Everything I've ever seen on the Cost side is that Medicare and Medicaid is much much more efficient than the insurance system. In fact where Medicare and Medicaid struggle is when they have to deal or use the insurance system in some way, it all gets bogged down in paperwork and bureaucracy.

For decades a lot of the public have wanted a health care for everyone single payer system. The only time this began to get traction was when GM endorsed a change in health care because it costs them $2000 more to make a car in Detroit than it does in Windsor Canada, because they have to pay for Health Care. That is a sign of a broken democracy but it's also a sign that this is cost effective and should be done the way the public wants.

--vive in all such circumstances.

(32)


25,6-7: "The three cardinal values of the Objectivist ethics ... are: Reason, Purpose, Self-Esteem, with their three corresponding virtues: Rationality, Productiveness, Pride.

"Productive work is the central purpose of a rational man's life..."

NA. Earlier, Rand told us that life is the only end in itself, and that one's own life is the purpose of each individual (25,2). She contradicts this by declaring something else to be the purpose of life.

Moreover, we have already seen that there is no reason within Rand's scheme why productive work is more morally virtuous than looting (comments 28-31).

(33)


25,7: "Rationality is man's basic virtue, the source of all his other virtues."

I agree with this; however, Rand can give no adequate basis for it. (See comments 20-24.)

(34)


25,7: "Irrationality is the rejection of man's means of survival and, therefore, a commitment to a course of blind destruction; that which is anti-mind, is anti-life."

I quote this to emphasize that Rand's view is that rationality is good only because it serves the end of 'life'; life is the only end in itself.

(35)


26,1: Rationality means a commitment to the principle "that one must never place any value or consideration whatsoever above one's perception of reality."

NA. How does this follow from her view of ethics? Rather, 'life' is supposed to be the highest value--one must place that above everything else. One's 'perception of reality' is only a means to furthering one's life, yet Rand seems to be saying that accurate perception is the ultimate end in itself.

(36)


26,1: "... It means one's acceptance of the responsibility of forming one's own judgments and of living by the work of one's own mind (which is the virtue of Independence)."

NA. How does this follow from the value of life? Why can't people survive while being dependent?

(37)


26,1: "It means that one must never sacrifice one's convictions to the opinions or wishes of others (which is the virtue of Integrity)--that one must never attempt to fake reality in any manner (which is the virtue of Honesty)..."

NA. I skip over the rest of her elaborations on what rationality means, about which I would say the same thing. Granted, dishonesty and lack of integrity may sometimes lead to one's death (though not very often), but how can Rand justify these "must never" claims? She makes no attempt to argue that these things one allegedly must never do will, all of them, automatically kill you. That is what she would have to argue, given that life is the only ultimate standard of value.

I skip over her similar remarks about productiveness and pride.

(38)


27,3: "The basic social principle of the Objectivist ethics is that just as life is an end in itself, so every living human being is an end in himself, not the means to the ends or the welfare of others--and, therefore, that man must live for his own sake, neither sacrificing himself to others nor sacrificing others to himself."

Above (comments 7-8) we saw that Rand adopts a purely agent-relative conception of value: that is, a thing cannot be said to be good simply. Rather, a thing can only intelligibly be said to be good for (or: good relative to) someone. This is what the ethical egoist has to say.

Since "is an end in itself" means "is good for its own sake," it follows that nothing can be said to be an end in itself in any absolute sense; rather, one can only say a thing is an end-in-itself for someone or other.

Now, what does Rand mean in saying "life is an end in itself"? This appears to be using "end in itself" in an absolute sense, but perhaps she means only that each particular life is an end in itself for that particular living thing. What does she mean by saying every human being "is an end in himself"? Again, is she using this in an absolute sense, or a relative sense?

Case A: Assume she is using "end in himself" in an absolute sense here. In that case, she is contradicting her earlier claim that value is agent-relative (comment . Furthermore, it would seem to follow that every person has a reason for promoting the welfare of everyone, as an end in itself. That is, utilitarianism would seem to follow, which is not what she wants. She thinks one should promote one's own life as one's sole ultimate value. Which brings us to the second case.

Case B: Rand must mean this in an agent-relative sense: i.e., each individual human being is an end in himself for himself (but not for other people). So for me, my life is the only end in itself, whereas for you, your life is the only end in itself. This is consistent with what she has said up to now. But now what about the rest of the passage: "not the means to the ends or the welfare of others." Well, of course for me my life is an end in itself. But for other people, it is not; we just established that. So why wouldn't my life be for them just a means to their own ends? Why wouldn't my life from my neighbor's point of view be good only as a means to promoting my neighbor's life?

Similarly, what about the remark, "man must live for his own sake, neither sacrificing himself to others nor sacrificing others to himself"? Clearly, given that my life is, for me, the only end in itself, I would be irrational to sacrifice it for the sake of others. But why would I not be rational to sacrifice others to myself? True, their lives are ends in themselves for them; but what has that to do with me? For me, their lives are not ends in themselves, since only mine is. So why wouldn't it be good, for me, to sacrifice their lives for the sake of my own?

What seems to have happened here is that Rand slipped from the agent-relative theory of value into the absolutist conception.

(39)


27,4: "In psychological terms, the issue of man's survival does not confront his consciousness as an issue of 'life or death,' but as an issue of 'happiness or suffering.'"

I think she means that, even though the good is in fact what serves our life (our survival), we aren't always aware of it as such; instead, we are aware of it as what makes us happy. In fact, what makes us happy does so because it promotes our life, but we're immediately aware of it only as what makes us happy.

(40)


27,4-5: "Emotions are the automatic results of man's value judgments integrated by his subconscious; emotions are estimates of that which furthers man's values or threatens them ... [T]he standard of value operating his emotional mechanism is not [automatic]. Since man has no automatic knowledge, he can have no automatic values; since he has no innate ideas, he can have no innate value judgements."

NA. There are a number of problems here.

First, Rand's claim that emotions result from value judgements is evolutionarily implausible. The other animals all have certain emotions, which we share (though we have a wider range of emotions)--e.g., fear, anger, love for one's offspring. But Rand would probably agree that the other animals do not make value judgments. Therefore, what she is saying is that at some time in our history, as humans broke off from the primate line, the emotional mechanisms of the animals got selected out, and then replaced by other mechanisms that induce us to have the same emotions.

Alternately, perhaps Rand would say that the other animals do have value judgments, but of a different kind: theirs are automatic and instinctive, whereas ours are not. Then again, she would be saying that the mechanisms that give the animals instinctive value judgments got selected out, and then replaced with mechanisms that lead us to make many of the same value judgments. (Cf. comment 21.)

Second, people can often have emotions that conflict with their value judgments, for instance, a person who experiences a fear of flying even though he knows that flying is perfectly safe.

Third, in order to claim, rationally, that people (a) have no innate knowledge, (b) have no innate values, and (c) have no innate ideas, Rand would have to cite some actual scientific evidence. This is armchair cognitive psychology. (Cf. comments 24, 25.)

