I worked in a grocery store during college. A lot of the food-stamp people ticked me off.
- I saw people buy steak for their dog when they were told they couldn't buy dog kibble with food-stamps.
- People refused to use their member discount card, saying "it doesn't matter, I'm not paying for it!"
- The food stamp card also had a cash portion. They'll pull off several hundred dollars in cash, then buy cigarettes and alcohol.
- They would get extravagant food. Either expennsive things like lobster & crab, or just load up their cart with junk like soda, chips, etc.
Not all of them were like that, but a good number were, probably around 50%. You could tell the people that actually needed the assistance because they bought things on sale, chose generic brands, used their member discount card, used coupons, etc.
The internet is a valuable tool in searching for a job. I know when I was last job searching, I applied via sites like CareerBuilder and Monster, without those sites, I wouldn't have even been aware of many of the companies I applied with. When I had an interview I used the internet to research the company so I wouldn't be clueless about the company, I could more adequately answer questions like "why do you want to work here?" or "what do you know about our company?".
Also, some places don't even accept paper applications. The FBI is one such example.
You may not live in an area where a car is necessary, but many people do. Where I grew up, and where my parents still live, there aren't any taxis, subways, or busses (other than school busses). Want groceries? You drive 20 miles. Want to go to Walmart? You drive 75 miles.
Mindless homework isn't the way to push kids to do better. We should be teaching our kids how to "work smart". Hours of homework each night isn't necessarily "working smart", it's "working for the sake of working".
What we need to do is not have everyone lumped together in the same classes. The below-average kids struggle, and the above-average kids are bored and drug down to a lower level than they should be. AP classes help a little bit with the above-average kids being challenged, but not every school offers AP classes and AP classes are usually only in high school, so by then, you've had bored kids for the first 9 years of their education.
I was a gifted student, yet got Bs and Cs when I was in public school. (When my parents switched by private school with a more challenging curriculum and harder grading scale, my grades significantly increased. Why? Because I was challenged and the teachers there had us "work smart". They didn't give homework just for the sake of giving homework.)
As far as pure laziness, that's our society now days. We keep moving more and more towards a society that expects everything to be handed to them and citizens expect to be babysat by the government. Until we start brining back some personal accountability and responsibility, it will just get worse.
If a smile can fool the software, what about makeup?
I have a friend that is a makeup artist. She can make people look completely different just adjusting how she does their makeup. (Make eyes appear close together, farther apart, or different size; make lips appear different shape or size; adjust shading so cheekbones appear higher; etc).
Gun owners/carriers don't want to have to shoot someone. Drawing your weapon is the last resort. If everything else has failed to get you out of the sitation, then and only then do you draw your weapon. And if you draw it, you better be ready to use it.
Bottom line, if someone is dead or wounded on the floor, they can't commit the crime. I wouldn't ever want to be in the situation where I actually had to shoot someone to defend myself, but if it comes down to it, I would do what needs to be do to protect myself and my loved ones.
It's like having insurance on your house. You hope that your house never gets burned down, flooded, blown away by a tornado/hurricane, etc. But if it does happen, you're protected.
How, pray tell, do you suggest I arm myself then? That doesn't require me being within arm's reach of whomever I'm trying to defend myself against?
Taser? Those are one-use, so you better not miss!
And if you don't allow law-abiding citizens to carry guns, then the criminals are guarenteed that their target is unarmed. Good news for the criminals, it lowers their risk of harm considerably.
I'm a 115 pound woman. How should I defend myself? A chef's knife? A pair of scissors? My fingernails? All those things require me to be within less than an arm's reach of whomever I'm trying to defend myself against. If I'm that close, I've already "lost".
Call the cops? The police response time for highest-priority calls in my city is 11 minutes. Police don't get there in time to stop a crime, they get there in time to take a report of what happened.
Most people I know agree with some things PETA says (almost everyone agrees you shouldn't beat your dog)
Being against cruelty is an animal welfare topic.
Animals rights takes a lot of the ideas of animal welfare... and then they step over the line and become extremists. "Treat your dog kindly" becomes "pets are slaves, collars are nooses, we must phase out companion animals for their own good".
If PETA had their way, the current generation of pets and other domestic animals would be the last. They want them phased out. Extinct. While they aren't telling people to get rid of their current pets, they fundamentally don't think pets should exist. (Their view is basically "take care of what we have until they die, then no more".)
PETA doesn't come right out and bluntly say they are opposed to pets, they have to sugar-coat everything as to not lose their ignorant supports, but if you do some research, they are.
"The cat, like the dog, must disappear... We should cut the domestic cat free from our dominance by neutering, neutering, and more neutering, until our pathetic version of the cat ceases to exist."
-- John Bryant, Fettered Kingdoms: An Examination of A Changing Ethic (Washington, DC: People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PeTA), 1982, p. 15 and Quoted in Animal People, May 1993
"In a perfect world, animals would be free to live their lives to the fullest: raising their young, enjoying their native environments, and following their natural instincts. However, domesticated dogs and cats cannot survive "free" in our concrete jungles, so we must take as good care of them as possible. People with the time, money, love, and patience to make a lifetime commitment to an animal can make an enormous difference by adopting from shelters or rescuing animals from a perilous life on the street. But it is also important to stop manufacturing "pets," thereby perpetuating a class of animals forced to rely on humans to survive."
