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For what it's worth, I never meant to imply you were misbehaving; you've always been a standard to hold others to when it came to posting. I don't know if I'm good enough to live on my suggestion of discussion with you, but I don't think at all you are the hazard in that proposition.Quote:
Originally Posted by Enoch the Red
Oooorrrr... we could be nice to each other and treat each other with respect and behave in a way that clearly shows that we're not interested in cornering each other or winning arguments at all costs but rather that we're interested in having discussions in good faith for as long as they're goodQuote:
Originally Posted by Dreadnaught
Yes, that's all good and well. And we can all pledge to do that. However there will always be people who don't agree or have a different notion of civility.
Nessus has been very clear that I should be doing something to enforce a particular notion of civility. Which candidly is a tall order when you think about it.
That is not an insurmountable problem. The solution begins with acknowledging another person's feelings rather than trying to make those feelings illegitimate and ends with being able to say sorry and trying again. With the right unifying vision the problems become technicalities to work through. See practical wisdom for some inspiration.Quote:
Originally Posted by Dreadnaught
I have to think in much more practical terms. Incentives have to be matched with disincentives. People whose posting style you don't like will probably not respond in the way you expect.
You just have to make voluntary regulation work :p night night red
I understand what you're saying, but given the scorn being thrown my way I have to think in much more practical terms if you want to create the posting utopia you seek.
Who said anything about an utopia? :noob:
Pepper spray.Quote:
Originally Posted by Dreadnaught
It's easy (lazy journalism), it's graphic, it's sensationalist. People go *outrage!*. Even your reaction is wanted. You just made people visit their site. So, in a free market weird kind of reasoning, it's Marketing well done.
(my reaction was: Milan Fashion Week?)
There is a difference between getting hung up on spliced replies and being turned off to discussion because of a never ending river of insults and stupidity.Quote:
Originally Posted by Dreadnaught
Hardly. Modern civilization is built on unmitigated greed and more corpses than could be counted in a lifetime. Evil kapitalists and inventors pursuing huge, "unfair" piles of money and bringing us all the products we rely on everyday for our stratospheric standards of living. The only thing socialism's done is kill >100 million people in the past 100 years or so. Yippie, equality!Quote:
Originally Posted by Aimless
Lol, OK. I'm sure it has nothing to do with the fact that you know the ideals you espouse are impractical and harmful when attempted. You can try to assert it's irrelevant all you want, but there's a reason that such metrics are so widely used. Talk is cheap, and when someone's willing to talk the talk, but not walk the walk, that demonstrates something about their argument.Quote:
Originally Posted by Aimless
No, you don't get to do that when the State would put me in a cage for the rest of my natural life if it found out even some of my secrets, which, I'll point out, don't involve harming another living creature or infringing on anyone else's rights. That's tyranny, not privilege.Quote:
Originally Posted by Aimless
You know, there's a reason a lot of places ban political and religious discussions, and why there's that old adage about not discussing the topics with those whom you wish to remain close to.Quote:
Originally Posted by Dreadnaught
Do you honestly think that would end up any different than the time we tried that? Not to discourage you or anything, but it seems to me that this approach has been tried and didn't achieve what you're hoping it would.Quote:
Originally Posted by Nessus
It did briefly before, after we had a thread .. called "why?" I think.Quote:
Originally Posted by CitizenCain
It's a shame though. You fellows can be rather interesting at times.
If it were possible, I wouldn't be opposed to trying to actually make D&D and General Discussion more separate. IE, General Discussion would remain anything-goes. D&D would have a very strict civil code and violating that would lead to temporary expulsion from the D&D.
In other words, if you want to discuss politics on this site you have to maintain a different standard of posting. It would be hard to define and enforce that standard, but maybe not impossible.
