You appear to be conflating conservative with Republican, but the two are not interchangeable, particularly with respect to the administration that just left office. There are plenty of conservatives that took issue with the warrantless wiretapping because it represented exactly the sort of governmental encroachment into private life that their ideology opposes.
That's the thing that amazes me. It's not like this is unknown territory. That sort of governmental encroachment (and its ten million justifications) has been tried, repeatedly, throughout history. The result has always been the same. It has always been an utter failure and led to some of the most egregious examples of evil in all of history. At what point can we, as one people, recognize together that this is a failed idea and that trying harder to implement it won't change that?
While companies such as Apple and Amazon have finally moved to music download services free of copy protection, MSN Mobile locks tracks to the mobile handset they are downloaded to. It also charges more than the other services per track, and offers no way to transfer your tracks to your new phone when you upgrade.
This is why it contradicts itself. If [A] piracy is a problem (represents lost sales, etc.) and [B] DRM is the correct response to this problem, then it does not follow that a system using a rather strict form of DRM would charge more per track. If anything, this should make their prices cheaper, especially considering that the non-transferrability would cause some repeat purchases with no additional expenses incurred by the seller.
The company's Head of Mobile UK spoke to PC Pro about the launch, but his answers are almost as baffling as the service itself. Best quote: Q: "If I buy these songs on your service â" and they're locked to my phone â" what happens when I upgrade my phone in six months' time?" A: "Well, I think you know the answer to that.""
He is being unusually honest about this, although I don't think that's courage on his part but rather a reliance on the apathy of the average customer.
It would be alright even if you never responded although I like that you did. I replied to you not for a response or for any other reason but because it was my joy to do so.
Thank you so much for taking the trouble to reply so eloquently.
Eloquence takes care of itself all by itself effortlessly when it's not you who's trying to do anything.
I am quite curious what that experience was that you refer to.
The only problem with explaining it is that especially in my case, it's going to sound very much like a more common thing that people think they know even though it happened in a radically different spirit. Understand that correctly and you'll see why it is that before this happened, I would make the mistake of getting stuck on the person or thing (the desire thereof) that otherwise could have led the way to this realization. Understand that incorrectly and you'll swear you correctly understand it but you'll think it's like something more mundane, about "stuff" and "storylines" and "participants" and you won't see the wonderful intuitive simplicity of it all. Let's say it was perfectly custom-tailored in every way to reach me and to have the effect that it had, and therefore it may be rather different for other people. That's why I don't think it's effective to go into details about it. If it resulted in someone trying to recreate my precise experience instead of being open to their own, whatever form that may take, then it would only pose a stumbling block. So, my intent here was to bear witness that this can and does indeed happen, that it is real. Lots of people don't even have a sudden conversion experience like I did. I tend to learn things (anything) by epiphanies so perhaps that better suited my temperament, but plenty of others steadily gain understanding over time until they come to the same place. It's all about what "you" "want" in a matter of speaking, except it's not really "you" and it's not a conscious desire or "want" but more like water seeking its own level in order to bring completion.
I found your response quite fulfilling in and of itself, and I genuinely appreciate your time. I've realized lately that not everyone thinks like you and I.
How different that was for me! Being reminded every day of how most people think used to cause me a great deal of suffering. Of course, that's a manner of speaking. It was my incorrect response to it (hatred-anger-fear-control-ego) that made me suffer because I did not love those people; in fact at the time I had no idea what love really was although I thought I did. It was my judgment and resentment and condemnation, produced by me who did not know better and aimed at they who also did not know better, that produced a good deal of misery because I was familiar with the words but did not really know what discernment and love and compassion are. If you are just discovering how most of the world really is, know that it's an ugly thing and that you must beware of the allure of ever judging them (because there's a judgment on your judgment, that is, by so doing you become like what you judge) or resenting them or even getting remotely upset for any reason, no matter how easily justified. The remedy is to genuinely love them to where you can see how ugly and wrong all of the things are that they do, and still have compassion for their ignorance and want something so much better than that for them. Only then do you have a hope of showing them something better, or if they will not listen, only then do you have a hope of rising and walking away and lovingly allowing them all the time and space they need to come to their own realization or to choose not to.
however, I still think you've read some books:-)
Certainly. Books are something I have always liked very
i'm not out to flame you here, I really am interested in what text/video/otherwise could convince a member of the stalwart and cynical slashdot crowd to behave in this way.
I will try and address what I perceive as the real nature of this question. The first thing I should tell you is that understanding all of this is incredibly childishly simple and intuitive, but explaining it with words is not. So, I will do what I can and if an analogy I give is not quite perfect, I ask that you put that aside and try to see the picture that I am painting instead of the pixels or brush-strokes of which it is composed.
If the Slashdot crowd or anyone else is stalwart and cynical it's because they are choosing to be. The more miserable they become because of that the more they will value and appreciate love when they find out that it's not a feeling and it's nothing like what they thought it was. Make no mistake, "miserable" is where cynicism leads, it cannot be otherwise because it's a re-action to negativity -- can you see how simple that is? So long as a person is re-acting they will be a slave to cause and effect. I had a notion like that when I chose this username, in fact, though I didn't know what to do about it at that time.
As to the source of all the negativity and misery, what you are dealing with here are vast impersonal forces that live and act through human beings. It is to thoughts what viruses are to DNA. Just as a biological virus isn't quite "alive" until it infects and takes over a host, so too these thought-forces are parasites with no real life of their own. Religions have different names for them; "powers and principalities" is probably most familiar to you. So, why is a biological virus effective? Because it compromises the cell to the point that the cell's "machinery" (for lack of a better word) cannot "tell the difference" between what the cell would normally do and what the virus is programming it to do.
Likewise, most people are not really themselves. They are compromised. They are filled with ideas and ways of being that are not the product of a careful consideration of all available options. That is, they do not know that this is a choice. The aberration begins when you allow yourself to get upset with people or to resent people. Discernment means that you can see the wrong that people do, call it what it is, and still truly love them and want something so much better than that for them. Judgment means that you see the wrong that people do and you hate them for it; hatred-fear is what resentment and anger actually is, why those are destructive forces. You feel that in comparison to that person's wrong you are much righter (ego) and so equanimity-compassion is the first loss. When that happens, a transferrance takes place. You yourself become an angry, resentful person when you do this (it cannot be otherwise because this entire process is the opposite of love and grace) and what happens next? You get angry and upset with other people and instead of correcting them with truth and love, or allowing them to find their own way, you demean them with judgment and the need to feel right and this tempts them to judge you (it's ego playing God). If they do, they then take on that same nature and so the cycle iterates.
But what has actually happened here? An abstract non-material entity has travelled through individual human beings just as surely as an ocean wave travels through individual water molecules. It works because each person involved identifies with this entity instead of seeing it as an invasive alien force and so they believe that it is their anger and their thoughts and their temptations when of course it is not (just as a cell cannot tell that those "commands" are coming from the biological virus). You can look at some of the most ignorant people who do some of the greatest damage to human joy and for all of them, you can say "if they really knew what they were doing, they wouldn't." Demons aren't red-
It's well known for all his failings Bush has made this the smoothest presidential transition in US history.
Wait, what? That's a wide net to throw. For instance, look at the transition from Washington to Adams. It was smooth as silk.
and had an "enlightened" staff who vandalized their own offices -- the offices paid for with my tax money -- out of spite.
Actually, Bush's own press secretary (Ari Flichter) discredited with those allegations in the briefing room and in his book.
George Washington's contribution to history is really amazing. He could have been a king or a dictator and he would have found great acceptance in that role. Instead, he was not tempted by power and he gladly renounced it for the greater good and edification of all. To my knowledge, he is the only person in history who ever provided such a great example.
I think this is the best post I've read here... like ever.
