You can get water from a stream, collect if from your roof, or buy it in little plastic bottles. You can heat your home by burning wood. You don't need piped water or electricity any more or less than you need the Internet. They are all luxuries. However, piped water and electricity have become so ubiquitous, and so important for normal everyday tasks that they aren't really considered luxuries, they are considered basic necessities. Some people consider the Internet in the same light. That is the view the gp was basing his argument on.
You haven't refuted it. All you've done is to essentially state, "I consider water and electricity to be necessities, but not the Internet." Which is fine, you are entitled to your opinion, but you haven't really shown why water and electricity piped from a central utility are necessities, and you certainly haven't shown that the Internet isn't, so all you have done is presented your own opinion unsupported by any facts.
I don't think 'surrender' means what you think it means.
In addition, let me be clear: I'm not worried about myself. I'm in the top 20% income bracket and perfectly happy with my material wealth, but, unlike you, I care about others.
You've lost, Arson. Badly. You provide nothing to back up your ludicrous claims, while I've sourced mine. I've argued circles around you and reduced you to a quivering heap of nonsensical, frothing rage.
I love it. Get it? I love owning a fucking power hungry fascist sociopath like yourself so completely you can't even think straight. When you admit that you just can't let it go, it makes my day complete.
So thanks for providing me with such satisfying entertainment. It proves you aren't completely worthless.
I read about this recently, tried it with several of my coworkers, and it really works. Simply lift your keyboard over your head while defocusing your eyes so the G and H keys overlap.
Hurling invective is not the same thing as arguing a point. Buit, since you use nonsensical sentences like "Instead capitalism needs competition and the perfect balance is when people can own a business." I can tell you aren't really cut out for actual argumentation, so carry on with the insults, as that is obviously the best you can do.
So, no sources. What a surprise. And more lies. Again, color me shocked.
From this wikipedia article, "Currently, the richest 1% hold about 38% of all privately held wealth in the United States.[2] while the bottom 90% held 73% of all debt.[10]"
That figure is from a recent book by Charles Hurst, but there are plenty more studies that show the same thing. Face it. Income inequality in America is enormous. The rich pay LESS than their share of taxes, because the top 20% owns about 80% of all wealth. The ranks of the owning class do not rotate. People do not rise from poverty to become billionaires. When you read about self made men, what you are reading about are actually the rare few who climb from the bottom of the owning class to the top. When you read about some billionaire's son losing all his money, you are not reading about the heir, but about some third child who has been reduced to living at the bottom of the owning class.
Life in America is not fair. It is not a land of opportunity for most people. The capitalist free market system serves the ruling class, not the rest of us. The middle class is just a disposable buffer between the rulers and the peons. It takes, on average, five generations for a family to move from poverty to the middle class.
You live in a self serving dream world where everything is fair, people succeed on merit not connections, people fail due to lack of motivation and hard work, not due to lack of opportunity, and most of all, you do not need to empathize with failures. Your own success is due to your own hard work, not luck or connections. In your world view, you don't need to lift a finger to help others.
You hold the view you do for reasons that are utterly transparent.
[2] Hurst, Charles E. Social Inequality: Forms, Causes, and Consequences, page 34. Pearson Education, Inc., 2007
Those sources do not support your assertions. They seem to be a list of the world's richest men. They do not show that 60% of the top 20% cycle in and out of that percentile.
The list also seems inaccurate. Bill Gates, for instance, comes from old money yet they list his wealth as 'self-made.' He never would have gotten anywhere if his family wasn't in the top 20% to begin with. Where would he have gotten the money to buy DOS?
Good luck on playing toady to those in power. Maybe if you kiss enough powerful butt they will let you in the clubhouse. But I doubt it.
Please. Sixty percent of the top 80% rotate in and out? You just made that up. Seriously, most of the wealth in the 80th percentile is actually concentrated in the top 10%, and most of that is concentrated in the top 1%.
They should be paying that much, as they are earning that much. Look at the facts, wages for all but the top 20% have stagnated for fifty years. Almost all of the increases in GDP have gone to that top 20%. Of course they should pay more in taxes, they own everything worth taxing.