Enoch seems far less interested in point-scoring than you do, though maybe empirical testing would make me think otherwise; I can't know beforehand, but I do know beforehand what happens in conversations with you. In the post I'm quoting you're conflating (it seems) the social democratic states of the Nordic countries with the crimes of the CCCP and co. You could maybe argue some co-opting on our part of the misery the communist nations inflicted, but that's still miles from what you're insinuating.Quote:
Originally Posted by CitizenCain
Yeah or there's more to life than your weird narrative, see: Christianity; rule of law; the presumption of innocence; the right to legal counsel; democracy; universal suffrage; the right to a basic education; scholarships and grants. It's a long list, I think you should catch up with the times a little. Shame Tear's not around, he could always be relied upon to present a convincing case for the role of education in turning the US into the technological and scientific behemoth it is.Quote:
Originally Posted by CitizenCain
So what's your point? That the only alternative to total unfairness is socialism? :bulb:Quote:
The only thing socialism's done is kill >100 million people in the past 100 years or so.
Oh come on. What is this, a gangsta rap forum? "There's a reason"? "Demonstrates something"? What reason and what does it demonstrate? Have you tested these hypotheses? Which specific walk would you require them to walk and why? Which ideals are you referring to specifically? I ask this last question especially because you have a habit of doing both sides of a conversation without telling people.Quote:
Lol, OK. I'm sure it has nothing to do with the fact that you know the ideals you espouse are impractical and harmful when attempted. You can try to assert it's irrelevant all you want, but there's a reason that such metrics are so widely used. Talk is cheap, and when someone's willing to talk the talk, but not walk the walk, that demonstrates something about their argument.
Oh quit whining, you get to play with guns, drink, fuck, surf the internet, learn everything you're capable of learning and even make lots of money. That's pretty great. Sure, maybe life's not exactly the way you want it to be, but isn't that just something you have to deal with? You want to learn about tyranny you can move to blah blah where people blah blah :downcast:Quote:
No, you don't get to do that when the State would put me in a cage for the rest of my natural life if it found out even some of my secrets, which, I'll point out, don't involve harming another living creature or infringing on anyone else's rights. That's tyranny, not privilege.
Well, not what I was referencing, but OK. Still, after a brief change, things settled back into their normal pattern. Not sure why Nessus (or anyone else) would expect different results this time. <shrug> But don't let me stop you from trying again, of course.Quote:
Originally Posted by Ziggy Stardust
Now if only any of that had anything to do with the modern standards of living and such. Or wait, was it Christianity that invented the internal combustion engine and discovered electricity? Or was it evil kapitalists who changed the world by pursuing "unfairly" large mountains of money? Evil bastard sons of whores, creating modern technology and making our standards of living possible. :mad:Quote:
Originally Posted by Aimless
My apologies, I tried to avoid calling you a hypocritical dumbass there, which was obviously a mistake, given how you responded. You can cry foul all want vis a vis the importance of hypocrisy, but actions do speak louder than words, and all your talk [and the "Occupy Wall Street" talk] is just so much hot air. People in the top percentile whining that there are people who have it better than they do, teh horrorz. Give them (or you) actual equality, and you lot would bitch even louder about having to work yourselves into an early grave to afford a TV.Quote:
Originally Posted by Aimless
Uhuh. First of all, fucking, drinking and learning are "natural rights." I could do that shit in the middle of nowhere, so crediting the government with "allowing" me to undertake those activities is about as useful as crediting Allah with letting you live... and you don't even thank Him for the privilege, you ingrate heathen. :mad:Quote:
Originally Posted by Aimless
Secondly, nice try, but you tried to attribute my lot in life to an all-knowing, benevolent Government patron that showers its faithful with gifts, when in reality, that government of mine (and pick either, it doesn't matter) would very much like to cage me for the rest of my life, save its fundamental ignorance. Don't get all bent out of shape at me because government isn't the panacea you like to believe it is... get bent out of shape at your parents and teachers who should have taught you better, or at the very least, not lied so blatantly to you.
Because electricity and the ICE are of course the total of modern civilisation :bored:Quote:
Originally Posted by CitizenCain
Of course, keeping people from getting "unfairly large sums of money" is just one thing a government may or may not do, and what a government may or may not do is just one aspect of the previously mentioned issue of unfairness, and "capitalists" who "discovered electricity" (:haha: ) were nowhere near as rich as capitalists who shuffle numbers and topple nations today, and, finally, fricking patent laws man.Quote:
Or was it evil kapitalists who changed the world by pursuing "unfairly" large mountains of money? Evil bastard sons of whores, creating modern technology and making our standards of living possible.
