Thank you very much--this is *precisely* the example I was hoping someone would feed me. Consider that you have a duty higher than that to family.
To be a silent witness to crime is to be an accomplice to it. In your example, your family member is the "worst criminal". Not someone whose "crime" you don't find to be particularly evil--"stealing" mp3s, or driving faster than the posted maximum speed. In your example, the crime to which you would be an accomplice is "the worst"--murder, rape, genocide--whatever it is, it's that thing that you find most morally repugnant. There are many ways you can address the issue. Turn them in to the police. Remove from them the ability to commit their crime--perhaps by having them committed under a physician's authority. Kill them and then turn yourself in to the police. It's up to you how you handle it--or fail to. And you'll be held accountable for that, too. There is a duty higher than that to family. Your duty here is very clear. It's just not *easy*.
You have moral priorities, whether you like it or not. When you can't please everybody, who do you please? The priorities I cited are fairly well known and quite successful at producing societies populated by generally happy people. But they're by no means the only ones. I can't comment on the priorities you proposed because you didn't propose any.
It's not really *that* complicated, and that, I believe is why you take issue. You know what you need to do; you just don't want to do it. It's a lot easier to debate away your duty with complicated BS than admit the simple truth that you *have* a duty. But if you must, take solace in the abundance of books, preachers, teachers, prophets, enablers, self-help gurus, lawyers, partners-in-crime, and a panorama of religions ready to convince you that whatever you want to do is the right thing to do.
tl/dr: It doesn't work if you put your country before your family or your family before God or your Country before your God. Volunteer to help your community. Help the schools. Feed the sick. Wash the feet of the poor. Who's stopping you? Do those things AFTER you take care of your family's needs. Anyone who looks out for their community BEFORE their family is dangerous to his community and his family.
God: Whether I believe in your God or a God is not relevant; this is just the phrasing of the idiom. This means "duty to self" to be morally correct--that is to say "maintaining myself as an instrument for good". Not as "looking out for number one"--(looking out for #1 is exactly the opposite!). It doesn't mean that I get to set myself up as a moral absolute and ignore everyone else's needs in order to satisfy my superiority. This comes first solely for the obvious practical reason that in order to do good, I must first be good or at least not particularly evil at that moment.
Family: Once this instrument of good exists, the first I must serve is my family. This needs no further explanation.
Country: A little thought tells me that I have a greater duty to those closer to than farther from me in this large community we call country. I cannot save the world. So I am responsible to do good where I can. I must help my neighbor before an arbitrary person on Earth (or off of it, I should be so lucky). That person has neighbors as well. In this area is of course Military Service, which also needs no explanation. My community's schools fall under the rough grouping of Country, more specifically somewhere between "Neighbors" and "any other sophonts in the universe" or "All God's kids" if you prefer.
Way after Family.
These priorities are in that order for a simple practical reason: The results of screwing up the order suck: History is full of examples: Good party members who rat out their family or neighbors for love of Country. A father who does things he knows are unethical in order to provide every luxury for his family. Nationalistically motivated genocide perpetrated by people who know *exactly* what "thou shalt not murder" means.
'Freedom of expression is given to people who stand up for what they’re saying and not hiding behind anonymity,'
Fuck you. It's a human right. Happens to be protected by our constitution, but that's not where it comes from either. You (Arianna Huffington) are a sanctimonious twit to sit there and dictate terms under which freedom of expression is "given".
Yes, it is. There's lists of criteria that help you recognize cults--read the lists and then go to a couple of meetings. Religion and cults are not bad per se. Just powerful social tools for making people do or be something other than what they are right now. Such tools can be used to do very, very bad things. But they can do good things, too.
So they're a cult. That's the point. I joined with full knowledge that these people are trying to brainwash me. Because that's what I wanted them to do. Help me reprogram my thinking because what I was doing wasn't working. I believed (yes, thats a "d' there) in it for the same reason anyone believes in anything. I chose to.
After a while, I didn't believe in it anymore. Character flaw I guess; after I'm around some BS for too long I can't believe in it anymore--even if I want to. Same thing happened when I tried a sales job. I kicked ass until it finally sunk in this was all cynical manipulation and made-up BS.
27 years later still clean and sober. AA helped me get that way. But when I was done believing I was done believing.
I go to a meeting from time to time; the fellowship is still there. But I don't believe the religion anymore. In life, if somebody asks for help, I'll share what I have experienced, and if I need help I'll ask for it. And if somebody wiser than me points out a character flaw I have, I'll take a look at it and maybe do something about it. I don't do this within AA because I don't hang out there. But I learned how to do these things in AA.
What's the point? None; I'm not trying to prove a point. Just thought somebody who'd actually been there should speak up.
Our household in Ohio depends on a private well for all our water, and it would surely be miserable if it got contaminated.
Just today, our dogs were freaking out because of the fracking machinery running on the neighbor's property. Poor Blanche just shivers and pants. It's better with her Thundershirt, though she's still fearful. And my wife told me she felt another earthquake this afternoon. She's from CA, so she knows earthquakes.
I guess we can live with all that, but you gotta have clean water! It's just such a relief to know that our well is safe.
I'm an EE, working for a small SI/contract house that's been in business since 1985. We're innundated with work right now--the problem is NOT finding contracts. It's finding qualified engineers that don't already have a gig. Still, the Clients remember the "bad economy" prices and believe those should persist. Our rates have not gone up in years.
At some level of management, the perception is that engineers and skilled trades are interchangeable commodities. The Client's argument seems to be that "There are 7 billion of us. Somewhere out there is a person with the exact skill set we need. We just have to find that person. Their services should cost no more than any other."
The Client must understand that if they want a specific skill set and aren't willing to "invest in people", they have to pay us to make the same investment. Most of us are permanent employees where I work. You don't pick up a random engineer on the street and find they're competent and have a good work ethic; those people have jobs already. Between gigs, you carry those folks so they're available when the next gig shows up. And when the work gets heavy, those people work a lot harder. To retain those folks, you have to pay them. This is "investing in people". At the end, the service we provide reflects that investment. Through a contract or as a direct employee, it still must be paid.