Nope. Nobody is going to mod you anything. Nobody cares. This story is old news nobody is reading. I only saw your post because I've got messages turned on. Nobody cares about your angry little rant. You are pissing in the wind. You are jerking it into your own eyes, no one else's. It doesn't even matter if you 'speak the truth' or not, but you're too retarded to understand that, aren't you?
Anarchists don't buy things? You don't seem to understand what anarchism means. I don't have a huge collection or anything, probably about 50 DVDs, but if I like a movie, I will buy it.
And if there were more people were like you, the world would be noticeably better. But there aren't.
Nah, if there were more people like me, there would just be a bunch of bitchy cynics trying to get even for all the real or imagined slights and insults in the world.
Keep telling yourself that, astroturf-boy. Obviously, no one will stand up to you and your nefarious plan will go off without a hitch now that you've belittled one guy on the Internet.
Netflix, Blockbuster and others probably get bulk deals. The summary says that Redbox have resorted to buying new releases at retail, so I'm guessing the studios are simply not offering wholesale prices to the rental companies for a month. So, the rental companies will buy at retail, and pass the costs on to us. They break even, the studios win, we lose.
In neither case am I going to feel any more or less compelled to buy the movie instead.
Really? Because I'm the type of guy, when someone tries to push me around, I will do the opposite of what they want just to show them they shouldn't try to push people around. Screw these bozos, I'll put off buying any new movies until they quite this greedy behavior.
I knew you wouldn't cite any facts. Just more propaganda. Tell me, how can you say everything would have been much better if FDR had followed different policies? Do you have access to alternate histories, perhaps some form of time travel? Because it certainly looks as though things started to get better as soon as FDR took office. And the economy grew much faster during his tenure than it did pre-depression. Why was that, exactly?
I mean, here we have some pretty clear cut data. FDR takes office. Things get much better, with GDP rising faster than it had pre-depression. He backs off some policies, the economy tanks again, then re-implements them, and things get better once more. How you can turn those cold hard facts into an argument against FDR and his policies is beyond me. It just doesn't add up.
Tell me, if FDR screwed up so badly, what masterpiece of propaganda made him so beloved by the majority of Americans who lived through the depression, and since? How did your side fail so utterly to capitalize on his mistakes?
Ah, but you are wrong. Anarchy has never been about no government. That would be 'anocracy.' Anarchy means no Archons, that is, no autocratic rulers. Democracy is just fine to an anarchist, as there are (ostensibly) no rulers but the people themselves.
Libertarians are a particularly American branch of anarchists, derived from the Boston school of individualist anarchists such as Lysander Spooner. They called themselves 'anarcho-capitalists' before government propaganda convinced people (yourself included, obviously) that anarchists simply wanted to abolish all government and destroy society.
Now, the thing about American Libertarians is that they all advocate for strong, government protected individual property rights, and this is where they earn the ire of other anarchists. Social anarchists, for example, often don't believe in individual ownership of the means of production, though most of us do believe that a man is entitled to the fruits of his labor.
Proudhon said, "property is theft." Meaning, private real property is theft by one from all. He also said, "property is freedom." Private property provides freedom from lords and kings, by making a man a lord of his own estate, free to keep his own serfs and exploit them as a king would.
Anyway, hope you found today's lesson in anarchism and the roots of modern libertarianism helpful and informative. You may be my elder, and probably more learned than I in many areas, but I can hazard a guess that I've had a more thorough education in anarchism than you have, being a child of freaky pinko baby boomers and a card carrying member of the IWW.
For more entertaining education on anarchism, feel free to read Ursala K. Le Guin's "The Dispossessed."
Slashdot Mirror
You can get water from a stream, collect if from your roof, or buy it in little plastic bottles. You can heat your home by burning wood. You don't need piped water or electricity any more or less than you need the Internet. They are all luxuries. However, piped water and electricity have become so ubiquitous, and so important for normal everyday tasks that they aren't really considered luxuries, they are considered basic necessities. Some people consider the Internet in the same light. That is the view the gp was basing his argument on.