How can you spout this sort of nonsensical tripe and still act as if you're intellectually superior to anyone? :bored: Your nonsense about hypocrisy constitute the dumbest things being said in this thread. Do you expect anyone to be impressed by it besides, I dunno, Dread? I'm glad to see the opponents have moved from the third and fourth quintiles to the top percentile of course, go mobility :bored: Dumbass.Quote:
My apologies, I tried to avoid calling you a hypocritical dumbass there, which was obviously a mistake, given how you responded. You can cry foul all want vis a vis the importance of hypocrisy, but actions do speak louder than words, and all your talk [and the "Occupy Wall Street" talk] is just so much hot air. People in the top percentile whining that there are people who have it better than they do, teh horrorz. Give them (or you) actual equality, and you lot would bitch even louder about having to work yourselves into an early grave to afford a TV.
Yeah good luck doing much learning in the middle of nowhere without government aid and the internet and good fucking luck trying to use "money" without a government to back it :haha: and good luck buying anything much of value with that "money" eg. oh I dunno medicines that only exist because of government funding developed by people who only have those skills due to government funding :haha:Quote:
Uhuh. First of all, fucking, drinking and learning are "natural rights." I could do that shit in the middle of nowhere, so crediting the government with "allowing" me to undertake those activities is about as useful as crediting Allah with letting you live... and you don't even thank Him for the privilege, you ingrate heathen. :mad:
How's this for a "natural right": you have the right to be killed by someone who wants what you have and has the means to kill you. Congratulations. How you can bitch and whine when you have it better than almost everyone else in this world I just don't understand. You want tyranny and abuse of power by the government there's a large selection of countries you might want to take a look at. But no, you want to whine about being oppressed in a nation that mostly symbolises the pinnacle of human civilisation, freer and more just than everyone else :bored: :cry: Quit whining and keep enjoying your privileged life in the world's only real superpower.
Oh boo hoo, how unfair, my heart weeps for you. But you can't hide from the truth. Your government has had as important and as beneficial a role in the development of your privileged life as Wall Street has had on the lot of those protesters. And, naturally, the government has had a role in many of the things these protesters are complaining about but I guess it's harder to protest the gummint in NYC.Quote:
Secondly, nice try, but you tried to attribute my lot in life to an all-knowing, benevolent Government patron that showers its faithful with gifts, when in reality, that government of mine (and pick either, it doesn't matter) would very much like to cage me for the rest of my life, save its fundamental ignorance.
Since you seem to be going blind stupid again, allow me to point out that I haven't said that the government is an all-knowing and benevolent entity that showers its faithful with gifts (although the latter is almost 100% true :o).
j00s :haha: :bored:Quote:
Don't get all bent out of shape at me because government isn't the panacea you like to believe it is... get bent out of shape at your parents and teachers who should have taught you better, or at the very least, not lied so blatantly to you.
In this thread, we put subprime mortgages on par with electricity *facepalm*
You've managed to dismiss the one thing drawing them together, all the disparate groups with different grievances, from NYC to LA, San Francisco, Chicago, Boston, Baltimore, Seattle---They're Mad as Hell. No, they're not advocating a specific policy, or demanding a perfect world with jobs and ponies for everyone. :rolleyes:Quote:
Originally Posted by Dreadnaught
Calling them immature and mushy is your way to blithely ignore how unifying Anger can be, in a bad economy. Good luck with that.
Alright, so you provide an example of something the government created that is "the total of modern civilisation" [sic]." How about just a substantial part? (And no, the internet doesn't count, given that Al Gore didn't actually create it.) No? Going to support your assertion that government is the great creator of modern life and standards of living at all, or was it just so much religious BS that can't be supported by actual facts?Quote:
Originally Posted by Aimless
So,Quote:
Originally Posted by Aimless
A) "fair" according your childish standards on which clearly not everyone agrees
B) learn what a patent is.