-- PeTA pamphlet, Companion Animals: Pets or Prisoners?
"Let us allow the dog to disappear from our brick and concrete jungles -- from our firesides, from the leather nooses and chains by which we enslave it."
-- John Bryant, Fettered Kingdoms: An Examination of A Changing Ethic Washington, DC: People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, 1982, p. 15
"As John Bryant has written in his book Fettered Kingdoms, they [pets] are like slaves, even if well-kept slaves."
-- PeTA's Statement on Companion Animals
"In a perfect world, all other than human animals would be free of human interference, and dogs and cats would be part of the ecological scheme."
-- PeTA's Statement on Companion Animals
,br>
Also, it's untrue that mixed-breed dogs are healthier than purebred dogs.
just to euthanize them. They've gone to shelters, claiming they wanting to help find homes for animals. The shelters turned over highly adoptable animals, and PETA turned around and killed them. They had no intention of trying to find homes for the animals.
Animal welfare and animal rights are two very different creatures (no pun intended).
Animal rights groups, such as PETA, have the goal of ending all interaction between humans and animals. No eating animals, no service dogs, no police dogs, no zoos, no hunting, no pets, etc.
Animal welfare groups believe in treating animals humanely. Don't abuse or neglect animals, if you're going to kill an animal for food do it as quickly and painless as possible, etc.
Most of PETA's members don't understand what PETA is truly about and don't realize that there's a difference between animal rights and animal welfare.
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I would prefer that I had 1 gun + 50 rounds to defend myself against said attacker.
I worked in a grocery store during college. A lot of the food-stamp people ticked me off.
- I saw people buy steak for their dog when they were told they couldn't buy dog kibble with food-stamps.
- People refused to use their member discount card, saying "it doesn't matter, I'm not paying for it!"
- The food stamp card also had a cash portion. They'll pull off several hundred dollars in cash, then buy cigarettes and alcohol.
- They would get extravagant food. Either expennsive things like lobster & crab, or just load up their cart with junk like soda, chips, etc.
Not all of them were like that, but a good number were, probably around 50%. You could tell the people that actually needed the assistance because they bought things on sale, chose generic brands, used their member discount card, used coupons, etc.
The internet is a valuable tool in searching for a job. I know when I was last job searching, I applied via sites like CareerBuilder and Monster, without those sites, I wouldn't have even been aware of many of the companies I applied with. When I had an interview I used the internet to research the company so I wouldn't be clueless about the company, I could more adequately answer questions like "why do you want to work here?" or "what do you know about our company?".
Also, some places don't even accept paper applications. The FBI is one such example.
You may not live in an area where a car is necessary, but many people do. Where I grew up, and where my parents still live, there aren't any taxis, subways, or busses (other than school busses). Want groceries? You drive 20 miles. Want to go to Walmart? You drive 75 miles.
Mindless homework isn't the way to push kids to do better. We should be teaching our kids how to "work smart". Hours of homework each night isn't necessarily "working smart", it's "working for the sake of working".
What we need to do is not have everyone lumped together in the same classes. The below-average kids struggle, and the above-average kids are bored and drug down to a lower level than they should be. AP classes help a little bit with the above-average kids being challenged, but not every school offers AP classes and AP classes are usually only in high school, so by then, you've had bored kids for the first 9 years of their education.
I was a gifted student, yet got Bs and Cs when I was in public school. (When my parents switched by private school with a more challenging curriculum and harder grading scale, my grades significantly increased. Why? Because I was challenged and the teachers there had us "work smart". They didn't give homework just for the sake of giving homework.)
As far as pure laziness, that's our society now days. We keep moving more and more towards a society that expects everything to be handed to them and citizens expect to be babysat by the government. Until we start brining back some personal accountability and responsibility, it will just get worse.
If a smile can fool the software, what about makeup? I have a friend that is a makeup artist. She can make people look completely different just adjusting how she does their makeup. (Make eyes appear close together, farther apart, or different size; make lips appear different shape or size; adjust shading so cheekbones appear higher; etc).
Gun owners/carriers don't want to have to shoot someone. Drawing your weapon is the last resort. If everything else has failed to get you out of the sitation, then and only then do you draw your weapon. And if you draw it, you better be ready to use it.
Bottom line, if someone is dead or wounded on the floor, they can't commit the crime. I wouldn't ever want to be in the situation where I actually had to shoot someone to defend myself, but if it comes down to it, I would do what needs to be do to protect myself and my loved ones.
It's like having insurance on your house. You hope that your house never gets burned down, flooded, blown away by a tornado/hurricane, etc. But if it does happen, you're protected.
How, pray tell, do you suggest I arm myself then? That doesn't require me being within arm's reach of whomever I'm trying to defend myself against? Taser? Those are one-use, so you better not miss!
