But there's not a huge difference.
Criminals know right from wrong, they just have issues controlling their impulses.

Will power is a limited thing. Once you use it up, impulses take over.
The only difference is. You have a greater reserve of will power to draw from.

If your wife and son died, your house and all your money were taken, and now you've got an officer in your face threatening you..

When you're reduced to the same impulsive state as a criminal.
You think your training and licensing are going to stop you from snapping? O_o?

Not everyone respects guns or their inherent danger as much as you.

So in a state like Arizona, where all it takes to legally own a gun is:
1.being of age 2. not being considered a "prohibited possessor"

Do you sincerely feel those requirements are enough to instill "a greater respect for the 'capabilities' of, and the 'consequences' resulting from irresponsible use of guns." in everyone?

No, of course not.

So obtaining and cherishing (wtf?) a gun legally doesn't mean shit. The owner can still be a fuckhead.

Lastly, WTF?! Guns aren't inherently violent? They're just tools?!

In the same way a katana or a nuclear bomb aren't inherently violent? Right?
They're just tools.

Tools meant for MURDERING people!

Guns, swords and bombs weren't invented for sport.
They were invented to make killing easier.

So tell me Buck. Besides practicing murdering things from a distance,actually murdering things from a distance and signaling the start of a foot race..

Can you list the oh-so-many uses of a gun/guns?

@braschlosan Thank you for sharing despite the emotional difficulty. The US system is indeed completely F'd up, I agree. I am speaking from the prospect of someone living in Switzerland, where prison life is quite comfortable and you have to do something really, really bad (e.g. rape will get you a few months, letting someone rape your girlfriend and then trying to get him to pay you for it will get you no punishment at all) to ever set foot there (most criminals get a fine that hardly any of them ever pay). I am all for rehabilitation, believe me, and it goes without saying that prisoners should be treated humanely. What I am saying is it should not only be reeducation, it should also be punishment. Just as one deprives one's kid from TV, games and or going out for a while as punishment for bad behaviour, while still encouraging them to be better.
Here in Switz you are encouraged to do apprenticeships in jail that are the equivalent of those everyone else does for a wide variety of professions; you can even work a job outside of prison if you are not considered dangerous (for the record, a man who stabbed another man + got a 14yo girl drunk to rape her was allowed this in his meagre 1 year sentence; just to show how lenient things are here).

I guess the misunderstanding is that my opinion is based on seeing Norway as far more similar to Switzerland than to the States. I have raged elsewhere on the Sift about how terrible the US prison system is, i.e. basically a dehumanizing slave market, but that is not what I am criticising here. I am simply saying that those who commit crimes (taking drugs or growing pot is not a crime imo btw, and here you hardly even get fined for it) should pay there dues to society while learning to be a productive/participating member thereof, instead of having society put them up in a luxury hotel at the expense of people who, despite their needs (yes, poor people exist in Europe too) refuse to take the easy way out, or give in to their baser impulses.

There is a political aspect to it too: when the taxpaying public continually reads about criminals getting off with little or no punishment, or being put in comfortable jails a few weeks before being let off to continue their thieving/raping/racketeering/etc, they tend to be more attracted to the conservative extremists. It particularly does not help that Travel People, Maghrebins, Africans and Eastern Europeans are over-represented in these areas, which fuels the xenophobic agenda of right-wing parties.

Okay, enough ranting from me. I am sorry if I upset you @braschlosan, I think it is mostly because of the misunderstanding concerning our different points of reference.

Kids aren't mature enough to wholeheartedly welcome people who is different from them. They have nothing common with this lady other than the fact that she's riding a bus with them, which casts her as an outsider.

I'm also guessing the school spent very little money educating kids on bullying, nor did they spend the money to properly train this poor woman from such abuse. It's not that kids are terrible, it's the horrible lack of support these people got from their school.

Both the kids and the school monitor should have been trained on these kinds of issues, but responsibility mostly falls on the adult. Kids are brutal. Their prefrontal cortex isn't developed well enough to monitor their own social behaviors and impulses. They literally cannot stop themselves from being brutal, and it is upto the adult to know how to handle the situation. You have to be authoritative; gentle yet firm. The poor woman showed none of these traits and just took everything on as it came at her. She let things happen to her; a typical bully victim.

All in all, I just would like to say that these aren't some demonic kids from hell. They're just kids, and the lady should have received proper training from the school when she was hired to do the job.

3:44 - Lucky bicyclist is lucky.
5:05 - Suicidal truck driver.

I'm also quite amazed at that in Russia:
Everybody speeds.
Everyone is Traffic light colour-blind.
UTurns and left turns are on impulse.
Getting a crash cam in your car gives you a 30% chance of being in an accident where you did nothing wrong.