C) conceding the point that we live as we do because people before us dared to chase "unfairly" large piles of money
D) All of the above.
(It's 'D', FYI.)
Well, the fact that I am helps, but probably not as much as the weak competition. And while I do enjoy your typical socialist shite trying to blame those better than you for some nebulous evil in being better, it's not my fault you have problems comprehending basic concepts like hypocrisy. And, interestingly, it's the guy who's got his panties in a wad about "fairness" [you] who can't seem to understand the basic, nearly universal sense of justice among humans that deems hypocrisy to be a negative trait...Quote:
Originally Posted by Aimless
And what, specifically, have I said about hypocrisy that's nonsense? Because this looks a lot like your uniquely, and less-than-endearing standard way of dismissing someone without actually saying anything of substance or value, whereas everything I've said about hypocrisy is pretty standard, and accepted among the vast majority of people. Your sanctimony and obvious superiority aside, of course, generally when one disagrees with the accepted norms or mores, one provides a convincing justification for said disagreement... or justification of any sort whatsoever, even.Quote:
Originally Posted by Aimless
Great that you don't care about hypocrisy (and how proud you must be), but the rest of us humans do, so you can enjoy your unearned feelings of moral superiority over the rest of us all you want, but it's not worth anything when you deign to grace us lowly humans with your "thoughts" and attempt to convince us of your Truth.
Your brain just totally turns off when you get pissed, doesn't it? Jokes about the difference being minimal aside, you acknowledged this exact mistake/distortion of yours back in post #97.Quote:
Originally Posted by Aimless
Moving goal posts, conflating bullshit, total inaccuracies and assorted sanctimonious crap. Really, 'tis a good thing Al Gore invented the internet for the US government, because before that, no one could "drink fuck or learn," to redirect you to your original claim of boons granted me by the state.Quote:
Originally Posted by Aimless
So that was the part where you whine about me pointing out that I don't owe everything I am to the state, and am not nearly as free as you want to think I am? Which, by the way, is a factual statement, not a complaint or a whine. And, you do this in the thread where you're whining about the top percentile not being wealthier... or more equaler to others, or whatever. I know you say you don't care about hypocrisy (and good thing too, I hear that self-loathing can be rough), but even so, how do you manage to process this kind of massive cognitive dissonance without losing whatever grip you do have on reality completely?Quote:
Originally Posted by Aimless
Right, you just said it was responsible for all that I have and all that I am. I even included that bit about Allah, in the misguided hopes that you'd make the connection between the way devout Muslims see their god and the way you see government. (The benevolent, all-knowing entity showering its faithful with gifts being a reference to god(s), just to be clear, since I seem to need to spell everything out explicitly for some of you.)Quote:
Originally Posted by Aimless
Unless, of course, you have a better explanation for the way you exploded into a flaming jackass without provocation, but that I deserved it for "insulting" your deity of choice.
Why should I? I am not claiming that government is the totality of civilisation. Learn to read.Quote:
Originally Posted by CitizenCain
Your laws, your infrastructure, your agricultural revolution, your education system, your technological and scientific leadership, your relative freedom from disease, ..., ...Quote:
How about just a substantial part?
How ignorant are you really? :bulb:
This is an accurate characterisation of your retarded anti-gummint ranting and wall-street love :confused: you seem to have mixed me up with your crazy again. Get a grip.Quote:
Going to support your assertion that government is the great creator of modern life and standards of living at all, or was it just so much religious BS that can't be supported by actual facts?
I haven't even told you what my standard of unfairness is.Quote:
So,
A) "fair" according your childish standards on which clearly not everyone agrees
You learn what a patent is:Quote:
B) learn what a patent is.
Quote:
A patent ( /ˈpætənt/ or /ˈpeɪtənt/) is a form of intellectual property. It consists of a set of exclusive rights granted by a sovereign state to an inventor or their assignee for a limited period of time in exchange for the public disclosure of an invention.
