I don't. You do. Without electricity all big cities would logistically collapse in a matter of days. People would be deprived of water, food, illumination, and transportation and massive chaos would ensue. Electricity is a necessity in any sizable urban concentration. It is impossible for cities like we have today to exist without electricity, and they would certainly cease to exist in its prolonged absence.
Even if we speak only about electricity in homes, the lack of it means old people and people with disabilities would sudden be unable to reach their apartments, refrigerated food would spoil and that would pressure food demand to unsustainable levels. A lot of people would not be able to work or study at home at night, because most of it is made through devices that operate on electric energy, which would force everyone to the same timetable and produce other logistic nightmares.
Similarly Internet is a necessity for economical reasons. A lot of business became dependent on it, or would never exist save for it, and so does the economy as a whole. A lot of people work at home, especially among the people who visit this site.
It is weird that things that exist for such a small time became necessities, as we managed to live without them before, but the fact is that the world changed and so did the requirements for our civilization to be.
It is silly to think you can find any topic no one would be offended with. There is always someone who is offended by anything you say, and as religion can encompass basically anything, in the end most offenses are covered by law. The plaintiff won't always win, but you sometimes he or she will, even if the claim is ridiculous.
I defend complete freedom of speech no matter what. It is easy to defend freedom of speech when people are saying things you like or are neutral about. It is a lot harder when you have to tolerate things you find wrong or offensive. I do believe any kind of communication should be at the very least tolerated.
To express any idea, however much unlikable it may be, should never be forbidden.
I am yet to see any group of people that is able to speak strictly about job issues for 8 hours a day 5 days a week. Sorry but it is just one more of your delusions.
Your insanity is proven by this gem:
... don't make any comments that could tie into race, gender, the usual crap
Why should people go out of their way to accommodate to your sensibilities? You are the reason of the disruption, not the guys who worked together for years, making jokes and having fun until you came and decided to dictate what they can or not say.
In the end the only thing you will accomplish with this excessive bickering, is getting unemployed and giving a bad reputation to your gender, race, religion, etc, because most likely than not you are not worth the trouble when there are people who can do your job just as well as you do, are not overly sensitive like you, and unlike you fit into the group.
And even if you succeed in making laws that force people into complying with your standards employers will end outsourcing as much as they can to avoid unnecessary litigations.
Yes, it is ok. It is also ok someone saying "annoying as a girl", or "dumb as a white male". If you don't think the joke is funny, ignore it. It is your problem, not theirs.
No, I don't "understand" why having your requests ignored is bad, and yes I defend the right to express yourself in any way you see fit, as long as it does not become harassment, which means a person verbally insulting you directly and aggressively at a daily basis, without provocation, for example. In this last case it may even be a problem for your boss to solve, but certainly not for the legal system.
In my opinion your attitude is perfect, and clearly defines the difference between real harassment and what courts call harassment nowadays in US. Unfortunately not everybody is as tolerant and sensible as you are.
Sometime ago we had an article where a MS was taking the heat because one of its employees who also contributed to Linux kernel put 0xB16B00B5 as an hex constant in the kernel. THAT is the degree of insanity that this nonsense reached nowadays.
Apparently you are indeed a child. You never learned to deal with your feelings. What is the big problem of being verbally slighted? Anyone can say anything they wish to me, it is irrelevant. If I don't like what the person is saying I can just ignore him.
If the person in question is a real bully that has a problem with you which is not exactly common in the workplace then there is a problem. But confronting a bully is exactly what you don't want to do. You want other people, your boss, the legal system, your daddy or anyone but you to do the job for you. If you have a problem with someone deal with it yourself.
Much more common are fleeting remarks and jokes that are considered offensive by the listener and end in lawsuits, which is clearly insane and tends to disrupt the workplace just because someone cannot deal with her own feelings.
The problem is that everything you define as unacceptable is subjective, including the laws regarding this matter. Subjective enough to make the workplace a minefield. What is "crude"? What is bad tasted? What is acceptable? What is offensive?
And no, those thinkers were not the exception. There is no clear relation between social behavior and productivity, especially in IT, were a great number of employees are highly capable and socially inept.
