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Judge Decides X-Men Aren't Human
An anonymous reader points to this Wall Street Journal article, writing "According to the U.S. Court of International Trade, the X-Men (along with other figures from the Marvel universe) aren't human. The presiding judge subjected the figures to "comprehensive examinations" which included "the need to remove the clothes of the figure." Ironically, the X-Men, whose struggle for human acceptance has been a key theme in the series, were more easily classified as non-human than Kraven and Mole Man.
The way I remember it, all X-men, and all mutants, for that matter belong to the species Homo Superior, and if I remember my Carl von Linné correctly (and I think I do) that means theyre not human. Theyre part of the same family (as Cro-Magnon and other prehistoric species) but not being the same species as humans, they arent humans. Why did it take her so long, unless she enjoyed playing, dressing and undressing the dolls. I know I would... Id undress Rogue and then.... Never you mind.
The article is actually on the front page of the deadtree version of the WSJ, a place I really thought I'd never see a little plastic Wolvie.
It's either an incredibly slow news day over there, or the wacky assistant-front page editor is filling in while the boss takes a three-day weekend or something. Wow.
"Understand you're having a little Jimmy Page trouble."
OK, so this shouldn't be the spark for the Mutant Uprising. But it's a little more relevant than you seem to think. To be "dolls", the figures had to depict humans. Otherwise, they were "toys". So the issue actually was, "Do the X-Men count as human?" This in turn demands we answer, "What makes a human human?"
And that's more important than you might want to admit. Sure, we're probably not likely to see Xavier and his cohorts on the streets of Manhattan. But how about cloned people? Or genetically modified -- even genetically enhanced -- people? What about, say, a weightlifter who's been designed from before birth to be the world's best weightlifter ever? What if the genetic modification was done under the sponsorship of a corporation? What if that corporation later asserted "property rights" to the modified person?
I found the judge's criteria, as quoted, quite disturbing. Apparently differing abilities was enough to classify the mutants as "non-human". The judge focused on their mutant powers, such as the ability to control storms or to withstand injury. Apparently she did not focus on their ability to speak, to reason, to create, to love
Although the actual case is a bit of a joke, the issues raised are deep and pressing. We're heading to a place where the very notion of "human" will be under strain as never before. Perhaps it's good that somebody is reasoning about it ahead of time -- though I could have wished for a better result.
The Mongrel Dogs Who Teach
Pretty sensationalist headline for the Journal.
Not really. The WSJ is actually a good, well-rounded paper which generally has at least one relatively fun/interesting column down the center of the front page. And, as an aside, their tech section is one of the best in the industry, which should be really embarassing to other tech news outlets (CNET, The Register, ZDNET, Wired, etc.), considering that this is primarily a business newspaper.
You say this like you're the only one who's ever figured it out. Since there's already been a whole Simpsons episode devoted to it, you can safely assume everybody already knows about the problem. Here's a question from the current state of the conversation: Is the rise in American obesity some kind of "Barbie backlash"?
Any sufficiently well-organized community is indistinguishable from Government.
*grin* - good point :)
As for the guy who mentioned 1040-C - it, like 1040 - is deceptively simple. The forms are all two pages, but each line typically involves multiple questions about putting things into slots, just like the "is it a toy or is it a doll" question.
Quickly now, can you tell me whether that new alternator's a valid car and truck expense (II-10, 1040-C)? How about whether or not it was a Section 179 expense deduction? Quickly now, are you renting or leasing your office space and equipment, and what effect does that have on your after-tax income? What percentage of your home were you using for your business? Is it more tax-efficient to use LIFO or FIFO accounting for your inventory? (What does "inventory" mean if part of what you sell is software? :-)
It ain't the math - it's basic arithmetic. It's figuring out which of the myriad rules apply to one's situation or not.
> Consider also that the taxes you pay helps to construct a legal and infrastructural framework under which businesses can operate quite safely and easily. Last I heard, the Soviet Union did not have any sort of effective tax law (or government either).
Last I heard, Russia instituted a flat tax and tax revenues skyrocketed because people were actually able to comply.
But I digress - my rant wasn't principally about the amount paid, but of the ludicrous complexity involved in figuring out how much is owed.
My "I'd have started a business" was a straw man -- but do you really thing we need seven definitions of "dependent child" (families), to draw a distinction between the taxation of a stock held for 359 days and 360 days (long-term vs short-term gains, and the host of "straddle/spread" rules required to preserve this distinction in the face of hedging strategies made possible through the use of exchange-traded options), to draw a distinction between "Section 1250 contracts" and normal securities (trading the S&P 500 is not the same as trading an S&P-500-based mutual fund - it's treated as 60% long-term-gain and 40% short-term-gain), so make sure you've checked off Form 4952 if you invested on margin, and Forms 4797, 2439, 6252, 4684, 6781, and 8824, (Line 11, 1040-D) whose purposes I've forgotten about, and don't even get me started on the Alternative Minimum Tax - in which you get to do it all over again? Those aren't strawmen - those are picked from just a casual glance at 1040C and 1040D.
At no points on this thread have I whined about the dollar amounts taken by the government, only ludicrous volume of paperwork involved in complying with the legal requirements of the taking.
In Soviet Russia... at least the damn tax system is comprehensible. And whether they're digging up the copper or not, that puts them light-years ahead of us.
To indulge in a little bit of traditional /. anti-corporatespeak: when only multibillion-dollar corporations can afford to hire the army of lawyers and CPAs required to comply with the tax laws, the only legal businesses will be multibillion-dollar corporations.