Citation needed :bored:Quote:
Well, the fact that I am helps
Citation neededQuote:
your typical socialist shite trying to blame those better than you for some nebulous evil in being better
I have no problems comprehending the concept, I simply don't think it's interesting and relevant. You have yet to demonstrate how it is interesting and relevant in any meaningful way. No, your obsession with it does not make it meaningful.Quote:
it's not my fault you have problems comprehending basic concepts like hypocrisy
Look, you need to pay better attention. My panties aren't in a wad about "fairness" so much as about your inability to read and your determination to continue being an asshat even though you can't read. Of course, if things were fair you would eg. be routinely harrassed for constantly spouting the same paranoid crazy unfocused unfounded ranting you harrass GGT for spouting. But you keep getting away with it because no one has the energy to give you the same treatment you give others, even though you so thoroughly deserve it.Quote:
And, interestingly, it's the guy who's got his panties in a wad about "fairness"understand
Hypocrisy is a negative trait but it's also irrelevant to this matter. Re. the human sense of justice, other things central to that sense of justice are fairness and retribution and its a sense of justice that seems to have a great ability to lead us astray. After all most of USA's humans seem to have few problems squaring their sense of justice with their redistributive welfare system.Quote:
[you] who can't seem to the basic, nearly universal sense of justice among humans that deems hypocrisy to be a negative trait...
"We don't like hypocrisy" isn't a particularly convincing case for relevance, esp. when you haven't even been able to demonstrate the actual hypocrisy.Quote:
And what, specifically, have I said about hypocrisy that's nonsense? Because this looks a lot like your uniquely, and less-than-endearing standard way of dismissing someone without actually saying anything of substance or value, whereas everything I've said about hypocrisy is pretty standard, and accepted among the vast majority of people. Your sanctimony and obvious superiority aside, of course, generally when one disagrees with the accepted norms or mores, one provides a convincing justification for said disagreement... or justification of any sort whatsoever, even.
There's nothing morally superior about rejecting the relevance to this issue of unproven hypocrisy. I'm amazed that someone can be a hypocrite in your world for being born into a higher social class :up:Quote:
Great that you don't care about hypocrisy (and how proud you must be), but the rest of us humans do, so you can enjoy your unearned feelings of moral superiority over the rest of us all you want, but it's not worth anything when you deign to grace us lowly humans with your "thoughts" and attempt to convince us of your Truth.
These protesters can't claim membership to the most afflicted of the groups they claim to represent. They can however claim to represent them until those others choose or find the means to represent themselves. They can claim brotherhood in spirit.
Yes, I remember that, and this time I chose to reinterpret it because if I don't then it remains totally irrelevant. Unless you seriously want to hold your government and your laws to the standards met by I dunno pick a random totalitarian regime anywhere in the world? :bulb: If you do you should probably stop complaining about your government because it seems to be among the best governments in the whole world :haha:Quote:
Your brain just totally turns off when you get pissed, doesn't it? Jokes about the difference being minimal aside, you acknowledged this exact mistake/distortion of yours back in post #97.
No no no they're not just granted to you by the state, they are very fairly left accessible to you by the state. The state could just prevent you from availing yourself to these wonders (as several other states might) but it doesn't. And yet you complain. You're paying your internet bill with numbers that would be entirely meaningless without your government. And yet you whine. Your government's funding of your education system and of research has enabled many of your nation's finest minds turn your world into something more fantastic than your ancestors could have dreamed of and yet, because you truly believe that being an extremist and a fundamentalist is better than being reasonable, you bitch about the evil gummint. Jesus :bored:Quote:
Moving goal posts, conflating bullshit, total inaccuracies and assorted sanctimonious crap. Really, 'tis a good thing Al Gore invented the internet for the US government, because before that, no one could "drink fuck or learn," to redirect you to your original claim of boons granted me by the state.