And if you don't allow law-abiding citizens to carry guns, then the criminals are guarenteed that their target is unarmed. Good news for the criminals, it lowers their risk of harm considerably.
http://www.a-human-right.com/
I'm a 115 pound woman. How should I defend myself? A chef's knife? A pair of scissors? My fingernails? All those things require me to be within less than an arm's reach of whomever I'm trying to defend myself against. If I'm that close, I've already "lost". Call the cops? The police response time for highest-priority calls in my city is 11 minutes. Police don't get there in time to stop a crime, they get there in time to take a report of what happened.
This is getting cluttered and a bit off-topic to discuss on this forum, but I invite you to continue this discussion at http://peta-sucks.com/smf/ .
Animals are not rational agents. They cannot have "rights".
Here's a good read for you: http://peta-sucks.com/smf/index.php?topic=7872.0
Animal welfare can indeed exist without 'animal rights'.
Most people I know agree with some things PETA says (almost everyone agrees you shouldn't beat your dog)
Being against cruelty is an animal welfare topic.
Animals rights takes a lot of the ideas of animal welfare... and then they step over the line and become extremists. "Treat your dog kindly" becomes "pets are slaves, collars are nooses, we must phase out companion animals for their own good".
If PETA had their way, the current generation of pets and other domestic animals would be the last. They want them phased out. Extinct. While they aren't telling people to get rid of their current pets, they fundamentally don't think pets should exist. (Their view is basically "take care of what we have until they die, then no more".)
PETA on pets: http://origin.www.peta.org/campaigns/ar-petaonpets.asp PETA on service dogs: http://blog.helpinganimals.com/2008/01/exploiting_mans_best_friend.php http://blog.helpinganimals.com/2008/02/to_serve_man.php PETA is against crating (crating is actually a helpful traing tool, as well as giving the dog its own private space): http://origin.www.peta.org/campaigns/ar-cratingdogs.asp PETA wants dogs and cats to be fed vegan/vegetarian diets (which is not good for the animals): http://www.peta.org/mc/factsheet_display.asp?ID=34 PETA tries to make children fear their their parents: http://www.furisdead.com/pdfs/mommykills.pdf http://www.fishinghurts.com/pdfs/DaddyKillsAnimals.pdf In short, they're a bunch of nut-jobs. Doesn't matter if you're democrat or republican, if someone really cares about or is involved with animal welfare, they shun PETA. I know plently of liberals as well as republicans that hate PETA. From pet owners, to shelter workers, to reputable breeders. Seriously, just read through their site, read between the lines, and research their claims. They aren't what they seem to be on the surface.
PETA doesn't come right out and bluntly say they are opposed to pets, they have to sugar-coat everything as to not lose their ignorant supports, but if you do some research, they are.
"The cat, like the dog, must disappear... We should cut the domestic cat free from our dominance by neutering, neutering, and more neutering, until our pathetic version of the cat ceases to exist." -- John Bryant, Fettered Kingdoms: An Examination of A Changing Ethic (Washington, DC: People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PeTA), 1982, p. 15 and Quoted in Animal People, May 1993
"In a perfect world, animals would be free to live their lives to the fullest: raising their young, enjoying their native environments, and following their natural instincts. However, domesticated dogs and cats cannot survive "free" in our concrete jungles, so we must take as good care of them as possible. People with the time, money, love, and patience to make a lifetime commitment to an animal can make an enormous difference by adopting from shelters or rescuing animals from a perilous life on the street. But it is also important to stop manufacturing "pets," thereby perpetuating a class of animals forced to rely on humans to survive." -- PeTA pamphlet, Companion Animals: Pets or Prisoners?
"Let us allow the dog to disappear from our brick and concrete jungles -- from our firesides, from the leather nooses and chains by which we enslave it." -- John Bryant, Fettered Kingdoms: An Examination of A Changing Ethic Washington, DC: People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, 1982, p. 15
"As John Bryant has written in his book Fettered Kingdoms, they [pets] are like slaves, even if well-kept slaves." -- PeTA's Statement on Companion Animals
"In a perfect world, all other than human animals would be free of human interference, and dogs and cats would be part of the ecological scheme." -- PeTA's Statement on Companion Animals
,br> Also, it's untrue that mixed-breed dogs are healthier than purebred dogs.
just to euthanize them. They've gone to shelters, claiming they wanting to help find homes for animals. The shelters turned over highly adoptable animals, and PETA turned around and killed them. They had no intention of trying to find homes for the animals.
Animal welfare and animal rights are two very different creatures (no pun intended).
Animal rights groups, such as PETA, have the goal of ending all interaction between humans and animals. No eating animals, no service dogs, no police dogs, no zoos, no hunting, no pets, etc.
Animal welfare groups believe in treating animals humanely. Don't abuse or neglect animals, if you're going to kill an animal for food do it as quickly and painless as possible, etc.
Most of PETA's members don't understand what PETA is truly about and don't realize that there's a difference between animal rights and animal welfare.