Because fighting instincts is hard. Telling people they just need to control their diet is about as effective as abstinance-only sex education. An effective response needs to examine the underlying instinct and either find a way to make it easier to control, or allow people to indulge while removing the negative consequences of doing so.
For quite a long time, I never bother to count calories or worry about what I eat or how sugary/fattening it is. I have been within five pounds of the same weight (which is right in the middle of the "ideal" range for someone my height and gender) for many years.
I suspect that much of the obesity comes from the failure to deal with emotions. When you have a natural appetite, you don't feel hunger unless you actually do require the calories and the nutrients. Once in a while I crave greasy fatty foods but this is rare. It's usually in connection with working harder than usual and exerting myself -- I allow it because it makes sense. I would have to work very hard to either gain weight or to lose weight and both would be unhealthy for me. That was not always the case for me, but instead of making a million excuses for why nothing is ever my fault, I stopped worrying about fault and blame entirely and started understanding the cause and effect.
In the wild, have you ever seen an obese deer? Did you ever see an obese lion in the wild? You never see obese animals in the wild no matter how abundant food may be. Animals in the wild have a natural appetite. What happens to people is that they start using food like a drug to derive a sense of emotional comfort. They even call it "comfort food". They eat when they aren't really hungry, either for this comfort or for something to do with their hands and mouths. It distracts them from all of their unresolved stress, traumas, resentments, and emotional issues. They eat for emotional reasons unrelated to their physical need for nutrients and calories. It upsets the balance of what was once a natural appetite. That's what I believe.
This is why all the emphasis on dieting and exercise isn't really doing much good. The imbalance between diet and exercise is an effect, not a cause. A diet is quite difficult to stick to because the unnatural hunger hasn't been resolved. As usual we are trying to treat surface symptoms instead of understanding how they came to be, mostly because understanding that means facing some very uncomfortable questions about who we are and how we live.
It's actually easier for a cocaine addict to give up cocaine than for a fattie to learn to use food properly. That's because the cokehead could quit using cocaine and (once past withdrawals) never have to touch it again, but you have to eat.
It's like what Neil Boortz said. If you send your child to a Catholic school, they will be raised to think Catholocism is great.
Well, you lost me there, because I went to a Catholic school and am agnostic. So maybe sending them to an oppressive high school makes them value their freedoms more once they get out.
They will be raised to think so. It doesn't mean they will accept what they are raised to believe.
Matter of fact, it sounds like it was an unduly harsh yet valuable experience for you. I don't personally believe you are actually an adult until you can question what you were brought up to believe and reject every piece of it that makes no sense.
Although what I would gain from treating a fictional book as some sort of Holy Bible to work into every possible conversation has yet to be explained to me, but a lot of people seem to consider it highly likely for some strange reason
Just FYI, actual Objectivists do treat Atlas Shrugged as a Holy Bible to be studied and quoted in that manner, and those on the far left will find those philosophies morally repugnant. So if you were wondering why you stepped into something... well, that's why.:-)
Bringing Ayn Rand into a discussion about Washington is like bringing a gun to a knife fight.
I've never before allowed the unreasonable overreactions of emotionally immature people to control my behavior. I'm not about to start today.
Let them foam at the mouth. Perhaps I'll invest in paper towels?
My guess would be that in low-traction situations, even light pressure on the brakes can be enough to lock the wheels, while engine braking cannot possibly cause the wheels to lock.
When I needed a replacement car, I got a very good one at an even better price and have not regretted this decision... but I certainly do miss a manual transmission for just this reason.
You are displaying what is, from my perspective, a primitive form of morality.
Lawrence Kohlberg was kind enough to document six stages of personal moral development. What you display is Stage 4. This is a description, with the bracketed statements being my own writing:
In Stage four (authority and social order obedience driven), it is important to obey laws, dictums and social conventions because of their importance in maintaining a functioning society. Moral reasoning in stage four is thus beyond the need for individual approval exhibited in stage three [this part is decent]. A central ideal or ideals often prescribe what is right and wrong, such as in the case of fundamentalism [not so decent]. If one person violates a law, perhaps everyone would—thus there is an obligation and a duty to uphold laws and rules. When someone does violate a law, it is morally wrong; culpability is thus a significant factor in this stage as it separates the bad domains from the good ones. Most active members of society remain at stage four, where morality is still predominantly dictated by an outside force [if you cannot think for yourself then you need an outside force to do it for you - sheep need their shepherd].
Copyright law was originally intended to provide a balance between the rewarding of creators on one hand, and the enrichment of the public domain on the other. The original duration of copyright was twelve years, back when movable type was the most effective way to distribute information. As our ability to endlessly duplicate and spread information increases, the duration should shorten if it changes at all -- a copyright holder could reach a bigger audience in less time. Instead it has increased to a maximum of the author's life plus more than a century, in an age when you can contact millions around the globe in seconds.
That is unjust. Copyright law and the balance it once sought to maintain is a social contract model, what Kohlberg calls Stage Five. This is the description, and the emphasis is mine:
In Stage five (social contract driven), the world is viewed as holding different opinions, rights and values. Such perspectives should be mutually respected as unique to each person or community. Laws are regarded as social contracts rather than rigid edicts. Those that do not promote the general welfare should be changed when necessary to meet “the greatest good for the greatest number of people”. This is achieved through majority decision, and inevitable compromise. Democratic government is ostensibly based on stage five reasoning.
Modern copyright law is made to benefit a tiny minority of the population - the monied copyright lobby - at the detriment of everyone else. There was no "democratic" process involved in making it this way. It was bought and paid for, pure and simple. It was not arranged based on any concept of what is right, what is best for society, what is the ideal balance of reward vs. the public domain, what voters wanted, none of that. A tiny minority realized they could abuse the system so they did. It is a complete rejection of the legal system and the participatory republic that you yourself adhere to when you ask me what I have done to resist it.
If you believe that citizens should be able to resist unjust laws by appealing to their representatives, then you must also view the copyright interests' usurpation of our legal system as the mockery of liberty that it is.
