I recently re-read this as well as Robinson Crusoe. I find both to be very interesting in that you get an understanding of dominant philosophies of the time, the traditions of life, language and more subtly writing; how all of those developed together and reflected upon each other.

But they are also both incredibly dull. I sort of wish I could read it as someone from that era read it, because I imagine it might be a little like seeing a film with revolutionary use of new film tech like sound or colour for the first time. It might be another old western, but it's engaging with parts of your brain you're not used to using in that particular medium. Whereas we're used to advanced and refined versions of the same thing, because it influenced so many.

The problem is that most people who are victimized reach a point where they don't feel capable of protecting themselves. Abusers rarely start with actual physical abuse, they work on a victim mentally until they break. Once they control the mind, the body simply refuses to follow typical fight or flight responses.

Think about it, if defending yourself was the only thing stopping abuse why wouldn't a person being abused equalize the playing field immediately? Grab a gun, a knife, hell a cast iron pan, and then protect yourself! But a person who has been trained to be a victim isn't going to take that step without outside influence, some sort of mitigating factor.

You will find that the overwhelming number of battered people won't defend themselves until that catalyst is added, like seeing their child being abused as well or someone they care about.

First thought,

If you find the question interesting, watch the Death Note anime(not the movie), this is more the less the premise of the entire series with a teenage genius gaining said power.

I have to say I find video presenter's approach to the question is interesting. He almost only addresses the crime of passion angle. The more difficult moral question IMO is as MilkmanDan alludes with the trolley problem. If you have essentially a superpower like this, it is not ONLY your use of it that is a dilemma, but also a refusal to use that power to help victims when you could.

Go back 10 years ago, what is morally worse, using your power to kill Osama Bin Laden, or to refuse to use your power when you could end his influence?

Lol, I read "imaginary Hiller" (and assumed you meant Hillary). My bad.



We have reasonable laws already.
Most things people ask for either already exist (and anti-gunners just don't know because they don't have to follow those laws), or only screw collectors and sportsmen while not doing anything to reduce risk (which I already covered, I assume you read the earlier part, eg California compliant AR15, etc).



Nobody expects to need to form a militia.
Nobody expects the country to go to hell.

The seat belt analogy is about preparedness for unlikely events.
Like, you don't "need" flood insurance in Houston - unless you do.

Owning a gun also hurts nobody.
By definition, ownership is not a harm.

Almost all guns will never be used to do any harm.
The very statement that "guns are all about hurting other people" is a non-empirical assertion.

Just shy of every last gun owner doesn't imagine themselves as Bruce Willis. Asserting that they do is a straw man.


You remind me of Republicans that complain that Black people are welfare queens (so they can redirect money out of welfare). Or Republicans that complain that Trans people are pedophiles in hiding (so they can pander to religious zelot voters). Creating a straw man and then getting mad about the straw man (rather than the real people) is self serving.


* Only the rarest few people think they are Roy Rogers. That is a straw man that does not apply to just shy of every gun owner.
* You don't need a gun for home defense... unless you do.
* Differences in likelihood of death armed vs unarmed is happenstance.
(Doesn't matter either way. Googled some likelihoods : http://www.theblaze.com/news/2013/02/15/how-likely-are-you-to-die-from-gun-violence-this-interesting-chart-puts-it-in-perspective/
You'd have to suffer death 350'000 times before you're at a 50/50 chance of your next death being by firearms.)
[EDIT, math error. Should say 17'000 years lived to reach a 50/50 chance of death by firearms in the next year]
* Technically, even 1 vote gets someone elected. You don't control who is on the ballot.



NRA and NSSF are on life support. They have to fight the influence of ABC, NBC, CBS, CNN, most major newspapers. They are way outclassed. Current events don't help either.
The "big bad NRA" rhetoric is just that, rhetoric. As is the rhetoric that the NRA only represents the industry.

-sceherazade

Um...that's legislative, judiciary, and executive.
Also, all 3 of those branches DO have oversight, although granted it is weak and highly politically influenced oversight at this point.

That said, public third party oversight of the police is hardly the kind of power that easily corrupts. Any abuse would be easy to spot and halt with some simple and clear rules. Many jurisdictions already have this, and I've never once heard of the powers being used for personal vendettas against a force or officer....or being abused at all for that matter. Usually they only have the power to suggest prosecutions or other actions (I think they need the power to fire officers at the least), and even that's unacceptable to the police.
The other option, the one you seem to prefer, is to allow the police to have all the corrupting power with absolutely no checks (except those they randomly self impose when it suits them) and no possibility of justice because the entire legal system is in cahoots and thoroughly corrupted, meaning any built in safeguards and oversight are made moot.

Funny to me that you start your post with "no need to politicize this with Obama/Trump or whatever" and end by politicizing it with Obama/Trump and whatever.

Didn't call for censorship. I just find little benefit in singling out an individual with a very tiny platform for saying something dumb. The idea that her being singled out online to be inundated with death threats and vitriol for her and her family (her and her family were doxxed over this) seems to far outweigh the benefit of "stopping this woman going around the country"... seeing as how she's one woman with basically no following and little influence. I doubt she's done many of these talks at all or will do more. (Looked it up. This talk was the only one she'd given all year. Only one on a different subject the year before. Both locally in her area.)

Spreading videos like this after someone has already been doxxed and threatened only seem to help compound the injury. And it's not ideological to me. Justine Sacco said something stupid online and got a crazy amount of blowback and lost her job for it- I don't agree with that either.

If you want to call out what you view as racism, going after the little guys for saying something a little off isn't the way. Go after people with influence. Hell, a police chief in Oklahoma was just caught running a white supremacist website and record label. That guy has direct impact on the rest of people's lives and even if they get to keep their lives in some situations.