It's unfortunate that pointing these things out can make people sound like some new-age weirdo hippy. From my experiences it's truth. I'm very happy with my life and I think it has much to do with me realizing a lot of what the parent spoke of here.
Unless it doesn't... in which case, nevermind...
Haha that's a beautiful way to put it. I especially enjoyed the "Unless it doesn't" part! But really, you are onto something and you knew that before I said it. The only thing I would add is that there is something like a "prime directive" when it comes to the path of development of other beings. Not because you could interfere with their growth and it would be wrong or counterproductive (and you really cannot -- all it would do is create conflict and puff up that person's wrong ideas), but because they really do need to come to their own understanding (and yes this is worth it). So, if a person has a need to dismiss and to name-call, be it "new-age weirdo hippy" or anything else, it really is okay. If they don't see the irony of taking age-old ideas and likening them to recent things like the New Age Movement or hippies, that's okay too, although I'd prefer they share my mirth at seeing it.
What happened to me could be called a conversion experience, although I am very cautious about using words that, while true, also happen to be "church words" with a lot of baggage attached to them. The amazing thing about religions is that they have all the basic concepts and they don't understand them because love is not something you can institutionalize. I don't mean anything I say here in any sort of a religious way and this is not intended to reflect any such framework (real freedom is free from that, too). What I am saying here is much simpler than all of that. I had an experience that was good and pure and wholesome that truly satisfied me to my very soul in a way that I wasn't so sure was even possible. There was no desire or lust or craving or attachment and there was no need to control. The mistake I made in the past was that I would come close to that level of experience but then I would want to "have" or control whatever the person or thing was that I thought was producing the experience (that desire to have is nothing more than ego). I realized that what I experienced was true, pure, agape love and that this is actual reality. That is, this love is not for any reason and it is not for no reason either, it is our real and true nature. It really is what all people and all things ultimately are and always have been. That wonderful conversion experience was a finger pointing to the heavens above and all it takes is just one time of not getting caught up in looking at the finger. I felt like I was and am falling in love with all of creation with absolutely no exceptions. This is so far beyond what the intellect alone can arrive at that you come to see what a limited tool intellect really is.
An amazing part of this is that once you give up your will to control and realize that the only thing your will can do is get upset, everything takes care of itself, effortlessly. You know what to say and what to do because there is no "you" who is doing it. You don't think about what you are going to say next or plan outcomes; you "find" or "observe" yourself doing it and it works. Something like the way there is no actual "society" but it's an artificial construct and only the individuals who compose it have real feelings, your concept of yourself is also an artificial construct and only the nature of love that composes it is real. It's like we did the separation thing so thoroughly well that we forgot the oneness from which it came and that is the primary ignorance. I suppose you could arrive at this understanding through esoteric knowledge and philosophy but that's really going about it the hard way. You find this great inexhaustible love that changes everything by showing you what everything always was, and all of the knowledge and understanding you could ever want will come effortlessly. It's just like Bill Hicks said in my sig, there really is one consciousness that is experiencing itself subjectively.
When you see that this is actual reality you wonder if maybe the whole problem before was your inability to believe. When you find the real love, it is so much better than anything you ever thought was possible or even dared to dream could be possible. Even if you thought you did, you really had no idea that anything so wonderful could exist or that it could "happen to you" (in a manner of speaking). You cannot help but to wish for all beings to drop their illusions (which are real enough until you understand them) and come to this realization, even though you know that they are and always have been doing that and that they must come to it at their own pace and in the fullness of their own time.
I assume you care cause you posted it. If you didnt care, you wouldnt have.
Text blocks are damn near unreadable due to lack of double space. It looked interesting, but when text sort of floats back and forth, I just quit reading.
And I wasnt trying to be trollish or funny. Im not really in that kind of mood right now:P though, I am a troll.
I care (a rather misunderstood word or perhaps a less precise one) for the pure joy of caring and for no other reason, that is, not to accomplish or obtain anything. That's what pure motive is and a side-effect of it is that effort no longer feels like work. It is with no expectation of outcome because the more accurate word for that is desire to control and it's utterly counterproductive and very good at creating misery and needless conflict. That's why I'm not disappointed and learning that I may have done better is not a failure (and why even if you wrote a post that blatantly intended to piss me off, it wouldn't). Likewise, I posted it for the joy of doing it. This is what I mean when I say that things like logic and reason are limited tools that have their uses. The problem is like that saying about having only a hammer and thinking everything is a nail. There are purposes other than reasoned justifications that don't weaken you and your well-being by creating a needless vulnerability to outcome, and believe me, things are much better and more beautiful this way.
Try paragraphs next time. I heard they improve readability.
The truly funny part is that if a (probably valid) stylistic objection is all you got from what I expressed, you probably believe that this is my loss or that I should feel like I failed to reach you in some way. Or maybe you believe that I will see your reply and get upset in any way, however slight, which is also pretty funny. You will learn whatever or be reached by whomever the moment you care to be and not a second before. The best things I try to explain, however well or however poorly, are always "to whom it may concern" and I don't think I'd have that any other way. This is because freedom is something I cherish and your freedom to make silly posts is part of that. If you do that knowing it's silly, well then that's even better!
I've written my fair share of trollish posts, though I generally do that as Anonymous Coward. If I then could not handle the same, I'd feel like I really should do something about that and that I'm not qualified to talk to anyone about truth and love until I did. I am grateful that this is not the case. I'm also grateful to you because this gave me a laugh, however it was intended, and those are always welcome.
My less mundane answer to you has to do with realizing that there is no such thing as chance, coincident, or accident and that you have problems because you need the things you gain by solving them.
Ah, so the imposition of reaganomics, deregulation, and FTAs which led to this meltdown are my problems and i need to solve them eh? where's my time machine and my gun.. oh wait.
It is not needless suffering and the Universe is not a sadistic place
you're absolutely right, the universe is not a sadistic place, the world however is ruled by the most corrupt people imaginable, and they are sadistic.
The rest is a question of philosophy, but if you are willing to let people believe the ideas spread by those who are corrupt are right then be prepared to be crushed by the laws (or lack thereof) which result. Prime examples of the product of this are:
-the credit crunch
-healthcare crisis
-lawsuits against 80 year olds, dead people, college kids, and single moms
-hens placed under full regulatory control of foxes (tech + dmca + MAFIAA)
-"competition in the labor market" (otherwise known as firing people and moving their jobs where pesky labor standards and human rights wont get in the way)
and much, much more.
All of those things are an aggregate or collective expression of what I was referring to earlier on an individual level. You have your problems because you need what you gain by solving them, and likewise society has its problems because society needs what it gains by solving them. This will be true so long as we keep mistaking conformity for real unity and oneness. That is, there is not truly an entity called "society", it is an artificial construct, but as long as we believe in the reality of this construct we will do whatever is necessary to give reality to it, such as declaring that this is Nation A and this over here is Nation B and creating armies so that there can be contests over which one controls the other. A person who misunderstands what I just said will believe that a one-world government is the solution, but if you're sharp you would recognize that as a refinement of the problem, a reiteration of the same failed ideas on a larger scale with nothing really new about it. Again I refer to Bill Hicks when he said "You know evolution did not just end with us growing thumbs. You see, the reason why things are so fucked up right now is because we are undergoing evolution. The reason why our institutions are crumbling is because they're no longer relevant. Yes, they are no longer relevant". I would add that we have built our systems and institutions on unsound ideas. Unsound ideas are inherently unstable and so it is only a question of time before they fail and crumble. This is why such things as nations and markets have what can be called life expectancies. They are about dominance and control and acquisition instead of being about harmony and balance and joy. The amazing thing is that they last as long as they do before they decay, that the system can take that much damage before it finally does fail. This is a good thing, however. That is, that flawed ideas always inevitably fail is a great thing. Love and harmony and truth is the only answer. Not because they are more desirable or because there is some hierarchy in which they are found to be superior, but because every other answer doesn't work. The fact that everything is getting more global which makes the damage so much more severe and widespread just means that if we do not willingly decide that there is a better way, the misery that is coming (you have not yet seen the beginning of it) is going to light a fire under our ass, so to speak, that will require us to look for new solutions that have not been tried before and to discover new values that did not matter to us before. What is at stake here is so precious that it really is worth all of this, but you really have to see that for yourself and even if you were incli
let me know when joy and fulfillment pay for food, shelter, water, and medical care.