On issues of privacy no less! What kind of message are these irresponsible parents sending their children, that they have a right to not be treated like inmates? These kids might grow up and demand that the GOVERNMENT not do it either! And then the future terrorists will win!!! WON'T SOMEONE THINK OF THE CHILDREN'S APATHY TO CIVIL RIGHTS ABUSES!?!?
The whole arrangement never made sense to me.
This state-sponsored, state-run institution can deny its students their natural inalienable rights such as free speech, freedom of association, etc. All they have to do is say "in loco parentis" and they get to fly in the face of every single court precedent in which just about every other state-sponsored institution was struck down for doing the same. Even though I've read the Constitution and it does not have an age limit.
So far as I can tell, the primary (intended or unintended) function of public schooling is to condition children from a young age to submit to authority and to tyranny without questioning its legitimacy. The lesson is that it's going to happen and there's nothing you can do about it. Any academic training that also occurs is coincidental.
It's like what Neil Boortz said. If you send your child to a Catholic school, they will be raised to think Catholocism is great. Send them to a Protestant school and they will be raised to believe Protestantism is great. Send them to a government school... well, we hardly have today that kind of government the Founders wanted. What we are heading towards is a soft tyranny, the kind that isn't because they have bigger guns, but because they know what's best for you. Much conditioning is needed for this to be accepted, and of course it's more effective if it starts at a young age like five or six years old, long before the ability to reason is fully developed.
The problem is that Ayn's premise was flawed. Companies don't hire lobbyists because they have to, they hire them because they want to influence (purchase) favorable rules and regulations. Lobbyists are not defensive, they are offensive.
The way you brought the subject up, and the fact that you pointed out a flawed premise as if it was factual is what made you sound like you were shoe horning Ayn into the conversation. You gave the impression that you were a blind follower of her.
Note: I have read Ayn's work but disagree with a lot of her philosophy.
Actually I happened to have just read that section of the book very recently. As in, a few hours before I saw this story. I am only at the beginning of the book so far and just came across that part of it. Then I see a Slashdot discussion about "Washington men" of a different sort, and well, I put two and two together. It was significantly apropos for me. Perhaps that is why you think I would shoehorn it in? Although what I would gain from treating a fictional book as some sort of Holy Bible to work into every possible conversation has yet to be explained to me, but a lot of people seem to consider it highly likely for some strange reason.
You see, on my own I would never have obtained and started reading any work by Rand. But I see so many otherwise calm people go from 0 to stark-raving-mad at the mere mention of her name on here. It is solely thanks to them and their extremely reactionary responses to the book that I became curious about it. I started wondering what the big deal was about. It obviously has a great deal of power over them. If not for that I'd have known nothing about it. Isn't that funny? See that's the problem with knee-jerk types, they have no sense of irony.
I still haven't seen what the big deal is, but it's early yet. I understand that Galt has this long monologue about the producers and the parasites (or whatever terminology is used) that seems to piss people off faster than an abortion debate. It's a pity that so few "adults" can disagree with something without freaking out in such a disgraceful manner. But it does give them an excuse to climb up on their high horses and shout and rain down fire and brimstone on whatever it is they're overreacting to, and the small-minded truly, madly, deeply are in love with doing that. I believe it's the highlight of their lives.
I wish Liberterarians would get some real friends so they'd stop posting their drivel on the internet for attention. You guys should arrange a meetup or something, get it all out of your system and stop shoehorning your idiotic philosophy into every single god damn slashdot submission.
I wish I could mention a simple fictional book without people freaking out about it and assuming they know who I am and what I believe and then proceeding to rail against whatever they just made up about me.
Honestly, perhaps you could consult a psychologist and ask about "systematic desensitization therapy"?
It would be a shame if your constituents found out about all this hentai porn you've downloaded from the Internet.
Perhaps you should send my friends at the FTC a letter explaining how their current views of Google are untenable.
*Strokes white cat*
Dearest Regards,
Dr. Larry Page
It reminds me of the book Atlas Shrugged, in the beginning, where the railroads had to hire a "Washington Man" to protect themselves from the legislature. It also mentions that such people are a reluctant necessity and tend not to be particularly upstanding or trustworthy.
Even if your joke has no basis in reality at all, some things don't change.
Target advertising isn't necessarily a bad thing unless the government gets involved.
They usually do that after the company has built up a nice, big, robust, relevant database full of information that the government would have had difficulty obtaining on its own.
Plenty of real criminals have been caught with the aid of data that Google had collected about them. This saves the cops some of the effort of doing real police work. The problem is, the same techniques could be used against "undesirables" as well.
Not to mention, the very idea that I need someone else to tell me what I want and what I need is just plain rude. So is the idea of tracking me without first obtaining my written consent. Targeted advertising is worse than the less specific kind. You'd have to be a serious slave to the most momentary of conveniences to think otherwise.
Between the government and the private sector, I know who's lied to me more about products. Hint: it rhymes with sivate prector.
Indeed, government probably won't lie to you, on this particular subject.
When they treat adults like you as though you were a two-year-old, they will do it quite openly and honestly. And shamelessly.
But hey, at least they aren't lying, right?
Or maybe the real question is what happened to you to make you crave so many sodas instead of honestly desiring to quench your thirst the natural and most effective way, with water. Maybe another real question is why you cannot take responsibility yourself for how you eat and whether you exercise, and remedy either (or both) as needed, why you would need any corporation or government agency to tell you how you should eat and when you should exercise. That would be a revolutionary concept, huh?
Of course if you are a total victim then the "advantage" (if you are warped and perverted enough to think of it as such) is that nothing is ever your fault. You're just a leaf in the wind, powerless to change anything, totally at the mercy of corporations and government to which you have ceded all of your personal power. Then sure, you get to blame them for your problems, yeah, maybe you can convince yourself that this is satisfying, are you happy with your life yet? Or you can trade away the blame-game bullshit and do what it takes to make better decisions and see with your own eyes that they bear fruit in the form of a better life that you get to run yourself.
