Remember, you said

>> ^bareboards2:

Love the cameras. Cameras and the internet are weaving a web of protection around each citizen.
Too cool, baby!


And before you said

>> ^bareboards2:

[edit] Allowing for hyperbole and "all" and "yearn" ....
1. Yes
2. Yes.
>> ^GenjiKilpatrick:
@bareboards2
1 - Was all that stuff invented & perpetuated out of a sincere need to protect you?
2 - Do you sincerely believe that 95% of police wake up yearning to prevent every citizen, as much as possible, from being robbed or raped or murdered?
Those are simple questions you've refused to address so far.



Just in case you're still havin' trouble letting it all sink in..

>> ^bareboards2:

I said that I am glad that cops have cameras on their cars. Transparency.
I am glad that the internet is spreading the videos far and wide. Public empowerment.
This is how we protect ourselves.

Replay what Anna says at min 2:55 a few times

Hah. Kumquat?

See MaxWilder's question to me and my answer above.

>> ^GenjiKilpatrick:

@bareboards2
Fer fuck's sake lady. Everytime you choose to whine about semantics instead of address the issue, I'll respond with "santorum stains". How 'bout that?
Why's it so hard to understand that I can't stop to get a statement before every question I ask you? [even if i did. you never give a straight answer anyway]
It's called making an inference from your past implications.
~~~
Anywho..
Like I said, the issue today is:
Why do you praise this video footage as public empowerment.. but view activists exercising civil disobedience as "dumb" or whatever exact set of words you used?
[I'd hate to infer put words in your mouth again]
I'm asking cause it's mind-boggling that you'd advocate "transparency" aka "waiting til some bad shit happens" first, over actively seeking a society in which something as simple as dancing would never be met with imprisonment or violence.

@bareboards2

Fer fuck's sake lady. Everytime you choose to whine about semantics instead of address the issue, I'll respond with "santorum stains". How 'bout that?

Why's it so hard to understand that I can't stop to get a statement before every question I ask you? [even if i did. you never give a straight answer anyway]

It's called making an inference from your past implications.
~~~
Anywho..

Like I said, the issue today is:

Why do you praise this video footage as public empowerment.. but view activists exercising civil disobedience as "dumb" or whatever exact set of words you used?
[I'd hate to infer put words in your mouth again]

I'm asking cause it's mind-boggling that you'd advocate "transparency" aka "waiting til some bad shit happens" first, over actively seeking a society in which something as simple as dancing would never be met with imprisonment or violence.

You're at it again, dear Genji.

I didn't say any of this.

I said that I am glad that cops have cameras on their cars. Transparency.

I am glad that the internet is spreading the videos far and wide. Public empowerment.

This is how we protect ourselves.

You are in favor of that, aren't you?


>> ^GenjiKilpatrick:

@bareboards2
So is this where you draw the line?
She did resist so she deserved it, right?
Or she wasn't resisting in a place designated as a "no disturbing/dancing area" so it's not deserved?
Just trying to understand why you can empathize with this sort of violence but not violence directed against "those silly" protestors.

Well, Christianity as it is practiced in America is extremely skewed..most of those evengelicals, the trinity broadcasting network, the lunatics known as the republican party..their brand of Christianity is a disgrace and a perversion. Things like the prosperity gospel should make any Christian sick to their stomach. Sadly a lot of people buy into it because living prudently, with a healthy dose of self-denial is not very popular in this gross materialism we are drowning in. I can understand why atheists cant stand these people..because I cant stand them either.

>> ^dag:
It's great of you to concede this SB.
Christianity in America is more like a personal empowerment and wealth creation seminar than a religion. Christ never said "the Lord helps those who help themselves" - though that's the primary tenant that most American Christians seem to follow. Maybe Tony Robbins is the second coming.
>> ^shinyblurry:
Sadly, he's right. I was fairly astonished that so many Christians didn't see anything wrong with celebrating someones death, Bin Laden or not. Though, what Bill Maher doesn't mention is that there was also a large number of Christians who did understand that was wrong and spoke out against it.
Many people do follow Christ in name only. The bible says they are only borrowing the name at a price. It's really no different however than anything else human beings do. That humans can mess up something good should be no surprise to anyone.

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

It's great of you to concede this SB.

Christianity in America is more like a personal empowerment and wealth creation seminar than a religion. Christ never said "the Lord helps those who help themselves" - though that's the primary tenant that most American Christians seem to follow. Maybe Tony Robbins is the second coming.

