This is a time of shame and sorrow. It is not a day for politics.

Neurosci Biobehav Rev. 2006;30(3):319-45. Epub 2005 Feb 25.
Testosterone and human aggression: an evaluation of the challenge hypothesis.
Archer J.

Department of Psychology, University of Central Lancashire, Preston, Lancashire PR12HE, UK. jarcher@uclan.ac.uk
Abstract

Research on testosterone-behavior relationships in humans is assessed in relation to a version of the challenge hypothesis, originally proposed to account for testosterone-aggression associations in monogamous birds. Predictions were that that testosterone would rise at puberty to moderate levels, which supported reproductive physiology and behavior. Sexual arousal and challenges involving young males would raise testosterone levels further. In turn, this would facilitate direct competitive behavior, including aggression. When males are required to care for offspring, testosterone levels will decrease. Testosterone levels will also be associated with different behavioral profiles among men, associated with life history strategies involving emphasis on either mating or parental effort. Most of these predictions were supported by the review of current research, although most studies were not designed to specifically test the challenge hypothesis.

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/16483890

http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=about&forum=1262

Statement of Purpose

Discuss how to enact progressive gun control reform in a supportive environment. The group serves as a safe haven in which to mobilize supporters in support of measures reducing gun violence by changing laws, culture and practice at the municipal, state, and federal levels. While there is no single solution to the tragic epidemic of gun violence, members agree that more guns are not the solution to gun violence, and are expected to be supportive of the policies of progressive gun control reform organizations.

Thanks for the link.

I had no idea. Honestly. Last thing I would've expected. I don't care if admin did decide to permit a free-for-all; we're still liable for our individual behavior regardless.

I told Skp he should've explained he was reposting Robb's work with his own revisions, and that it would've been better to have asked permission first as well. Perhaps he omitted that last point knowing permission would be refused, as I can well understand why. I actually liked his OP best but that's entirely beside the point - it never should've been done in the first place.

...Our lives on this planet are too short and the work to be done too great to let this spirit flourish any longer in our land. Of course we cannot vanquish it with a program, nor with a resolution.

But we can perhaps remember, if only for a time, that those who live with us are our brothers, that they share with us the same short moment of life; that they seek, as do we, nothing but the chance to live out their lives in purpose and in happiness, winning what satisfaction and fulfillment they can.

Surely, this bond of common faith, this bond of common goal, can begin to teach us something. Surely, we can learn, at least, to look at those around us as fellow men, and surely we can begin to work a little harder to bind up the wounds among us and to become in our own hearts brothers and countrymen once again.

http://www.vsotd.com/Article.php?art_num=4651

This is a time of shame and sorrow. It is not a day for politics. I have saved this one opportunity, my only event of today, to speak briefly to you about the mindless menace of violence in America which again stains our land and every one of our lives.

It is not the concern of any one race. The victims of the violence are black and white, rich and poor, young and old, famous and unknown. They are, most important of all, human beings whom other human beings loved and needed. No one - no matter where he lives or what he does - can be certain who will suffer from some senseless act of bloodshed. And yet it goes on and on and on in this country of ours.

Why? What has violence ever accomplished? What has it ever created? No martyr's cause has ever been stilled by an assassin's bullet.

No wrongs have ever been righted by riots and civil disorders. A sniper is only a coward, not a hero; and an uncontrolled, uncontrollable mob is only the voice of madness, not the voice of reason.

Whenever any American's life is taken by another American unnecessarily - whether it is done in the name of the law or in the defiance of the law, by one man or a gang, in cold blood or in passion, in an attack of violence or in response to violence - whenever we tear at the fabric of the life which another man has painfully and clumsily woven for himself and his children, the whole nation is degraded.

"Among free men," said Abraham Lincoln, "there can be no successful appeal from the ballot to the bullet; and those who take such appeal are sure to lose their cause and pay the costs."

Yet we seemingly tolerate a rising level of violence that ignores our common humanity and our claims to civilization alike. We calmly accept newspaper reports of civilian slaughter in far-off lands. We glorify killing on movie and television screens and call it entertainment. We make it easy for men of all shades of sanity to acquire whatever weapons and ammunition they desire.

Too often we honor swagger and bluster and wielders of force; too often we excuse those who are willing to build their own lives on the shattered dreams of others. Some Americans who preach non-violence abroad fail to practice it here at home. Some who accuse others of inciting riots have by their own conduct invited them.

Some look for scapegoats, others look for conspiracies, but this much is clear: violence breeds violence, repression brings retaliation, and only a cleansing of our whole society can remove this sickness from our soul.