The victimhood mentality is astonishingly popular. I must conclude that the people who prefer it have never honestly mastered both options. It's like a computer user who swears Windows is the best OS for his needs, yet he knows nothing about any other OS. His opinion is not a valid one because he has no basis for comparison. Now if he were equally skillful in Windows, Linux, FreeBSD, and OSX, and then still preferred Windows, I would call that a valid opinion.
Can you be any less condescending? I am a Second Amendment supporter. I don't believe that it is truly a meaningful "safeguard against tyranny" today, but I consider it important for other reasons (like right to defend oneself). I support other organizations who defend our freedoms and human rights, like ACLU. But you just went out of your way to offend me, because I do have a gun in my pocket? Are you living in perpetual fear of being in a proximity of a lethal weapon, or something?
I live in a state where the law allows you to openly carry, or you can obtain a permit to conceal-carry.
Sometimes in public places I see people openly carrying. I suppose I also see people who conceal-carry but by the nature of that I don't know which they are.
When I am at a store and I see a fellow citizen openly carrying a gun, it makes me feel safer. I am happy to see it. I know that any would-be violent criminal can also see it and that it gives them a reason to think twice about trying something stupid. I am not afraid of the person who is carrying. They are obviously following the law. Thus, they are not criminals and are not to be regarded as such. Like I said, I am glad to see them and I wish more people did it.
Now, I more strongly favor conceal-carry for one simple reason. When the criminals themselves do not know who is armed and who is not, it makes them think twice about attacking anyone. Ergo, even people who don't own guns benefit from this.
When you vote you are exercising one of the few types of force that has any meaning. The real pity is that once you have exercised that force the party you voted for can change their whole agenda.
The major motivation for this is the influence money has on the political process.
There is a great remedy for this. Give a very generous amount of public money, with no strings attached, to all candidates who have met the requiremetns to appear on the ballot. Mandate that this money is their sole means of financing their campaigns. Mandate that candidates may not use their personal wealth and any attempt to do so disqualifies them, then audit them regularly. Then pass a law stating that any campaign contribution to any candidate shall be construed as a bribe and punished with life in prison and no possibility of parole, including the candidates themselves if they accept it, or just the would-be donor if the candidate rejects it.
That would be something like the respect that is due for such important offices.
Probably. Which is why it's necessary. The alternative is large parts of the population are disenfranchised, that it is because they have been convinced their votes can't change anything rather than directly preventing them from voting
In a parliamentary system with multiple (i.e more than two) parties, this is a good idea. It tends to work. It works even better if the single transferrable vote system is implemented (something you may wish to look up if you are unfamiliar with it).
In the USA's winner-take-all system with only two parties that stand a chance of winning, lots of votes ARE wasted. A candidate can win 51% of the vote and the other 49% of voters may as well have stayed home.
Then there's another deal you may not have considered, and certainly haven't addressed. If someone is apathetic enough that they will not vote unless threatened with a fine, what makes you think they have bothered to inform themselves about who the candidates are and what they stand for? Do you think lots of uninformed voters is a good thing? I really, really don't. It's at least as bad as people who vote for parties mindlessly with no consideration of the candidate.
At least in the USA, if you want more people to vote, especially young people, you need to give them the hope of actually changing and reforming the system. Not manufactured controversies like gay marriage or abortion, but real issues like why we still have a War on Drugs that obviously isn't working, why there is such a huge deficit, why the federal government gets involved in so many local and state affairs, why Social Security is not an interest-bearing account with your name on it, why we keep trying to police the entire world, why we have fiat currency instead of representative currency, etc. These are all sacred cows that no one in office really wants to change.
It encourages extremism, a relatively small group of motivated zealots, NRA members, for instance, can leverage their ability to turn out the vote to have an undue influence on government.
If they are truly a small minority then only a fraction of the majority could vote against their proposals and that would be that. If they can't be bothered to do that then they must not think its important and so they are giving their silent consent to it.
As I see it, no one wants to talk about this but there are two groups that really have undue influence on government. One of them is retirees. When you no longer have to spend most of your waking hours working for a living and raising a family, it's certainly easier to be politically active. The other group are welfare recipients, who consistently vote for whomever will promise more benefits (typically this is a Democrat and constitutes a significant Democrat Party bloc). Both are a minority of the population. Both have enormous influence over elections.
If you have a philosophical objection to voting, you can just pay the small fine. Or cast a blank ballot.
Or pick a random candidate to get the damned thing over with since you didn't want to be there anyway. Again, this is no good if you want genuine elections.
, 4) liberty and personal responsibility are more important than fear.
Owning a gun is an admission that you live in fear, and want to make others fear you even more.
I'll add that the only reason _you_ don't live in fear is because there are men with guns who are charged with your safety. They are the police in many places and the military in places where police don't usually carry guns. You hire them with your tax dollars to present deadly force on your behalf. Owning a gun simply means sharing this responsibility and not completely delegating it to someone else whom you've never met.
I long for a world where force or threat of force is no longer necessary to maintain order, but we don't have that world at this time. So yes I think guns are great, and I think the 2nd Amendment is great, and I think conceal-carry laws are great, especially the part where most crimes were stopped without firing a single shot. Once the criminal realized the intended "victim" was armed, that was that. The media is oh-so-careful never to report these events, but they do happen and you can find the information yourself now that you know it happens.
, 4) liberty and personal responsibility are more important than fear.
Owning a gun is an admission that you live in fear, and want to make others fear you even more.
It's an admission that unfortunately, some people cannot be reasoned with.
Most people who actually own guns hope that they never have to use them. It's a bit like car insurance. You have it, but not because you're planning to crash your car.
neeet! Not a fan of hackers, but if WoW had a way of doing this then sooner of later it would happen.
I'm not a fan of much of anything, but I can't help feeling a certain amusement at such events. I imagine it really pisses in the cornflakes of the Type-A control freaks who tend to run large organizations. I think they need to be reminded once in a while that not everything can be commanded and made to comply.