Yes, you should be able to tolerate crude jokes and "offensive" remarks your colleagues and even answering in kind without suing or being sued by them. If you cannot I will weight your value in my team against the trouble your over sensitivity brings.
If I want any work done in a timely and efficient fashion the only way is to create an environment were my employees can speak freely and are not fearful of being prosecuted all the time. Police states are not conducive to productivity. Especially in IT, if such an environment is not achievable in US I will contract elsewhere. Simple as that.
I'd argue not being able to adapt to the environment childishness. If you enter in a team you better be able to fit or to be so good that will be worth the trouble you are bringing.
Obviously the problem is not the person making the frivolous remarks, but that these frivolous remarks can open you to a lawsuits, which they clearly should not.
As you grow you understand you can't always have your way. Actually you can seldom have it. That is why it is an adult decision to just accept and ignore it when you don't, unless it is something so grave and important that demands action. Bickering does not classify.
Your problem is that you seem to think that anyone that makes remarks that offend you hate you, and not the other way around. People more often then not do not need to feel anger or contempt to make remarks that offend other people, especially in these oversensitive days, and even if they do it is a fallacy to relate their feelings and remarks with the quality of his work. Many of the greatest minds of our History were intractable human beings, and produced some of the greatest achievements of mankind.
Last but not least, a productive work environment should not be altered unless there is a very good motive to do so, and avoiding hurting the feelings of an oversensitive childish person is not reason enough to do disrupt the habits of several others.
Yes I would. Welcome to the live of a man. Men have to deal with it all their lives and we manage it quite well. Try to be offended when children at school decide to give you an offensive nickname and see how the results go for you.
The best way to deal with it is to ignore and prove your worth with results. Bickering is childish and by doing that you prove to be as much unprofessional as the one you are complaining about.
Dear AC, your answer makes very clear who is infantile, idiotic and rageful. Your behavior is befitting of a kid, not an adult, and you bring no argument to the discussion, besides ad hominem fallacies against the previous poster.
By some you mean a very small percentage, right? And only in countries were suing is becoming an sport, like US. I can't really blame them.
The truth is the silliness of your overreaction to people's hurt feelings is to become a non competitive market for hiring. Every time you make more dangerous to contract people without being sued, more jobs will be outsourced. Good luck!
If someone uses his power to force sexual favors over you you have all the right in the world to prosecute the company. It is not only the right thing to do but something good for the company.
On the other hand wanting your company to adapt to you because you can't deal with fleeting remarks is ridiculous. Grow up, deal you your feelings and get your job done.
And the same applies to the female in question. If I hire an employee, male or female I expect her or him to get the work done, instead of bitching about not liking what other employees are saying and making frivolous accusation of sexual harassing because of fleeting remarks.
I have nothing against prosecuting people who use their positions of authority to demand sexual favors, but in USA things have became utterly silly. ANYTHING can be considering harassment, even the way you look at someone. It is no wonder jobs are getting outsourced more and more.
And you won't see ever ever EVER a man complaining about this if and when it happens. Men adapt to their environments instead of wanting the environment to adapt to themselves. Women complain way too much, and as long as they keep seeing themselves as victims they will never be considered equal.
Nothing makes any of my paradigms better than yours, but what we are discussing is not even a paradigm. If you observe with care my words, I never said North America or south America do not exist, neither did I say that they are not continents. Saying some abstract entity like a continent doesn't exist is refuting the existence of the abstraction itself, in this case, the model, which is a falsity, as the model in question do exist.
Both the 6 and 7 continent models do exist and are used in many countries, including English speaking ones, at least enough to make entries into English dictionaries. Although it is not the prevalent model in USA, it is a model largely used in the World. The properly way to express yourself in this matter is: "Accordingly to the prevalent (or preferred) continent model in USA, North America and South America are considered separate continents, but there are other models that consider both as parts of a single continent, named 'America' or 'Americas', in English."