The idea that someone in the second camp won't suffer because of this behavior is beyond naive in the context of a world in which money is required to live.
I'm talking about the kind of understanding that makes one more able to take care of things like food, shelter, water, and medicine (everything, really). It is plainly about not getting in your own way by unknowingly entering into arrangements that weaken you and give you less control (to call it that, anyway) over your own life. Someone who understands what I am getting at is much more (not less) equipped to deal with basic needs and to handle difficulties and problems that may arise without making them worse than they need to be by responding to them incorrectly. This is my mundane answer to you.
My less mundane answer to you has to do with realizing that there is no such thing as chance, coincident, or accident and that you have problems because you need the things you gain by solving them. It is not needless suffering and the Universe is not a sadistic place that just wants to watch you squirm and it is not indifferent either, or to put that another way it is indifferent for a purpose. That's not really something you can just tell someone, they have to see that for themselves. The best you can do is hint at it; you cannot prove it with a system of logic or reason so that the other person is forced to concede that you must be right. Part of this is realizing that those things (logic, etc) have their purpose but that they are tools and they are only a few tools of many and that they are some of the most mundane and limited tools available. The exclusive use of only these tools of understanding is the product of what you might call an obsession with consensus and a need to establish it. There is so much more to life than those things that people believe they understand because they know the words for them. I don't expect you to agree with that and that's alright. This is coming from a place of not having to prove anything to anyone but rather, offering ideas to minds that are willing to entertain them without a need for someone to be right and someone to be wrong. If your reaction is to read this and scoff or dismiss or continue to argue, that's alright too, though I hope you understand that I cannot sincerely join you.
Whether "nice" finishes last depends on your understanding of "nice". The more common usage is a people-pleaser who means well but cannot help operating out of a position of weakness because he thinks that happiness and fulfillment and completion come from other people (i.e. their approval and acceptance). To take on this nature is to be a leaf in the wind, always at the mercy of other people who themselves do not (yet) see their beliefs and full actions (with no exceptions) as choices. This is actually a form of slavery and it works because ignorance of the higher way prevents people from seeing that it is bondage. This idea taken to its full expression is unfortunately what most people think love is, when in reality its most healthy expression (which is still enslaving) is nothing more than a mutually agreed trade like those found in any market ("you're nice to me so I am nice to you").
The less common usage is well beyond mere courtesy and is more like an act of love. This is a person who has kindness and compassion for its own sake because cultivating these is pure joy. When you have this, there is no concern for outcomes or results because you realize that all of us are equal and must come to our own understanding at our own pace and in the fullness of our own time. There is no need to control and there is no need for this type of loving-kindness to be reciprocated. Reciprocated or not, the mere expression of it is pure joy and it is complete in and of itself. Everything is filled to the brim with nothing missing and there is no need to get upset (and thus cause suffering over) the non-ideal. It is the truly pure motive, in that even the exquisite joy of it is not done for the sake of experiencing joy. This is the type of person who finds possibilities and opportunities where there are none; the one for whom all actions and all speech are expressions of an ultimately simple and self-evident Truth. With this understanding, you feel that you yourself are not doing or saying anything. It is more like you find or observe yourself saying or doing this-and-that and it happens to be the best thing you could have said or done at the time, certainly far better than the result of any kind of deductive process. An engineer or anyone else who has this need not worry about things like tough times because he or she is free of the slavery that makes someone a victim of circumstance.
The only thing that is regrettable, or something like regrettable, is that most people live their entire lives without ever knowing the difference. It is not so complicated that most people cannot understand it. It is so incredibly utterly simple that most people overlook it out of a belief that they themselves should be doing something or seeking something or becoming something.
It's better to first worry about whether an idea is sound and good. Only after deciding that does it really make sense to concern yourself with what it would take to bring it about, like a constitutional amendment in this case.
Except that was my point. It's NOT a sound or good idea any more than a prison where the inmates have the keys to the internal and external doors.
The goal is a good one, but "putting something into law" to affect the behavior of congress is kind of like trying to drown Neptune.
Then please do explain the (modern) function of the Bill of Rights. That is of course a rhetorical request. This is dealt with by having a hierarchy. Your response seems to indicate that you believe laws created by Congress are equal to laws included in the Constitution but this is not the case. The Constitution is the highest law of the land and Congress is not authorized to contradict it. An amendment like this would be ratified by a sufficient number of the state legislatures and the national Congress really wouldn't have much to do with it.
My point was that you can decide whether an idea is sound and good (or from a lower perspective, desirable) in principle and only after making that decision do you consider how feasible it is. This is part (and only a part) of not being tempted or otherwise lead astray by what look like easy answers. You are making an argument against the feasibility that, even if it were a valid and insurmountable argument, cannot actually be extended to decide the soundness of the underlying principles involved.
Wow. You've clearly got a Bachelor's Degree. I can tell because you used a lot of very well constructed sentences comprised of effective vocabulary, in which you completely and thoroughly said pretty much nothing. Every finely crafted sentence after the first was, actually, just a waste. But that's how our schools teach people to write.
I won't comment on whether or not I have a degree of any sort or what type of degree it is if I do have one. What I will tell you is that I've always felt that my education is far too important to me to be trusted to the complete strangers who call themselves professionals because they have made a profession out of something that is not inherently a business transaction. To abandon my education (let alone my edification) to them would be a failure to take responsibility for my own life. Modern education has many primary purposes but enlightened, tough-minded individuals who are capable of critical thinking and are not easily misled by propaganda and misinformation is definitely not one of them.
Oops. I didn't mean to post that anonymously (I should watch where I click eh?). This is my writing.
'Tis not. It's mine! You just quoted the parent and claimed it as yours! I'm the one who has to watch where I click.
Makes me think of what you may think of as Eastern ideas as to just what constitutes "you". Like that Bill Hicks quote (I may change my sig to that) "It's as though we are all one consciousness experiencing itself subjectively." From that perspective this is really funny.
Yeah, that's why I called it a joke. The USA and Russia didn't exactly like each other during this time, so the jokes and derision they had for one another aren't the kind of nice uplifting things that prevent knee-jerk moderators from deciding I was trolling. Your need to explain and their need to mod down in response amuses me though not in the derisive way that you might think it would.
Wow. You've clearly got a Bachelor's Degree. I can tell because you used a lot of very well constructed sentences comprised of effective vocabulary, in which you completely and thoroughly said pretty much nothing. Every finely crafted sentence after the first was, actually, just a waste. But that's how our schools teach people to write.
I won't comment on whether or not I have a degree of any sort or what type of degree it is if I do have one. What I will tell you is that I've always felt that my education is far too important to me to be trusted to the complete strangers who call themselves professionals because they have made a profession out of something that is not inherently a business transaction. To abandon my education (let alone my edification) to them would be a failure to take responsibility for my own life. Modern education has many primary purposes but enlightened, tough-minded individuals who are capable of critical thinking and are not easily misled by propaganda and misinformation is definitely not one of them.
Oops. I didn't mean to post that anonymously (I should watch where I click eh?). This is my writing.
So often the message sent is, "you're educated if you agree with me." Truth does not mean very much to people like this. In fact truth, or at least the love of truth and the entire truth not for any agenda but for its own sake, was the first thing they had to sacrifice to become as sold to their own system as they are. The thing that (I believe) is often forgotten is that once people are compromised in this fashion, for any reason, they become "true believers" in whatever it was that compromised them and they give their allegiance to it. Most people are not entirely 100% themselves and are compromised in some way by ideas that did not come from a careful evaluation of available options. This is where the abuses and the underhanded maneuvers come from. That is, they come not from people who know they are doing something wrong and do not care, but from people who have an endless supply of rationalizations that they themselves believe.