What would be truly useful is a way to remind them of this without the need for unauthorized access or any other kind of criminal activity. Sadly, corporations are internally arranged as dictatorships or tyrannies, so this is not likely. What would really interest me is a corporation structured more like a democracy or a republic, where rank-and-file workers share at least some portion of the decision-making. I wonder if such a company would be competitive in the marketplace.
If you're on/. and don't know what NPC is, or how to find out, you're probably not the target audience here.
If you're on/. and don't like answering peoples' questions, even when it would have taken you less time to type than the snide remark you chose, you're probably the target audience here.
A little definition is in order. A stupid question is one you could easily answer yourself in less time than it would take to request hand-holding you don't really need. A stupid question is rude because it is effectively a claim that someone else's time is worth far less than your own, and therefore they should serve you (as if you are some kind of king) and do your own minor legwork for you. That is absurd. I notice you did not submit to it yourself -- you did not answer the question either -- so whether you like it or not, your actions are in agreement with me.
Stupid questions from literate adults who obviously have Internet (thus Google) access... they deserve the snide remarks they receive. When you consider he could have Googled "NPC" in less time than it took to ask a stupid question, the remark was actually rather polite.
Sorry if you are too soft to recognize the good that comes from not lowering the standards to suit the intellectually lazy. Intellectual laziness and the choice to knowingly embrace helplessness are character flaws. They are not supposed to be validated. They don't deserve it.
Now then, go ahead and launch your personal attacks and invective. That's what those of your emotionally-goverened, offense-driven mentality usually do when the following two conditions have been met: a) they cannot formulate an effective counter-point, and b) they are too haughty to admit when a good point has been made.
Your "Founding Fathers" had no experience with any form of government except Monarchy. Their perspective is hopelessly outdated and limited, and it takes either an enormous idiot or intellectually dishonest person to treat their writings as anything but historical curiosities.
When the USA descends into tyranny please act surprised, will you? I couldn't tell you how much I would like to be wrong about this, but all the signs are there.
And I like how you just gloss over what I had to say about wishing death to people you've never met and know nothing about. I suppose you couldn't comment on that, after all you might lose face if you gave any sort of honest answer. At least, to someone who would say such a thing, a statement like "hmm you know I shouldn't have said that, I was out of line" would equate to losing face. To me, it would equate to being man enough to take responsibility for your own actions and would only increase my respect for that person.
"But but I don't like that guy, personally I hate him, I mean after all he expressed an opinion I disagree with... so I can't show him that much decency, I mean if I did that I would lose ten points" that's about how the thinking goes. It's some kind of puerile emotional "logic" designed to protect ego. It's also a path to misery. I would feel like a prisoner within my own life if I couldn't overcome that. Enjoy whatever smug superiority you can convince yourself of.
Having said that, the issue of sexual assault in prisons is an important one. It's literally a joke to many people; in fact, it's one of the few types of "rape joke" that's still socially acceptable.
I have a rather expansive sense of humor. In a non-serious context many completely tasteless jokes could be funny, particularly with alcohol involved. But in a serious context, actual rape of actual human beings is not remotely funny. It's demoralizing that so many people think it is.
No legislator wants to talk about it lest they be seen as "soft on crime" in a society based around retribution rather than justice.
You especially see this "soft on crime" bullshit when it comes to non-violent drug offenders who have not victimized anyone. Making the punishment actually fit the crime, or even admitting that sometimes the law invents crimes where no real crime has happened (that is, there is no victim) is what you would expect from a competent and responsible legislator. We generally don't have those. We have approval whores who will pander to anyone if they think it will get them elected. I'm not sure they even have their own beliefs, principles, and convictions. If they do, they certainly don't have the backbone to stand up for them.
Hell, police in the US will actually use it as a threat!
I know that particularly after 9/11 it has become fashionable to glorify police and celebrate their great "heroics". This is sometimes legitimate, but I deal in facts. Police themselves are often violent people. They certainly like to be in control. The kind of power they have is most appealing to sociopaths and fevered egos. You could say it's irresistable. Sociopaths are notorious for their ability to blend in with normal people by saying or doing anything in order to be seen as virtuous.
I have personally met both police officers and firefighters. It's much easier for me to respect someone like a firefighter because their job doesn't provide so many reasons to push people around and act like a tough guy, and I would not hesitate to point out that anyone willing to run into a burning building has some serious balls. It's no surprise to me that police would say or do just about anything they can get away with (which is a lot more than you or I could get away with) if they really want to make someone comply. It seems they can blatantly break the law and inflict violence with the loss of their job being the most severe consequence they are likely to ever face.
If you're right about this guy, fixing that problem would have resulted in not only less sexual assault in the world, but also fewer innocent people's lives being endangered and one less suicide here. How is that not win-win?
In the case of someone who is sent to prison in the first place for having raped someone, I really don't have a lot of sympathy for them having to find out just how unpleasant it is to be the victim. But if we are going to consider that a "feature" and not a "bug", then make it part of the official sentence. That would, of course, be both barbaric and crazy. At least it would also be honest. This "turning a blind eye" bullshit has to stop though. I don't care what the prisoner did to get there, we as a society have to be better than those we condemn. Otherwise, on what basis do we condemn them?
I don't know for sure that prison rape is why he would have rather killed himself, but I strongly suspect it ran through his mind. Plenty of bullying and beatings and things of that nature, short of rape, do go on in a confined environment full of violent people such as a prison.
The picture you paint is certainly a win-win. This guy could have served his time, maybe learned a trade or job skill, and tried to turn his life back around. The stigma of a criminal record would be difficult to overcome. Mainstream America generally doesn't admit that people can chang
Slashdot Mirror
Because fighting instincts is hard. Telling people they just need to control their diet is about as effective as abstinance-only sex education. An effective response needs to examine the underlying instinct and either find a way to make it easier to control, or allow people to indulge while removing the negative consequences of doing so.
For quite a long time, I never bother to count calories or worry about what I eat or how sugary/fattening it is. I have been within five pounds of the same weight (which is right in the middle of the "ideal" range for someone my height and gender) for many years.