You haven't refuted it. All you've done is to essentially state, "I consider water and electricity to be necessities, but not the Internet." Which is fine, you are entitled to your opinion, but you haven't really shown why water and electricity piped from a central utility are necessities, and you certainly haven't shown that the Internet isn't, so all you have done is presented your own opinion unsupported by any facts.
I don't think 'surrender' means what you think it means.
In addition, let me be clear: I'm not worried about myself. I'm in the top 20% income bracket and perfectly happy with my material wealth, but, unlike you, I care about others.
You've lost, Arson. Badly. You provide nothing to back up your ludicrous claims, while I've sourced mine. I've argued circles around you and reduced you to a quivering heap of nonsensical, frothing rage.
I love it. Get it? I love owning a fucking power hungry fascist sociopath like yourself so completely you can't even think straight. When you admit that you just can't let it go, it makes my day complete.
So thanks for providing me with such satisfying entertainment. It proves you aren't completely worthless.
Hey now. That was an optical illusion. Mine is an intelligence test. Totally different.
I read about this recently, tried it with several of my coworkers, and it really works. Simply lift your keyboard over your head while defocusing your eyes so the G and H keys overlap.
What do you see there?
Hurling invective is not the same thing as arguing a point. Buit, since you use nonsensical sentences like "Instead capitalism needs competition and the perfect balance is when people can own a business." I can tell you aren't really cut out for actual argumentation, so carry on with the insults, as that is obviously the best you can do.
And I'm a platypus, so your argument is moot.
So, no sources. What a surprise. And more lies. Again, color me shocked.
From this wikipedia article, "Currently, the richest 1% hold about 38% of all privately held wealth in the United States.[2] while the bottom 90% held 73% of all debt.[10]"
That figure is from a recent book by Charles Hurst, but there are plenty more studies that show the same thing. Face it. Income inequality in America is enormous. The rich pay LESS than their share of taxes, because the top 20% owns about 80% of all wealth. The ranks of the owning class do not rotate. People do not rise from poverty to become billionaires. When you read about self made men, what you are reading about are actually the rare few who climb from the bottom of the owning class to the top. When you read about some billionaire's son losing all his money, you are not reading about the heir, but about some third child who has been reduced to living at the bottom of the owning class.
Life in America is not fair. It is not a land of opportunity for most people. The capitalist free market system serves the ruling class, not the rest of us. The middle class is just a disposable buffer between the rulers and the peons. It takes, on average, five generations for a family to move from poverty to the middle class.
You live in a self serving dream world where everything is fair, people succeed on merit not connections, people fail due to lack of motivation and hard work, not due to lack of opportunity, and most of all, you do not need to empathize with failures. Your own success is due to your own hard work, not luck or connections. In your world view, you don't need to lift a finger to help others.
You hold the view you do for reasons that are utterly transparent.
[2] Hurst, Charles E. Social Inequality: Forms, Causes, and Consequences, page 34. Pearson Education, Inc., 2007
[10] Hurst, page 36
Sources?
Those sources do not support your assertions. They seem to be a list of the world's richest men. They do not show that 60% of the top 20% cycle in and out of that percentile.
The list also seems inaccurate. Bill Gates, for instance, comes from old money yet they list his wealth as 'self-made.' He never would have gotten anywhere if his family wasn't in the top 20% to begin with. Where would he have gotten the money to buy DOS?
Good luck on playing toady to those in power. Maybe if you kiss enough powerful butt they will let you in the clubhouse. But I doubt it.
Please. Sixty percent of the top 80% rotate in and out? You just made that up. Seriously, most of the wealth in the 80th percentile is actually concentrated in the top 10%, and most of that is concentrated in the top 1%.
Most of the top 1% is old money.
They should be paying that much, as they are earning that much. Look at the facts, wages for all but the top 20% have stagnated for fifty years. Almost all of the increases in GDP have gone to that top 20%. Of course they should pay more in taxes, they own everything worth taxing.
Nope. Nobody is going to mod you anything. Nobody cares. This story is old news nobody is reading. I only saw your post because I've got messages turned on. Nobody cares about your angry little rant. You are pissing in the wind. You are jerking it into your own eyes, no one else's. It doesn't even matter if you 'speak the truth' or not, but you're too retarded to understand that, aren't you?