(41)


28,5: "Happiness is that state of consciousness which proceeds from the achievement of one's values. ... [I]f a man values destruction, like a sadist--or self-torture, like a masochist--or life beyond the grave, like a mystic--or mindless 'kicks,' like the driver of a hotrod car--his alleged happiness is the measure of his success in the service of his own destruction. It must be added that the emotional state of all those irrationalists cannot be properly designated as happiness or even as pleasure: it is merely a moment's relief from their chronic state of terror."

28,6: "Neither life nor happiness can be achieved by the pursuit of irrational whims."

29,2: "Happiness is a state of non-contradictory joy--a joy without penalty or guilt, a joy that does not clash with any of your values and does not work for your own destruction. ... Happiness is possible only to a rational man..."

The initial claim is that happiness simply results from attaining one's values. But this is followed by the claim, apparently, that a person with the wrong values cannot experience happiness (or 'true' happiness).

Why wouldn't the 'irrationalists' experience happiness when they attained their goals? Perhaps Rand is saying that it is impossible for the irrationalists to attain their goals. Why? Rand implies that the 'irrational' goals are ones that lead to one's own 'destruction.' Now, there are two alternatives:

Case A: Suppose Rand means this literally: that those values, if attained, result in your being literally dead, i.e., not existing. Then we could understand why people with those values could not experience happiness (since they would be dead first). However, she has given no indication of why this would be true. Apart from the 'mystic' case, the other kinds of people she mentions do seem to be alive and to often get the things she says they seek (e.g., drivers of hotrod cars do get kicks). Why, therefore, are they not 'really' happy?

Case B: Suppose Rand meant their 'destruction' metaphorically, e.g., their ceasing to live the life proper to man. In that case, she has given no explanation for why these people would not experience happiness when they attain this improper state, given that it is what they value.

The third quotation suggests that perhaps Rand believes these people's pseudo-happiness is always tainted by guilt. But she has just told us (comment 40) that all our value judgements are chosen, not innate. So if someone chose the improper values, how would they feel guilt upon attaining them? Guilt would seem to presuppose that they somehow knew those values to be wrong; but by hypothesis, they don't, since they have such knowledge neither innately nor by choice.

The significance of this is that it is another example of Rand's failure to explain, in terms of her theory, why sadism, masochism, or various other things she believes to be wrong, are wrong.

(42)


29,3: "The maintenance of life and the pursuit of happiness are not two separate issues. ... [W]hen one experiences the kind of pure happiness that is an end in itself ... one is ... affirming ... the metaphysical fact that life is an end in itself."

It is possible for a person to be alive but not happy, so how can it be that the maintenance of life is not a "separate issue" from the pursuit of happiness? Further, since Rand has said that life is the only end in itself, how can it also be that some kind of happiness is an end in itself?

This apparent contradiction could be resolved if and only if we assume that happiness is (that is, is exactly the same thing as) life. This is false, since a person can be alive but not happy--unless Rand wants to simply define "life" to mean "a happy life." But then her initial argument for why life is the ultimate value would not apply to this new sense of "life". (Cf. comment 27.)

Happiness, on Rand's theory of the emotions, is simply a signal that one is attaining one's values. It is the values themselves that are valuable; why would the mere signal be intrinsically valuable? Given the rest of her view, happiness could only be valuable as a means to furthering one's life.

(43)


29,5: "This is the fallacy inherent in hedonism ... 'Happiness' can properly be the purpose of ethics, but not the standard. The task of ethics is to define man's proper code of values and thus to give him the means of achieving happiness. To declare, as the ethical hedonists do, that 'the proper value is whatever gives you pleasure' is to declare that 'the proper value is whatever you happen to value'--which is an act of intellectual and philosophical abdication..."

First, it is unclear how happiness, rather than life, can be the purpose of ethics, according to what Rand has said earlier.

Second, it is unclear what the distinction is supposed to be between the 'purpose' and the 'standard' of ethics. If one's purpose is X, then why wouldn't one's standard be simply: that which achieves X? Here is everything Rand has to say about this:

25,3: "The difference between 'standard' and 'purpose' in this context is as follows: a 'standard' is an abstract principle that serves as a measurement or gauge to guide a man's choices in the achievement of a concrete, specific purpose. 'That which is required for the survival of man qua man' is an abstract principle that applies to every individual man. The task of applying this principle to a concrete, specific purpose--the purpose of living a life proper to a rational being--belongs to every individual man, and the life he has to live is his own."

I take it that survival qua man is the same thing as living a life proper to a rational being. The difference between the 'standard' and the 'purpose' in this example, then, seems to be that the 'standard' is something that applies to everyone--it is 'the life proper to a rational being'--while the 'purpose' is made specific to a single person--e.g., 'my living the life proper to a rational being.' Why this is a significant distinction escapes me. In any case, none of this explains why happiness could be a 'purpose' but not a 'standard.' Apparently, she is claiming that 'happiness' can be specific and concrete but not abstract?

Leaving that aside, the complaint against the hedonists seems to be one of circularity. They are not giving a genuine standard of value, since one's experience of pleasure depends on one's already having values; one then experiences pleasure as a result of attaining those values. This, however, is false. Children do not experience pleasure when eating ice cream because they believe that eating ice cream is good; quite the reverse. (Cf. comments 21, 24, 40.)

(44)


30,2: "The philosophers who attempted to devise an allegedly rational code of ethics gave mankind nothing but a choice of whims: the 'selfish' pursuit of one's own whims (such as the ethics of Nietzsche)--or 'selfless' service to the whims of others (such as the ethics of Bentham, Mill, Comte and of all social hedonists, whether they allowed man to include his own whims among the millions of others or advised him to turn himself into a totally selfless 'shmoo' that seeks to be eaten by others)."

This passage is misleading about the history of ethics.

First, it implies that there are some philosophers who held that people should turn themselves into totally selfless shmoos that seek to be eaten by others, but, while she names some 'social hedonists', she does not tell us who she thinks held the 'shmoo' theory. Perhaps she meant Comte (inventor of the term "altruism")--but Comte did not believe that 'altruistic' behavior was self-destructive. Nor did Bentham or Mill think that somehow, other people's pleasure had value but one's own did not.

Second, Rand seems to be using "whim" as a term of abuse. Utilitarians believe that one ought to bring about the most overall pleasure or happiness in the world that one can, but they certainly do not think this amounts to pursuing whims. Rand does, but it is unclear what she is saying is a whim here. The utilitarians advocate pursuing pleasure. So, is pleasure, itself, a whim? Perhaps Rand means that the desire for pleasure is a whim. More likely, she is applying her theory (see comment 43) that one will only experience pleasure when something happens, if one antecedently desired that thing--and it is the desires whose satisfaction causes pleasure that she is calling 'whims'.