I suspect that much of the obesity comes from the failure to deal with emotions. When you have a natural appetite, you don't feel hunger unless you actually do require the calories and the nutrients. Once in a while I crave greasy fatty foods but this is rare. It's usually in connection with working harder than usual and exerting myself -- I allow it because it makes sense. I would have to work very hard to either gain weight or to lose weight and both would be unhealthy for me. That was not always the case for me, but instead of making a million excuses for why nothing is ever my fault, I stopped worrying about fault and blame entirely and started understanding the cause and effect.
In the wild, have you ever seen an obese deer? Did you ever see an obese lion in the wild? You never see obese animals in the wild no matter how abundant food may be. Animals in the wild have a natural appetite. What happens to people is that they start using food like a drug to derive a sense of emotional comfort. They even call it "comfort food". They eat when they aren't really hungry, either for this comfort or for something to do with their hands and mouths. It distracts them from all of their unresolved stress, traumas, resentments, and emotional issues. They eat for emotional reasons unrelated to their physical need for nutrients and calories. It upsets the balance of what was once a natural appetite. That's what I believe.
This is why all the emphasis on dieting and exercise isn't really doing much good. The imbalance between diet and exercise is an effect, not a cause. A diet is quite difficult to stick to because the unnatural hunger hasn't been resolved. As usual we are trying to treat surface symptoms instead of understanding how they came to be, mostly because understanding that means facing some very uncomfortable questions about who we are and how we live.
It's actually easier for a cocaine addict to give up cocaine than for a fattie to learn to use food properly. That's because the cokehead could quit using cocaine and (once past withdrawals) never have to touch it again, but you have to eat.
It's like what Neil Boortz said. If you send your child to a Catholic school, they will be raised to think Catholocism is great.
Well, you lost me there, because I went to a Catholic school and am agnostic. So maybe sending them to an oppressive high school makes them value their freedoms more once they get out.
They will be raised to think so. It doesn't mean they will accept what they are raised to believe.
Matter of fact, it sounds like it was an unduly harsh yet valuable experience for you. I don't personally believe you are actually an adult until you can question what you were brought up to believe and reject every piece of it that makes no sense.
Although what I would gain from treating a fictional book as some sort of Holy Bible to work into every possible conversation has yet to be explained to me, but a lot of people seem to consider it highly likely for some strange reason
Just FYI, actual Objectivists do treat Atlas Shrugged as a Holy Bible to be studied and quoted in that manner, and those on the far left will find those philosophies morally repugnant. So if you were wondering why you stepped into something... well, that's why. :-)
Bringing Ayn Rand into a discussion about Washington is like bringing a gun to a knife fight.
I've never before allowed the unreasonable overreactions of emotionally immature people to control my behavior. I'm not about to start today.
Let them foam at the mouth. Perhaps I'll invest in paper towels?
My guess would be that in low-traction situations, even light pressure on the brakes can be enough to lock the wheels, while engine braking cannot possibly cause the wheels to lock.
When I needed a replacement car, I got a very good one at an even better price and have not regretted this decision ... but I certainly do miss a manual transmission for just this reason.
A secondary reason is that it's just more fun.
Yeah, that's what it's all about. Nobody's actually afraid of any real bombs going off anywhere.
If it meant drastically reducing the size and power of the federal government, I would gladly take the chance of dying because of a terrorist's bomb.
I'd be more likely to die by being struck by lightning, in fact.
Lawrence Kohlberg was kind enough to document six stages of personal moral development. What you display is Stage 4. This is a description, with the bracketed statements being my own writing:
In Stage four (authority and social order obedience driven), it is important to obey laws, dictums and social conventions because of their importance in maintaining a functioning society. Moral reasoning in stage four is thus beyond the need for individual approval exhibited in stage three [this part is decent]. A central ideal or ideals often prescribe what is right and wrong, such as in the case of fundamentalism [not so decent]. If one person violates a law, perhaps everyone would—thus there is an obligation and a duty to uphold laws and rules. When someone does violate a law, it is morally wrong; culpability is thus a significant factor in this stage as it separates the bad domains from the good ones. Most active members of society remain at stage four, where morality is still predominantly dictated by an outside force [if you cannot think for yourself then you need an outside force to do it for you - sheep need their shepherd].
Copyright law was originally intended to provide a balance between the rewarding of creators on one hand, and the enrichment of the public domain on the other. The original duration of copyright was twelve years, back when movable type was the most effective way to distribute information. As our ability to endlessly duplicate and spread information increases, the duration should shorten if it changes at all -- a copyright holder could reach a bigger audience in less time. Instead it has increased to a maximum of the author's life plus more than a century, in an age when you can contact millions around the globe in seconds.
That is unjust. Copyright law and the balance it once sought to maintain is a social contract model, what Kohlberg calls Stage Five. This is the description, and the emphasis is mine:
In Stage five (social contract driven), the world is viewed as holding different opinions, rights and values. Such perspectives should be mutually respected as unique to each person or community. Laws are regarded as social contracts rather than rigid edicts. Those that do not promote the general welfare should be changed when necessary to meet “the greatest good for the greatest number of people”. This is achieved through majority decision, and inevitable compromise. Democratic government is ostensibly based on stage five reasoning.
Modern copyright law is made to benefit a tiny minority of the population - the monied copyright lobby - at the detriment of everyone else. There was no "democratic" process involved in making it this way. It was bought and paid for, pure and simple. It was not arranged based on any concept of what is right, what is best for society, what is the ideal balance of reward vs. the public domain, what voters wanted, none of that. A tiny minority realized they could abuse the system so they did. It is a complete rejection of the legal system and the participatory republic that you yourself adhere to when you ask me what I have done to resist it.
If you believe that citizens should be able to resist unjust laws by appealing to their representatives, then you must also view the copyright interests' usurpation of our legal system as the mockery of liberty that it is.
Don't forget Betty Humpter and Amanda Huginkis.