For there is another kind of violence, slower but just as deadly destructive as the shot or the bomb in the night. This is the violence of institutions; indifference and inaction and slow decay. This is the violence that afflicts the poor, that poisons relations between men because their skin has different colors. This is the slow destruction of a child by hunger, and schools without books and homes without heat in the winter.

This is the breaking of a man's spirit by denying him the chance to stand as a father and as a man among other men. And this too afflicts us all.

I have not come here to propose a set of specific remedies nor is there a single set. For a broad and adequate outline we know what must be done. When you teach a man to hate and fear his brother, when you teach that he is a lesser man because of his color or his beliefs or the policies he pursues, when you teach that those who differ from you threaten your freedom or your job or your family, then you also learn to confront others not as fellow citizens but as enemies, to be met not with cooperation but with conquest; to be subjugated and mastered.

We learn, at the last, to look at our brothers as aliens, men with whom we share a city, but not a community; men bound to us in common dwelling, but not in common effort. We learn to share only a common fear, only a common desire to retreat from each other, only a common impulse to meet disagreement with force. For all this, there are no final answers.

Yet we know what we must do. It is to achieve true justice among our fellow citizens. The question is not what programs we should seek to enact. The question is whether we can find in our own midst and in our own hearts that leadership of humane purpose that will recognize the terrible truths of our existence.

We must admit the vanity of our false distinctions among men and learn to find our own advancement in the search for the advancement of others. We must admit in ourselves that our own children's future cannot be built on the misfortunes of others. We must recognize that this short life can neither be ennobled or enriched by hatred or revenge.

Our lives on this planet are too short and the work to be done too great to let this spirit flourish any longer in our land. Of course we cannot vanquish it with a program, nor with a resolution.

But we can perhaps remember, if only for a time, that those who live with us are our brothers, that they share with us the same short moment of life; that they seek, as do we, nothing but the chance to live out their lives in purpose and in happiness, winning what satisfaction and fulfillment they can.

Surely, this bond of common faith, this bond of common goal, can begin to teach us something. Surely, we can learn, at least, to look at those around us as fellow men, and surely we can begin to work a little harder to bind up the wounds among us and to become in our own hearts brothers and countrymen once again.v

"Yet we seemingly tolerate a rising level of violence that ignores our common humanity and our claims to civilization alike.

We calmly accept newspaper reports of civilian slaughter in far-off lands.

We glorify killing on movie and television screens and call it entertainment.

We make it easy for men of all shades of sanity to acquire whatever weapons and ammunition they desire."

Robert F. Kennedy is better known for his spontaneous speech delivered in Indianapolis on the day Martin Luther King was assassinated. Lesser known is this speech, given the day after, at the City Club of Cleveland, April 5, 1968. The text follows the video, below.



This is a time of shame and sorrow. It is not a day for politics. I have saved this one opportunity, my only event of today, to speak briefly to you about the mindless menace of violence in America which again stains our land and every one of our lives.

It is not the concern of any one race. The victims of the violence are black and white, rich and poor, young and old, famous and unknown. They are, most important of all, human beings whom other human beings loved and needed. No one - no matter where he lives or what he does - can be certain who will suffer from some senseless act of bloodshed. And yet it goes on and on and on in this country of ours.

Why? What has violence ever accomplished? What has it ever created? No martyr's cause has ever been stilled by an assassin's bullet.

No wrongs have ever been righted by riots and civil disorders. A sniper is only a coward, not a hero; and an uncontrolled, uncontrollable mob is only the voice of madness, not the voice of reason.

Whenever any American's life is taken by another American unnecessarily - whether it is done in the name of the law or in the defiance of the law, by one man or a gang, in cold blood or in passion, in an attack of violence or in response to violence - whenever we tear at the fabric of the life which another man has painfully and clumsily woven for himself and his children, the whole nation is degraded.

"Among free men," said Abraham Lincoln, "there can be no successful appeal from the ballot to the bullet; and those who take such appeal are sure to lose their cause and pay the costs."

Yet we seemingly tolerate a rising level of violence that ignores our common humanity and our claims to civilization alike. We calmly accept newspaper reports of civilian slaughter in far-off lands. We glorify killing on movie and television screens and call it entertainment. We make it easy for men of all shades of sanity to acquire whatever weapons and ammunition they desire.

Too often we honor swagger and bluster and wielders of force; too often we excuse those who are willing to build their own lives on the shattered dreams of others. Some Americans who preach non-violence abroad fail to practice it here at home. Some who accuse others of inciting riots have by their own conduct invited them.