You are precisely as free as I think you are, because I think you're a great deal freer than very many other people in this world who are ruled by far worse governments. That is how free you are and I bring this up because it's part of the arguments you use to deride the kids bumming around on Wall Street. It's a retarded argument and I hope I've seen the last of its kind from you.Quote:
So that was the part where you whine about me pointing out that I don't owe everything I am to the state, and am not nearly as free as you want to think I am?
I'm not whining about that, learn to read :down:Quote:
And, you do this in the thread where you're whining about the top percentile not being wealthier... or more equaler to others, or whatever.
You tell me how you can put up with yourself and you may have your answer.Quote:
I know you say you don't care about hypocrisy (and good thing too, I hear that self-loathing can be rough), but even so, how do you manage to process this kind of massive cognitive dissonance without losing whatever grip you do have on reality completely?
I didn't, I said:Quote:
Right, you just said it was responsible for all that I have and all that I am.
Quote:
Oh quit whining, you get to play with guns, drink, fuck, surf the internet, learn everything you're capable of learning and even make lots of money. That's pretty great. Sure, maybe life's not exactly the way you want it to be, but isn't that just something you have to deal with? You want to learn about tyranny you can move to blah blah where people blah blah
It wasn't just your hope that was misguided, it was your comparison, not least because I don't think the government is a benevolent all-knowing entity showering blah blah any more than I think Wall Street is.Quote:
I even included that bit about Allah, in the misguided hopes that you'd make the connection between the way devout Muslims see their god and the way you see government. (The benevolent, all-knowing entity showering its faithful with gifts being a reference to god(s), just to be clear, since I seem to need to spell everything out explicitly for some of you.)
I am strongly provoked by your flaming jackassery, I thought this was clear from my posts over the past few days. If you're going to be an asshole and not muster the minimal effort required to have a civil discussion in good faith with someone who disagrees with you then you will occasionally get flaming jackassery in response and I can only hope you will one day be able to appreciate how goddamned irritating and harmful that sort of behaviour is. You made me Cain :mad: :down: Minx is gone thanks to you :downcast: I just hope his sacrifice wasn't entirely futileQuote:
Unless, of course, you have a better explanation for the way you exploded into a flaming jackass without provocation, but that I deserved it for "insulting" your deity of choice.
Wow, that's some powerful stuff, OG. :(
Yes, the 99% are MAD AS HELL. And why shouldn't they be?
It's convenient for people to argue that 99% of Americans are living in grinding destitution. Allows you to argue that any problems around you are the result of whatever you say it is. I highly doubt anywhere close to 99% would support socialism.
Wait, the world isn't perfect? I was led to believe Obama would fix this.
Is that what you think the 99% are saying, that they're living in grinding destitution? Or that voting for Obama was Palin's "hopey changey thing" in an attempt to make the world perfect?Quote:
Originally Posted by Dreadnaught
No wonder you don't understand the protests. :rolleyes:
I understand the protests perfectly. A mismash of anti-capitalists claiming to speak for 99% of the 300+ million Americans. When no one will listen to them, they just escalate and act-out, EG blocking traffic on the Brooklyn Bridge.
Your idea of perfect understanding is perfectly flawed. I'm surprised to see your shallow assessment, Dread, since you used to be a "journalist" for your university newspaper. If all it takes is a couple of years out of your Ivy League university to become so distant from others....then you really are the effete elite your parents didn't want you to become. Good job?Quote:
Originally Posted by Dreadnaught
That was old Dreadnaught. Why in the hell would I be a journalist? I worked in media long enough to know that's a terrible plight.
But surely you see the arrogance of a few hundred protestors and a few thousand more people online claiming to speak for 99% of a whole country. I'm lightyears from the top income percentile and yet these guys don't speak for me or most people I know.
Good on you, I suppose? While your Ivy League degree, Manhattan apartment, and nifty job might make you see the "arrogance" of the protesters, you sure do sound arrogant yourself.Quote:
Originally Posted by Dreadnaught
Arguably it's arrogant for those people to pretend to speak for 99% of the Americans, too.Quote:
Originally Posted by GGT
Technically, 99% of Americans means the voice of almost everyone. That's why the protesters don't have just one message.Quote:
Originally Posted by Flixy
So, technically, the top 1% could also 'speak for' 99% of the people :bulb: And I could speak for the entire world.