On issues of privacy no less! What kind of message are these irresponsible parents sending their children, that they have a right to not be treated like inmates? These kids might grow up and demand that the GOVERNMENT not do it either! And then the future terrorists will win!!! WON'T SOMEONE THINK OF THE CHILDREN'S APATHY TO CIVIL RIGHTS ABUSES!?!?
The whole arrangement never made sense to me.
This state-sponsored, state-run institution can deny its students their natural inalienable rights such as free speech, freedom of association, etc. All they have to do is say "in loco parentis" and they get to fly in the face of every single court precedent in which just about every other state-sponsored institution was struck down for doing the same. Even though I've read the Constitution and it does not have an age limit.
So far as I can tell, the primary (intended or unintended) function of public schooling is to condition children from a young age to submit to authority and to tyranny without questioning its legitimacy. The lesson is that it's going to happen and there's nothing you can do about it. Any academic training that also occurs is coincidental.
It's like what Neil Boortz said. If you send your child to a Catholic school, they will be raised to think Catholocism is great. Send them to a Protestant school and they will be raised to believe Protestantism is great. Send them to a government school... well, we hardly have today that kind of government the Founders wanted. What we are heading towards is a soft tyranny, the kind that isn't because they have bigger guns, but because they know what's best for you. Much conditioning is needed for this to be accepted, and of course it's more effective if it starts at a young age like five or six years old, long before the ability to reason is fully developed.
The problem is that Ayn's premise was flawed. Companies don't hire lobbyists because they have to, they hire them because they want to influence (purchase) favorable rules and regulations. Lobbyists are not defensive, they are offensive.
The way you brought the subject up, and the fact that you pointed out a flawed premise as if it was factual is what made you sound like you were shoe horning Ayn into the conversation. You gave the impression that you were a blind follower of her.
Note: I have read Ayn's work but disagree with a lot of her philosophy.
Actually I happened to have just read that section of the book very recently. As in, a few hours before I saw this story. I am only at the beginning of the book so far and just came across that part of it. Then I see a Slashdot discussion about "Washington men" of a different sort, and well, I put two and two together. It was significantly apropos for me. Perhaps that is why you think I would shoehorn it in? Although what I would gain from treating a fictional book as some sort of Holy Bible to work into every possible conversation has yet to be explained to me, but a lot of people seem to consider it highly likely for some strange reason.
You see, on my own I would never have obtained and started reading any work by Rand. But I see so many otherwise calm people go from 0 to stark-raving-mad at the mere mention of her name on here. It is solely thanks to them and their extremely reactionary responses to the book that I became curious about it. I started wondering what the big deal was about. It obviously has a great deal of power over them. If not for that I'd have known nothing about it. Isn't that funny? See that's the problem with knee-jerk types, they have no sense of irony.
I still haven't seen what the big deal is, but it's early yet. I understand that Galt has this long monologue about the producers and the parasites (or whatever terminology is used) that seems to piss people off faster than an abortion debate. It's a pity that so few "adults" can disagree with something without freaking out in such a disgraceful manner. But it does give them an excuse to climb up on their high horses and shout and rain down fire and brimstone on whatever it is they're overreacting to, and the small-minded truly, madly, deeply are in love with doing that. I believe it's the highlight of their lives.
No, I actually hacked Larry Page's gmail account and found this in there.
SRSLY
I think this thread is evidence that the use of crack cocaine is far more widespread than previously suspected.
I'm not replying to you because you are part of such evidence, but because I think you would understand.
And yeah, that might be the future with self publishing on the rise but right now they have those texts under laws that are legitimate US Laws.
If by "legitimate" you mean:
I wish Liberterarians would get some real friends so they'd stop posting their drivel on the internet for attention. You guys should arrange a meetup or something, get it all out of your system and stop shoehorning your idiotic philosophy into every single god damn slashdot submission.
I wish I could mention a simple fictional book without people freaking out about it and assuming they know who I am and what I believe and then proceeding to rail against whatever they just made up about me.
Honestly, perhaps you could consult a psychologist and ask about "systematic desensitization therapy"?
My Good Friend Jared,
It would be a shame if your constituents found out about all this hentai porn you've downloaded from the Internet.
Perhaps you should send my friends at the FTC a letter explaining how their current views of Google are untenable.
*Strokes white cat*
Dearest Regards, Dr. Larry Page
It reminds me of the book Atlas Shrugged, in the beginning, where the railroads had to hire a "Washington Man" to protect themselves from the legislature. It also mentions that such people are a reluctant necessity and tend not to be particularly upstanding or trustworthy.
Even if your joke has no basis in reality at all, some things don't change.
Target advertising isn't necessarily a bad thing unless the government gets involved.
They usually do that after the company has built up a nice, big, robust, relevant database full of information that the government would have had difficulty obtaining on its own.
Plenty of real criminals have been caught with the aid of data that Google had collected about them. This saves the cops some of the effort of doing real police work. The problem is, the same techniques could be used against "undesirables" as well.
Not to mention, the very idea that I need someone else to tell me what I want and what I need is just plain rude. So is the idea of tracking me without first obtaining my written consent. Targeted advertising is worse than the less specific kind. You'd have to be a serious slave to the most momentary of conveniences to think otherwise.
This was an entertaining post and an amusing break from all of the argument about Google vs. Apple.
It should be +5 Funny. If that isn't what the author intended, tell him that's tough titty: it should still be +5 Funny.
Between the government and the private sector, I know who's lied to me more about products. Hint: it rhymes with sivate prector.
Indeed, government probably won't lie to you, on this particular subject.
When they treat adults like you as though you were a two-year-old, they will do it quite openly and honestly. And shamelessly.
But hey, at least they aren't lying, right?
Or maybe the real question is what happened to you to make you crave so many sodas instead of honestly desiring to quench your thirst the natural and most effective way, with water. Maybe another real question is why you cannot take responsibility yourself for how you eat and whether you exercise, and remedy either (or both) as needed, why you would need any corporation or government agency to tell you how you should eat and when you should exercise. That would be a revolutionary concept, huh?