Why would those desires be 'whims'? Perhaps Rand's point is simply that some of them are whims--i.e., that people can get pleasure from satisfying whimsical desires, and the hedonists do not discount those kinds of pleasures--those pleasures are just as intrinsically good as any other pleasures, according to the hedonists (except for Mill). This is a genuine objection to some forms of hedonism. Nevertheless, Rand's remarks are at best misleading--they suggest, to a reader unfamiliar with whom Rand is talking about, that these 'hedonists' all say: "A person should just pursue solely whims, of himself or of others, with no exercise of reason." Which, of course, is false.

The significance, again, is that Rand is able to illegitimately make her theory seem more plausible by attacking straw men.

(45)


30,5: "[W]hen one speaks of man's right to exist for his own sake, for his own rational self-interest, most people assume automatically that this means his right to sacrifice others. Such an assumption is a confession of their own belief that to injure, enslave, rob or murder others is in man's self-interest..."

The omission of quantifiers is used to great effect here. When they hear the idea that an individual should always do whatever serves his own interests, most people assume this means his right to sacrifice others. They are thereby 'confessing' their belief that it could be in someone's interest, some time, to injure, enslave, rob, or murder someone else. If one removes the italicized quantifier terms in the above, Rand sounds much more reasonable.

However, Rand has given no evidence for the conclusion that it is never in anyone's interest to harm anyone else (see comments 27-31).

(46)


31,3: "The Objectivist ethics holds that human good does not require sacrifices and cannot be achieved by the sacrifice of anyone to anyone. It holds that the rational interests of men do not clash..."

NA.

This would be a good time for a general remark about all the ethical claims Rand makes about what the life of man qua man requires, or what a rational person would value, and so on--that is, all her ethical claims after the claim that life is the ultimate value.

Not only does Rand gives virtually no argument for any of them, but she has given us no criterion of what is 'rational'--unless we are to take the criterion, 'what serves life is rational.' Let us consider four cases:

Case A: The rational is what serves your life, and "life" means continued existence. In that case, Rand needs to give an argument that you will literally, physically die if you do any of the things she says are wrong, or refrain from the things she says are right. For instance, if you hurt another person, drive a hotrod car (28,5), or marry a slut (32,1), you will die.

Case B: The rational is what serves your life, and "life" means "the sort of life proper to a rational person." This is circular.

Case C: The rational is what serves your life, and "life" means "the life of man qua man," where this does not just mean "the sort of life proper to a rational person." In that case, Rand has given us no criterion for what does or does not serve the life of man qua man.

Case D: The rational is what serves your life, and "life" means something other than (A), (B), or (C). In this case, Rand has not told us what she means.

Case E: The rational is something other than "what will serve your life." In this case, given what she said earlier, what is 'rational' cannot be used as a criterion for ethical judgement, since she already told us that what serves life is the only legitimate such criterion.

I think this problem is extremely significant. The problem is that--whichever one of these cases holds--"rational" and "man qua man" are simply fudge words. That is, their function in the theory is that they enable Rand to claim almost anything she likes as being supported by her theory, and also to reject any attempt to infer conclusions that she doesn't want from the theory.

I give a couple of examples to show what I mean by a "fudge". First, imagine I declare boldly, "No real philosopher has ever denied the law of non-contradiction." You respond: "What about Nicholas of Cusa, who thought that God has all properties, including contradictory ones?" I say, "Oh, he's not a real philosopher. He's more of a theologian." You: "Okay, how about Hegel?" Me: "Oh, he's not a real philosopher. He's much too incomprehensible to be a real philosopher. Only analytic philosophers count." You: "Okay, how about Graham Priest? He's an analytic philosopher, and he denies the law of non-contradiction." Me: "Oh, he's not a real philosopher. Have you seen his book, In Contradiction? It's terrible." Now, you can imagine that in each of these cases, an interminable debate might spawn about whether my stated rationale justified denying the figure in question the status of 'real philosopher.' In the course of the debate, I make a bunch of declarations about who is and isn't a 'real' philosopher, but I never come out with a precise, unambiguous criterion of 'real-philosopher-ness'. In this case, I am using "real" as a fudge word. That is, it is a word that insulates my thesis from decisive testing, because any proposed counter-example can, if I choose, be immediately bogged down in interminable debates about who is real qua philosopher. So I am never forced to give it up. At the same time, at the end of this debate, I can declare victory, since no one found a counter-example to my thesis. I probably won't convince anyone else, unless they were already favorably disposed toward my thesis, but I can almost certainly convince myself that I gave good reasons for rejecting each of the proposed counter-examples.

Second example. This one is more realistic. On a television program investigating his psychic powers, Uri Geller instructed the audience to phone in if anything unusual happened during he program. At the end, several people phoned in reporting bizarre occurrences that took place during the show. Geller claimed that this supported psychic powers (I'm not sure if he meant because he had psychically predicted these events, or because the TV show had psychically caused them, or just because the events themselves were inherently psychical). Of course, we know this is nonsense. But since Geller did not precisely define "unusual", nor was it known how many people were watching the show, no one could calculate the prior probability of unusual events happening during the show, and thus no one could actually prove that what Geller claimed was nonsense. This meant that people who wanted to believe in psychic powers could do so, and could interpret Geller's remark about unusual events as predicting the events the callers described. Geller used "unusual" as a fudge word.

Third illustration, but this one is an example of non-use of fudges. In scientific testing of drugs, it is standard to use "double blind" tests. This means that half the subjects are given placebos, and neither the patients nor the physicians observing the results know who has the placebo and who has the drug. Now, why keep the physicians 'blind'? The answer is, because it is too easy to fudge--that is, to interpret results favorably if you want the drug to be successful. Scientists know this, and they impose this restriction on themselves, to prevent themselves from fudging. (You don't always know when you're fudging.)

So a 'fudge word' is a word that functions to make fudging easy. "Rational" and "man qua man" are Rand's fudge words. She never gives a precise and unambiguous criterion for their applicability. Thus, suppose someone tries to argue that, on Rand's theory, it would be morally acceptable to steal from people, provided you could get away with it. Then she has at least two fudges she can employ (probably more): (a) She could claim that this is not in your interests, because there is always a risk that you might get caught, and it's not worth it. This works because no one knows how to calculate this risk, so no one can actually refute this claim. This is the sort of thing I have seen many Objectivists do. However, Rand doesn't do this in "The Objectivist Ethics"; she goes for the second sort of fudge: (b) She can claim that although you would gain money from this, it would not be in your rational interests, or it would not be serving the life of 'man qua man', or that it would reduce you to a 'subhuman' status. Thus, she can immediately bog down the counter-example in an interminable debate about what is or isn't 'rational', 'subhuman', etc., because no precise and unambiguous criterion of the rational, or the human, has been identified. She gets to make it up as she goes along.

Now, let's look at her definition of "rationality":

25,8: "The virtue of Rationality means the recognition and acceptance of reason as one's only source of knowledge, one's only judge of values and one's only guide to action."