Then I doubt the studios can get away with this. Didn't the studios lose a case regarding first sale and rentals back in the VCR days?
Anarchists don't buy things? You don't seem to understand what anarchism means. I don't have a huge collection or anything, probably about 50 DVDs, but if I like a movie, I will buy it.
And if there were more people were like you, the world would be noticeably better. But there aren't.
Nah, if there were more people like me, there would just be a bunch of bitchy cynics trying to get even for all the real or imagined slights and insults in the world.
Keep telling yourself that, astroturf-boy. Obviously, no one will stand up to you and your nefarious plan will go off without a hitch now that you've belittled one guy on the Internet.
Netflix, Blockbuster and others probably get bulk deals. The summary says that Redbox have resorted to buying new releases at retail, so I'm guessing the studios are simply not offering wholesale prices to the rental companies for a month. So, the rental companies will buy at retail, and pass the costs on to us. They break even, the studios win, we lose.
In neither case am I going to feel any more or less compelled to buy the movie instead.
Really? Because I'm the type of guy, when someone tries to push me around, I will do the opposite of what they want just to show them they shouldn't try to push people around. Screw these bozos, I'll put off buying any new movies until they quite this greedy behavior.
Yes, very good. Gold star material, you are. People quote Monty Python. Proven fact, been going on for decades.
However, I was referring to this article. But you still get a gold star, because everyone is a winner! Yay!
I'm surprised no one has said this: My hovercraft is full of eels.
I knew you wouldn't cite any facts. Just more propaganda. Tell me, how can you say everything would have been much better if FDR had followed different policies? Do you have access to alternate histories, perhaps some form of time travel? Because it certainly looks as though things started to get better as soon as FDR took office. And the economy grew much faster during his tenure than it did pre-depression. Why was that, exactly?
I mean, here we have some pretty clear cut data. FDR takes office. Things get much better, with GDP rising faster than it had pre-depression. He backs off some policies, the economy tanks again, then re-implements them, and things get better once more. How you can turn those cold hard facts into an argument against FDR and his policies is beyond me. It just doesn't add up.
Tell me, if FDR screwed up so badly, what masterpiece of propaganda made him so beloved by the majority of Americans who lived through the depression, and since? How did your side fail so utterly to capitalize on his mistakes?
I love the smell of Windex in the morning... The smell, you know that fresh smell... Smells like, virtue.
Charlie don't clean windows.
You just need to spritz her with some Windex and all immoral thoughts will disappear.
Ah, but you are wrong. Anarchy has never been about no government. That would be 'anocracy.' Anarchy means no Archons, that is, no autocratic rulers. Democracy is just fine to an anarchist, as there are (ostensibly) no rulers but the people themselves.
Libertarians are a particularly American branch of anarchists, derived from the Boston school of individualist anarchists such as Lysander Spooner. They called themselves 'anarcho-capitalists' before government propaganda convinced people (yourself included, obviously) that anarchists simply wanted to abolish all government and destroy society.
Now, the thing about American Libertarians is that they all advocate for strong, government protected individual property rights, and this is where they earn the ire of other anarchists. Social anarchists, for example, often don't believe in individual ownership of the means of production, though most of us do believe that a man is entitled to the fruits of his labor.
Proudhon said, "property is theft." Meaning, private real property is theft by one from all. He also said, "property is freedom." Private property provides freedom from lords and kings, by making a man a lord of his own estate, free to keep his own serfs and exploit them as a king would.
Anyway, hope you found today's lesson in anarchism and the roots of modern libertarianism helpful and informative. You may be my elder, and probably more learned than I in many areas, but I can hazard a guess that I've had a more thorough education in anarchism than you have, being a child of freaky pinko baby boomers and a card carrying member of the IWW.
For more entertaining education on anarchism, feel free to read Ursala K. Le Guin's "The Dispossessed."
Except no one is writing their own MySpace layout, you just copy a bunch of CSS from some template site.
So rather than inventing their own ugly, people can copy-paste generic pre-made ugly. Ah, the wonders of progress...