Of course if you are a total victim then the "advantage" (if you are warped and perverted enough to think of it as such) is that nothing is ever your fault. You're just a leaf in the wind, powerless to change anything, totally at the mercy of corporations and government to which you have ceded all of your personal power. Then sure, you get to blame them for your problems, yeah, maybe you can convince yourself that this is satisfying, are you happy with your life yet? Or you can trade away the blame-game bullshit and do what it takes to make better decisions and see with your own eyes that they bear fruit in the form of a better life that you get to run yourself.
The victimhood mentality is astonishingly popular. I must conclude that the people who prefer it have never honestly mastered both options. It's like a computer user who swears Windows is the best OS for his needs, yet he knows nothing about any other OS. His opinion is not a valid one because he has no basis for comparison. Now if he were equally skillful in Windows, Linux, FreeBSD, and OSX, and then still preferred Windows, I would call that a valid opinion.
Can you be any less condescending? I am a Second Amendment supporter. I don't believe that it is truly a meaningful "safeguard against tyranny" today, but I consider it important for other reasons (like right to defend oneself). I support other organizations who defend our freedoms and human rights, like ACLU. But you just went out of your way to offend me, because I do have a gun in my pocket? Are you living in perpetual fear of being in a proximity of a lethal weapon, or something?
I live in a state where the law allows you to openly carry, or you can obtain a permit to conceal-carry.
Sometimes in public places I see people openly carrying. I suppose I also see people who conceal-carry but by the nature of that I don't know which they are.
When I am at a store and I see a fellow citizen openly carrying a gun, it makes me feel safer. I am happy to see it. I know that any would-be violent criminal can also see it and that it gives them a reason to think twice about trying something stupid. I am not afraid of the person who is carrying. They are obviously following the law. Thus, they are not criminals and are not to be regarded as such. Like I said, I am glad to see them and I wish more people did it.
Now, I more strongly favor conceal-carry for one simple reason. When the criminals themselves do not know who is armed and who is not, it makes them think twice about attacking anyone. Ergo, even people who don't own guns benefit from this.
When you vote you are exercising one of the few types of force that has any meaning. The real pity is that once you have exercised that force the party you voted for can change their whole agenda.
The major motivation for this is the influence money has on the political process.
There is a great remedy for this. Give a very generous amount of public money, with no strings attached, to all candidates who have met the requiremetns to appear on the ballot. Mandate that this money is their sole means of financing their campaigns. Mandate that candidates may not use their personal wealth and any attempt to do so disqualifies them, then audit them regularly. Then pass a law stating that any campaign contribution to any candidate shall be construed as a bribe and punished with life in prison and no possibility of parole, including the candidates themselves if they accept it, or just the would-be donor if the candidate rejects it.
That would be something like the respect that is due for such important offices.
Probably. Which is why it's necessary. The alternative is large parts of the population are disenfranchised, that it is because they have been convinced their votes can't change anything rather than directly preventing them from voting
In a parliamentary system with multiple (i.e more than two) parties, this is a good idea. It tends to work. It works even better if the single transferrable vote system is implemented (something you may wish to look up if you are unfamiliar with it).
In the USA's winner-take-all system with only two parties that stand a chance of winning, lots of votes ARE wasted. A candidate can win 51% of the vote and the other 49% of voters may as well have stayed home.
Then there's another deal you may not have considered, and certainly haven't addressed. If someone is apathetic enough that they will not vote unless threatened with a fine, what makes you think they have bothered to inform themselves about who the candidates are and what they stand for? Do you think lots of uninformed voters is a good thing? I really, really don't. It's at least as bad as people who vote for parties mindlessly with no consideration of the candidate.
At least in the USA, if you want more people to vote, especially young people, you need to give them the hope of actually changing and reforming the system. Not manufactured controversies like gay marriage or abortion, but real issues like why we still have a War on Drugs that obviously isn't working, why there is such a huge deficit, why the federal government gets involved in so many local and state affairs, why Social Security is not an interest-bearing account with your name on it, why we keep trying to police the entire world, why we have fiat currency instead of representative currency, etc. These are all sacred cows that no one in office really wants to change.
It encourages extremism, a relatively small group of motivated zealots, NRA members, for instance, can leverage their ability to turn out the vote to have an undue influence on government.
If they are truly a small minority then only a fraction of the majority could vote against their proposals and that would be that. If they can't be bothered to do that then they must not think its important and so they are giving their silent consent to it.
As I see it, no one wants to talk about this but there are two groups that really have undue influence on government. One of them is retirees. When you no longer have to spend most of your waking hours working for a living and raising a family, it's certainly easier to be politically active. The other group are welfare recipients, who consistently vote for whomever will promise more benefits (typically this is a Democrat and constitutes a significant Democrat Party bloc). Both are a minority of the population. Both have enormous influence over elections.
If you have a philosophical objection to voting, you can just pay the small fine. Or cast a blank ballot.
Or pick a random candidate to get the damned thing over with since you didn't want to be there anyway. Again, this is no good if you want genuine elections.
, 4) liberty and personal responsibility are more important than fear.
Owning a gun is an admission that you live in fear, and want to make others fear you even more.
I'll add that the only reason _you_ don't live in fear is because there are men with guns who are charged with your safety. They are the police in many places and the military in places where police don't usually carry guns. You hire them with your tax dollars to present deadly force on your behalf. Owning a gun simply means sharing this responsibility and not completely delegating it to someone else whom you've never met.
I long for a world where force or threat of force is no longer necessary to maintain order, but we don't have that world at this time. So yes I think guns are great, and I think the 2nd Amendment is great, and I think conceal-carry laws are great, especially the part where most crimes were stopped without firing a single shot. Once the criminal realized the intended "victim" was armed, that was that. The media is oh-so-careful never to report these events, but they do happen and you can find the information yourself now that you know it happens.
, 4) liberty and personal responsibility are more important than fear.
Owning a gun is an admission that you live in fear, and want to make others fear you even more.
It's an admission that unfortunately, some people cannot be reasoned with.