Now why'd you hafta go and bring religion into this discussion?
That's a pretty funny joke that seems all too accurate. It requires something like a religious belief to behave in the abusive and amoral fashion as, in my opinion, the RIAA has done. That is, they imbue this cause/agenda of theirs with an undue importance that, in their minds, justifies any measures they take to further it. They sacrifice even their conscience on the altar of this Cause of theirs and in their minds they can do no wrong. To me, this elevation of peddling music to a status of mattering more than human suffering is the real meaning of "idolatry" (and is probably different from how most religious people use the term). It's really not unlike the process by which peaceful democratic nations become warlike dictatorships, just on a much smaller scale.
since the professed aim of the litigations was to 'educate' the public?"
Well, sure, but not to educate the public *too* much.
So often the message sent is, "you're educated if you agree with me." Truth does not mean very much to people like this. In fact truth, or at least the love of truth and the entire truth not for any agenda but for its own sake, was the first thing they had to sacrifice to become as sold to their own system as they are. The thing that (I believe) is often forgotten is that once people are compromised in this fashion, for any reason, they become "true believers" in whatever it was that compromised them and they give their allegiance to it. Most people are not entirely 100% themselves and are compromised in some way by ideas that did not come from a careful evaluation of available options. This is where the abuses and the underhanded maneuvers come from. That is, they come not from people who know they are doing something wrong and do not care, but from people who have an endless supply of rationalizations that they themselves believe.
What I don't understand is how this comes up at all. I'm straight, too, but I don't discuss my sex life with coworkers
Wow.....way to completely miss the point.
Prop 8 hurts Google not because gays would have to hide their orientation.
Prop 8 hurts Google because gays who wanted to move to CA before now do not want to move to CA in order to work for Google.
Discussing a related but different point is not the same thing as missing the point. Please see this post, and this post and this post. It's okay to discuss various nuances of a complex issue. Really, it is. I say that with a smile.
Perhaps I didn't think of that because I've always felt it was a bad idea to get too buddy-buddy with coworkers in a professional environment. I mean, everyone should be treated with kindness and understanding, but mixing business with your personal affairs tends to be more trouble than it's worth and just sounds like a bad idea. Anyone who's heard a few minutes of office gossip and decided they don't want any part of it can understand what I mean.
You know, I've always felt the same way, but my straight co-workers have the freedom to choose their policy on that without as much to worry about as I do. I don't really know how much of my tendency to avoid anything that even hints of mixing my personal and professional life stems from fear of what effect it could have if co-workers knew how thoroughly queer I am.
I wish I had an answer to that for you, but you know the truth is that the answer to that is within you and can be learned when you obtain (as we all seek, in our own way) a stronger appreciation and knowledge of yourself. The closest I can come to answering that is to tell you that I am heterosexual and don't want my personal affairs to be anywhere near coworkers. I believe in being very close to people in a dynamic relationship and really know and appreciate them for who they are, and that if you don't intend to do this, there is not much of a point in relating to them. At work, you have casual acquaintances and you can only get to know them but so well before you encounter a "brick wall" in the form of non-business matters that are not appropriate for the workplace. Therefore, I am unable to fully relate to them in what I consider (in my personal opinion) to be a healthy, growing, satisfying way; as a result, I prefer not to do so at all (healthy joyous relationships are that important to me) even though I may appreciate and respect my coworkers a great deal.
I've never felt that whom I am seeing or not seeing, or what I do with my free time (behind closed doors or otherwise) was appropriate for the workplace. I gain nothing from people knowing this when they are practically strangers and I stand to lose privacy and I stand to become entangled in the gossip mill against my will, so for me this is a no-brainer. I think the gossippers are very much like the people who are obsessed with the private lives of celebrities, the only difference between them being a matter of degree. Both seem to want to live vicariously and I recognize this as an unhealthy impulse that probably comes from a dissatisfaction with their lives. Taking part in this (and the mentality behind it) would be a step away from the healthy, strong life that I am building for myself. Not to mention that if someone feels that life is empty and unsatisfying, the solution is to learn to find meaning and joy, not to take an undue and unhealthy interest in the affairs of others.
You may or may not have (relatively) unique reasons for doing so, but I believe you are making a wise decision.
Many of my co-workers have pictures of their families/long-term partners in their cubes/offices. Put one of those in your office if you're gay and you're automatically outed. Same with bringing something to company affairs (holiday celebrations, etc.). You probably would have no problem talking about your "hot date" with someone when in a corporate male-only group (and hopefully only with your close peers - you are right that the rest of us aren't interested). The bottom line is that most of us who have lives outside of the office are able to talk about them. As a straight person, I can see where someone's sexual orientation can leak out into the environment when just talking about everyday life. And even I, as a straight person can see that gay people just don't have that freedom without the chance of facing discrimination.
Perhaps I didn't think of that because I've always felt it was a bad idea to get too buddy-buddy with coworkers in a professional environment. I mean, everyone should be treated with kindness and understanding, but mixing business with your personal affairs tends to be more trouble than it's worth and just sounds like a bad idea. Anyone who's heard a few minutes of office gossip and decided they don't want any part of it can understand what I mean.
It is interesting that you mention that they "just don't have that freedom". It's like the quote from the Zeitgeist II movie, "as soon as you clock in, you are walking into a dictatorship." I'd like to see more of them that are more "democratically" run, but a corporation is a dictatorship and you really don't have very many freedoms there. I've always thought this was hypocritical -- for example, if you really believe in the right to free speech, you believe in it for all people at all times; having "free speech zones" or in the case of the workplace, "non-free speech zones" means that you believe in it based on convenience, not principle. But then I understand what a "right" is and why it's not the same thing as a privilege.
And, as for your "separate but equal" suggestion about civil unions, that's never seemed to work out so well in the past. Somehow, although we usually get the separate part right, the equal part always seems to elude us.
That's possibly because we tend not to do things via simple, effective methods. You could simply pass a law stating that gay people in a civil union can call themselves "married" on any sort of official document, such as income tax forms. Then they are merely using an existing mechanism and the needless complication that creates opportunities for failure is neatly avoided, not to mention that this is less "separate" and more "equal". What will probably happen instead is a whole new special category will be created, with its own rules and regulations and expectations. If that happens, I think it will be subject to all of the failings that you bring up.
What has struck me as ironic is Christians citing monogamous heterosexual marriage as something ordained by God, when the monogamous part of it was in fact pressed upon the Hebrews and other subjected people of the Roman Empire.
Marriage was first and foremost about kinship ties and property rights in most civilizations, not about procreation.
Not to mention that back then, in that culture, most marriages were arranged by the parents.
That is a pretty major issue you happen to bring up - benefits.
Consider party 1 - a man and woman with a little certificate saying that they're going to stay with each other for as long as they both may live, or at least until the divorce settlement.
Consider party 2 - two people of the same sex, minus the certificate, but wanting the same sort of relationship.
If one of party 1 gets hired by a company like Google, the other member can get health insurance and other benefits. But, this only works if you have that little certificate. Party 2 can't get that certificate. Therefore, the worker's partner can't get benefits. Therefore, they need a higher salary to pay for those benefits.
So, you're already automatically locking out some of your workforce by salary requirements.
Next, imagine you have two choices for a place to work, in different countries, and you and your partner like to read. In one of those countries, they've started making laws about what people who like to read can and can't do. In the other, there are no such laws, or if there are, they embrace people who like to read.