Some look for scapegoats, others look for conspiracies, but this much is clear: violence breeds violence, repression brings retaliation, and only a cleansing of our whole society can remove this sickness from our soul.

For there is another kind of violence, slower but just as deadly destructive as the shot or the bomb in the night. This is the violence of institutions; indifference and inaction and slow decay. This is the violence that afflicts the poor, that poisons relations between men because their skin has different colors. This is the slow destruction of a child by hunger, and schools without books and homes without heat in the winter.

This is the breaking of a man's spirit by denying him the chance to stand as a father and as a man among other men. And this too afflicts us all.

I have not come here to propose a set of specific remedies nor is there a single set. For a broad and adequate outline we know what must be done. When you teach a man to hate and fear his brother, when you teach that he is a lesser man because of his color or his beliefs or the policies he pursues, when you teach that those who differ from you threaten your freedom or your job or your family, then you also learn to confront others not as fellow citizens but as enemies, to be met not with cooperation but with conquest; to be subjugated and mastered.

We learn, at the last, to look at our brothers as aliens, men with whom we share a city, but not a community; men bound to us in common dwelling, but not in common effort. We learn to share only a common fear, only a common desire to retreat from each other, only a common impulse to meet disagreement with force. For all this, there are no final answers.

Yet we know what we must do. It is to achieve true justice among our fellow citizens. The question is not what programs we should seek to enact. The question is whether we can find in our own midst and in our own hearts that leadership of humane purpose that will recognize the terrible truths of our existence.

We must admit the vanity of our false distinctions among men and learn to find our own advancement in the search for the advancement of others. We must admit in ourselves that our own children's future cannot be built on the misfortunes of others. We must recognize that this short life can neither be ennobled or enriched by hatred or revenge.

Our lives on this planet are too short and the work to be done too great to let this spirit flourish any longer in our land. Of course we cannot vanquish it with a program, nor with a resolution.

But we can perhaps remember, if only for a time, that those who live with us are our brothers, that they share with us the same short moment of life; that they seek, as do we, nothing but the chance to live out their lives in purpose and in happiness, winning what satisfaction and fulfillment they can.

Surely, this bond of common faith, this bond of common goal, can begin to teach us something. Surely, we can learn, at least, to look at those around us as fellow men, and surely we can begin to work a little harder to bind up the wounds among us and to become in our own hearts brothers and countrymen once again.

http://www.vsotd.com/Article.php?art_num=4651

During his speeches at Notre Dame and Ball State, Kennedy focused on domestic issues, the Vietnam War, and racism. At Notre Dame's Stepan Center, a crowd of approximately 5,000 heard Kennedy speak on poverty in America and the need for better-paying jobs. When asked about draft laws, Kennedy called them "unjust and inequitable" and argued to end college deferments on the basis that they discriminated against those who could not afford a college education. His speech at Ball State was well received by more than 9,000 students, faculty, and community members. One African-American student raised a question to Kennedy that seems almost a premonition of the speech to come later that night after the horrific events of the day. The student asked, “Your speech implies that you are placing a great deal of faith in white America. Is that faith justified?” Kennedy answered “Yes” and added that “faith in black America is justified, too” although he said there “are extremists on both sides.” Before boarding a plane to fly to Indianapolis, Kennedy learned that Martin Luther King, Jr. had been shot. On the plane, Kennedy told a reporter "You know, it grieves me. . . that I just told that kid this and then walk out and find that some white man has just shot their spiritual leader."[8] Kennedy did not learn that King was dead until his plane landed in Indianapolis. According to reporter John J. Lindsay, Kennedy "seemed to shrink back as though struck physically" and put his hands to his face, saying "Oh, God. When is this violence going to stop?"

In Indianapolis the news of King's death caused concern among representatives from Kennedy's campaign and city officials, who feared for his safety and the possibility of a riot. After talking with reporters at the Indianapolis airport, Kennedy canceled a stop at his campaign headquarters and continued on to the rally site, where a crowd had gathered to hear him speak. Both Frank Mankiewicz, Kennedy's press secretary, and speechwriter Adam Walinsky drafted notes immediately before the rally for Kennedy's use, but Kennedy refused Walinsky's notes, instead using some that he had likely written on the ride over; Mankiewicz arrived after Kennedy had already begun to speak. The Indianapolis chief of police warned Kennedy that the police could not provide adequate protection for the senator if the crowd were to riot, but Kennedy decided to go speak to the crowd regardless. Standing on a podium mounted on flatbed truck, Kennedy spoke for just four minutes and fifty-seven seconds.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_F._Kennedy%27s_speech_on_the_assassination_of_Martin_Luther_King,_Jr.#Earlier_that_day