Most people who actually own guns hope that they never have to use them. It's a bit like car insurance. You have it, but not because you're planning to crash your car.
neeet! Not a fan of hackers, but if WoW had a way of doing this then sooner of later it would happen.
I'm not a fan of much of anything, but I can't help feeling a certain amusement at such events. I imagine it really pisses in the cornflakes of the Type-A control freaks who tend to run large organizations. I think they need to be reminded once in a while that not everything can be commanded and made to comply.
What would be truly useful is a way to remind them of this without the need for unauthorized access or any other kind of criminal activity. Sadly, corporations are internally arranged as dictatorships or tyrannies, so this is not likely. What would really interest me is a corporation structured more like a democracy or a republic, where rank-and-file workers share at least some portion of the decision-making. I wonder if such a company would be competitive in the marketplace.
If you're on /. and don't know what NPC is, or how to find out, you're probably not the target audience here.
If you're on /. and don't like answering peoples' questions, even when it would have taken you less time to type than the snide remark you chose, you're probably the target audience here.
A little definition is in order. A stupid question is one you could easily answer yourself in less time than it would take to request hand-holding you don't really need. A stupid question is rude because it is effectively a claim that someone else's time is worth far less than your own, and therefore they should serve you (as if you are some kind of king) and do your own minor legwork for you. That is absurd. I notice you did not submit to it yourself -- you did not answer the question either -- so whether you like it or not, your actions are in agreement with me.
... they deserve the snide remarks they receive. When you consider he could have Googled "NPC" in less time than it took to ask a stupid question, the remark was actually rather polite.
Stupid questions from literate adults who obviously have Internet (thus Google) access
Sorry if you are too soft to recognize the good that comes from not lowering the standards to suit the intellectually lazy. Intellectual laziness and the choice to knowingly embrace helplessness are character flaws. They are not supposed to be validated. They don't deserve it.
Now then, go ahead and launch your personal attacks and invective. That's what those of your emotionally-goverened, offense-driven mentality usually do when the following two conditions have been met: a) they cannot formulate an effective counter-point, and b) they are too haughty to admit when a good point has been made.
Your "Founding Fathers" had no experience with any form of government except Monarchy. Their perspective is hopelessly outdated and limited, and it takes either an enormous idiot or intellectually dishonest person to treat their writings as anything but historical curiosities.
When the USA descends into tyranny please act surprised, will you? I couldn't tell you how much I would like to be wrong about this, but all the signs are there.
... so I can't show him that much decency, I mean if I did that I would lose ten points" that's about how the thinking goes. It's some kind of puerile emotional "logic" designed to protect ego. It's also a path to misery. I would feel like a prisoner within my own life if I couldn't overcome that. Enjoy whatever smug superiority you can convince yourself of.
And I like how you just gloss over what I had to say about wishing death to people you've never met and know nothing about. I suppose you couldn't comment on that, after all you might lose face if you gave any sort of honest answer. At least, to someone who would say such a thing, a statement like "hmm you know I shouldn't have said that, I was out of line" would equate to losing face. To me, it would equate to being man enough to take responsibility for your own actions and would only increase my respect for that person.
"But but I don't like that guy, personally I hate him, I mean after all he expressed an opinion I disagree with
Having said that, the issue of sexual assault in prisons is an important one. It's literally a joke to many people; in fact, it's one of the few types of "rape joke" that's still socially acceptable.
I have a rather expansive sense of humor. In a non-serious context many completely tasteless jokes could be funny, particularly with alcohol involved. But in a serious context, actual rape of actual human beings is not remotely funny. It's demoralizing that so many people think it is.
No legislator wants to talk about it lest they be seen as "soft on crime" in a society based around retribution rather than justice.
You especially see this "soft on crime" bullshit when it comes to non-violent drug offenders who have not victimized anyone. Making the punishment actually fit the crime, or even admitting that sometimes the law invents crimes where no real crime has happened (that is, there is no victim) is what you would expect from a competent and responsible legislator. We generally don't have those. We have approval whores who will pander to anyone if they think it will get them elected. I'm not sure they even have their own beliefs, principles, and convictions. If they do, they certainly don't have the backbone to stand up for them.
Hell, police in the US will actually use it as a threat!
I know that particularly after 9/11 it has become fashionable to glorify police and celebrate their great "heroics". This is sometimes legitimate, but I deal in facts. Police themselves are often violent people. They certainly like to be in control. The kind of power they have is most appealing to sociopaths and fevered egos. You could say it's irresistable. Sociopaths are notorious for their ability to blend in with normal people by saying or doing anything in order to be seen as virtuous.
I have personally met both police officers and firefighters. It's much easier for me to respect someone like a firefighter because their job doesn't provide so many reasons to push people around and act like a tough guy, and I would not hesitate to point out that anyone willing to run into a burning building has some serious balls. It's no surprise to me that police would say or do just about anything they can get away with (which is a lot more than you or I could get away with) if they really want to make someone comply. It seems they can blatantly break the law and inflict violence with the loss of their job being the most severe consequence they are likely to ever face.
If you're right about this guy, fixing that problem would have resulted in not only less sexual assault in the world, but also fewer innocent people's lives being endangered and one less suicide here. How is that not win-win?
In the case of someone who is sent to prison in the first place for having raped someone, I really don't have a lot of sympathy for them having to find out just how unpleasant it is to be the victim. But if we are going to consider that a "feature" and not a "bug", then make it part of the official sentence. That would, of course, be both barbaric and crazy. At least it would also be honest. This "turning a blind eye" bullshit has to stop though. I don't care what the prisoner did to get there, we as a society have to be better than those we condemn. Otherwise, on what basis do we condemn them?
I don't know for sure that prison rape is why he would have rather killed himself, but I strongly suspect it ran through his mind. Plenty of bullying and beatings and things of that nature, short of rape, do go on in a confined environment full of violent people such as a prison.
The picture you paint is certainly a win-win. This guy could have served his time, maybe learned a trade or job skill, and tried to turn his life back around. The stigma of a criminal record would be difficult to overcome. Mainstream America generally doesn't admit that people can chang