>> ^shinyblurry:

Sadly, he's right. I was fairly astonished that so many Christians didn't see anything wrong with celebrating someones death, Bin Laden or not. Though, what Bill Maher doesn't mention is that there was also a large number of Christians who did understand that was wrong and spoke out against it.
Many people do follow Christ in name only. The bible says they are only borrowing the name at a price. It's really no different however than anything else human beings do. That humans can mess up something good should be no surprise to anyone.

Uh, where exactly did Christian influences play a role in that? >> ^Reefie:

>> ^EMPIRE:
yeah... arabic mentality is not exactly the most respectful towards women (surprise, surprise!).

Wasn't always like that so it's not fair to generalise. Take a look at how women used to be treated in Afghanistan, they were worshipped and were easily the equals of men (worth also pointing out that the Koran classes men and women as equals). It's only since the end of the second world war when religions such as Christianity and Islam worked to change the perceived role of women in Afghan society so that the last half a decade has radically altered the standing of women in that country. King Amanullah worked very hard to promote women's empowerment in the early 20th century, but all his work has been undone, and from a historical perspective we only need to look towards the Christian and Taliban influences at work in that country to understand how it all got fucked up.

I wasn't talking about how women were treated in the past, or will be treated in the future. I'm talking about the current mentality towards women in most arabic countries.

Sure there's still a lot of discrimination against women in almost every country in the world. But in arabic countries it's particularly bad.

>> ^Reefie:

>> ^EMPIRE:
yeah... arabic mentality is not exactly the most respectful towards women (surprise, surprise!).

Wasn't always like that so it's not fair to generalise. Take a look at how women used to be treated in Afghanistan, they were worshipped and were easily the equals of men (worth also pointing out that the Koran classes men and women as equals). It's only since the end of the second world war when religions such as Christianity and Islam worked to change the perceived role of women in Afghan society so that the last half a decade has radically altered the standing of women in that country. King Amanullah worked very hard to promote women's empowerment in the early 20th century, but all his work has been undone, and from a historical perspective we only need to look towards the Christian and Taliban influences at work in that country to understand how it all got fucked up.

>> ^EMPIRE:
yeah... arabic mentality is not exactly the most respectful towards women (surprise, surprise!).


Wasn't always like that so it's not fair to generalise. Take a look at how women used to be treated in Afghanistan, they were worshipped and were easily the equals of men (worth also pointing out that the Koran classes men and women as equals). It's only since the end of the second world war when religions such as Christianity and Islam worked to change the perceived role of women in Afghan society so that the last half a decade has radically altered the standing of women in that country. King Amanullah worked very hard to promote women's empowerment in the early 20th century, but all his work has been undone, and from a historical perspective we only need to look towards the Christian and Taliban influences at work in that country to understand how it all got fucked up.

@GeeSussFreeK

I didn't say GDP, I said GDP per capita. Both Finland and the US have roughly the same GDP per capita.

My assertion is that crimes are more likely to be committed by criminals who are empowered by guns. Suicide has nothing to do with this and that's why I didn't address it.

Murder rates are the only universally comparable measure when you consider various violent offenses are classified differently and with varying degrees of tolerance in difference countries.

I think it would hardly be a stretch to assert that guns allow criminals and delinquents to dish out far more death per violent incident - being a reason why crime is average/above average, but murder (especially by firearms) is astronomical.

Either way, I want to address murder singlehandedly as I think it's certainly still an important (and far less finnicky) topic to argue in and of itself, not crime generally.

Crimes again are classified and reported to varying degrees in different countries.

Again, I want to point out that my argument isn't about gun legislation but about gun ownership rates. I have no doubt that if you were to ban guns immediately in one state, there'll not be a chasm of a decline in gun murder rates. Arguments that look at gun laws ignore the blatant fact that US borders are very porous as far as I understand, and that even then, gun laws take years, decades perhaps to have meaningful effects on ownership rates and as a result, general availability at above minimal cost to criminals. Looking at the wikipedia page for California's gun laws, the only meaningful law I see is a 2005 ban in San Fransisco on all firearms and ammunition. Something like this would take at least a decade to have any meaningful effect though, I'm sure I would agree with you here when I say that smuggling guns into simply a city of all places (not a country with customs, or even a state) and selling them on the black market would hardly be difficult - where surrounding areas have no such ban.

I agree that no legislation will prevent a determined terrorist or capable individual from inflicting massive damage if nuclear weapons were readily available and manufactured in large amounts in one area of the world. A concerted and enforced gun ban on the other hand (with restrictions for hunting in some areas, target shooting, and potentially eased laws for protection in remote areas with low police presence) would do a great deal to reduce availability and reduce the incidence of gun murder by petty criminals which makes up the majority of gun deaths in the US.