ABC News’ Jason Ryan reports:

At an event commemorating the 50th Anniversary of Robert F. Kennedy’s swearing-in as Attorney General, his eldest daughter, Kathleen Kennedy Townsend, made reference to the recent Tucson shooting and called for tighter gun control laws. Kennedy Townsend, who lost both her father and uncle to assassins’ bullets, said, “I believe that this department and this country have got to do a better job on gun regulation and on gun control and making our citizens safe. As my father said, we glorify killing on movies and on television screens and call it entertainment. We make it easy for men of all shades and sanity to acquire weapons, and violence breeds violence. Repression brings retaliation, and only a cleaning of our whole society can remove this sickness from our soul.”

Legends of the civil rights movement, members of the Kennedy Family and current and former Justice Department officials gathered in the Great Hall at the Justice Department to remember RFK on the 50th anniversary of his arrival as Attorney General. The Justice Department released a trove of pictures from the archives honoring him as the 64th Attorney General of the United States. Find them HERE.

The Robert F. Kennedy Department of Justice building in Washington bears his name. Today’s tribute reflected on the strides he made for civil rights in the United States.

Attorney General Eric Holder described his excitement watching the Kennedy brothers when he was a young boy, and how, years later, actions taken by RFK to integrate the University of Alabama touched his life.

more at the link: http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/politics/2011/01/robert-f-kennedys-daughter-calls-for-tighter-gun-laws/

In response to your reply:

In this event, there is no original work that was reposted. Nothing in the original work was original; it was a "re-mix" of Kennedy's words.

In turn, my post was a remix of the selections used in the other post, with one section and two pictures removed to make the point I wanted to make.

It would have been better to provide the attribution at first, I'll admit that, but it's there now.

Unless someone has used original language, I will not ask for permission, and I will not expect permission if someone reposts one of my posts, if that post consists of material found elsewhere.

...As I looked around this crowd today and saw us all graced not only by the laughter of children but by the tears of those of us old enough to remember, it struck me again that the memory of Robert Kennedy is so powerful that in a profound way we are all in two places today. We are here and now, and we are there, then.

snip

He spoke out against neglect, but he challenged the neglected to seize their own destiny. He wanted so badly for Government to act, but he did not trust bureaucracy. And he believed that Government had to do things with people, not for them. He knew we had to do things together or not at all. He spoke to the sons and daughters of immigrants and the sons and daughters of sharecroppers and told them all, "As long as you stay apart from each other, you will never be what you ought to be."

He saw the word not in terms of right and left but right and wrong. And he taught us lessons that cannot be labeled except as powerful proof. Robert Kennedy reminded us that on any day, in any place, at any time, racism is wrong, exploitation is wrong, violence is wrong, anything that denies the simple humanity and potential of any man or woman is wrong.

snip

If you listen now you can hear with me his voice telling me and telling you and telling everyone here, "We can do better." Today's troubles call us to do better. The legacy of Robert Kennedy is a stem rebuke to the cynicism, to the trivialization that grips so much of our public life today. What use is it in the face of the aching problems gripping millions of Americans, the American without a job, the American without health care, the American without a safe street to live on or a good school to send a child to? What use is it in the face of all the divisions that keep our country down and rob our children of their rightful future?

Let us learn here once again the simple, powerful, beautiful lesson, the simple faith of Robert Kennedy: We can do better. Let us leave here no longer in two places, but once again in one only: in the here and now, with a commitment to tomorrow, the only part of our time that we can control. Let us embrace the memory of Robert Kennedy by living as he would have us to live. For the sake of his memory, of ourselves, and of all of our children and all those to come, let us believe again, we can do better.

The Landmark for Peace is a memorial sculpture at Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Park on the northside of Indianapolis that honors the contributions of the slain leaders Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and Robert F. Kennedy. The memorial, which features King and Kennedy reaching out to each other, was designed and executed by Indiana artist Greg Perry. The bronze portraits were created by Indianapolis sculptor Daniel Edwards.

On April 4, 1968, near the site of the memorial, Robert Kennedy gave an impromptu speech to an inner-city crowd about reconciliation between the races after he learned of King's assassination.[1] Kennedy was told that riots had broken out in other cities and was advised not to make the speech, but he refused to cancel his plans. Originally Kennedy intended to make a speech on his presidential aspirations, instead he spoke of King. No riots took place in Indianapolis, a fact many attribute to the effect of Kennedy's speech.



http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Landmark_for_Peace_Memorial