Personally, I prefer the strict geological definition of continents as a single mass of land, where there are only 4 continents: America, Afro-Eurasia, Australia and Antarctica, because it just makes more sense. Other definitions are just too vague and subjective. The ONU and the Olympic committee use the 6 continent model without Antarctica (America, Europe, Asia, Africa and Oceania), though.
I can't really prove beyond doubt that most, or any, primitive societies fit in my description, but neither can you, and I want to remind you that the one who started with claims of knowing how humanity behaved for most of its History was you. The best we both can do is to refer do documentation uncovered by historians, which many times are inconsistent with each other.
Furthermore I never mentioned that a communist regimen must be totalitarian, just that nobody ever managed to implement a real one that wasn't, which points to the possibility that it may not be possible for one to exist. There is no tautology here. To clarify my line of thought, by communist regimen I indeed refer to the Marxist formulation, as you inferred, which is the one defended by most, if not all, contemporary communist parties of any significance in this World.
Maybe there is out there a workable communist approach that isn't exactly what Marx and Engels proposed, but then again, maybe there is not, and discussing about if something may exist or not, without any evidence, borders on the realm of religion. If and when someone proposes something that may work rest assured a lot of people will follow him and we will know about it. People follow even the ideas that can't possibly work preached today, after all.
You should really make an effort and finish Atlas Shrugged. It is worth it, even if it is just to criticize it better.
Certainly, there was nowhere near the differences of today, because there was too few people and not very many possessions for one to have beyond food and women. And there was always the boss and his favorites. They often had most females, which were propriety, and the best of them, were able to choose what they eat first, so eat better, etc. Furthermore in most tribes if you couldn't do your part for any motive, you were usually abandoned or banned.
I would hardly call this communism, at least, as the term is used today to refer to a government system applicable to a sizable amount of people where inequality is undesirable. And that is the root of the problem with modern communism: give accordingly with your abilities and take accordingly to your needs. Ayn Rand shows very well why it doesn't work in Atlas Shrugged.
Slashdot Mirror
Nokia does not maintain QT anymore. QT is in open governance for a while now, and a lot of the TrollTech guys are still part of QT development team.
I don't. You do. Without electricity all big cities would logistically collapse in a matter of days. People would be deprived of water, food, illumination, and transportation and massive chaos would ensue. Electricity is a necessity in any sizable urban concentration. It is impossible for cities like we have today to exist without electricity, and they would certainly cease to exist in its prolonged absence.
Even if we speak only about electricity in homes, the lack of it means old people and people with disabilities would sudden be unable to reach their apartments, refrigerated food would spoil and that would pressure food demand to unsustainable levels. A lot of people would not be able to work or study at home at night, because most of it is made through devices that operate on electric energy, which would force everyone to the same timetable and produce other logistic nightmares.
Similarly Internet is a necessity for economical reasons. A lot of business became dependent on it, or would never exist save for it, and so does the economy as a whole. A lot of people work at home, especially among the people who visit this site.
It is weird that things that exist for such a small time became necessities, as we managed to live without them before, but the fact is that the world changed and so did the requirements for our civilization to be.
Let me guess. For you electricity must be just a convenience too, right?
It is silly to think you can find any topic no one would be offended with. There is always someone who is offended by anything you say, and as religion can encompass basically anything, in the end most offenses are covered by law. The plaintiff won't always win, but you sometimes he or she will, even if the claim is ridiculous.
I defend complete freedom of speech no matter what. It is easy to defend freedom of speech when people are saying things you like or are neutral about. It is a lot harder when you have to tolerate things you find wrong or offensive. I do believe any kind of communication should be at the very least tolerated.
To express any idea, however much unlikable it may be, should never be forbidden.
Your insanity is proven by this gem:
... don't make any comments that could tie into race, gender, the usual crap
Why should people go out of their way to accommodate to your sensibilities? You are the reason of the disruption, not the guys who worked together for years, making jokes and having fun until you came and decided to dictate what they can or not say.
In the end the only thing you will accomplish with this excessive bickering, is getting unemployed and giving a bad reputation to your gender, race, religion, etc, because most likely than not you are not worth the trouble when there are people who can do your job just as well as you do, are not overly sensitive like you, and unlike you fit into the group.