Take for example our legislation in Australia. There's nothing exceptional about it, I'm just most familiar with it:

"State laws govern the possession and use of firearms in Australia. These laws were largely aligned under the 1996 National Agreement on Firearms. Anyone wishing to possess or use a firearm must have a Firearms Licence and, with some exceptions, be over the age of 18. Owners must have secure storage for their firearms.

Before someone can buy a firearm, he or she must obtain a Permit To Acquire. The first permit has a mandatory 28-day delay before it is first issued. In some states (e.g. Queensland, Victoria, and New South Wales), this is waived for second and subsequent firearms of the same class. For each firearm a "Genuine Reason" must be given, relating to pest control, hunting, target shooting, or collecting. Self-defense is not accepted as a reason for issuing a licence, even though it may be legal under certain circumstances to use a legally held firearm for self-defense.[2]

Each firearm in Australia must be registered to the owner by serial number. Some states allow an owner to store or borrow another person's registered firearm of the same category."

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

There is a very good reason why this has led to a 5.2% ownership rate among citizens and a murder rate by guns of between 29% and 19% that of the US per capita depending on which numbers you use from here:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_firearm-related_death_rate

If you want to come back to saying that people simply murder in different ways, then look at purely the murder rate - the number goes up just slightly to 35% (the rate of murder per capita in Australia of that in the US).

Gun laws aren't punishment. Just like nuclear weapon bans aren't punishment. Or Sarin Gas bans. They're good policy.

Just like making everyone buy basic health insurance to reduce risk among consumers and lower prices, where the poorest are subsidised. If you insist on using analogies, I think this compares incredibly well to a gun ban which makes allowance for recreation and hunting (and at least in my view, allowances of 'for protection' licenses in remote areas with limited quantity and strict restriction to avoid smuggling).

Just like the compulsory third party car insurance we have here, that ensures that if you are at fault and damage another car, the innocent party is guaranteed to have their car repaired.

What I hope you understand coming from a libertarian position (and this is repeating the first thing I said in this whole discussion to blankfist) is that libertarianism is not a flat and universal position on individual rights. You, just like anyone I would imagine, have limits to how far you go with individual rights. You recognize the validity of a system of laws to limit the impact of one's individual's actions on another, and the retribution they should receive for violating it. You simply draw the metaphorical line on rights further right on the ideological spectrum than I do.

Therefore you can't simply justify gun ownership by claiming individual rights and the notion that everyone's entitled to them as they are not presumed guilty. You have to consider whether it does harm in society or not, just like the rest of us.

I hope I've laid out a pretty convincing arguments based on the statistics (speculative of course, I have neither the time nor resources to do a rigorous analysis controlling for a multitude of variables) that gun ownership does lead to more (gun) murders. If we were taking about a 10-20% difference, sure it would be debatable, but we're talking about a 2 to 3 fold increase. Let's not kid around about what causes this.

If you think that individual rights are so incredibly important that they trump this palpably gargantuan increase in death (and suffering) then that is certainly a position you can take, but let's be honest about this if that's the position you want to take.

As far as I'm concerned, I don't think they are. I think the opportunities for self defense, the willingness to use a gun of most people, the willingness of normal and ration people to risk death for losing their property are small. The sheer empowerment and impetus a gun (easily available from a nearby store at a price anyone can pay) can give a criminal on the other hand is huge.

---

Just a quick recap on things I didn't cover.

If you want to demonstrate guns are less devastating than drugs then kindly provide data to support this. If you are referencing the drug war or even if you are not, this is totally irrelevant to the question I posed to you.

Comparing guns to drugs and referencing the opium war is just not a good analogy. Colonialism. Colonialism. Colonialism.

Yes cars kill people, so do airplanes. So do pretzels. In fact, just about everything kills people (although yes car accidents are far more significant than pretzels). We do have a plethora of legislation that increases car safety. Guns are of course unique in that supposedly (if you would believe people in the US), more guns and LESS gun legislation protects you from the more guns you now have and so on. Let's look at this objectionably just as I compared the benefits to defenders versus aggressors for gun ownership. Cars provide an obvious benefit and are fundamental to commerce and modern life (unlike guns 99.9% of the time for private defenders of civil liberty). More legislation and safety requirements can obviously reduce death rates. To me it seems pretty obvious how to proceed here.

Wall of text warning. No tl;dr. Learn to read dammit (see what I did there?).

@quantumushroom

Unusual post from you there qm. But again you miss the point (what did you expect?).