Does this obviate my 'fudge word' charge? Not at all. Whenever she encounters a behavior she disapproves of, she can declare that the person is not accepting reason as his only guide to action. The above 'criterion' just refers the fudge word "rational" back to the fudge concept of what is "supported by reason". If Rand could give us a precise, unambiguous list of what reason recommends and why, then this charge would be answered.

Rand's following list of things that rationality 'means' is filled with further fudge words. Here are some of the concepts that can be fudged: the notion of using full focus in all choices (if x makes a choice I don't like, I can claim he wasn't in full focus), the idea of a commitment to 'reality', the idea that values must be 'validated' and 'logical', the idea of living 'by one's own mind', etc.

Now, I am not saying here that all of those concepts are bad concepts and should never be used--any more than I think the concept "real" or "unusual" should never be used. Often we have no choice but to use vague concepts. But we should recognize that they are not like scientific and mathematical concepts. They are concepts whose application requires interpretation.

(47)


32,6: "[N]o man may initiate the use of physical force against others. ... Men have the right to use physical force only in retaliation, and only against those who initiate its use."

NA. Again, Rand would have to show how this follows from the premise of life as the standard of value--i.e., she would have to demonstrate that if you initiate the use of force, you will automatically die. 'Automatically', because she is saying you must never initiate force, so she must hold that you could never do it and not die.
Notes

1. All references are to "The Objectivist Ethics" in The Virtue of Selfishness, paperback edition (New York: Signet, 1961), pp. 13-35.

2. I have cited passages where Rand mentions the connection between 'is' and 'ought' and where she discusses the standard of 'life' as an action-guiding principle. Unfortunately, she did not clearly distinguish 9 from 12, but it is clear she meant to assert 12.

3. All quotations are from "The Objectivist Ethics" in The Virtue of Selfishness, paperback edition (New York: Signet, 1961), pp. 13-35.

4. The book is Ethical Theories, ed. A. I. Melden (Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice-Hall, 1967).

5. Introduction to Objectivist Epistemology (New York: NAL Books, 1990), p. 29.

6. "Intrinsically good" in ethics means the same as Rand's "an end-in-itself": i.e. a thing which is good for its own sake, and not merely for the sake of something else to be obtained by means of it.

I have know Idea what he was singing about.

edit
In the merry month of May, From my home I started,
Left the girls of Tuam, Nearly broken hearted,
Saluted father dear, Kissed my darlin' mother,
Drank a pint of beer, My grief and tears to smother,
Then off to reap the corn, And leave where I was born,
I cut a stout blackthorn, To banish ghost and goblin,
In a brand new pair of brogues, I rattled o'er the bogs,
And frightened all the dogs,On the rocky road to Dublin.

One, two, three, four five,
Hunt the hare and turn her
Down the rocky road
And all the ways to Dublin,
Whack-fol-lol-de-ra.

In Mullingar that night, I rested limbs so weary,
Started by daylight, Next mornin' light and airy,
Took a drop of the pure, To keep my heart from sinkin',
That's an Irishman's cure, Whene'er he's on for drinking.
To see the lasses smile, Laughing all the while,
At my curious style, 'Twould set your heart a-bubblin'.
They ax'd if I was hired, The wages I required,
Till I was almost tired, Of the rocky road to Dublin.

In Dublin next arrived, I thought it such a pity,
To be so soon deprived, A view of that fine city.
Then I took a stroll, All among the quality,
My bundle it was stole, In a neat locality;
Something crossed my mind, Then I looked behind;
No bundle could I find, Upon my stick a wobblin'.
Enquirin' for the rogue, They said my Connacht brogue,
Wasn't much in vogue, On the rocky road to Dublin.

From there I got away, My spirits never failin'
Landed on the quay As the ship was sailin';
Captain at me roared, Said that no room had he,
When I jumped aboard, A cabin found for Paddy,
Down among the pigs I played some funny rigs,
Danced some hearty jigs, The water round me bubblin',
When off Holyhead, I wished myself was dead,
Or better far instead, On the rocky road to Dublin.

The boys of Liverpool, When we safely landed,
Called myself a fool; I could no longer stand it;
Blood began to boil, Temper I was losin',
Poor ould Erin's isle They began abusin',
"Hurrah my soul," sez I, My shillelagh I let fly;
Some Galway boys were by, Saw I was a hobble in,
Then with a loud hurray, They joined in the affray.
We quickly cleared the way, For the rocky road to Dublin.

Comment hidden because you are ignoring dag. (show it anyway)

With regard to the click to see comments- this is something that we did to increase the performance of the site for everyone. We noticed that our slow queries that bog down the site are those on long threads. However! You can disable this in your profile and view the entire thread, old school style.

WRT the share button, I'm finding it annoying too - perhaps we should just axe it.


>> ^ForgedReality:
I have to say it, even though I'm sure it will probably make no difference to anyone:
I do not like some of the new VideoSift features. Good design goes unnoticed. If you notice a feature, something's wrong.
PUT MY TEXT WHERE I TELL YOU TO PUT IT! DO NOT AUTOMATICALLY PUT THE QUOTE BENEATH IT. What happens if I want to quote multiple posts and I want to address each one individually? This is extremely annoying.
And WHY THE HELL DO I HAVE TO CLICK TO SEE ALL COMMENTS NOW?! It was a lot better being able to simply scroll to read comments, especially the newest ones. Now I can't see the newer ones until I click a stupid link. At least I can disable it, so that's a start. Too bad it isn't disabled by default.
The stupid "Share" button is annoying and utterly useless to me. If it were moved somewhere else on the page so that I don't inadvertently mouseover it, causing it to balloon out and OBSCURE 50% OF MY VIDEO, making me WAIT FOR IT TO DISAPPEAR, it would be fine. I don't use facebook, twitter, or any of those other annoying ass "communities" for a reason. Do not make me look at a stupid list of places I never visit. It simply reassures me of the reasons WHY I don't use those sites. I am not going to share a video with anyone via that button. I know I don't like spam. I'm sure none of my friends do either. If I want to show someone, I'll simply fucking copy the URL and paste it to them. At least MOVE THE GODDAMNED ICON to some place where it isn't accidentally annoying. As it is now, I simply adblock the button so I don't have to fucking deal with it in the first place.
Christ. Whose bad choices were these?

Up? Another money-printing pixar typical 'old man who hates kids spends time with kid, then come to like them as kid learns valuable life lessons'. Pfft.

Haven't seen Zombieland - yet another goreporn with bursts of comedic goodness but mostly bogged down in the gutters of pop culture.

Matrix - what a load of crap. Unrealistic plot. Washed up actors/actresses giving it one more go. Arrogant neo-religious overtones meant to guide viewer through a cascade of emotional discovery, but crashing several times on the way. Modern reinterpretation of the bible - if you don't see that you're a maroon.