Now, for what you bring up, I believe that is between the homosexual people and the (state) government. If they have some kind of civil union or other analog that is exactly like marriage in every way, then that neatly solves this problem by providing that "certificate" you mention. If not, then this is between them and Google and if Google wants their talents, Google certainly has the resources to make it worth their while. "Where do you want to go work?" sounds like a question that they could best answer after negotiation with Google.
Personally I don't think your employer should even know whether you are married or not. They pay you, you work hard for them, it should end right there. Perhaps the practice of income taxation has made people accustomed to the routine collection of personal information not directly related to the actual business transaction taking place. But then, the only reason to have an income tax (as opposed to all other forms of taxation) is so that you can data mine and use carrot-and-stick methods to manipulate behavior. Not unlike the income tax, which was a "temporary wartime measure" (we fall for that one every time don't we?), employer-provided benefits are the direct result of a WWII wage freeze that required employers to use other methods to attract talent since they could not do so via competitive pay. That's possibly the only reason why you do not have a competitive market today in which any individual can obtain affordable health insurance. I'd rather people question the origin of these practices instead of worrying so much about the implementations.
Slashdot Mirror
You appear to be conflating conservative with Republican, but the two are not interchangeable, particularly with respect to the administration that just left office. There are plenty of conservatives that took issue with the warrantless wiretapping because it represented exactly the sort of governmental encroachment into private life that their ideology opposes.
That's the thing that amazes me. It's not like this is unknown territory. That sort of governmental encroachment (and its ten million justifications) has been tried, repeatedly, throughout history. The result has always been the same. It has always been an utter failure and led to some of the most egregious examples of evil in all of history. At what point can we, as one people, recognize together that this is a failed idea and that trying harder to implement it won't change that?
This is why it contradicts itself. If [A] piracy is a problem (represents lost sales, etc.) and [B] DRM is the correct response to this problem, then it does not follow that a system using a rather strict form of DRM would charge more per track. If anything, this should make their prices cheaper, especially considering that the non-transferrability would cause some repeat purchases with no additional expenses incurred by the seller.
He is being unusually honest about this, although I don't think that's courage on his part but rather a reliance on the apathy of the average customer.
It would be alright even if you never responded although I like that you did. I replied to you not for a response or for any other reason but because it was my joy to do so.
Eloquence takes care of itself all by itself effortlessly when it's not you who's trying to do anything.
The only problem with explaining it is that especially in my case, it's going to sound very much like a more common thing that people think they know even though it happened in a radically different spirit. Understand that correctly and you'll see why it is that before this happened, I would make the mistake of getting stuck on the person or thing (the desire thereof) that otherwise could have led the way to this realization. Understand that incorrectly and you'll swear you correctly understand it but you'll think it's like something more mundane, about "stuff" and "storylines" and "participants" and you won't see the wonderful intuitive simplicity of it all. Let's say it was perfectly custom-tailored in every way to reach me and to have the effect that it had, and therefore it may be rather different for other people. That's why I don't think it's effective to go into details about it. If it resulted in someone trying to recreate my precise experience instead of being open to their own, whatever form that may take, then it would only pose a stumbling block. So, my intent here was to bear witness that this can and does indeed happen, that it is real. Lots of people don't even have a sudden conversion experience like I did. I tend to learn things (anything) by epiphanies so perhaps that better suited my temperament, but plenty of others steadily gain understanding over time until they come to the same place. It's all about what "you" "want" in a matter of speaking, except it's not really "you" and it's not a conscious desire or "want" but more like water seeking its own level in order to bring completion.
How different that was for me! Being reminded every day of how most people think used to cause me a great deal of suffering. Of course, that's a manner of speaking. It was my incorrect response to it (hatred-anger-fear-control-ego) that made me suffer because I did not love those people; in fact at the time I had no idea what love really was although I thought I did. It was my judgment and resentment and condemnation, produced by me who did not know better and aimed at they who also did not know better, that produced a good deal of misery because I was familiar with the words but did not really know what discernment and love and compassion are. If you are just discovering how most of the world really is, know that it's an ugly thing and that you must beware of the allure of ever judging them (because there's a judgment on your judgment, that is, by so doing you become like what you judge) or resenting them or even getting remotely upset for any reason, no matter how easily justified. The remedy is to genuinely love them to where you can see how ugly and wrong all of the things are that they do, and still have compassion for their ignorance and want something so much better than that for them. Only then do you have a hope of showing them something better, or if they will not listen, only then do you have a hope of rising and walking away and lovingly allowing them all the time and space they need to come to their own realization or to choose not to.
Certainly. Books are something I have always liked very
What about the King of Bhutan who voluntarily gave up monarchy despite the Bhutanese pleading with him to stay on as the monarch?
Haha, thank you! One example was a good thing and you have now made me aware of two good things.
i'm not out to flame you here, I really am interested in what text/video/otherwise could convince a member of the stalwart and cynical slashdot crowd to behave in this way.
I will try and address what I perceive as the real nature of this question. The first thing I should tell you is that understanding all of this is incredibly childishly simple and intuitive, but explaining it with words is not. So, I will do what I can and if an analogy I give is not quite perfect, I ask that you put that aside and try to see the picture that I am painting instead of the pixels or brush-strokes of which it is composed.
If the Slashdot crowd or anyone else is stalwart and cynical it's because they are choosing to be. The more miserable they become because of that the more they will value and appreciate love when they find out that it's not a feeling and it's nothing like what they thought it was. Make no mistake, "miserable" is where cynicism leads, it cannot be otherwise because it's a re-action to negativity -- can you see how simple that is? So long as a person is re-acting they will be a slave to cause and effect. I had a notion like that when I chose this username, in fact, though I didn't know what to do about it at that time.
As to the source of all the negativity and misery, what you are dealing with here are vast impersonal forces that live and act through human beings. It is to thoughts what viruses are to DNA. Just as a biological virus isn't quite "alive" until it infects and takes over a host, so too these thought-forces are parasites with no real life of their own. Religions have different names for them; "powers and principalities" is probably most familiar to you. So, why is a biological virus effective? Because it compromises the cell to the point that the cell's "machinery" (for lack of a better word) cannot "tell the difference" between what the cell would normally do and what the virus is programming it to do.
Likewise, most people are not really themselves. They are compromised. They are filled with ideas and ways of being that are not the product of a careful consideration of all available options. That is, they do not know that this is a choice. The aberration begins when you allow yourself to get upset with people or to resent people. Discernment means that you can see the wrong that people do, call it what it is, and still truly love them and want something so much better than that for them. Judgment means that you see the wrong that people do and you hate them for it; hatred-fear is what resentment and anger actually is, why those are destructive forces. You feel that in comparison to that person's wrong you are much righter (ego) and so equanimity-compassion is the first loss. When that happens, a transferrance takes place. You yourself become an angry, resentful person when you do this (it cannot be otherwise because this entire process is the opposite of love and grace) and what happens next? You get angry and upset with other people and instead of correcting them with truth and love, or allowing them to find their own way, you demean them with judgment and the need to feel right and this tempts them to judge you (it's ego playing God). If they do, they then take on that same nature and so the cycle iterates.
But what has actually happened here? An abstract non-material entity has travelled through individual human beings just as surely as an ocean wave travels through individual water molecules. It works because each person involved identifies with this entity instead of seeing it as an invasive alien force and so they believe that it is their anger and their thoughts and their temptations when of course it is not (just as a cell cannot tell that those "commands" are coming from the biological virus). You can look at some of the most ignorant people who do some of the greatest damage to human joy and for all of them, you can say "if they really knew what they were doing, they wouldn't." Demons aren't red-
Wait, what? That's a wide net to throw. For instance, look at the transition from Washington to Adams. It was smooth as silk.
Actually, Bush's own press secretary (Ari Flichter) discredited with those allegations in the briefing room and in his book.
George Washington's contribution to history is really amazing. He could have been a king or a dictator and he would have found great acceptance in that role. Instead, he was not tempted by power and he gladly renounced it for the greater good and edification of all. To my knowledge, he is the only person in history who ever provided such a great example.