The current statement FTA is that the 5th protects you only from being forced to decrypt *A* hard drive. If you did that, you'd be saying in effect "that's my hard drive". In this case, the FBI says the figured out it was that guy's hard drive. The judge in this case has to say "OK, they know it's your hard drive; you lose nothing by providing the password now."
So, if you accept the current legal state that decrypting *your* hard drive is not protected, there is no protection for this guy.
Personally, I would have taken the simple "I'm not going to say anything because it might get me into trouble" as sort of the point of the 5th amendment, but that's not how the courts currently see it.
For common people, the rule seems to be that the *act* of supplying the documents (that is the decryption itself) is protected. But the documents themselves (that is the unencrypted data) *derived* from that act is NOT protected. http://www.ca11.uscourts.gov/opinions/ops/201112268.pdf
I'm guessing it's this part of it that protected him: "nor shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself"
There's no clause in the fifth amendment that says "...but if we have good evidence you're guilty, then you have to tell us what we need to know in order to get more evidence."
The police put you in a room and say "CONFESS", and you refuse. Judge says "that's right--you don't have to confess to anything. In fact, you don't have to say anything at all. You can remain silent." Later, the police find some evidence that suggests you really did something illegal. And really socially repulsive.
Judge thinks for 2 seconds and realizes "Who's going to defend a kiddy diddler? I can rule however I want against this guy and get almost no political backlash. But if I "defend the constitution", I'm a liberal judge letting a monster get away on a technicality." Not a difficult decision for a pragmatic public servant. "Let the beatings begin.".
First they came for the child rapists and I said nothing because everyone would think I was one, too.
Where in "Get yourself ready to go out there and live in the world and then go out there and live" did you find "Don't work, Don't Socialize"? There are appropriate places for many stages of recovery; I cited (and you quoted above) several of them.
There are people who are so new in recovery and have no healthy coping tools. A casual conversation or some slight frustration often quickly becomes too intense to handle and they act out their feelings or withdraw. They break down and cry, scream, pound their fists (on objects or people), pick fights, sleep (or don't sleep) for long periods. Inpatient treatment in hospitals or treatment centers provide a place where this behaviour is allowed, and managed safely while the patient develops the skills and healthy coping mechanisms they need. This sort of very protected environment is a temporary situation for all except the most severely mentally disabled. It is a transient condition only seen at the the very beginning of recovery.
"Splitting"--the all-or-nothing approach to which you allude is nothing more than resistance to recovery. Your attitude is common to people in recovery. They often fight the process. It's also not an appropriate attitude if you want to recover. Nobody expects a person to go directly from a severe injury back to full participation in society. Recovery is a process.
At later stages of recovery, when patients have acquired some tools in therapy and treatment, they may be able to go home--depending on what support network they have at home. Halfway houses also exist for the purpose of allowing a person to gradually re-enter society with a safe place to retreat if things get too tough.
Recovery is an ongoing process. A person may have years of recovery/sobriety/freedom from gambling--whatever you call it in your program--behind them, and still run across something that "sets them off" or "triggers old feelings". The healthy response to that is to call your sponsor, go to church, talk to your therapist, meditate, or whatever it is you do in your particular program.
A less healthy response would be to demand that the world wrap itself in Nerf so you don't bump your head on a corner. Enabling that attitude doesn't help the person in recovery; it slows them down. If you're doing it, stop.
It is a terrible thing that somebody has a traumatic experience. If you're walking on eggshells around that person, you're part of the problem.
PTSD represents a bona fide injury and needs to be treated. If you have an injury, the injury is almost always not your fault, but your recovery is absolutely your responsibility. In those cases where it is your fault (deliberate self-destructive behaviour), you have another problem, which is also not your fault. But dealing with it IS your responsibility! This is a practical, not a moral judgement--nobody can make you deal with your issues. There's truth to the old punchline "the light bulb has to want to change".
Because there is a behavioural component--sometimes including denial--in psychological injury, the injured person may need some external help to get them started. But, even in this case, the injured person is responsible for their own recovery.
Demanding that the world re-arrange itself so that you can continue in your injured condition is NOT dealing with your problem. Complying with such demands is--on a personal level--classic codependent enabling behaviour, and does not help anybody. "Codependency" is not meaningful on an institutional level. The harm to the injured person, whether enabled by an individual or an institution, is exactly the same.
Somebody fresh from their injury is likely to emotionally raw to "get out there". Stay in a safe place and work on your issues: Home. Halfway house. Hospital. Talk to your counsellor. Call your sponsor. Go to a meeting. Have a session with your psychologist. Pray. Meditate. Whatever your program for recovery is, work your program and get your life back. Get yourself ready to go out and live in the world, and then go out there and live.
Somebody who goes out into society and tells everyone "please don't talk about these things because it sets me off" is NOT dealing with their problem. Rather than doing the painful, humiliating and frightening work on themselves, they're assuming the role of director and staging the world to suit themselves.
Even if it would work for one person (it doesn't), there is more than one psychologically traumatized person in any given place. It's simply not practical to ban everything. "I was locked in a tiny room. If only there weren't all these closed windows, I wouldn't have panic attacks." "I was abandoned in a big train station. If only there weren't all these open doors and windows, I wouldn't have panic attacks." "I'm an alcoholic. If only there wasn't booze everywhere, I wouldn't get drunk." "I'm a compulsive gambler. If only there weren't internet cafes on every streetcorner, I wouldn't gamble." "I fought in a war. If only people wouldn't slam doors, I wouldn't have these flashbacks."
If only the world would re-arrange itself to suit my particular trauma, I could be comfortable in the world NOW, instead of after I've worked for my recovery.
When I tried to sell my RV, I ran across a scammer who tried to extort money from me by claiming "we had a verbal contract and you broke it". We didn't. I called lawyer I found in the yellow pages, explained the situation; he told me "You're fine; the guy is an idiot and you don't need my services." No charge.
Most won't charge you for the initial consult. Lawyers are professionals with a code of ethics. Most of them are decent human beings.
OK, if you're curious, I put it up for sale, some guy called and said he was interested, but never agreed on a price. Meanwhile I sold it to someone else. Called the first guy to tell him "You never agreed to my price or made me a counteroffer. Somebody else made me an offer, so I sold it to them." Seemed more polite than just not calling him back. At that point he told me "Oh, I've made all kinds of plans and bought all kinds of furniture that will only fit in that kind of RV. We had a verbal contract and you broke it and I'm out lots of money. At least a grand. But I'll take $250 and a sincere apology; otherwise I'm going to sue you." After talking to the lawyer, I told him "Fine take me to court. I called a lawyer and he says your complaint has no merit. If you found a lawyer to file this suit for you, give me his contact info & I'll pass it along." And that was about the end of it.
The obvious one--distraction. We're all talking about guns and not the economy, net neutrality, privacy, or other boring things we were all worried about last month. "They're taking our guns!" "You monster--you love your guns more than America's Children?!! It's blatant abuse of rhetoric but unfortunately, it works. Everybody already talks about this one. "They're distracting us from the real issues...The tail wags the dog...Don't you see you're being duped by the media? Why aren't they reporting the things that really matter?" This conversation is repetitive, boring, and fruitless.
The other manipulation here is more subtle. Guns are symbols of power. Note it's SYMBOLS here. The ritual reply "Oh, so you want to revolt against the government? You're a nut and besides, they'll beat you every time." is also misdirection.
It's not about the actual ability to defy the law. It's about the attitude that I might be able to define and defend my own freedom. But, if it's important enough to me, I might have a chance to say "no" and make it stick. I might win. I'll probably lose. But with this attitude, I might fight more often than I'll quietly crawl away.
If I've got a bunch of shotguns, a few pistols, and a rifle or two, I have the following internal dialogue: "I have the ability to kill people. But of course I wouldn't and don't do it unless it's appropriate. Like, say somebody trying to hurt me or my family. If they come to rob my house, I'll walk out the back door; I have insurance and it's not like they rob the place every day. If they did, I'd have to come up with another plan. But they don't.
Having considered those things and deciding what I will do in certain situations means something: I am making decisions about things that matter--my and other people's lives. I am using my own moral and practical conscience, as well as my awareness of the legal and social consequences of my action--or failure to take action. I am not following a strict procedure; I am responsible for the outcome here.
And I like this. I like it a lot. This personal decision making and personal accountability is much more interesting than living in a world where "that which is not mandatory is forbidden".
I might go further and demand that my public servants--those elected officials that work for the public, not the other way around!--are also held personally accountable for their actions. I might get the idea I should expect those public servants to hold accountable those persons that I can't personally call to explain their actions. Corporate "persons". Judges and police. Those with financial, military and political power. I might get the idea that we should all be accountable to each other. Not just the small people required to explain themselves to the big ones. I might get the idea that we are all equal.
THIS is what is meant by "...Sam Colt made them equal.". Not that the little guy will shoot the big guy because they both have a pistol. That the little guy has an attitude that he shouldn't have to crawl in front of the big guy.
I may never shoot a person or hunt another animal in my life. I have no particular desire to do so, but if I decide it's the appropriate thing to do, it is my decision and the consequences are mine as well.
Possessing "symbols" of power--and knowing that I can freely go out and acquire more of them gives me a certain attitude. An attitude which--were it present in a larger portion of the populace--would become inconvenient for those who wish to retain power only for themselves.
From the program in it, I guess it was a demo, not running anything.
I found it completely by accident by searching for the part number of one of the modules that happened to be in the chassis with the controller and the ethernet bridge. The ethernet bridge has its own web page which automatically displays the contents of the chassis, with links to the modules.
I added a controller-scoped tag to it called "ICanSeeYouFromTheInternet", and a tag description of "Please put your ENBT on a private network" A couple days later it was gone.
No, it's not. It's not even close to that. It's a plastic lower receiver with the rest of the gun being not plastic.
Actually, that's exactly what it is. The lower reciever is the "firearm" as far as BATF are concerned. The rest is just unregulated parts. So, if you want a gun, you have 3 (legal) choices
Run down to Dick's Sporting Goods, hand over your Visa, and (after satisfying all the regulatory burdens), walk out with your gun.
Wait for a gun show, find a random guy, swap cash and gun on the spot. More privacy, less convenience, no warranty.
Build your own. As long you're not transferring it to someone else this is (for the moment) perfectly legal.
The last option, as parent points out, is only safely available to a relatively small group of very skilled experts.
A "plastic gun"--more specifically a safe lower receiver which can reliably be manufactured with little special skills is significant. We are watching the development of a process and set of instructions that will make this available.
If Dawkins truly believes that religion will quietly tolerate being told it is wrong, he is an idiot. Well, he's not an idiot. He's trying to point out the absurdity of holding a point of view that takes offense at any question, challenge, or outright dispute. And that this type "offense" is fabricated to manipulate polite society and should be ignored.
There are such things as boundaries in human society, and while they're never absolute, there comes a point when one group extends the boundaries of its own propriety so far that there is no room for anyone else to exist--let alone coexist with a similarly absurdly broad set of boundaries. We can't all be pope.
Affected outrage is worn like a mask and used like a weapon to cow the rest of society to the will of an aggressive and dangerous few. It's not the responsibility of the rest of the world to tiptoe around a group of people who have subverted the natural human desire for social harmony. Nobody offended you; you chose to "take offense". Well, now you've taken it; you have it; enjoy it. This is your offense, not ours.
You don't get to "opt out" and believe something else on your own time. You're either with or you're against. The domain of God and His representatives on earth is absolute. "Heresy" is ANY teaching inconsistent with dogma. It doesn't matter who teaches it or to whom. Church member or not, challenging dogma is not only an insult, it's a crime.
In modern times, the power of the Church to prosecute heresy has decreased significantly. They grudgingly acknowledge the existence of other views, but VCII, Ecumenism, etc. are still controversial with a lot of people. "OK, sure, we don't have to convert all the ignorant savages. We tend get a lot of really dirty looks from folks when we do that, and besides, we can't enforce it anyway. So, in the spirit of God's love for all His children, we accept that all..." But make no mistake if the Church had the power to enforce canon law everywhere, they would. Manipulation of the secular law where canon law has lost dominion is an effective and efficient tool.
One can only imagine that another's religion, especially offshoots of the one into which one has been indoctrinated has similarly totalitarian views of dissention--by members of the church or by people in general. I invite their own apostates to speak for their religion's tolerance to heresy.
I worked as a contract controls engineer (still do), and did a lot of startups & commissioning gigs. I lived in a 40' 5th wheel, and enjoyed the flexibility. I could go from fully set up to fully set up within 24 hours. The flexibility made it a LOT easier for my employer to stick me into a gig, so the job security improved a lot.
The moves were not that often (every few months or so), so my employer hired an over-the-road truck to move the RV and I met them at the new site. It's cheaper than a week in a hotel, and WAY cheaper than paying to move an employee. As an out-of-town resource, I still received the same housing and M&IE per diems as any other contractor (see your federal regulations on that one; there's charts for every major metro & surrounding area). This pays for the site as well as repaying the cost of the investment in the RV. (Investment--a thing where you spend money and expect to make money with the thing you bought. Like a carpenter who buys a good set of tools.)
I worked a lot of automotive gigs and found that there was NEVER a gig more than about 1/2 hour from a full-time park with Winter sites. Generally if you stay for a few months, they will give you a big discount on the slot, esp. Winter. Only one site didn't have sewer hookup (it did have electric & water), and the honey wagon came by every week.
I met some really great people full-timing in an RV; there's a real community out there. I've never had a bad neighbor, and the good thing is if you do, you can always move! Also, I met my wife while full-timing. We lived together in that 5th wheel for 3 years, and if we had an argument, there was no avoiding an issue by stomping off to the other end of the house. We pretty much had to deal with it then and there!
Some suggestions You will need a "tax home" when you file your taxes and to maintain your driver license. If you qualify for residency in a state without income taxes, this is a good choice. If you move around a lot, get a forwarding mail service. This can also help with the item above. Personally, I used the post office of Mom & Dad. Every month or so they'd throw all my mail into a box & UPS it to me. If I needed something in a hurry, there was fax (ok, I guess it was a while ago...) and email.
If you plan to do this for a while, get a nice RV. If you live in rathole you will feel like a rat. If you buy the RV new, have it prewired for generator, satellite on the roof and cable in the side. I used sat & cable both when I was on the road; cable is better, but SAT is not so bad. After you've done it a couple of times you can point the dish in about 10 minutes. I never needed a generator, so I never bought one. RV generators are not cheap, they're noisy, and the take up a lot of space.
If you need AC, get more than the vendor says you need. The folks that sell them lie. On the days you need it you will be very glad you got it. Either a roof-mounted RV unit (or two) or a window unit. You have to reinstall the window unit every time you move, but it's a lot cheaper and works just as good.
Water in Winter Get some Raychem Frostex and heavy pipe insulation for your water hookup if you plan to Winter in a cold area. Dig out the water tap to below the frost line and run the heat trace and insulate. Buy a tankless water heater! I installed a precision temp RV-500, and believe me--a long hot shower in the middle of Winter is wonderful.
Heating in Winter Don't get the tile floor. They crack up and are cold as hell. Do buy some good thick house slippers. I think we had "Uggs" or a knockoff like them. Thick wool sheepskin slippers. RVs floors get cold in Winter; your feet will thank you. Keep a spare furnace motor on hand. The DC motor has carbon brushes which are a wear item. Once they're go, you need a new motor. And they die when it's cold. Get the double-insulated windows, or just cut some Plexi to size and cover the windows on the inside. It makes a significant difference in the temperature and your propane bill.
Of course "boobs" is specific to women. The homologous structures in men are known as "moobs".
There is no hex number that looks similar to "Moobs". From now on, all numbers must be represented as Unicode (it would not be politically correct to favor the character set used by any specific culture) where each 16-bit element specifies the text representation of the numerical value desired.
Who do you blame when it costs $75.00 to fill your gas tank? 71077345
Libel laws in the UK are very biased towards the prosecution. While RLP's tactics may offend your sense of fair play (they certainly do mine), what they're doing works much better in the UK than other commonwealth countries. Suing somebody for libel in the UK is a common tactic for people who know they have no case another jurisdiction--even when there is little or no justification for their preferred venue.
In UK libel law, RLP has a big stick with which to beat its critics. The Streisand effect may direct a few more folks to the consumer websites--I certainly checked them out. But I'll bet the degree to which RLP is going to get them to permanently back is worth a little transient negative publicity.
Slashdot Mirror
We could put a pod on top and shoot it into space.
Thank you very much--this is *precisely* the example I was hoping someone would feed me. Consider that you have a duty higher than that to family.
To be a silent witness to crime is to be an accomplice to it. In your example, your family member is the "worst criminal". Not someone whose "crime" you don't find to be particularly evil--"stealing" mp3s, or driving faster than the posted maximum speed. In your example, the crime to which you would be an accomplice is "the worst"--murder, rape, genocide--whatever it is, it's that thing that you find most morally repugnant.
There are many ways you can address the issue. Turn them in to the police. Remove from them the ability to commit their crime--perhaps by having them committed under a physician's authority. Kill them and then turn yourself in to the police. It's up to you how you handle it--or fail to. And you'll be held accountable for that, too.
There is a duty higher than that to family. Your duty here is very clear. It's just not *easy*.
You have moral priorities, whether you like it or not. When you can't please everybody, who do you please? The priorities I cited are fairly well known and quite successful at producing societies populated by generally happy people. But they're by no means the only ones. I can't comment on the priorities you proposed because you didn't propose any.
It's not really *that* complicated, and that, I believe is why you take issue. You know what you need to do; you just don't want to do it. It's a lot easier to debate away your duty with complicated BS than admit the simple truth that you *have* a duty. But if you must, take solace in the abundance of books, preachers, teachers, prophets, enablers, self-help gurus, lawyers, partners-in-crime, and a panorama of religions ready to convince you that whatever you want to do is the right thing to do.
tl/dr:
It doesn't work if you put your country before your family or your family before God or your Country before your God.
Volunteer to help your community. Help the schools. Feed the sick. Wash the feet of the poor. Who's stopping you? Do those things AFTER you take care of your family's needs. Anyone who looks out for their community BEFORE their family is dangerous to his community and his family.
God:
Whether I believe in your God or a God is not relevant; this is just the phrasing of the idiom.
This means "duty to self" to be morally correct--that is to say "maintaining myself as an instrument for good". Not as "looking out for number one"--(looking out for #1 is exactly the opposite!). It doesn't mean that I get to set myself up as a moral absolute and ignore everyone else's needs in order to satisfy my superiority. This comes first solely for the obvious practical reason that in order to do good, I must first be good or at least not particularly evil at that moment.
Family:
Once this instrument of good exists, the first I must serve is my family. This needs no further explanation.
Country:
A little thought tells me that I have a greater duty to those closer to than farther from me in this large community we call country. I cannot save the world. So I am responsible to do good where I can. I must help my neighbor before an arbitrary person on Earth (or off of it, I should be so lucky). That person has neighbors as well. In this area is of course Military Service, which also needs no explanation.
My community's schools fall under the rough grouping of Country, more specifically somewhere between "Neighbors" and "any other sophonts in the universe" or "All God's kids" if you prefer.
Way after Family.
These priorities are in that order for a simple practical reason: The results of screwing up the order suck:
History is full of examples: Good party members who rat out their family or neighbors for love of Country. A father who does things he knows are unethical in order to provide every luxury for his family. Nationalistically motivated genocide perpetrated by people who know *exactly* what "thou shalt not murder" means.
http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/right-to-read.html
Once your extreme views become fact, you're no longer a crackpot.
'Freedom of expression is given to people who stand up for what they’re saying and not hiding behind anonymity,'
Fuck you. It's a human right. Happens to be protected by our constitution, but that's not where it comes from either.
You (Arianna Huffington) are a sanctimonious twit to sit there and dictate terms under which freedom of expression is "given".
Yes, it is. There's lists of criteria that help you recognize cults--read the lists and then go to a couple of meetings.
Religion and cults are not bad per se. Just powerful social tools for making people do or be something other than what they are right now. Such tools can be used to do very, very bad things. But they can do good things, too.
So they're a cult. That's the point. I joined with full knowledge that these people are trying to brainwash me. Because that's what I wanted them to do. Help me reprogram my thinking because what I was doing wasn't working. I believed (yes, thats a "d' there) in it for the same reason anyone believes in anything. I chose to.
After a while, I didn't believe in it anymore. Character flaw I guess; after I'm around some BS for too long I can't believe in it anymore--even if I want to. Same thing happened when I tried a sales job. I kicked ass until it finally sunk in this was all cynical manipulation and made-up BS.
27 years later still clean and sober. AA helped me get that way. But when I was done believing I was done believing.
I go to a meeting from time to time; the fellowship is still there. But I don't believe the religion anymore. In life, if somebody asks for help, I'll share what I have experienced, and if I need help I'll ask for it. And if somebody wiser than me points out a character flaw I have, I'll take a look at it and maybe do something about it. I don't do this within AA because I don't hang out there. But I learned how to do these things in AA.
What's the point? None; I'm not trying to prove a point. Just thought somebody who'd actually been there should speak up.
Our household in Ohio depends on a private well for all our water, and it would surely be miserable if it got contaminated.
Just today, our dogs were freaking out because of the fracking machinery running on the neighbor's property.
Poor Blanche just shivers and pants. It's better with her Thundershirt, though she's still fearful.
And my wife told me she felt another earthquake this afternoon. She's from CA, so she knows earthquakes.
I guess we can live with all that, but you gotta have clean water! It's just such a relief to know that our well is safe.
as I was a 9-year old kid going through his tackle box before our fishing trip.
His answer "Fishermen".
I'm an EE, working for a small SI/contract house that's been in business since 1985.
We're innundated with work right now--the problem is NOT finding contracts. It's finding qualified engineers that don't already have a gig. Still, the Clients remember the "bad economy" prices and believe those should persist. Our rates have not gone up in years.
At some level of management, the perception is that engineers and skilled trades are interchangeable commodities.
The Client's argument seems to be that "There are 7 billion of us. Somewhere out there is a person with the exact skill set we need. We just have to find that person. Their services should cost no more than any other."
The Client must understand that if they want a specific skill set and aren't willing to "invest in people", they have to pay us to make the same investment. Most of us are permanent employees where I work. You don't pick up a random engineer on the street and find they're competent and have a good work ethic; those people have jobs already. Between gigs, you carry those folks so they're available when the next gig shows up. And when the work gets heavy, those people work a lot harder. To retain those folks, you have to pay them. This is "investing in people". At the end, the service we provide reflects that investment. Through a contract or as a direct employee, it still must be paid.
To follow up and clarify:
The current statement FTA is that the 5th protects you only from being forced to decrypt *A* hard drive. If you did that, you'd be saying in effect "that's my hard drive".
In this case, the FBI says the figured out it was that guy's hard drive.
The judge in this case has to say "OK, they know it's your hard drive; you lose nothing by providing the password now."
So, if you accept the current legal state that decrypting *your* hard drive is not protected, there is no protection for this guy.
Personally, I would have taken the simple "I'm not going to say anything because it might get me into trouble" as sort of the point of the 5th amendment, but that's not how the courts currently see it.
For common people, the rule seems to be that the *act* of supplying the documents (that is the decryption itself) is protected.
But the documents themselves (that is the unencrypted data) *derived* from that act is NOT protected.
http://www.ca11.uscourts.gov/opinions/ops/201112268.pdf
But, if you're a lawyer or politico, then the supplying of documents and the content of those documents are BOTH protected.
http://www.oyez.org/cases/1990-1999/1999/1999_99_166
EFF would like to see it go this way, too (good luck!)
http://www.eweek.com/c/a/Security/EFF-Claims-Encrypted-Password-is-Protected-Under-5th-Amendment-560879/
I'm guessing it's this part of it that protected him:
"nor shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself"
There's no clause in the fifth amendment that says "...but if we have good evidence you're guilty, then you have to tell us what we need to know in order to get more evidence."
The police put you in a room and say "CONFESS", and you refuse. Judge says "that's right--you don't have to confess to anything. In fact, you don't have to say anything at all. You can remain silent."
Later, the police find some evidence that suggests you really did something illegal. And really socially repulsive.
Judge thinks for 2 seconds and realizes "Who's going to defend a kiddy diddler? I can rule however I want against this guy and get almost no political backlash. But if I "defend the constitution", I'm a liberal judge letting a monster get away on a technicality." Not a difficult decision for a pragmatic public servant. "Let the beatings begin.".
First they came for the child rapists and I said nothing because everyone would think I was one, too.
Now, go look up the word "unenforcable".
Excellent Science fiction on many levels.
Takes a while to get started, but he really pulls it together.
Where in "Get yourself ready to go out there and live in the world and then go out there and live" did you find "Don't work, Don't Socialize"?
There are appropriate places for many stages of recovery; I cited (and you quoted above) several of them.
There are people who are so new in recovery and have no healthy coping tools. A casual conversation or some slight frustration often quickly becomes too intense to handle and they act out their feelings or withdraw. They break down and cry, scream, pound their fists (on objects or people), pick fights, sleep (or don't sleep) for long periods.
Inpatient treatment in hospitals or treatment centers provide a place where this behaviour is allowed, and managed safely while the patient develops the skills and healthy coping mechanisms they need. This sort of very protected environment is a temporary situation for all except the most severely mentally disabled. It is a transient condition only seen at the the very beginning of recovery.
"Splitting"--the all-or-nothing approach to which you allude is nothing more than resistance to recovery.
Your attitude is common to people in recovery. They often fight the process. It's also not an appropriate attitude if you want to recover.
Nobody expects a person to go directly from a severe injury back to full participation in society. Recovery is a process.
At later stages of recovery, when patients have acquired some tools in therapy and treatment, they may be able to go home--depending on what support network they have at home. Halfway houses also exist for the purpose of allowing a person to gradually re-enter society with a safe place to retreat if things get too tough.
Recovery is an ongoing process. A person may have years of recovery/sobriety/freedom from gambling--whatever you call it in your program--behind them, and still run across something that "sets them off" or "triggers old feelings".
The healthy response to that is to call your sponsor, go to church, talk to your therapist, meditate, or whatever it is you do in your particular program.
A less healthy response would be to demand that the world wrap itself in Nerf so you don't bump your head on a corner.
Enabling that attitude doesn't help the person in recovery; it slows them down. If you're doing it, stop.
It is a terrible thing that somebody has a traumatic experience.
If you're walking on eggshells around that person, you're part of the problem.
PTSD represents a bona fide injury and needs to be treated.
If you have an injury, the injury is almost always not your fault, but your recovery is absolutely your responsibility. In those cases where it is your fault (deliberate self-destructive behaviour), you have another problem, which is also not your fault. But dealing with it IS your responsibility!
This is a practical, not a moral judgement--nobody can make you deal with your issues. There's truth to the old punchline "the light bulb has to want to change".
Because there is a behavioural component--sometimes including denial--in psychological injury, the injured person may need some external help to get them started. But, even in this case, the injured person is responsible for their own recovery.
Demanding that the world re-arrange itself so that you can continue in your injured condition is NOT dealing with your problem.
Complying with such demands is--on a personal level--classic codependent enabling behaviour, and does not help anybody.
"Codependency" is not meaningful on an institutional level. The harm to the injured person, whether enabled by an individual or an institution, is exactly the same.
Somebody fresh from their injury is likely to emotionally raw to "get out there".
Stay in a safe place and work on your issues: Home. Halfway house. Hospital. Talk to your counsellor. Call your sponsor. Go to a meeting. Have a session with your psychologist. Pray. Meditate. Whatever your program for recovery is, work your program and get your life back. Get yourself ready to go out and live in the world, and then go out there and live.
Somebody who goes out into society and tells everyone "please don't talk about these things because it sets me off" is NOT dealing with their problem.
Rather than doing the painful, humiliating and frightening work on themselves, they're assuming the role of director and staging the world to suit themselves.
Even if it would work for one person (it doesn't), there is more than one psychologically traumatized person in any given place. It's simply not practical to ban everything.
"I was locked in a tiny room. If only there weren't all these closed windows, I wouldn't have panic attacks."
"I was abandoned in a big train station. If only there weren't all these open doors and windows, I wouldn't have panic attacks."
"I'm an alcoholic. If only there wasn't booze everywhere, I wouldn't get drunk."
"I'm a compulsive gambler. If only there weren't internet cafes on every streetcorner, I wouldn't gamble."
"I fought in a war. If only people wouldn't slam doors, I wouldn't have these flashbacks."
If only the world would re-arrange itself to suit my particular trauma, I could be comfortable in the world NOW, instead of after I've worked for my recovery.