The Princess Bride? Great movie - for teenybopper girls (actually, I've never seen it, or Lawrence of Arabia).

Casablanca - gimme a break. The black & white just oozes pretension. That ending? C'mon - mysterious doesn't always equal good.

The Godfather? Glamourizing organized crime while simultaneously annoying my ears with that wheezy voice on Brando. Try some Halls ferchristsake!

The way they have it now is fine for a jump in and play console game , it will provide 2-6 months of enjoyment for the average player but will be replaced pritty fast by another game.


Pc FPS gamers expect more. Normally when a stable game comes out that has a solid foundation + a large starting user base it makes it ripe for mods that expands the game play in ways that would not be traditionally conciderd to be commercially viable.


Pc gamers have not to worry when the new Dice engine games come out on pc they will allow for some really good mods. Dice have managed to fix the net code issues from the previous engine and have also implemented destructible terrain.


so long as you remember that Mw2 is a console arcade shooter then you will enjoy it , The reason people got annoyed is that they were expecting it to be along the same lines as , mw1 , halflife2, Bf2.

like most blockbuster console games MW2 is largely Hype it works to sell console games Its allso a Safer bissiniess stratagy , and one that has proven to work for the last 10 years. games like NFS shift and forza 3 have done the same thing the game play is fairly bog standerd but they pack in a large amount of conntent and pritt6y grafics then spend milloins on advertising it to make out that its the best game ever.
enevitably game sells well but 4-6 months after its replaced by another game , but thats exactly what the publishers want as this means more sales .

Edit: Apologies, I just noticed you changed yours to private, so I will do the same now.
Edit 2: No fuck it, it's public. Say thanks to this moron: http://rasch187.videosift.com/#comment-897638

Hi again Rae,

First off, I'm sorry about the mile long wall of text. I do hope you will read all of it none-the-less.

I'm glad you came out yourself to address this, because it's better we get this over with properly, so we can move on with our lives.

I'll stress as well, that UP and Rasch got in to their fight on their own, I had no involvement until UP sent me a message about it.

I was under a completely different impression about being invited to bea's place and honestly I still am. I didn't try to force myself over there, but when she invited me, however casually, we discussed quite a bit on messenger afterwards. I wouldn't have gone over there if I had been given the slightest impression that she was not comfortable with it. I'm very sorry that she did feel pressured into it, but I never intended to do that. I just saw a trip to Texas as a golden opportunity to get OUT, get away from Denmark for a while. As we discussed in our chats, I had been feeling restless and bogged down in everyday life for a pretty long and her invitation was like a blessing to me (for lack of a better word). I may have been eager about it, but I don't know what to say - I just wanted to get out. I didn't buy the tickets overnight - we did discuss it, and we chatted quite a lot before I did come over there, and she never gave any indication that she didn't want me to come over.

In the very first chat we had on messenger, I very clearly remember it, you said.. "I could seriously fall for you" and followed it up by "but I'm actually already taken (...)" and we got into a discussion about jake and all that. I accepted it already then. We both carried on afterwards with talking dirty and watching all that weird porn (you were quite as much to blame for that!) and I had loads of fun, because you were much different from anyone I knew. You made me smile when we talked.

I'm sorry I didn't let the coming to meet you lie, but I was not being so frantically serious about it. I really wanted to meet you, yes, and to be honest I still would, in a crowded room, with many sifters. At a siftup, perhaps. (Incidentally, I have nothing against Jake. I think he's a good guy and you two ARE lucky to have found each other.)

I never meant to imply that he and you were not serious. You made it abundantly clear that you were very serious, I was just being a smart-ass, because if I had been in his shoes that's what I would have wanted to do. I never meant to imply anything about you and Jake with that, so I'm sorry you saw it as such. I really am.

About skype and messenger for that matter, I only asked for your skype address once and it was partly meant as a joke; and with your reply "no way, that's just for me and jake" I let that lie. The other part of that was that I wanted to just talk with you, to hear your voice, and it had been a long time since we chatted, so I wrote that message - as you said, so shoot me...

I know you hate hurting people and I appreciate that, but in the end this has hurt a lot more. If you had told me something to the effect "I think this coming over to meet me is making me uncomfortable, because you're too persistent - I like you as a friend, but I don't want to meet with you, at least not on my own or right now" I would have apologized right there and I would have learned to ease up with you. Instead I kept teasing you with it, and as I've said before, to jake and you, I believe, my common sense was just out of wack because of all the shit we talked about. I never saw it coming that you just did not want to talk to me, and when you wrote your "tired of the bullshit" I had no idea what you were getting on about, so it hurt.. to be honest, it really hurt. I was messed up all day from that and that's why I was so after getting a bigger reply after that. I felt as if I had been hit by a bus, because I truly considered you a friend.

About the trip to Texas. I did not get the impression that it was a disaster at all. She was a bit pissed with me for the boob grabbing, but it was only two days after she booted me because she had to tend to her father's funeral. In that two day span, everything was just dandy, I mean, she never gave any indication that it was so disastrous. Yes, the boobgrabbing was way over the line, we've been over that a million times and I've apologized as much as I can about it. The environment that they created was a factor in me doing it, it was not just "because I was drunk" - I wasn't THAT drunk, and I don't get grabby in general. When I am in good company, with people I consider friends, I can be quite dirty talking, sure, but I'm not a sexually offensive guy physically at all, I just followed their lead when they freaking made out on the porch I though, "well three can play that game" and did it. I know that was wrong, but that's the reason I did it. I didn't want to freak them out as bad as they clearly did, and they didn't do anything at the time, they just basically shrugged it off.

As we have discussed earlier, I portray myself here as pretty much myself - not completely, I take it to much larger extremes here, but mostly I'm just being myself.

Also I know that we have discussed your inability to find a woman. You yourself put it down to the fact that you had to get drunk to converse with them, and once that had happened you tended to become lewd and inappropriate, the drink was doing the talking

I think you are getting at this from a wrong angle. They are two different issues. One is that I don't have the nerve to approach strange girls, or really strangers altogether, but I loosen up when I get a beer in me. Most guys can relate to that, girls too, I would think. Second, I'm not lewd and inappropriate around people I don't know, even when I'm drunk, I only get like that around people that I like - as in if we're a bunch from my year on the university out getting smashed or something. The reason I got like that at bea's place the one night, was because I was having a good time and the three of them were good company. Yeah, I did swear to the three adults, but I never did so to any of her kids - I don't want to freak out kids, I don't really even like kids, but I think I behaved pretty well around her children in general, except for when we had that game of scrabble and I swore to iv or bea in casual conversation, when the little one had just snuck out from the bedroom. I was doing this partly to be intentionally teasing, because we had just had a discussion earlier about what one should and shouldn't say to kids. Bea had sworn as well earlier in casual conversation, so I did not take that as so terrible. Evidently, I was mistaken.