I think this is the best post I've read here... like ever.
It's unfortunate that pointing these things out can make people sound like some new-age weirdo hippy. From my experiences it's truth. I'm very happy with my life and I think it has much to do with me realizing a lot of what the parent spoke of here.
Unless it doesn't... in which case, nevermind...
Haha that's a beautiful way to put it. I especially enjoyed the "Unless it doesn't" part! But really, you are onto something and you knew that before I said it. The only thing I would add is that there is something like a "prime directive" when it comes to the path of development of other beings. Not because you could interfere with their growth and it would be wrong or counterproductive (and you really cannot -- all it would do is create conflict and puff up that person's wrong ideas), but because they really do need to come to their own understanding (and yes this is worth it). So, if a person has a need to dismiss and to name-call, be it "new-age weirdo hippy" or anything else, it really is okay. If they don't see the irony of taking age-old ideas and likening them to recent things like the New Age Movement or hippies, that's okay too, although I'd prefer they share my mirth at seeing it.
What happened to me could be called a conversion experience, although I am very cautious about using words that, while true, also happen to be "church words" with a lot of baggage attached to them. The amazing thing about religions is that they have all the basic concepts and they don't understand them because love is not something you can institutionalize. I don't mean anything I say here in any sort of a religious way and this is not intended to reflect any such framework (real freedom is free from that, too). What I am saying here is much simpler than all of that. I had an experience that was good and pure and wholesome that truly satisfied me to my very soul in a way that I wasn't so sure was even possible. There was no desire or lust or craving or attachment and there was no need to control. The mistake I made in the past was that I would come close to that level of experience but then I would want to "have" or control whatever the person or thing was that I thought was producing the experience (that desire to have is nothing more than ego). I realized that what I experienced was true, pure, agape love and that this is actual reality. That is, this love is not for any reason and it is not for no reason either, it is our real and true nature. It really is what all people and all things ultimately are and always have been. That wonderful conversion experience was a finger pointing to the heavens above and all it takes is just one time of not getting caught up in looking at the finger. I felt like I was and am falling in love with all of creation with absolutely no exceptions. This is so far beyond what the intellect alone can arrive at that you come to see what a limited tool intellect really is.
An amazing part of this is that once you give up your will to control and realize that the only thing your will can do is get upset, everything takes care of itself, effortlessly. You know what to say and what to do because there is no "you" who is doing it. You don't think about what you are going to say next or plan outcomes; you "find" or "observe" yourself doing it and it works. Something like the way there is no actual "society" but it's an artificial construct and only the individuals who compose it have real feelings, your concept of yourself is also an artificial construct and only the nature of love that composes it is real. It's like we did the separation thing so thoroughly well that we forgot the oneness from which it came and that is the primary ignorance. I suppose you could arrive at this understanding through esoteric knowledge and philosophy but that's really going about it the hard way. You find this great inexhaustible love that changes everything by showing you what everything always was, and all of the knowledge and understanding you could ever want will come effortlessly. It's just like Bill Hicks said in my sig, there really is one consciousness that is experiencing itself subjectively.
When you see that this is actual reality you wonder if maybe the whole problem before was your inability to believe. When you find the real love, it is so much better than anything you ever thought was possible or even dared to dream could be possible. Even if you thought you did, you really had no idea that anything so wonderful could exist or that it could "happen to you" (in a manner of speaking). You cannot help but to wish for all beings to drop their illusions (which are real enough until you understand them) and come to this realization, even though you know that they are and always have been doing that and that they must come to it at their own pace and in the fullness of their own time.
I assume you care cause you posted it. If you didnt care, you wouldnt have.
Text blocks are damn near unreadable due to lack of double space. It looked interesting, but when text sort of floats back and forth, I just quit reading.
And I wasnt trying to be trollish or funny. Im not really in that kind of mood right now :P though, I am a troll.
I care (a rather misunderstood word or perhaps a less precise one) for the pure joy of caring and for no other reason, that is, not to accomplish or obtain anything. That's what pure motive is and a side-effect of it is that effort no longer feels like work. It is with no expectation of outcome because the more accurate word for that is desire to control and it's utterly counterproductive and very good at creating misery and needless conflict. That's why I'm not disappointed and learning that I may have done better is not a failure (and why even if you wrote a post that blatantly intended to piss me off, it wouldn't). Likewise, I posted it for the joy of doing it. This is what I mean when I say that things like logic and reason are limited tools that have their uses. The problem is like that saying about having only a hammer and thinking everything is a nail. There are purposes other than reasoned justifications that don't weaken you and your well-being by creating a needless vulnerability to outcome, and believe me, things are much better and more beautiful this way.
tl;dr
Try paragraphs next time. I heard they improve readability.
The truly funny part is that if a (probably valid) stylistic objection is all you got from what I expressed, you probably believe that this is my loss or that I should feel like I failed to reach you in some way. Or maybe you believe that I will see your reply and get upset in any way, however slight, which is also pretty funny. You will learn whatever or be reached by whomever the moment you care to be and not a second before. The best things I try to explain, however well or however poorly, are always "to whom it may concern" and I don't think I'd have that any other way. This is because freedom is something I cherish and your freedom to make silly posts is part of that. If you do that knowing it's silly, well then that's even better!
I've written my fair share of trollish posts, though I generally do that as Anonymous Coward. If I then could not handle the same, I'd feel like I really should do something about that and that I'm not qualified to talk to anyone about truth and love until I did. I am grateful that this is not the case. I'm also grateful to you because this gave me a laugh, however it was intended, and those are always welcome.
My less mundane answer to you has to do with realizing that there is no such thing as chance, coincident, or accident and that you have problems because you need the things you gain by solving them.
Ah, so the imposition of reaganomics, deregulation, and FTAs which led to this meltdown are my problems and i need to solve them eh? where's my time machine and my gun.. oh wait.
It is not needless suffering and the Universe is not a sadistic place
you're absolutely right, the universe is not a sadistic place, the world however is ruled by the most corrupt people imaginable, and they are sadistic.
The rest is a question of philosophy, but if you are willing to let people believe the ideas spread by those who are corrupt are right then be prepared to be crushed by the laws (or lack thereof) which result. Prime examples of the product of this are: -the credit crunch -healthcare crisis -lawsuits against 80 year olds, dead people, college kids, and single moms -hens placed under full regulatory control of foxes (tech + dmca + MAFIAA) -"competition in the labor market" (otherwise known as firing people and moving their jobs where pesky labor standards and human rights wont get in the way)
and much, much more.
All of those things are an aggregate or collective expression of what I was referring to earlier on an individual level. You have your problems because you need what you gain by solving them, and likewise society has its problems because society needs what it gains by solving them. This will be true so long as we keep mistaking conformity for real unity and oneness. That is, there is not truly an entity called "society", it is an artificial construct, but as long as we believe in the reality of this construct we will do whatever is necessary to give reality to it, such as declaring that this is Nation A and this over here is Nation B and creating armies so that there can be contests over which one controls the other. A person who misunderstands what I just said will believe that a one-world government is the solution, but if you're sharp you would recognize that as a refinement of the problem, a reiteration of the same failed ideas on a larger scale with nothing really new about it. Again I refer to Bill Hicks when he said "You know evolution did not just end with us growing thumbs. You see, the reason why things are so fucked up right now is because we are undergoing evolution. The reason why our institutions are crumbling is because they're no longer relevant. Yes, they are no longer relevant". I would add that we have built our systems and institutions on unsound ideas. Unsound ideas are inherently unstable and so it is only a question of time before they fail and crumble. This is why such things as nations and markets have what can be called life expectancies. They are about dominance and control and acquisition instead of being about harmony and balance and joy. The amazing thing is that they last as long as they do before they decay, that the system can take that much damage before it finally does fail. This is a good thing, however. That is, that flawed ideas always inevitably fail is a great thing. Love and harmony and truth is the only answer. Not because they are more desirable or because there is some hierarchy in which they are found to be superior, but because every other answer doesn't work. The fact that everything is getting more global which makes the damage so much more severe and widespread just means that if we do not willingly decide that there is a better way, the misery that is coming (you have not yet seen the beginning of it) is going to light a fire under our ass, so to speak, that will require us to look for new solutions that have not been tried before and to discover new values that did not matter to us before. What is at stake here is so precious that it really is worth all of this, but you really have to see that for yourself and even if you were incli
let me know when joy and fulfillment pay for food, shelter, water, and medical care.