Your point makes no sense.
Of course they wouldn't support it; as evidenced by the recent GOP and Teaper debates, the public, the people, support executing people and letting 30-year-old mothers to die in their hospital beds. Sorry, to be dragged out of said beds to die on the street, but you get the general gist of it. What means do we have available to have a rational discourse with people bent on muddying up the pool, and using the democratic machinery against itself? The ways they are doing this are manifold and we've discussed some on here, but suffice to say a) it's very hard to make informed decisions based on your own actual best interests 2) religion and cultural tradition are rather shamelessly exploited to move opinion. The failed Tsarist Russia didn't manage to out-wit the Bolsheviks doing this, Weimar Germany was a democracy quite happy to eat itself alive.Quote:
Originally Posted by Dreadnaught
That's the biggest thing here. In order to be democratic, we have to listen to everyone, but when a good portion of people want to stop being democratic, what's the enlightened response? Join up, or emigrate? What? And changing nations only helps so much, as the globe is becoming smaller and smaller and the same business interests are keen to subjugating peoples on all continents. (It should be noted that most of the vocal support of this are the people also being subjugated!)
There's a whole host of systematic, institutional problems at work both over there and on this side of the pond that make parliamentary work difficult, and the interface between the man on the street and the 'Man in Washington' is a very confusing affair. And that man on the street has no interface with his 'corporate overlords', at all, which I imagine can be rather frustrating. Now before our favourite Holocaust co-opter flames me, this isn't to suggest that there's some conspiracy afoot, nor that the people manipulating these things for their own financial benefit are some sort of ghoulish untermenschen. They're acting on their own best interests, as we should assume people to do! The point is, those interests generate unhealthy side-effects (or should I say ripple-effects?) throughout the rest of society, and it seems that 'we' as a people lack the means of combating those effects. Shit, we can't even have a discourse on the subject!
I really haven't wanted to wade into this thread for obvious reasons, but I thought I'd interject with one or two interesting observations:
I was listening to NPR this morning, and they had a short segment on how the 'Occupy Wall Street' protests are organized/working, what their stated goals are, who they are composed of, etc. The piece spend much of its time making fun of the protesters - implying that their method of direct democracy for making decisions was hopelessly disorganized, that their goals were confused and poorly defined (I believe 'overthrow the government' figured in there somewhere), that their ambitions were ridiculously small time (they focused on a lengthy debate about whether they should spend $2k to buy some sleeping bags), and that the protesters were mostly composed of your normal collection of young left wing nutjob protesters ('dreadlocks, camouflage pants, etc.' were their specific language in describing most of them IIRC). I was shocked that NPR would have aired such a piece, even when their sympathies were ostensibly with the nebulous goals of the protesters. That, more than anything else, suggests to me that there is some truth to the criticisms of this 'movement' as extremely poorly defined and largely marginal. Doesn't mean it doesn't warrant some press attention, but I was really surprised at NPR's coverage.
On the flip side, a well-heeled postdoc I know whose entire social milieu is upper-middle class Northeast intellectuals/liberals was telling me about her friends in Boston who were getting all fired up about the protests and being involved in their own small version up in MA. Clearly the message of (perhaps vague) discontent resonates with different aspects of society - the extreme progressive/socialist, the young soon-to-be professional, the older disaffected worker. It isn't a cohesive movement, no, but it does represent quite a bit of dissatisfaction with how the country is currently being run from a number of perspectives.
These movements can gain strength and coalesce into something real - just look at the Tea Partiers! I think a potentially better example, though, is Israel's latest upheaval in the 'social justice' protests this summer. It started with small groups of middle class, educated, 20-something workers who were fed up with the cost of housing (and later, childcare/etc.) pitching tents along a main drag in Tel Aviv - many of them might be called 'hipsters' (er, maybe). Yet their message resonated - into the execrable state of Israeli education, increasing living costs, falling taxes on the wealthy, perceived inequalities in society, etc. It resonated with a wide swath of educated, disaffected Israelis across the country who felt that a fundamental social contract had been abrogated. And it ended up with hundreds of thousands of protesters taking to the streets (peacefully, as a rule) around the country demanding comprehensive change.