I never EVER said anything sexual to any of her kids. I'm appalled that she thinks that, because I don't do that.

The remark after the siftup was not aimed at you at all and I was perplexed that you saw it as such, because we didn't have any secrets at all. As we chatted on messenger about, I never intended it for you it was just a general remark to sifters.

Concerning rasch. I made it clear in private to you that I didn't like him. He was an obnoxious person and he should go suck a fuck. I still hold that opinion. If our roles had been reversed, I would have told YOU to take care of the situation, instead of interjecting myself as a fucking savior to get you poor women the rescue you so needed. That's because I'm a nice person, who don't put my own ego in front of everyone else's. The chat that he quoted between you and him seems to me to be pretty damn two-faced from you as well. You present yourself one way to me and another to him. That's not nice,, at all. I know exactly what he did and so does everyone else - it's plainly public. He acted like an aggressive brute trying to verbally punch me out in his comments. He attacked me way earlier than that as well, the comment you laughed about a while back, even though he did apologize for that afterwards. He deserves the tiny little corner of shame that he painted himself into.

The accusations made against me are many and plentiful (well, three in total counting boobgrabbing, gutter mouthing and your own), but I think it's a shame that yours and bea's have been muddled together, because they are really two separate issues.

I'm quite angry with bea still, because it's because of her that this has blown up and blown so out of proportion as it has. This was not my doing - any of you could have approached me privately and that could have been that - if you had explained what I had done wrong. All of you, except Cari, just ignored me and left me in the complete dark. Cari kept me on facebook and was in general like she always was, but said she didn't want to get involved when I asked what was up with bea, because she had removed me from facebook. I respected that and I still do - she acted the most like an adult. I think you are out of line to suggest why she apologized, but while you may or may not be right, she apologized none-the-less. And we are still friendly around each other, even though she is the one that was slighted the most. I'm not going to visit her in person, probably ever, but that doesn't mean that we can't be civil. I still think she's fun and a boon.

It's likely that she didn't actually forgive you at all and that she is too nice of a person to really come out and say what she thinks. I can relate.

You are being awfully passive-aggressive here and presumptuous. I would welcome her saying all she wanted to me in private if she wanted, but she already has - and we've patched things up as far as we could at this time. We're in a good place now both of us as far as I know.

Bea got blamed for everything justly in my opinion - I got my share of grizzly attacks too, which I feel terrible about, but I owned up to my fucking mistakes - she just shits on the floor and slams the door behind her. She has as much blame in this situation as I do and if she wants to flame out, as she did, then I have no interest in patching anything up with her. She was fun to talk to, if a big damn bit more crazy than you, for instance, but fun non-the-less. Not so much anymore. I acted pretty well over there and if she had issues with me, she could have just told me. We sat on her porch and talked while she smoked plenty of times and no indication at all. Her family and friends were never there except Cari and their friend Rick on that Tuesday with the boobgrabbing (and of course the kids, who I was very nice to).

Have I lied to you before? Honestly, ever? I've only ever been painfully truthful and if I wanted to just talk shit, wouldn't I have painted a much more rose-tinted version? I'm sorry you are taking her version, because it is far more skewed than mine is - and dammit, I ought to have deserved some trust with you.. we were friends!

I've reflected on this long and hard, I truly have, and I think I have learned from it as well. I've toned down my lewdness and I find myself holding my tongue more often than before. But not much else is to change, unless I want to be a completely different person, and all my friends seem to like me as I am just fine, so I don't want to change into something I'm not.

I've also learned that there are people in this world, who will fuck you over. I am not one of those people and I don't think you are either. We all make mistakes and misjudgments and I think you are misjudging me. I still would like to be your "friend" in some capacity, but you make it pretty clear you don't want that. I'm sorry you don't. I will consider myself as on friendly terms with you and if you do come back to the sift some time, then I will treat you respectfully and I hope you will do the same thing with me.

I still feel terrible about how all this happened and about how our friendship fell apart. :-/

Nicki.

PS. Incidentally, I have found a woman, who I am very glad for and who for some bizarre reason likes me a whole lot too, so I HAVE grown a bit at least.

In reply to this comment by alien_concept:
OK, first of all I want you to know, I happened upon this whole conversation between UP, rasch and yourself as I still visit now and again. Don't for one moment think that he's come crying to me.

If rasch was referring to anything creepy, then it wouldn't have been logs of conversations we've had, it would have been PM's. And also pointing out certain things you had written in threads, baiting me etc. Most of it was not private.

I wish I'd have come straight to you once everything had come out regarding bea, but honestly at that point I had already had enough of our relationship on here and had been avoiding talking to you for ages. Yes I'm a coward for not just straight up telling you things were bothering me. And yes, everything here could have been dealt with differently. The main reason for me not coming straight out and ever saying anything, was because I really felt that the way I carried on with you, that I had encouraged you. I am very open and broad minded. We have discussed numerous topics and I always came across like I was comfortable in anything we discussed. And for a long while I was.

Quite early on it became apparent that you had feelings for me. At this point I told you about myself and Jake, because I didn't want you to think that any relationship between us was possible. You will notice that Jake not once ever had a problem with the way we behaved around here or in fact on messenger. He just saw it all as a bit of fun and nothing to get possessive about. It was nothing to do with him, right? Because we were just friends, fooling around and being risque for a laugh.

The things that started bothering me were that you wouldn't let the coming here to see me lie. I'd give you a thousand excuses as to why it couldn't happen, at least not any time soon. But it was so regular, and the comments you made about how if you were Jake you'd have been here with me already (implying that he wasn't serious about me? that's kind of how it felt) and always with the questioning. Why did you have to wait til after he had been here, where do you live, what's your skype address (even though I told you that skype was only something I used for me and him). And telling me you'd found out how much it cost to get here etc etc. It built up and built up, and I didn't know how to tell you to back off without hurting your feelings entirely. I HATE hurting anyone, and like I said, I blamed myself for having not said anything before and letting it get to the point it was at, and potentially giving you mixed signals, by first telling you I was unavailable and then carrying on flirting with you (out in the open)and sharing graphic (although always sickly amusing) porn, and discussing other such personal subjects. I hadn't been careful, so instead of fronting it out with you, I ignored you. So shoot me...

When bea messaged me after you had left Texas, she did it not to gossip, but because your visit there had been a fucking disaster, she felt that you didn't understand any boundaries, you made her feel uncomfortable with the things you were coming out with and you had told her that you intended to come and see me. She felt like she had to warn me about how you had presented yourself there. The thing was, so many things rang true on what she was saying. That she hadn't outright invited you - just in the lounge she'd said off the cuff as she does, that yeah you should come to Texas one day, and the next thing she knew you'd booked tickets and she didn't have a clue how to say no. Well, you were relentless with me about coming here...

That you had made inappropriate sexual comments in front of her children. Well I remember one time you making one about my daughter too, something about when she came of age, blech. I took it as a joke, at the time although it didn't sit comfortably with me. Also I know that we have discussed your inability to find a woman. You yourself put it down to the fact that you had to get drunk to converse with them, and once that had happened you tended to become lewd and inappropriate, the drink was doing the talking. Now considering that you spent time there getting drunk and you definitely thought it was ok to grab IV's breast (btw, justifying that by saying that bea had just done it, what the fuck???) it didn't take much to come to the conclusion what with everything else that you were indeed not in your right mind. Whether you agree or not, that's how it all came about. It felt like the character you "played" on here, wasn't just a character after all. And that was fucking disturbing to me.

I sat on it forever. I wasn't going to bring any of it up because bea did not want the drama, and neither did IV. She also felt partly responsible for giving you the wrong idea about things because of the way she converses with everyone. And she didn't want it all to drag out like it has. But as I told you, after numerous PM's and references in video threads, then the limerick, and THEN what I truly felt to be another jab against me when you mentioned in the sift up thread that anyone who had secrets with you weren't secrets any more, I finally blew my lid. I just didn't want to be here any longer.

If you had have been on the outside of this looking in like rasch has been, I'm pretty sure that you would have, after all the evidence presented to you, felt that it needed to once and for all be addressed. I'm not saying he couldn't have gone about it in a better way, he definitely could. But then, so could we all have done, isn't that right? I'd like you to stop blaming him for everything now, it's somewhat projecting rather than really taking a look at how and why things have happened how they have. He has freely admitted that he should have been more discreet, and now he is just left defending his corner without really being able to say anything at all. Enough is enough.

I hope this explains what you have wanted to know. Whether you agree with the accusations made against you, they have been made. Not just by one person, but two and that's not including her family and friends who were around too I'm sure. IV apologised with you to keep the peace and not let it all get blown up publically like it has and to stop bea being blamed for everything like she was after she flamed out. It's likely that she didn't actually forgive you at all and that she is too nice of a person to really come out and say what she thinks. I can relate. I hope you reflect on all of this and you consider how things can end up, as have I on numerous occasions. And yes, it's your word against hers. Either of you could be talking shit. But I'm taking her version, as have people chosen to take yours.

Rae

>> ^Bruti79:
I didn't quite understand what caught his wheel on that last turn? Was he trying to cut on the inside, and got his front wheel bogged down in sand?


I'm not sure what you mean by 'bogged down in sand', but basically you can't turn fast in loose land without the wheel sliding. Essentially he was moving forward, turned his wheel, but the sand didn't provide the traction for him to be able to turn, so essentially his wheel was turned but he continue to go forward due to momentum.

I didn't quite understand what caught his wheel on that last turn? Was he trying to cut on the inside, and got his front wheel bogged down in sand?

^The Bayer incident was international news. I would have never heard about it if it wasn't for having a friend who is a hemophiliac. I would have quoted a more "reliable source" but reliable sources are hard to come by for stories which involve negative PR of billion dollar companies...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Contaminated_haemophilia_blood_products

http://ww2.aegis.com/news/sc/2003/SC030603.html

http://www.nytimes.com/1996/06/11/business/blood-money-aids-hemophiliacs-are-split-liability-cases-bogged-down-disputes.html?sec=health&&n=Top%2fNews%
2fHealth%2fDiseases%2c%20Conditions%2c%20and%20Health%20Topics%2fAIDS

"Contaminated haemophilia blood products were a serious public heath problem in the late 1970s and early 1980s. These products caused large numbers of hemophiliacs to became infected with HIV and hepatitis C. Companies involved included Armour Pharmaceutical Company, Bayer Corporation and its Cutter Biological division, Baxter International and its Hyland Pharmaceutical division and Alpha Therapeutic Corporation.[1] Estimates range from 6,000 to 10,000 hemophiliacs in the United States becoming infected with HIV.[1][2]"

Hey look Baxter again. So thats twice in the last 20 years that they shipped or tried to ship contaminated products. And thats just what they were caught or what I've heard about. Conspiracy, carelessness, coincidence, or conniving? What would you guess?

I think I get the gist of what you're saying, and you're certainly way more schooled that me.

It is of course dangerous to generalise from anecdotes - I threw them in because clearly I now have a bias and they're part of the reason why.

Maybe there's something in the practice of modern Islam that's not working.

I tell you what's funny is that when I went to church for the funeral in June I remembered *everything*, all the amens and hosanna in the highests and exactly when to stand up or kneel. And this is after many years of not going to church.

In reply to this comment by enoch:
former catholic eh?
many people come to me from the ecclestiastical teachings of catholicism very confused.
cant blame them...the doctrine of the church is contradictory to the teachings of jesus,and the papacy has for centuries amended doctrine when it so suited them.
which is EXACTLY my point.
substitute catholic for muslim and my point my become clearer.
religious dogma and doctrine has always been the whipping tool of those who hold the reigns.preying on the weak,poor and ill-educated to submit to a doctrine that is contradictory to the teachings of <fill in holy messenger HERE>.
i could spend hours debunking the biblical (quran,torah,KJV) scriptures that have been misused to perpetuate a misnomer on:womens rights,sexuality,marriage,sin etc etc eeeeeetc.
most atheists i know are not in reality atheists,just agnostics who have peeked through the veil of the church and found it lacking.
many of them are angry,feeling betrayed by an institution that so often stated that they were right.
no...they werent.
the thing i find most funny is that every spiritual "leader"(if i may)has denounced the church of that time as being a form of evil fomenting more evil.
but i digress (i know..shocker),
my point is that islam has enriched human society tenfold.
by creating the most egalitarian society 500 a.d
womens rights 525 a.d
property rights 525 a.d
the continuation of sciences,so while europe got bogged down in the 600 yr dark ages and the church raped the countryside with its inquistitions,islam was not only preserving but helping to restore as much of the library of alexandria as it could.
fairness,justice,honesty virtues held in huge regard.
humility and reverence for all creation.
these are worthy things to admire.

maybe its the history teacher in me,i tend to look at information in giant blocks.the ebb and flow of time,forces of social upheavel and political unrest changing one national landscape to form into another.philisophical tectonic plates if you will.sometime i forget the here and now.
the teachings of mohamhed and jesus are poignant and wise.
i do not like the polarized nature of our countries,it only leads to danger.
i am sorry that the situation is where its at in your country.
by your response i can never know,but i can guess:
the newly immigrated islamic community is using its religion to strongarm the rest of the community to bend to the churches wishes.
i shall look more into this,i welcome any anecdotes you may wish to reveal.
while i still feel the billions of muslims are being misunderstood due to these few who butcher a beautiful text to garner their desires.
that is NOT from islam..nor christianity for that matter.
but they keep saying thats exactly what the text says dont they?
and they could not be more wrong.
those who are unfamiliar with islamic text base their assumptions on these selfish people.
sad sad sad....
what could have been a good and righteous thing is now an instrument of divisiveness.
bah...rambling again.
thank you for the reply my friend,i do hope this makes a modicum of sense.
namaste.