The idea that someone in the second camp won't suffer because of this behavior is beyond naive in the context of a world in which money is required to live.
I'm talking about the kind of understanding that makes one more able to take care of things like food, shelter, water, and medicine (everything, really). It is plainly about not getting in your own way by unknowingly entering into arrangements that weaken you and give you less control (to call it that, anyway) over your own life. Someone who understands what I am getting at is much more (not less) equipped to deal with basic needs and to handle difficulties and problems that may arise without making them worse than they need to be by responding to them incorrectly. This is my mundane answer to you.
My less mundane answer to you has to do with realizing that there is no such thing as chance, coincident, or accident and that you have problems because you need the things you gain by solving them. It is not needless suffering and the Universe is not a sadistic place that just wants to watch you squirm and it is not indifferent either, or to put that another way it is indifferent for a purpose. That's not really something you can just tell someone, they have to see that for themselves. The best you can do is hint at it; you cannot prove it with a system of logic or reason so that the other person is forced to concede that you must be right. Part of this is realizing that those things (logic, etc) have their purpose but that they are tools and they are only a few tools of many and that they are some of the most mundane and limited tools available. The exclusive use of only these tools of understanding is the product of what you might call an obsession with consensus and a need to establish it. There is so much more to life than those things that people believe they understand because they know the words for them. I don't expect you to agree with that and that's alright. This is coming from a place of not having to prove anything to anyone but rather, offering ideas to minds that are willing to entertain them without a need for someone to be right and someone to be wrong. If your reaction is to read this and scoff or dismiss or continue to argue, that's alright too, though I hope you understand that I cannot sincerely join you.
Whether "nice" finishes last depends on your understanding of "nice". The more common usage is a people-pleaser who means well but cannot help operating out of a position of weakness because he thinks that happiness and fulfillment and completion come from other people (i.e. their approval and acceptance). To take on this nature is to be a leaf in the wind, always at the mercy of other people who themselves do not (yet) see their beliefs and full actions (with no exceptions) as choices. This is actually a form of slavery and it works because ignorance of the higher way prevents people from seeing that it is bondage. This idea taken to its full expression is unfortunately what most people think love is, when in reality its most healthy expression (which is still enslaving) is nothing more than a mutually agreed trade like those found in any market ("you're nice to me so I am nice to you").
The less common usage is well beyond mere courtesy and is more like an act of love. This is a person who has kindness and compassion for its own sake because cultivating these is pure joy. When you have this, there is no concern for outcomes or results because you realize that all of us are equal and must come to our own understanding at our own pace and in the fullness of our own time. There is no need to control and there is no need for this type of loving-kindness to be reciprocated. Reciprocated or not, the mere expression of it is pure joy and it is complete in and of itself. Everything is filled to the brim with nothing missing and there is no need to get upset (and thus cause suffering over) the non-ideal. It is the truly pure motive, in that even the exquisite joy of it is not done for the sake of experiencing joy. This is the type of person who finds possibilities and opportunities where there are none; the one for whom all actions and all speech are expressions of an ultimately simple and self-evident Truth. With this understanding, you feel that you yourself are not doing or saying anything. It is more like you find or observe yourself saying or doing this-and-that and it happens to be the best thing you could have said or done at the time, certainly far better than the result of any kind of deductive process. An engineer or anyone else who has this need not worry about things like tough times because he or she is free of the slavery that makes someone a victim of circumstance.
The only thing that is regrettable, or something like regrettable, is that most people live their entire lives without ever knowing the difference. It is not so complicated that most people cannot understand it. It is so incredibly utterly simple that most people overlook it out of a belief that they themselves should be doing something or seeking something or becoming something.
It's better to first worry about whether an idea is sound and good. Only after deciding that does it really make sense to concern yourself with what it would take to bring it about, like a constitutional amendment in this case.
Except that was my point. It's NOT a sound or good idea any more than a prison where the inmates have the keys to the internal and external doors.
The goal is a good one, but "putting something into law" to affect the behavior of congress is kind of like trying to drown Neptune.
Then please do explain the (modern) function of the Bill of Rights. That is of course a rhetorical request. This is dealt with by having a hierarchy. Your response seems to indicate that you believe laws created by Congress are equal to laws included in the Constitution but this is not the case. The Constitution is the highest law of the land and Congress is not authorized to contradict it. An amendment like this would be ratified by a sufficient number of the state legislatures and the national Congress really wouldn't have much to do with it.
My point was that you can decide whether an idea is sound and good (or from a lower perspective, desirable) in principle and only after making that decision do you consider how feasible it is. This is part (and only a part) of not being tempted or otherwise lead astray by what look like easy answers. You are making an argument against the feasibility that, even if it were a valid and insurmountable argument, cannot actually be extended to decide the soundness of the underlying principles involved.
I won't comment on whether or not I have a degree of any sort or what type of degree it is if I do have one. What I will tell you is that I've always felt that my education is far too important to me to be trusted to the complete strangers who call themselves professionals because they have made a profession out of something that is not inherently a business transaction. To abandon my education (let alone my edification) to them would be a failure to take responsibility for my own life. Modern education has many primary purposes but enlightened, tough-minded individuals who are capable of critical thinking and are not easily misled by propaganda and misinformation is definitely not one of them.
Oops. I didn't mean to post that anonymously (I should watch where I click eh?). This is my writing.
'Tis not. It's mine! You just quoted the parent and claimed it as yours! I'm the one who has to watch where I click.
Makes me think of what you may think of as Eastern ideas as to just what constitutes "you". Like that Bill Hicks quote (I may change my sig to that) "It's as though we are all one consciousness experiencing itself subjectively." From that perspective this is really funny.
Russia was not a 3rd world country during the cold war.
Yeah, that's why I called it a joke. The USA and Russia didn't exactly like each other during this time, so the jokes and derision they had for one another aren't the kind of nice uplifting things that prevent knee-jerk moderators from deciding I was trolling. Your need to explain and their need to mod down in response amuses me though not in the derisive way that you might think it would.
nothing worked right, but that was no big deal since the machines were so tough, they could just brute force their way to the end.
I think that during the Cold War, the joke (in the USA) was that Russia was a third-world country with nukes.
I won't comment on whether or not I have a degree of any sort or what type of degree it is if I do have one. What I will tell you is that I've always felt that my education is far too important to me to be trusted to the complete strangers who call themselves professionals because they have made a profession out of something that is not inherently a business transaction. To abandon my education (let alone my edification) to them would be a failure to take responsibility for my own life. Modern education has many primary purposes but enlightened, tough-minded individuals who are capable of critical thinking and are not easily misled by propaganda and misinformation is definitely not one of them.
Oops. I didn't mean to post that anonymously (I should watch where I click eh?). This is my writing.
So often the message sent is, "you're educated if you agree with me." Truth does not mean very much to people like this. In fact truth, or at least the love of truth and the entire truth not for any agenda but for its own sake, was the first thing they had to sacrifice to become as sold to their own system as they are. The thing that (I believe) is often forgotten is that once people are compromised in this fashion, for any reason, they become "true believers" in whatever it was that compromised them and they give their allegiance to it. Most people are not entirely 100% themselves and are compromised in some way by ideas that did not come from a careful evaluation of available options. This is where the abuses and the underhanded maneuvers come from. That is, they come not from people who know they are doing something wrong and do not care, but from people who have an endless supply of rationalizations that they themselves believe. Now why'd you hafta go and bring religion into this discussion?