Ashleigh is an unemployed recent college grad. The most influence she has are the 15 or 20 people who were all adults that signed up for this particular seminar. I imagine they either agreed with or are old enough to make up their own mind on what was said.

*promote

Very cool to see the influences. Apocalypse now.

Wow. Great sift.

I went to a state university in Kansas in the early 2000s, so this stuff is after my time and probably centered more in the Ivy League type places. But still, so much rings true and also helps explain the why.

Being a teacher at the High School age range in Thailand has been very interesting. So many things different, with plenty of pros and cons compared to my own experience. Cliques exist here, but aren't as antagonistic toward each other as they were when I was in school. Kids here are massively more accepting towards different groups like LGBT, LD/autistic/whatever, socially awkward academic nerds, etc. I'm sure the change in perspective from student to teacher influences my perceptions of this, but bullying seems essentially nonexistent here compared to rampant when I was in school.

Anyway, it seems to me like one thing that could really help dig us out of this mess is real multiculturalism and diversity (as opposed to what the SJW types that Haidt describes in the video would affix those words to). Knowing more about how other cultures and countries do things and being able to objectively compare and figure out alternative ways of doing things that might be better/worse is extremely useful.

Careful, if @bobknight33 sees you saying that he'll respond with some pretty harsh criticism. I'll pull quotes from his profile to simulate what he would say.

"Cuba citizens live as long and pay less? That Communism is better? That Cubans live shit life's but have live as long? Sign me up for that stuff... Then I 'll build a boat out of trash bans and float 90miles to tot the USA for a worse life. Sign me up for that stuff.

Every group that a has money at stake are trying to influence the people / governments one way or another in their favor.

All those hard line [prices] are only starting negotiating positions.

Trump is punking the shit out of liberals. Too funny. No real evidence or facts. just "sources" for liberal media false hype to continue its 24/7 anti Trump narrative."

It does not have to be about fitting into gamut, pink is a combination of blue and red light, which monitors are good at.

The problem with real world materials is that perception is not as simple as that. The combination of reflected, refracted, and even radiated (transformed wavelength) and polarized light, the micro-structure of the surface and possibly other properties can influence perception.

Like your favourite washing powder makes your whites whiter, this stuff makes pinks look pinker somehow. Its about fooling your eyes in specific conditions. You can simulate the difference between a known pink - a standard colour sample - and this awesome new pink by putting them side by side and calibrating the camera and monitor to show the new pink as pink and the reference pink as less pink, like at the end of the video, but that cant beat walking into an art gallery and seeing it with your own eyes. I mean probably, I havent seen this particular pink, but I have seen modern paintings which look nothing like their RGB or CMYK reproductions.

Since you agree that they're trying to influence the debate, is there any aspect of let's call it 'global warming scepticism' that you think is basically a lie perpetuated by the industry to make their argument more persuasive?

It's pretty easy for say, a fossil fuel company to pay (what is pocket change to to them) a PR company quietly to spread ideas that are misleading but sound convincing right?

Also where did Inconvenient Truth say the planet would be basically dead? I don't recall that at all.

Every group that a has money at stake are trying to influence the people / governments one way or another in their favor.

I do believe that temperatures are changing but to say man is mostly at fault -- I don't buy it. Even those promoting man made warming concede that even the Paris accord will not truly change the doomsday course we are on.

Al Gore's Inconvenient truth movie has the planet basically dead today -- but we are all here. Kind of the boy crying woof.

Genuine question, do you think that the fossil fuel industry tries to influence the debate in their favour?

I'm asking regardless of whether global warming is true or not.

Was the girl who was arrested driving? Due to video quality...unknown. Someone who was passed out was.
The motor was running.

The girl grabbed the bong, evidence, and threw it back in the car....on video....then made furtive moves pretending to both attack and run from the officers. She also, as a minor, refused to give her parents contact info, another reason to arrest and positively identify her to be sure she's not a runaway.

OK, I see, you're splitting hairs....driving while under the influence then....although I've smoked for over 30 years and never passed out cold on just weed so I'm not convinced it was just weed.

I agree that a disturbed person with more power is a bigger problem. To go straight for the Godwin's Law example, there have probably been people more evil and messed up than Hitler in the history of Earth, but very few had the power and opportunity to act on that evil to the magnitude he did.

However, you brought up magnitude of problems and compared the two as "equally disturbed". The Republican Congressman (with admittedly more power/influence) "body-slammed" a reporter. The Democrat nutcase shot up 6 people and (I think) didn't manage to kill any of them, but not for lack of trying.

We don't really know what was going on in either persons' heads when they did these things. What led up to them, etc. Maybe the reporter had been doggedly following and questioning/harassing the Congressman to such an extent that he snapped. Happens quite a lot with paparazzi, and we tend to give the celebrity targets a lot of benefit of the doubt in those cases. The only long-term result of the bodyslam incident that I know of is that the reporter's glasses were broken. Glasses can be repaired or replaced. Bullet wounds are rather tougher to fix.

However my main point isn't to get into a dick-measuring contest about who did more harm or who is more fucked up. My point is that the person entirely responsible in either incident is known. GOP Congressman physically assaulted a reporter of his own volition. Democrat nutcase shot up that baseball practice of his own volition. Those individuals are 100% responsible for what they did, no matter who or what they might claim drove them to their actions. Just like it isn't Ozzy Osbourne's fault when some nutter offs themselves after listening to his song "Suicide Solution", or John Carmack's fault for Columbine even though Klebold and Harris liked playing Doom.