When I tried to sell my RV, I ran across a scammer who tried to extort money from me by claiming "we had a verbal contract and you broke it".
We didn't. I called lawyer I found in the yellow pages, explained the situation; he told me "You're fine; the guy is an idiot and you don't need my services."
No charge.
Most won't charge you for the initial consult.
Lawyers are professionals with a code of ethics. Most of them are decent human beings.
OK, if you're curious, I put it up for sale, some guy called and said he was interested, but never agreed on a price.
Meanwhile I sold it to someone else.
Called the first guy to tell him "You never agreed to my price or made me a counteroffer. Somebody else made me an offer, so I sold it to them."
Seemed more polite than just not calling him back.
At that point he told me "Oh, I've made all kinds of plans and bought all kinds of furniture that will only fit in that kind of RV. We had a verbal contract and you broke it and I'm out lots of money. At least a grand. But I'll take $250 and a sincere apology; otherwise I'm going to sue you."
After talking to the lawyer, I told him "Fine take me to court. I called a lawyer and he says your complaint has no merit. If you found a lawyer to file this suit for you, give me his contact info & I'll pass it along."
And that was about the end of it.
Well, they did say *almost*.
The obvious one--distraction. We're all talking about guns and not the economy, net neutrality, privacy, or other boring things we were all worried about last month. "They're taking our guns!" "You monster--you love your guns more than America's Children?!!
It's blatant abuse of rhetoric but unfortunately, it works.
Everybody already talks about this one. "They're distracting us from the real issues...The tail wags the dog...Don't you see you're being duped by the media? Why aren't they reporting the things that really matter?" This conversation is repetitive, boring, and fruitless.
The other manipulation here is more subtle.
Guns are symbols of power. Note it's SYMBOLS here.
The ritual reply "Oh, so you want to revolt against the government? You're a nut and besides, they'll beat you every time." is also misdirection.
It's not about the actual ability to defy the law. It's about the attitude that I might be able to define and defend my own freedom. But, if it's important enough to me, I might have a chance to say "no" and make it stick. I might win. I'll probably lose. But with this attitude, I might fight more often than I'll quietly crawl away.
If I've got a bunch of shotguns, a few pistols, and a rifle or two, I have the following internal dialogue:
"I have the ability to kill people. But of course I wouldn't and don't do it unless it's appropriate. Like, say somebody trying to hurt me or my family.
If they come to rob my house, I'll walk out the back door; I have insurance and it's not like they rob the place every day. If they did, I'd have to come up with another plan. But they don't.
Having considered those things and deciding what I will do in certain situations means something:
I am making decisions about things that matter--my and other people's lives.
I am using my own moral and practical conscience, as well as my awareness of the legal and social consequences of my action--or failure to take action.
I am not following a strict procedure; I am responsible for the outcome here.
And I like this. I like it a lot.
This personal decision making and personal accountability is much more interesting than living in a world where "that which is not mandatory is forbidden".
I might go further and demand that my public servants--those elected officials that work for the public, not the other way around!--are also held personally accountable for their actions.
I might get the idea I should expect those public servants to hold accountable those persons that I can't personally call to explain their actions. Corporate "persons". Judges and police. Those with financial, military and political power.
I might get the idea that we should all be accountable to each other. Not just the small people required to explain themselves to the big ones.
I might get the idea that we are all equal.
THIS is what is meant by "...Sam Colt made them equal.". Not that the little guy will shoot the big guy because they both have a pistol.
That the little guy has an attitude that he shouldn't have to crawl in front of the big guy.
I may never shoot a person or hunt another animal in my life.
I have no particular desire to do so, but if I decide it's the appropriate thing to do, it is my decision and the consequences are mine as well.
Possessing "symbols" of power--and knowing that I can freely go out and acquire more of them gives me a certain attitude.
An attitude which--were it present in a larger portion of the populace--would become inconvenient for those who wish to retain power only for themselves.
From the program in it, I guess it was a demo, not running anything.
I found it completely by accident by searching for the part number of one of the modules that happened to be in the chassis with the controller and the ethernet bridge. The ethernet bridge has its own web page which automatically displays the contents of the chassis, with links to the modules.
I added a controller-scoped tag to it called "ICanSeeYouFromTheInternet", and a tag description of "Please put your ENBT on a private network"
A couple days later it was gone.
And hey, it's a plastic gun.
No, it's not. It's not even close to that. It's a plastic lower receiver with the rest of the gun being not plastic.
Actually, that's exactly what it is.
The lower reciever is the "firearm" as far as BATF are concerned. The rest is just unregulated parts.
So, if you want a gun, you have 3 (legal) choices
Run down to Dick's Sporting Goods, hand over your Visa, and (after satisfying all the regulatory burdens), walk out with your gun.
Wait for a gun show, find a random guy, swap cash and gun on the spot. More privacy, less convenience, no warranty.
Build your own. As long you're not transferring it to someone else this is (for the moment) perfectly legal.
The last option, as parent points out, is only safely available to a relatively small group of very skilled experts.
A "plastic gun"--more specifically a safe lower receiver which can reliably be manufactured with little special skills is significant.
We are watching the development of a process and set of instructions that will make this available.
I think we're about to see some very interesting (and fun) developments in firearms design.
Some folks hear "Holy cow--people could do anything " as a joyful expression of individual freedom.
Some folks hear it as a threat that must be curtailed at all costs
If Dawkins truly believes that religion will quietly tolerate being told it is wrong, he is an idiot.
Well, he's not an idiot. He's trying to point out the absurdity of holding a point of view that takes offense at any question, challenge, or outright dispute. And that this type "offense" is fabricated to manipulate polite society and should be ignored.
There are such things as boundaries in human society, and while they're never absolute, there comes a point when one group extends the boundaries of its own propriety so far that there is no room for anyone else to exist--let alone coexist with a similarly absurdly broad set of boundaries. We can't all be pope.
Affected outrage is worn like a mask and used like a weapon to cow the rest of society to the will of an aggressive and dangerous few.
It's not the responsibility of the rest of the world to tiptoe around a group of people who have subverted the natural human desire for social harmony. Nobody offended you; you chose to "take offense". Well, now you've taken it; you have it; enjoy it. This is your offense, not ours.
To cite examples from the religion into which I have been indoctrinated:
Whoever is not with me is against me, and whoever does not gather with me scatters.
Whoever causes one of these little ones who believe in me to sin, it would be better for him to have a great millstone hung around his neck and to be drowned in the depths of the sea
You don't get to "opt out" and believe something else on your own time. You're either with or you're against. The domain of God and His representatives on earth is absolute. "Heresy" is ANY teaching inconsistent with dogma. It doesn't matter who teaches it or to whom. Church member or not, challenging dogma is not only an insult, it's a crime.
In modern times, the power of the Church to prosecute heresy has decreased significantly. They grudgingly acknowledge the existence of other views, but VCII, Ecumenism, etc. are still controversial with a lot of people. "OK, sure, we don't have to convert all the ignorant savages. We tend get a lot of really dirty looks from folks when we do that, and besides, we can't enforce it anyway. So, in the spirit of God's love for all His children, we accept that all..." But make no mistake if the Church had the power to enforce canon law everywhere, they would. Manipulation of the secular law where canon law has lost dominion is an effective and efficient tool.
One can only imagine that another's religion, especially offshoots of the one into which one has been indoctrinated has similarly totalitarian views of dissention--by members of the church or by people in general. I invite their own apostates to speak for their religion's tolerance to heresy.
I worked as a contract controls engineer (still do), and did a lot of startups & commissioning gigs.
I lived in a 40' 5th wheel, and enjoyed the flexibility. I could go from fully set up to fully set up within 24 hours. The flexibility made it a LOT easier for my employer to stick me into a gig, so the job security improved a lot.
The moves were not that often (every few months or so), so my employer hired an over-the-road truck to move the RV and I met them at the new site. It's cheaper than a week in a hotel, and WAY cheaper than paying to move an employee.
As an out-of-town resource, I still received the same housing and M&IE per diems as any other contractor (see your federal regulations on that one; there's charts for every major metro & surrounding area). This pays for the site as well as repaying the cost of the investment in the RV. (Investment--a thing where you spend money and expect to make money with the thing you bought. Like a carpenter who buys a good set of tools.)
I worked a lot of automotive gigs and found that there was NEVER a gig more than about 1/2 hour from a full-time park with Winter sites. Generally if you stay for a few months, they will give you a big discount on the slot, esp. Winter. Only one site didn't have sewer hookup (it did have electric & water), and the honey wagon came by every week.
I met some really great people full-timing in an RV; there's a real community out there. I've never had a bad neighbor, and the good thing is if you do, you can always move! Also, I met my wife while full-timing. We lived together in that 5th wheel for 3 years, and if we had an argument, there was no avoiding an issue by stomping off to the other end of the house. We pretty much had to deal with it then and there!
Some suggestions
You will need a "tax home" when you file your taxes and to maintain your driver license. If you qualify for residency in a state without income taxes, this is a good choice. If you move around a lot, get a forwarding mail service. This can also help with the item above. Personally, I used the post office of Mom & Dad. Every month or so they'd throw all my mail into a box & UPS it to me. If I needed something in a hurry, there was fax (ok, I guess it was a while ago...) and email.
If you plan to do this for a while, get a nice RV. If you live in rathole you will feel like a rat.
If you buy the RV new, have it prewired for generator, satellite on the roof and cable in the side. I used sat & cable both when I was on the road; cable is better, but SAT is not so bad. After you've done it a couple of times you can point the dish in about 10 minutes. I never needed a generator, so I never bought one. RV generators are not cheap, they're noisy, and the take up a lot of space.
If you need AC, get more than the vendor says you need. The folks that sell them lie. On the days you need it you will be very glad you got it. Either a roof-mounted RV unit (or two) or a window unit. You have to reinstall the window unit every time you move, but it's a lot cheaper and works just as good.
Water in Winter
Get some Raychem Frostex and heavy pipe insulation for your water hookup if you plan to Winter in a cold area. Dig out the water tap to below the frost line and run the heat trace and insulate. Buy a tankless water heater! I installed a precision temp RV-500, and believe me--a long hot shower in the middle of Winter is wonderful.
Heating in Winter
Don't get the tile floor. They crack up and are cold as hell. Do buy some good thick house slippers. I think we had "Uggs" or a knockoff like them. Thick wool sheepskin slippers. RVs floors get cold in Winter; your feet will thank you. Keep a spare furnace motor on hand. The DC motor has carbon brushes which are a wear item. Once they're go, you need a new motor. And they die when it's cold. Get the double-insulated windows, or just cut some Plexi to size and cover the windows on the inside. It makes a significant difference in the temperature and your propane bill.
Of course "boobs" is specific to women. The homologous structures in men are known as "moobs".
There is no hex number that looks similar to "Moobs".
From now on, all numbers must be represented as Unicode (it would not be politically correct to favor the character set used by any specific culture) where each 16-bit element specifies the text representation of the numerical value desired.
Who do you blame when it costs $75.00 to fill your gas tank? 71077345
Libel laws in the UK are very biased towards the prosecution.
While RLP's tactics may offend your sense of fair play (they certainly do mine), what they're doing works much better in the UK than other commonwealth countries. Suing somebody for libel in the UK is a common tactic for people who know they have no case another jurisdiction--even when there is little or no justification for their preferred venue.
In UK libel law, RLP has a big stick with which to beat its critics. The Streisand effect may direct a few more folks to the consumer websites--I certainly checked them out.
But I'll bet the degree to which RLP is going to get them to permanently back is worth a little transient negative publicity.
In a few months, I expect the trees will be filled with underwear.