, it would mean that I had become too disassociated from humanity. To view things as going on somewhere else and having no relevance to me, would be the worst thing, I think. I am responsible..we are all responsible!!!

The things that struck me as crucial in this cycle that seems to now perpetuate itself..is the way bureaucracy disables people. How the system and charities ..and the politically correct use other people's suffering to promote themselves. To make crass statements and do the tokenistic acts of kindess that make sod all difference...might as well piss up the wall.

I don't say that something so powerful as a violent sub culture (which has evolved - or morphed...and now seems to be gaining more power in its identity/ies) in spite of all the do gooders is easily remedied. But I do think the media by overplaying sentimentality ("an innocent boy was killed") whilst actually not doing any depthy investigative research are doing more damage than good. It is like a flash of sensationalism and then it's not much of anything to worry about.

I am scared (witless) for young people and the loss of youth...more so because I think us adults are viewing them as aliens rather than human beings that we have created. The flesh of our flesh.

And as tv had quite an impact on me, and my psyche, yesterday...I am going to make Paul O'Grady my Messiah of the Week. As is the format of his show....he has 10-15 minute slots (on a kind of rotating basis) about celebs and other things (non celeb orientated). So 2 people with mental illness were herded on...They spoke about their mental illness (approx 5 minutes each)...the message put across was "TAKE YOUR TABLETS AND JOIN MIND and you will be fine" and then they were herded off again.

Well, there you go. It is that simple!!!! One thing he managed to say, that I thought was okay, was that Bipolar is being used as a fashion statement. When he said it I had this image of Paris Hilton and one of her toy dogs. For me, the toy dog symbolised Bipolar. So he wasn't a complete toss pot in my eyes but if chat show hosts (or those setting the schedules) think something like mental illness is important..then a whole show dedicated to it, with some objectivity thrown in, would be better.

And now it is time for me fluids, pain killers and bed!!!