That's a pretty funny joke that seems all too accurate. It requires something like a religious belief to behave in the abusive and amoral fashion as, in my opinion, the RIAA has done. That is, they imbue this cause/agenda of theirs with an undue importance that, in their minds, justifies any measures they take to further it. They sacrifice even their conscience on the altar of this Cause of theirs and in their minds they can do no wrong. To me, this elevation of peddling music to a status of mattering more than human suffering is the real meaning of "idolatry" (and is probably different from how most religious people use the term). It's really not unlike the process by which peaceful democratic nations become warlike dictatorships, just on a much smaller scale.
Well, sure, but not to educate the public *too* much.
So often the message sent is, "you're educated if you agree with me." Truth does not mean very much to people like this. In fact truth, or at least the love of truth and the entire truth not for any agenda but for its own sake, was the first thing they had to sacrifice to become as sold to their own system as they are. The thing that (I believe) is often forgotten is that once people are compromised in this fashion, for any reason, they become "true believers" in whatever it was that compromised them and they give their allegiance to it. Most people are not entirely 100% themselves and are compromised in some way by ideas that did not come from a careful evaluation of available options. This is where the abuses and the underhanded maneuvers come from. That is, they come not from people who know they are doing something wrong and do not care, but from people who have an endless supply of rationalizations that they themselves believe.
Wow.....way to completely miss the point.
Prop 8 hurts Google not because gays would have to hide their orientation.
Prop 8 hurts Google because gays who wanted to move to CA before now do not want to move to CA in order to work for Google.
Discussing a related but different point is not the same thing as missing the point. Please see this post, and this post and this post. It's okay to discuss various nuances of a complex issue. Really, it is. I say that with a smile.
Perhaps I didn't think of that because I've always felt it was a bad idea to get too buddy-buddy with coworkers in a professional environment. I mean, everyone should be treated with kindness and understanding, but mixing business with your personal affairs tends to be more trouble than it's worth and just sounds like a bad idea. Anyone who's heard a few minutes of office gossip and decided they don't want any part of it can understand what I mean.
You know, I've always felt the same way, but my straight co-workers have the freedom to choose their policy on that without as much to worry about as I do. I don't really know how much of my tendency to avoid anything that even hints of mixing my personal and professional life stems from fear of what effect it could have if co-workers knew how thoroughly queer I am.
I wish I had an answer to that for you, but you know the truth is that the answer to that is within you and can be learned when you obtain (as we all seek, in our own way) a stronger appreciation and knowledge of yourself. The closest I can come to answering that is to tell you that I am heterosexual and don't want my personal affairs to be anywhere near coworkers. I believe in being very close to people in a dynamic relationship and really know and appreciate them for who they are, and that if you don't intend to do this, there is not much of a point in relating to them. At work, you have casual acquaintances and you can only get to know them but so well before you encounter a "brick wall" in the form of non-business matters that are not appropriate for the workplace. Therefore, I am unable to fully relate to them in what I consider (in my personal opinion) to be a healthy, growing, satisfying way; as a result, I prefer not to do so at all (healthy joyous relationships are that important to me) even though I may appreciate and respect my coworkers a great deal.
I've never felt that whom I am seeing or not seeing, or what I do with my free time (behind closed doors or otherwise) was appropriate for the workplace. I gain nothing from people knowing this when they are practically strangers and I stand to lose privacy and I stand to become entangled in the gossip mill against my will, so for me this is a no-brainer. I think the gossippers are very much like the people who are obsessed with the private lives of celebrities, the only difference between them being a matter of degree. Both seem to want to live vicariously and I recognize this as an unhealthy impulse that probably comes from a dissatisfaction with their lives. Taking part in this (and the mentality behind it) would be a step away from the healthy, strong life that I am building for myself. Not to mention that if someone feels that life is empty and unsatisfying, the solution is to learn to find meaning and joy, not to take an undue and unhealthy interest in the affairs of others.
You may or may not have (relatively) unique reasons for doing so, but I believe you are making a wise decision.
Perhaps I didn't think of that because I've always felt it was a bad idea to get too buddy-buddy with coworkers in a professional environment. I mean, everyone should be treated with kindness and understanding, but mixing business with your personal affairs tends to be more trouble than it's worth and just sounds like a bad idea. Anyone who's heard a few minutes of office gossip and decided they don't want any part of it can understand what I mean.
It is interesting that you mention that they "just don't have that freedom". It's like the quote from the Zeitgeist II movie, "as soon as you clock in, you are walking into a dictatorship." I'd like to see more of them that are more "democratically" run, but a corporation is a dictatorship and you really don't have very many freedoms there. I've always thought this was hypocritical -- for example, if you really believe in the right to free speech, you believe in it for all people at all times; having "free speech zones" or in the case of the workplace, "non-free speech zones" means that you believe in it based on convenience, not principle. But then I understand what a "right" is and why it's not the same thing as a privilege.
That's possibly because we tend not to do things via simple, effective methods. You could simply pass a law stating that gay people in a civil union can call themselves "married" on any sort of official document, such as income tax forms. Then they are merely using an existing mechanism and the needless complication that creates opportunities for failure is neatly avoided, not to mention that this is less "separate" and more "equal". What will probably happen instead is a whole new special category will be created, with its own rules and regulations and expectations. If that happens, I think it will be subject to all of the failings that you bring up.
What has struck me as ironic is Christians citing monogamous heterosexual marriage as something ordained by God, when the monogamous part of it was in fact pressed upon the Hebrews and other subjected people of the Roman Empire.
Marriage was first and foremost about kinship ties and property rights in most civilizations, not about procreation.
Not to mention that back then, in that culture, most marriages were arranged by the parents.
That is a pretty major issue you happen to bring up - benefits. Consider party 1 - a man and woman with a little certificate saying that they're going to stay with each other for as long as they both may live, or at least until the divorce settlement. Consider party 2 - two people of the same sex, minus the certificate, but wanting the same sort of relationship.
If one of party 1 gets hired by a company like Google, the other member can get health insurance and other benefits. But, this only works if you have that little certificate. Party 2 can't get that certificate. Therefore, the worker's partner can't get benefits. Therefore, they need a higher salary to pay for those benefits.
So, you're already automatically locking out some of your workforce by salary requirements.
Next, imagine you have two choices for a place to work, in different countries, and you and your partner like to read. In one of those countries, they've started making laws about what people who like to read can and can't do. In the other, there are no such laws, or if there are, they embrace people who like to read.
Where do you want to go work?
Please see this post and this post.
Now, for what you bring up, I believe that is between the homosexual people and the (state) government. If they have some kind of civil union or other analog that is exactly like marriage in every way, then that neatly solves this problem by providing that "certificate" you mention. If not, then this is between them and Google and if Google wants their talents, Google certainly has the resources to make it worth their while. "Where do you want to go work?" sounds like a question that they could best answer after negotiation with Google.
Personally I don't think your employer should even know whether you are married or not. They pay you, you work hard for them, it should end right there. Perhaps the practice of income taxation has made people accustomed to the routine collection of personal information not directly related to the actual business transaction taking place. But then, the only reason to have an income tax (as opposed to all other forms of taxation) is so that you can data mine and use carrot-and-stick methods to manipulate behavior. Not unlike the income tax, which was a "temporary wartime measure" (we fall for that one every time don't we?), employer-provided benefits are the direct result of a WWII wage freeze that required employers to use other methods to attract talent since they could not do so via competitive pay. That's possibly the only reason why you do not have a competitive market today in which any individual can obtain affordable health insurance. I'd rather people question the origin of these practices instead of worrying so much about the implementations.