former catholic eh?
many people come to me from the ecclestiastical teachings of catholicism very confused.
cant blame them...the doctrine of the church is contradictory to the teachings of jesus,and the papacy has for centuries amended doctrine when it so suited them.
which is EXACTLY my point.
substitute catholic for muslim and my point my become clearer.
religious dogma and doctrine has always been the whipping tool of those who hold the reigns.preying on the weak,poor and ill-educated to submit to a doctrine that is contradictory to the teachings of <fill in holy messenger HERE>.
i could spend hours debunking the biblical (quran,torah,KJV) scriptures that have been misused to perpetuate a misnomer on:womens rights,sexuality,marriage,sin etc etc eeeeeetc.
most atheists i know are not in reality atheists,just agnostics who have peeked through the veil of the church and found it lacking.
many of them are angry,feeling betrayed by an institution that so often stated that they were right.
no...they werent.
the thing i find most funny is that every spiritual "leader"(if i may)has denounced the church of that time as being a form of evil fomenting more evil.
but i digress (i know..shocker),
my point is that islam has enriched human society tenfold.
by creating the most egalitarian society 500 a.d
womens rights 525 a.d
property rights 525 a.d
the continuation of sciences,so while europe got bogged down in the 600 yr dark ages and the church raped the countryside with its inquistitions,islam was not only preserving but helping to restore as much of the library of alexandria as it could.
fairness,justice,honesty virtues held in huge regard.
humility and reverence for all creation.
these are worthy things to admire.

maybe its the history teacher in me,i tend to look at information in giant blocks.the ebb and flow of time,forces of social upheavel and political unrest changing one national landscape to form into another.philisophical tectonic plates if you will.sometime i forget the here and now.
the teachings of mohamhed and jesus are poignant and wise.
i do not like the polarized nature of our countries,it only leads to danger.
i am sorry that the situation is where its at in your country.
by your response i can never know,but i can guess:
the newly immigrated islamic community is using its religion to strongarm the rest of the community to bend to the churches wishes.
i shall look more into this,i welcome any anecdotes you may wish to reveal.
while i still feel the billions of muslims are being misunderstood due to these few who butcher a beautiful text to garner their desires.
that is NOT from islam..nor christianity for that matter.
but they keep saying thats exactly what the text says dont they?
and they could not be more wrong.
those who are unfamiliar with islamic text base their assumptions on these selfish people.
sad sad sad....
what could have been a good and righteous thing is now an instrument of divisiveness.
bah...rambling again.
thank you for the reply my friend,i do hope this makes a modicum of sense.
namaste.

I realize that your view is that there is no difference. To you, people starving in a rich society isn't a moral failing of the society, it's a failure of the individual, and richly deserved.

Who are these people starving in a rich society? You mean the society where the economy is doing so well, productivity is unhindered and savings are abundant, it's a lot easier to open up a business, many more businesses are competing for your money and offering all kinds of services and jobs, you have many more choices for education at lower prices, where money is sound and isn't constantly being devalued, and people are naturally encouraged to have savings so most of them have enough and don't mind being charitable towards the very few that, for some reason, can't provide for themselves? That society?

I'm talking about productivity and you talk about starvation. While you're busy worrying that starvation leads to loss of productivity, I'm worried about the root problem: What leads to starvation? Oh yes, lack of productivity, people not producing enough to buy food for themselves or their families.

Starvation is a terrible thing, that's why productivity is so important. Allowing and encouraging a society to produce makes a lot more sense than just granting free food for the poor. Doing that on a large scale and instituting free food as a right is detrimental to society because resources are being poorly allocated (unproductive!) and the practice discourages productivity on the long run.

If someone escapes the reach of charity and does die by starvation, I wouldn't say it's something that person deserves, we are responsible for how we live and choices we make, that is accountability and responsibility playing a role. If we always expect govt to safeguard people from the consequences of their actions, we're instituting irresponsability.

Moreover, starvation is a net positive, as it fills you with energy to work harder, and that's really all anyone needs to succeed.

Not energy, motivation.

Imagine if I could render you immortal in a way that would make you completely independent of any material needs. My guess is you'd eventually become absolutely unproductive. You wouldn't need to produce anything to sustain yourself, or produce anything for others because you wouldn't need anything from them. You wouldn't rush to live your life or basically do anything, because you'd have all the time in the world and not even the explosion of the sun billions of years from now would threaten your existence. Kind of like a Doctor Manhattan without the powers. That guy ended up getting bored with humanity and leaving the galaxy.

(...)what conservatives push for. It always boils down to dehumanizing the losers in our economy.

Your characterizations of the worlds a "conservative" and a "liberal" want are so biased, that you completely miss the end result. It's like talking to backwards logic man. An ideal "liberal" society is just short of the dehumanizing utopia that socialists want, talk about trying to help people out of their human nature.

What is the point of villifying those who seek productivity and profit, when these are the very things that provide food, shelter, healthcare, education, etc. everything a good liberal wants everybody to have?

The difference is that liberals want everybody to have stuff for free, conveniently disregarding the impractical aspect of "free" meaning "not producing anything in exchange" and "at the expense of productive people". I also want people to have their stuff while being guided by their selfish interest in profit, because that's what really leads to the most wealth being allowed to the most people.

And you really don't want to open the can of worms on health care with me. (...) If people were the priority instead of profits, we would've gotten "socialized" healthcare done in the Truman era, and we'd be far better off now.

Ah, the socialized medicine kool-aid.

Sure. I won't bother trying to convince you that we'd be worse off, but it bothers me that you think that what once made US's healthcare so great and is currently keeping it barely afloat is the *problem* and what is bogging it down and slowly choking it to death is the solution.

Up north, it the town I just moved away from last year, there was a woman who did laugh seminars. Everyone would just get together and laugh for the whole evening. People I know, that went, told me it made them feel alive and amazing inside! A type of therapy that should come as natural to most of us is quickly being extinguished in today's society as stress continues to bog us down!

>> ^entr0py

But wherever you go in the world, there are a certain minority of people, who, for whatever reason, lack empathy, or can switch it off like a light.

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"I just went, my mind just went, I didn't and I wasn't the only one that did it, a lot of other people did it. I just killed, once I started the training, the whole programming part of killing, it just came out... I just lost all sense of direction, of purpose. I just started killing in any kind of way I could kill. It just came, I didn't know I had it in me, but like I say after I killed the child my whole mind just went, it just went."

- Vernardo Simpson on his participation in the My Lai massacre

Not to get bogged down in the details of that particular case, but I think looking back at history you'll find plenty of cases of perfectly sane, empathetic people turning into killers and torturers when the circumstances are right. In fact, in the light of the last century, I'd say it's a minority who will without fail keep to what we under current circumstances deem moral. People are not stable, they change according to the circumstances they are in.