The Israeli movement came under a lot of criticism - first, for being ill-defined, leaderless, and composed of relatively privileged educated elites. Later, liberal papers like Ha'aretz panned their unrealistic proposed budgetary changes as mathematically unsound. There were critiques that the protests were orchestrated by various left wing organizations/leaders. But at the end of the day, they clearly struck a chord, and there's something to be said about galvanizing hundreds of thousands of boring, well-mannered middle class people to make a point. Who knows if these protests have the same power, but the point is that they don't have to be toothless or irrelevant.
Dissatisfaction, disenfranchised, disillusionment....the social contract abrogated, just as wiggin said. So many perspectives and groups make it look "disorganized", and the media doesn't know how to cover that kind of thing. They traditionally send reporters to ask the 30 second sound byte, "What is your complaint? What are your goals? What are your demands" with a take-me-to-your-leader and show us your Manifesto approach.
I've read things showing they're very organized, with hubs like a welcome center, food and water stations, even child-care and a Lost and Found. And organizing into sub-groups like tax reform, education reforms, even new third parties, etc. wiggin's also right that these things can gain strength and coalesce, over time. With cross-over from Tea Party activists who originally used their anger and frustration to have a voice, too.
http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/...0,933662.storyQuote:
Out of the 25 largest cities in the U.S., New York is the most unequal when it comes to income distribution. In New York, the top 1% of households claimed 44% of all income during 2007 (the last year for which data are available). That's almost twice the record-high levels among the 1 Percenters nationwide, who claimed 23.5% of all national income in 2007. During the housing bubble that ended in our current calamity, the average income for the 1 Percenters in New York went up 119%.
Meanwhile, the number of homeless in the city rose to an all-time high last year, with 113,000 men, women and children retreating night after night to municipal shelters. The real hourly median wage in New York between 1990 and 2007 fell by almost 9%. Young men and women age 25 to 34 with a bachelor's degree and a year-round job in New York saw their earnings drop 6%. Middle-income New Yorkers — defined broadly as those earning between $29,000 and $167,000 — saw a 19% decrease in earnings. Almost 11% of the population in New York, about 900,000 people, lives in what the federal government describes as "deep poverty," which for a four-person family means an income of $10,500; the average 1 Percenter household in New York makes about that same amount every day.
Lazy opinion journalism backed by seriously BS numbers. New York's homeless is maybe in the tens of thousands, not 113,000. 40k was a peak of last winter's shelter census.
http://www.coalitionforthehomeless.o...es/basic-facts
http://www.nyc.gov/html/dhs/html/press/pr031910.shtml
But for the 20th time, money isn't a zero-sum game. Just because someone has a lot of cash doesn't put you at a disadvantage unless someone with a $40k salary is interested in the same Fendi bag as someone with a $400,000 salary.
Purchasing power, growth, jobs, etc. matters more.
I agree, the media doesn't quite know how to "cover" this. I also think it's a mistake to interpret the protesters as being "anti-rich", "wealth envy" or even "anti-Wall Street".Quote:
Originally Posted by Dreadnaught
Hasn't there been enough credible data linked in this forum, for you to acknowledge the stagnant wages, decreasing purchasing power, employment and retirement instability for themiddle classesmiddle quintiles....for the last two decades? Of course, if you don't admit there's a problem in the first place, it's easy to dismiss the whole thing as immature hippies asking for free stuff.
It's easy to dismiss either way, actually. ":cry:, life is hard!!!1"/":cry:, some people have it better than me!!!1" is hardly a valid political protest or complaint. If they think life's hard now, just wait until mommy and daddy stop paying for their iPads. :downcast:Quote:
Originally Posted by GGT
In praise of Wall Street protesters
http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/d5951...#axzz1a0ecK300
There's more than one way to view this, ya know. :donkey: