There is nothing preventing other countries from setting up their own DNS systems, and interfacing with the one the US built. Literally nothing. Except time and money. So... quitcher bitchin'. If you don't want to build your own, and want to use the one we made, fine. But you don't have to, and that doesn't create any obligation on the part of the US.
How about a deal? We get to use your (American) TCP/IP and DNS protocols, and you get to use our HTTP protocol and HTML language, which were invented in Switzerland and paid for by European grant money.
Um, the USA doesn't run the DNS system. It runs the.com,.edu,.mil,.gov and a few other domains. The DNS system is already decentralised, and different countries run their own domains, like.de for Germany,.uk for United Kingdom,.ch for China, and so on.
Also, I don't think you'd want the rest of the world to invent their own DNS system. That'd effectively isolate the USA from the rest of the world. It'd hurt the rest of the world a lot, but it'd hurt the USA more.
A minor nitpick: http and the World Wide Web was invented by Tim Berners-Lee in Switzerland.
I agree with your WW2 examples, but I'm not sure most of what the USA has done since then has been helpful.
I believe the Soviet Union fell because their system was unsustainable - they were basing their economy on agriculture and natural resources, they were incredibly inefficient, and they were very slow at adopting technological innovation. Eventually, people realised they were better off in a more western-style society, and used peaceful means to change into a democracy. The arms race with the USA may have hastened their economic decline, but on the other hand, giving the Soviet leaders an external enemy (the USA) may have helped them to divert people's miscontent.
USA:s invasion of Iraq caused terrorism to increase dramatically. Saddam had very little to do with terrorism (and nothing to do with 9/11), despite being an oppressive dictator to his own people. After the invasion, Iraq became a chaotic hotbed where terrorists could be recruited and trained. Using a flimsy pretext ("weapons of mass destruction"), sent the message to Middle Eastern countries that no one was safe from invasion. I think the invasion of Iraq has made the muslim world more hateful and fearful of the West, and the world a less safe place for all Westerners.
As for my own country (Sweden), we give 0.7% of our GDP as foreign aid. That's a percentage of the total economy, not of the state budget. We're one of the few countries which manages to fulfill the UN:s recommendations for foreign aid.
We've also contributed UN troops to Afghanistan, Kosovo, Somalia, Croatia, Liberia, Macedonia, Bosnia, and so on, despite having no interests in those conflicts. Our troops are of course very small compared to the USA:s, but we're only a country of 9 million people.
We also accept large numbers of political and war refugees - many of them from wars the USA has started, like Iraq and Afghanistan. Someone needs to take care of them after their homes become war zones.
That's how it looked from a European perspective too - the copyright provisions were sneaked through the European Parliament by being decided by bureaucrats and lobbyists during the ACTA negotiations.
Democracy really doesn't work well in the EU (on the top level I mean; it may work well in individual member countries).
Petition is what you do in absence of a working democracy. It's the equivalent of going up to your lord and saying, "Please, sir, can you find it in your heart to right this wrong?" In a democracy, you complain publicly, or go to court and demand your right.
When I was 14-15, I was accused of vandalizing a teachers house based solely on knowing who lived in the house that had been spray painted and TP'd as we drove by it on the bus in the morning. The judge in that case basically put me on house arrest and said I couldn't leave the house except for school unless a parent was with me the entire time.
It sounds like the judge based his decision on very flimsy evidence. It doesn't exactly teach kids to trust the system.
That's an extremely literal interpretation. Why would the judge bother to point out that losing his XBox "would show him what it was like to have something he valued taken from him", if it didn't have something to do with the crime he was accused of?
What reason is there to set the XBox as bail, except to teach the kid a lesson? Did the 13-year-old pose a flight risk? If he did flee, would he be likely to bring his XBox with him?
Being legally binding is a separate issue from the burden of proof. A written contract is legally binding, but if you can't prove who wrote the signature on it, it's not enforceable. Conversely, you may not be able to prove who clicked on the "I accept" button, but it's still legally binding in theory (so if, for example, someone testifies they saw you click it, the contract is enforceable).
Judges are required to follow procedure even before the actual trial, for example, when setting bail. Even if the kid gets his XBox back in a year or so, it's worrying when a judge confuses his personal feelings and personal sense of justice with the application of law.
As I said, my own country provides a counter-example, since we don't convict people to make them suffer, and still have relatively low crime rates (the USA has unusually high crime rates for a rich, modern country).
Most victims and their families accept that criminals don't suffer. Having the crime recognised by society is more important. The need for revenge is largely a learned, cultural thing, not something universal.
You can talk all you want about "sex education being the answer" and ensuring easy access to birth control, but the fact remains that the only 100% effective form of birth control is not having sex in the first place.
But it's infinitely more efficient than keeping contraceptives from the kids and hoping they'll be abstinent. The facts of life are that a lot of teens will have sex whether they're allowed or not, and without sex ed and contraceptives they'll have unsafe sex instead.
Here in Sweden, teen pregnancies are a non-issue. The age of consent is 15, and from that age you can go to the public health care for contraceptives and/or counselling. And it doesn't make people particularly promiscuous; most still end up in monogamous long-term relationships, and many teens still choose to wait until they have sex.
That's pretty easy to accomplish with younger kids by simply not planting the seed in their head that it's even an option for them.
You can't hide from kids what sex is without raising them in a closet or on an isolated farm. They get the ideas from TV, books, friends, overheard conversations...
And the sexual feelings will still be there and lead to fantasies, touching oneself and ejaculations in your sleep. When you've had the sexual need without getting release for some time, you eventually figure out that stimulating certain parts of the body feels good. Children (even pre-pubescent children) can have sexual fantasies (even kinky sexual fantasies), without being taught about sexual situations, because they simply notice certain situations are sexually stimulating.
The sexual needs vary a lot between individuals, of course. In general, they're more insistent for boys than for girls.
I think your reasoning makes sense, but I don't agree with one of the assumptions.
Sexual depictions makes me want to have sex with someone, even if they are not my wife. I do not appreciate this.
Is this really true for most people? Sexual depictions make me want to get sexual release, but I have no trouble waiting until I get home to my partner, or solving the problem on my own. Besides, the really arousing sexual depictions I watch in my own home, where my partner is the closest available female.
In fact, if I'm aroused by a woman who is not my partner, pornography helps me get release *without* being unfaithful. And after the release, I'm not tempted anymore.
If one accepts the premise that there is a creator, and that there were certain people who violated his commands, and that said creator was enacting judgement on them, it begins to make sense to understand why the israelites were commanded to begin their conquest.
Yes, it makes sense, but only if the creator is petty and vengeful.
People don't need fantasies to engage in sex. The male need for sexual release is physical. If you don't get release through sex or masturbation, you eventually ejaculate in your sleep. Even if you don't look at a single dirty picture, hear a single dirty word, or consciously engage in a single dirty fantasy, your lust for sex will increase until just seeing a woman makes you think of sex. And for a pubescent male, this usually happens within a matter of days.
Pornography and fantasies help you get release without needing to engage in actual sex.
Now, if it really was The US vs The World, why do the counterpoints always come from a handful of places? Why don't we hear about the giant billboards of naked people from India, or China, or Mexico.
Ouch. You got me there. It's only a few countries which are civilised and have come far with gender equality which have a liberal view on sex.
Seriously. Respect for women and a liberal view on sex go hand in hand. It's no coincidence the countries where women wear burka so as not to arouse any men also are the ones where women are most repressed.
Yes, there are many borderline cases, but slander and libel are most definitely speech, so you could argue the Founding Fathers made a mistake when they didn't explicitly specify that there could be exceptions to freedom of speech.
In Europe, we have an explicit exception to free speech instead - states may apply restrictions to free speech which "are prescribed by law and are necessary in a democratic society". It's defined in the European Convention, and is interpreted by the European Court of Human Rights.
Slashdot Mirror
There is nothing preventing other countries from setting up their own DNS systems, and interfacing with the one the US built. Literally nothing. Except time and money. So... quitcher bitchin'. If you don't want to build your own, and want to use the one we made, fine. But you don't have to, and that doesn't create any obligation on the part of the US.
How about a deal? We get to use your (American) TCP/IP and DNS protocols, and you get to use our HTTP protocol and HTML language, which were invented in Switzerland and paid for by European grant money.
Um, the USA doesn't run the DNS system. It runs the .com, .edu, .mil, .gov and a few other domains. The DNS system is already decentralised, and different countries run their own domains, like .de for Germany, .uk for United Kingdom, .ch for China, and so on.
Also, I don't think you'd want the rest of the world to invent their own DNS system. That'd effectively isolate the USA from the rest of the world. It'd hurt the rest of the world a lot, but it'd hurt the USA more.
A minor nitpick: http and the World Wide Web was invented by Tim Berners-Lee in Switzerland.
I agree with your WW2 examples, but I'm not sure most of what the USA has done since then has been helpful.
I believe the Soviet Union fell because their system was unsustainable - they were basing their economy on agriculture and natural resources, they were incredibly inefficient, and they were very slow at adopting technological innovation. Eventually, people realised they were better off in a more western-style society, and used peaceful means to change into a democracy. The arms race with the USA may have hastened their economic decline, but on the other hand, giving the Soviet leaders an external enemy (the USA) may have helped them to divert people's miscontent.
USA:s invasion of Iraq caused terrorism to increase dramatically. Saddam had very little to do with terrorism (and nothing to do with 9/11), despite being an oppressive dictator to his own people. After the invasion, Iraq became a chaotic hotbed where terrorists could be recruited and trained. Using a flimsy pretext ("weapons of mass destruction"), sent the message to Middle Eastern countries that no one was safe from invasion. I think the invasion of Iraq has made the muslim world more hateful and fearful of the West, and the world a less safe place for all Westerners.
As for my own country (Sweden), we give 0.7% of our GDP as foreign aid. That's a percentage of the total economy, not of the state budget. We're one of the few countries which manages to fulfill the UN:s recommendations for foreign aid.
We've also contributed UN troops to Afghanistan, Kosovo, Somalia, Croatia, Liberia, Macedonia, Bosnia, and so on, despite having no interests in those conflicts. Our troops are of course very small compared to the USA:s, but we're only a country of 9 million people.
We also accept large numbers of political and war refugees - many of them from wars the USA has started, like Iraq and Afghanistan. Someone needs to take care of them after their homes become war zones.
But... But... But... Slashdot is hosted in the US!
Yes... for now.
Mua ha ha ha ha...
That's how it looked from a European perspective too - the copyright provisions were sneaked through the European Parliament by being decided by bureaucrats and lobbyists during the ACTA negotiations.
Democracy really doesn't work well in the EU (on the top level I mean; it may work well in individual member countries).
Petition is what you do in absence of a working democracy. It's the equivalent of going up to your lord and saying, "Please, sir, can you find it in your heart to right this wrong?" In a democracy, you complain publicly, or go to court and demand your right.
This:
When I was 14-15, I was accused of vandalizing a teachers house based solely on knowing who lived in the house that had been spray painted and TP'd as we drove by it on the bus in the morning. The judge in that case basically put me on house arrest and said I couldn't leave the house except for school unless a parent was with me the entire time.
It sounds like the judge based his decision on very flimsy evidence. It doesn't exactly teach kids to trust the system.
That's an extremely literal interpretation. Why would the judge bother to point out that losing his XBox "would show him what it was like to have something he valued taken from him", if it didn't have something to do with the crime he was accused of?
What reason is there to set the XBox as bail, except to teach the kid a lesson? Did the 13-year-old pose a flight risk? If he did flee, would he be likely to bring his XBox with him?
Being legally binding is a separate issue from the burden of proof. A written contract is legally binding, but if you can't prove who wrote the signature on it, it's not enforceable. Conversely, you may not be able to prove who clicked on the "I accept" button, but it's still legally binding in theory (so if, for example, someone testifies they saw you click it, the contract is enforceable).
What you're describing sounds pretty wrong to me.
Well, maybe the need is always there, but it's not that hard to suppress it.
Judges are required to follow procedure even before the actual trial, for example, when setting bail. Even if the kid gets his XBox back in a year or so, it's worrying when a judge confuses his personal feelings and personal sense of justice with the application of law.
Read the article before you start yelling at people for not understanding.
The point isn't that an XBox is being used as bail. The point is that the judge sets the bail to teach the accused a lesson:
The judge told the youth it would show him what it was like to have something he valued taken from him.
As you say, bail SHOULD be used to ensure someone turns up in court. Here, it is ACTUALLY being used by the judge to punish someone.
As I said, my own country provides a counter-example, since we don't convict people to make them suffer, and still have relatively low crime rates (the USA has unusually high crime rates for a rich, modern country).
Most victims and their families accept that criminals don't suffer. Having the crime recognised by society is more important. The need for revenge is largely a learned, cultural thing, not something universal.
You can talk all you want about "sex education being the answer" and ensuring easy access to birth control, but the fact remains that the only 100% effective form of birth control is not having sex in the first place.
But it's infinitely more efficient than keeping contraceptives from the kids and hoping they'll be abstinent. The facts of life are that a lot of teens will have sex whether they're allowed or not, and without sex ed and contraceptives they'll have unsafe sex instead.
Here in Sweden, teen pregnancies are a non-issue. The age of consent is 15, and from that age you can go to the public health care for contraceptives and/or counselling. And it doesn't make people particularly promiscuous; most still end up in monogamous long-term relationships, and many teens still choose to wait until they have sex.
That's pretty easy to accomplish with younger kids by simply not planting the seed in their head that it's even an option for them.
You can't hide from kids what sex is without raising them in a closet or on an isolated farm. They get the ideas from TV, books, friends, overheard conversations...
And the sexual feelings will still be there and lead to fantasies, touching oneself and ejaculations in your sleep. When you've had the sexual need without getting release for some time, you eventually figure out that stimulating certain parts of the body feels good. Children (even pre-pubescent children) can have sexual fantasies (even kinky sexual fantasies), without being taught about sexual situations, because they simply notice certain situations are sexually stimulating.
The sexual needs vary a lot between individuals, of course. In general, they're more insistent for boys than for girls.
I think your reasoning makes sense, but I don't agree with one of the assumptions.
Sexual depictions makes me want to have sex with someone, even if they are not my wife. I do not appreciate this.
Is this really true for most people? Sexual depictions make me want to get sexual release, but I have no trouble waiting until I get home to my partner, or solving the problem on my own. Besides, the really arousing sexual depictions I watch in my own home, where my partner is the closest available female.
In fact, if I'm aroused by a woman who is not my partner, pornography helps me get release *without* being unfaithful. And after the release, I'm not tempted anymore.
If one accepts the premise that there is a creator, and that there were certain people who violated his commands, and that said creator was enacting judgement on them, it begins to make sense to understand why the israelites were commanded to begin their conquest.
Yes, it makes sense, but only if the creator is petty and vengeful.
sorry, you might consider the wholesale slaughter of an entire race or nation as 'cleansing the promised holy land', I call it murder
That's not murder; that's genocide.
People don't need fantasies to engage in sex. The male need for sexual release is physical. If you don't get release through sex or masturbation, you eventually ejaculate in your sleep. Even if you don't look at a single dirty picture, hear a single dirty word, or consciously engage in a single dirty fantasy, your lust for sex will increase until just seeing a woman makes you think of sex. And for a pubescent male, this usually happens within a matter of days.
Pornography and fantasies help you get release without needing to engage in actual sex.
Now, if it really was The US vs The World, why do the counterpoints always come from a handful of places? Why don't we hear about the giant billboards of naked people from India, or China, or Mexico.
Ouch. You got me there. It's only a few countries which are civilised and have come far with gender equality which have a liberal view on sex.
Seriously. Respect for women and a liberal view on sex go hand in hand. It's no coincidence the countries where women wear burka so as not to arouse any men also are the ones where women are most repressed.
I mean, have you seen naked Europeans before? Either they look emaciated on the catwalk, or full of cellulite with hair under their arms.
I guess Europeans don't want women who look like children.
Children born out of wedlock are more likely to starve to death.
Unless you live in a civilised country, with social security.
If large guns and people willing to use them deterred criminals, there should be really little crime in places like Bosnia and Chechnya.
Yes, there are many borderline cases, but slander and libel are most definitely speech, so you could argue the Founding Fathers made a mistake when they didn't explicitly specify that there could be exceptions to freedom of speech.
In Europe, we have an explicit exception to free speech instead - states may apply restrictions to free speech which "are prescribed by law and are necessary in a democratic society". It's defined in the European Convention, and is interpreted by the European Court of Human Rights.
(The European Convention is a legal document, pre-dating the European Union, which defines human rights and which most European countries have ratified. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Article_10_of_the_European_Convention_on_Human_Rights)