And even if you succeed in making laws that force people into complying with your standards employers will end outsourcing as much as they can to avoid unnecessary litigations.
Yes, it is ok. It is also ok someone saying "annoying as a girl", or "dumb as a white male". If you don't think the joke is funny, ignore it. It is your problem, not theirs.
No, I don't "understand" why having your requests ignored is bad, and yes I defend the right to express yourself in any way you see fit, as long as it does not become harassment, which means a person verbally insulting you directly and aggressively at a daily basis, without provocation, for example. In this last case it may even be a problem for your boss to solve, but certainly not for the legal system.
In my opinion your attitude is perfect, and clearly defines the difference between real harassment and what courts call harassment nowadays in US. Unfortunately not everybody is as tolerant and sensible as you are.
Sometime ago we had an article where a MS was taking the heat because one of its employees who also contributed to Linux kernel put 0xB16B00B5 as an hex constant in the kernel. THAT is the degree of insanity that this nonsense reached nowadays.
Apparently you are indeed a child. You never learned to deal with your feelings. What is the big problem of being verbally slighted? Anyone can say anything they wish to me, it is irrelevant. If I don't like what the person is saying I can just ignore him.
If the person in question is a real bully that has a problem with you which is not exactly common in the workplace then there is a problem. But confronting a bully is exactly what you don't want to do. You want other people, your boss, the legal system, your daddy or anyone but you to do the job for you. If you have a problem with someone deal with it yourself.
Much more common are fleeting remarks and jokes that are considered offensive by the listener and end in lawsuits, which is clearly insane and tends to disrupt the workplace just because someone cannot deal with her own feelings.
The problem is that everything you define as unacceptable is subjective, including the laws regarding this matter. Subjective enough to make the workplace a minefield. What is "crude"? What is bad tasted? What is acceptable? What is offensive?
And no, those thinkers were not the exception. There is no clear relation between social behavior and productivity, especially in IT, were a great number of employees are highly capable and socially inept.
Yes, you should be able to tolerate crude jokes and "offensive" remarks your colleagues and even answering in kind without suing or being sued by them. If you cannot I will weight your value in my team against the trouble your over sensitivity brings.
If I want any work done in a timely and efficient fashion the only way is to create an environment were my employees can speak freely and are not fearful of being prosecuted all the time. Police states are not conducive to productivity. Especially in IT, if such an environment is not achievable in US I will contract elsewhere. Simple as that.
I'd argue not being able to adapt to the environment childishness. If you enter in a team you better be able to fit or to be so good that will be worth the trouble you are bringing.
Obviously the problem is not the person making the frivolous remarks, but that these frivolous remarks can open you to a lawsuits, which they clearly should not.
As you grow you understand you can't always have your way. Actually you can seldom have it. That is why it is an adult decision to just accept and ignore it when you don't, unless it is something so grave and important that demands action. Bickering does not classify.
Your problem is that you seem to think that anyone that makes remarks that offend you hate you, and not the other way around. People more often then not do not need to feel anger or contempt to make remarks that offend other people, especially in these oversensitive days, and even if they do it is a fallacy to relate their feelings and remarks with the quality of his work. Many of the greatest minds of our History were intractable human beings, and produced some of the greatest achievements of mankind.
Last but not least, a productive work environment should not be altered unless there is a very good motive to do so, and avoiding hurting the feelings of an oversensitive childish person is not reason enough to do disrupt the habits of several others.
Yes I would. Welcome to the live of a man. Men have to deal with it all their lives and we manage it quite well. Try to be offended when children at school decide to give you an offensive nickname and see how the results go for you.
The best way to deal with it is to ignore and prove your worth with results. Bickering is childish and by doing that you prove to be as much unprofessional as the one you are complaining about.
Dear AC, your answer makes very clear who is infantile, idiotic and rageful. Your behavior is befitting of a kid, not an adult, and you bring no argument to the discussion, besides ad hominem fallacies against the previous poster.
You can tell them to shut up, and if they refuse you can behave like an adult and just ignore them.