First off, religion necessarily has an effect on society otherwise no one would care if you adhered or not (i.e. there would be no religious wars, no religious-based hatred etc.). The problem is not that religion enhances your sense of well-being, it's that as a consequence (or side effect if you will) you close yourself off from people of a different religion and from contrary opinions on many different matters: you trade freedom of thought for psychological safety and by doing that you deserve neither. Now, if you're a "religious scientist" type then your either not really religious or not really a scientist. Compartmentalization can only get you so far.

Second, wtf does any of this has to do with liberalism? Your tangent does not intersect my argument at any point. I bet you can't derive for shit. Do you even know what derivation is?

Third, atheism is neutral. Atheism is to theism as amoralism is to moralism. The antonym to moral is not amoral but immoral. In the same way, the antonym to theism is non-theism. A non-theist can be religious, he simply does not believe in a deity or deities. Atheism was a term invented by theists to vilify non-theist and polytheists. It has been adopted by non-religious people like "nigger" has been adopted by African-Americans, as a way of empowerment. It encompasses many views, most of them non-religious. It does not mean atheists cannot suffer from the same delusions as religious people, only that they are less likely because by identifying and refusing to accept the kind of bad thinking that goes on in religious circles, they have inoculated themselves to a point.

Fourth, on the contrary one could say that there have never been a religion without a state. Every religion needs a vector of power to affirm its authority and convert others. The Jews in Pharaonic Egypt formed a state within a state, electing their own leaders and applying the laws of Abraham to their brethren, much like Muslims try to do in western countries by following sharia law and even trying to make it official. I would go so far as to say that religion is the prototype of the state. Look at Buddhism. Not a year after the Buddha died and already sects formed and tried to control the movement he started. The conflicts may not have been overtly violent, but they were power struggles and as such quite far from the detachment from worldly matters taught by the Buddha. All prophets are dictators. Their intentions may be good, but it will always turn sour when they're gone as they, and not their god or teachings, are really what unify their followers. The continuation depends not on the person or the teachings but on the institutions that they or their successors build, just like a state. You could see what I mean if you had read the Leviathan of Hobbes (that's not what he says, but the parallels he makes and his insistence that religion is necessary for the state's well-being goes in this direction). This, to me, argues for anarchism but of course with people like quantumushroom - not to mention the potential for greed and cruelty still in all of us - I would have to say we are not ripe for it just yet. It may well be that a great part of the population will need to be forced to become atheists just to live among an atheist society comfortably, like atheists were once forced to recant their views in religious societies. While it would mean some psychological violence, as long as we stay in a democratic state it would not do more damage than what religion does now and I believe it would benefit humankind in the long run.

@Gallowflak

Nowhere did I say atheists were more rational than the religious. In fact, most rationalists (like Descartes) are religious for various reasons, one which I will explore below. I said that atheists are more reasonable and detached in their understanding of the world. Now, while "reasonable" comes from "reason" it does not mean here that a reasonable person uses more reason than another. It means that a person is more sensible than another. For example, there are no empirically verifiable evidence of a god or gods. Any religious person not mentally ill will agree. They may argue for the acceptance of anecdotal evidence or of natural phenomena as "acts of God", but just saying something doesn't make it so and anecdotal evidence is not verifiable/repeatable by a third-party and thus of very little value. So there doesn't seem to be any evidence for deities, even Pascal admitted that fact in the frickin 17th century, that's why he had to make a wager with non-believers: he tried to say that by betting on an infinite reward you cannot lose (many think that Pascal says the odds are infinite, but that would be empirical. Pascal says that since god is presumably infinite, and that you presumably gain this infinity when you die, you should take the bet since by doing so you lose nothing in this life. Of course the last part I think is false, also the dying part. Only the "god is infinite" has any kind of weight and it is very light). Of course he didn't really understand mathematical infinity and thus didn't realize that doing so meant you only had an infinitesimal chance of winning in return.

Digression aside, this means that the natural state of a rational being would be non-theistic. Only non-rational belief (based on logical fallacies or the sentiment of faith) or logical arguments based on non-empirical premises can lead to the existence of a god as part of one's thinking. Thus, while not necessarily non-rational, religious thinking most of the time is. In other cases, when dubious premises are used, we would say that the conclusions are not reasonable, meaning that they do not agree with our raw, unfiltered experiences of the world. This is exactly why many religious persons and theists resort to rationalism, as it lets them bypass primary experience in order to define god a priori as the creator of our experiences by some logical argument with dubious premises. Of course this comes from an empiric viewpoint, but then again rationalists don't have a monopoly on reason even though they let us empiricists have a monopoly on experience: that's where the Kantians enter, but that's a story for another time I'm afraid.