By some you mean a very small percentage, right? And only in countries were suing is becoming an sport, like US. I can't really blame them.
The truth is the silliness of your overreaction to people's hurt feelings is to become a non competitive market for hiring. Every time you make more dangerous to contract people without being sued, more jobs will be outsourced. Good luck!
If someone uses his power to force sexual favors over you you have all the right in the world to prosecute the company. It is not only the right thing to do but something good for the company.
On the other hand wanting your company to adapt to you because you can't deal with fleeting remarks is ridiculous. Grow up, deal you your feelings and get your job done.
And the same applies to the female in question. If I hire an employee, male or female I expect her or him to get the work done, instead of bitching about not liking what other employees are saying and making frivolous accusation of sexual harassing because of fleeting remarks.
I have nothing against prosecuting people who use their positions of authority to demand sexual favors, but in USA things have became utterly silly. ANYTHING can be considering harassment, even the way you look at someone. It is no wonder jobs are getting outsourced more and more.
And you won't see ever ever EVER a man complaining about this if and when it happens. Men adapt to their environments instead of wanting the environment to adapt to themselves. Women complain way too much, and as long as they keep seeing themselves as victims they will never be considered equal.
Nothing makes any of my paradigms better than yours, but what we are discussing is not even a paradigm. If you observe with care my words, I never said North America or south America do not exist, neither did I say that they are not continents. Saying some abstract entity like a continent doesn't exist is refuting the existence of the abstraction itself, in this case, the model, which is a falsity, as the model in question do exist.
Both the 6 and 7 continent models do exist and are used in many countries, including English speaking ones, at least enough to make entries into English dictionaries. Although it is not the prevalent model in USA, it is a model largely used in the World. The properly way to express yourself in this matter is: "Accordingly to the prevalent (or preferred) continent model in USA, North America and South America are considered separate continents, but there are other models that consider both as parts of a single continent, named 'America' or 'Americas', in English."
Personally, I prefer the strict geological definition of continents as a single mass of land, where there are only 4 continents: America, Afro-Eurasia, Australia and Antarctica, because it just makes more sense. Other definitions are just too vague and subjective. The ONU and the Olympic committee use the 6 continent model without Antarctica (America, Europe, Asia, Africa and Oceania), though.
I can't really prove beyond doubt that most, or any, primitive societies fit in my description, but neither can you, and I want to remind you that the one who started with claims of knowing how humanity behaved for most of its History was you. The best we both can do is to refer do documentation uncovered by historians, which many times are inconsistent with each other.
Furthermore I never mentioned that a communist regimen must be totalitarian, just that nobody ever managed to implement a real one that wasn't, which points to the possibility that it may not be possible for one to exist. There is no tautology here. To clarify my line of thought, by communist regimen I indeed refer to the Marxist formulation, as you inferred, which is the one defended by most, if not all, contemporary communist parties of any significance in this World.
Maybe there is out there a workable communist approach that isn't exactly what Marx and Engels proposed, but then again, maybe there is not, and discussing about if something may exist or not, without any evidence, borders on the realm of religion. If and when someone proposes something that may work rest assured a lot of people will follow him and we will know about it. People follow even the ideas that can't possibly work preached today, after all.
You should really make an effort and finish Atlas Shrugged. It is worth it, even if it is just to criticize it better.
Certainly, there was nowhere near the differences of today, because there was too few people and not very many possessions for one to have beyond food and women. And there was always the boss and his favorites. They often had most females, which were propriety, and the best of them, were able to choose what they eat first, so eat better, etc. Furthermore in most tribes if you couldn't do your part for any motive, you were usually abandoned or banned.
I would hardly call this communism, at least, as the term is used today to refer to a government system applicable to a sizable amount of people where inequality is undesirable. And that is the root of the problem with modern communism: give accordingly with your abilities and take accordingly to your needs. Ayn Rand shows very well why it doesn't work in Atlas Shrugged.
You can reject anything you want. It is your prerogative. That does not make it go away, though.
No, I meant 'regimen' (government). Both 'regime' and 'regimen' can be used with this meaning.
http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/regimen