>> ^qualm:
tsquire1: "...to compare the situation of a male withholding information to a women with its antipode is to ignore the reality of a patriarchal society where men benefit substantially for gender privilege."
I agree. The imbalance of power between men and women is institutionalized, ie. patriarchy, so that while individually women can be hateful or "sexist," there's no entrenchent, and little to no meaningful empowerment for women to subvert and reverse structural injustice and inequalities. And so it is with racism. A Palestinian can hate Jewish Israelis, but from outside.
In Israel Palestinians are "the other." They have nothing in the way of leverage, so instead there's misery, frustration and endless intractable conflict. So it is that from despair erupts the most existentially strange phenomenon of violence: the suicide bomber.
It's one of those historical ironies that the first suicide bomber in Israel/Palestine was an early zionist.


Wow, really, a negative down vote? For stating what my expericence has been?

My brother gets beaten by his wife and his wife gets taken to jail. Also, his wife threatened him about sending his ass to jail as she slapped herself in the face. Well, good thing the cops were listening at the door and took pictures of his injuries! That was in addition to being forced to live with his wife's abusive parapaligic mother too...

And my father, god, how horrible that was for him... I feel bad for him when at 3 in the morning my mother still ranted...

But even then, if it would commonly stop at those and a few more experiences, I would say that women-dominence is an isolated thing and not culturally driven... However, the cliches are there because our culture does drive inequality---both ways!

But because I have seen the other side of patriachal-female driven society, you down vote my idea...

Wow, how silly of you! I will not dispute that women are not paid as much as men, nor do they recieve the same chances for jobs that men have ample opportunity get. But of course, that must not be enough to please qualm, huh?

>> ^qualm:
tsquire1: "...to compare the situation of a male withholding information to a women with its antipode is to ignore the reality of a patriarchal society where men benefit substantially for gender privilege."
I agree. The imbalance of power between men and women is institutionalized, ie. patriarchy, so that while individually women can be hateful or "sexist," there's no entrenchent, and little to no meaningful empowerment for women to subvert and reverse structural injustice and inequalities. And so it is with racism. A Palestinian can hate Jewish Israelis, but from outside.
In Israel Palestinians are "the other." They have nothing in the way of leverage, so instead there's misery, frustration and endless intractable conflict. So it is that from despair erupts the most existentially strange phenomenon of violence: the suicide bomber.
It's one of those historical ironies that the first suicide bomber in Israel/Palestine was an early zionist.


I have found that women hold most of the power in the Western World. All the jokes are not so funny about how "pussy-whipped" men are when it is a reality for many, many men.

My wife tried breaking me for five years! Five fucking years! You would think she would lose her entitlement issues in the gender race. I am thankful we are now equals. Also, my father was broken by my mother, my brothers by their wives, my wife's family by their husbands... You get the point... All that is left over is a souless slave that works to feed a woman's need to spend or be the bully...

tsquire1: "...to compare the situation of a male withholding information to a women with its antipode is to ignore the reality of a patriarchal society where men benefit substantially for gender privilege."

I agree. The imbalance of power between men and women is institutionalized, ie. patriarchy, so that while individually women can be hateful or "sexist," there's no entrenchent, and little to no meaningful empowerment for women to subvert and reverse structural injustice and inequalities. And so it is with racism. A Palestinian can hate Jewish Israelis, but from outside.

In Israel Palestinians are "the other." They have nothing in the way of leverage, so instead there's misery, frustration and endless intractable conflict. So it is that from despair erupts the most existentially strange phenomenon of violence: the suicide bomber.

It's one of those historical ironies that the first suicide bomber in Israel/Palestine was an early zionist.

1. I had a feeling nostalgia might be one reason. I guess I'm more of an iconoclast, but then I never have been really into comics in the first place.

2. Her old, scantily-clad outfit is certainly appealing to the eye, but it just seems less practical for crime fighting. Wouldn't her tits always be on the verge of popping out when the action got intense?

3. If she is less curvy, it ain't by much. Her boobs are still at least a D-cup, maybe even DD-cup. That counts as curves to me. I'll concede that her hips have slightly less curve, but not by much. IMO she hardly looks like an adolescent Teen Titan. She's all woman to me, brother.

4. I like the more sophisticated look. Like I said, it makes her look more like a real superhero and less like a bimbo walking around the Playboy mansion. But to each his own. (Though I'll admit, in this image she still looks pretty badass.) And a choker bothers you, but a tiara doesn't? Oh well, to each his own.

5. She still looks every bit like a symbol of feminist empowerment to me, actually even more so. As mentioned earlier, she looks more like a real superhero and less like this.

You may be right - they may change her back because of rabid fanboys. Still, I have to hand it to J. Michael Straczynski for being willing to try something new.