Everyone I've ever dated or married always looked at other girls and guys and commented on their fuckability in fact, lust-watch developed into a favored pastime in all of my relationships.
There are indicators available to humans of another human's libido still having legs under it and the impulse to keep humanity from further repression should be part of any healthy survivor's MO.

They aren't "banned" in Canada but most grocery stores have instituted a new policy that seems to be working in most cases.

First the bags have been switched from the cheep nylon bags to a stronger plastic bag.
At the beginning of your purchase you are asked how many bags you would like to purchase (10¢ bag).

Most people now bring their own cloth bags just to avoid the extra charges.
Also, as you enter the checkout-line in the impulse buying section, there are cloth bags at $1-2 each

Those that do purchase the (plastic) bags, now have a stronger plastic bag that can be reused next time they come and will be good for several uses.

One drawback for cloth bags is when you are buying meat. Sometimes meat such as raw pork and chicken has "drippings" in the package which drip into the bag and then through to your car. Not only is it messy but unsanitary as you get bacteria everywhere which can be dangerous. (always keep some plastic bags handy or buy some to keep - just in case)


Edit: WalMart is still using the cheap Nylon Bags (Which ad up if you buy groceries from them.) They use a lot of bags (only a few items per bag) because they are so short and not very strong. We can easily come home with 15-20 bags on a $70 grocery trip. Excessive in my opinion.

and remember $70 doesn't buy you many groceries.

FEAR.

It is amazing to me how undeniable in every-way if you systematically take apart his masterpiece of nothing and throw it into tiered columns and subject matters via science and psychology, setup a little like a tree you will always find that the source component of everything you've just heard is FEAR. It is the literal trunk of the tree with the neurons and chemical impulses that make us being the roots. Everything above the trunk in the canopy is DRIVEN by that fear meaning that if it happens to be a large amount of information then you MAY NEED TO discredit it.

Everything this man has ever said may be a result of fear, we don't know for sure, but in this situation EVERYTHING was. But, if you look at his other shows or speeches I bet he has a lot of anger driven (anger is fear, BTW) pieces, but they probably all come from one source and that is FEAR.

This is why so many religion speakers and believers fail. They don't understand themselves. They don't do enough self-introspection except to get past the front door. If you kept looking you TOO would also realize the same things scientists say, these things all stem from one primary system in our body: the fight or flight basically. For many of us WE ARE fighting, but oh so many are just running--trampling and killing anything in their path in irrational escape to nowhere, nowhere.

Nice answer. I don't necessarily agree, but if you -must- express violent impulses, I suggest video games. There's less pain involved, and a -much- smaller chance of going to the hospital or jail.
>> ^Gallowflak:

>> ^Stormsinger:
Yes indeed...two morons beating on each other. What a sport!

Your reasons for being condescending are obvious, but we must be allowed some mutually consensual means of having a healthy relationship with our violent impulses.

>> ^Stormsinger:

Yes indeed...two morons beating on each other. What a sport!


Your reasons for being condescending are obvious, but we must be allowed some mutually consensual means of having a healthy relationship with our violent impulses.

No, no, this "non-Samaritan" attitude goes back centuries. It has nothing to do with modern notions of liability.

The Chinese culture is very different from Western culture. "Saving face" isn't a light topic there. Suicide to save the family's honor has been part of their culture, hasn't it? I'm not that well versed in the differences of the various Asian cultures.

Hari kiri is the Japanese equivalent, yeah? The most honorable way to die is to disembowel yourself with no assistance. Most chose to have a trusted relative or friend behead them so they died quickly -- after stabbing themselves in the gut. I learned all this from Hollywood movies and novels -- so maybe it is all a load of crap.

So I"m sticking with my plausible interpretation that it is POSSIBLE that this was orchestrated by the government. Maybe it was just the government taking advantage of a true kind impulse on the part of the taxi driver -- but they do control the media still, yeah?

Cynical. That's me!




In reply to this comment by longde:
damn, you are cynical!!! It's sad that some of the bad infrastructure in china make this story perfectly plausible.

I think this attitude has to do with the ease of liability being assigned to the helper. In this case, there is no way any reasonable person would think the cab driver was responsible for the girl's injury. As opposed to a driver stopping for an injured pedestrian.>> ^bareboards2:

Here's another topic missed by this video --
Remember when that little girl got ran over by a truck and everyone walked by? The only person who went to help was a very poor woman?
Apparently there is a culture in China of NOT helping others. What I read at the time was if you help someone, then you become responsible for them. Which is why only the very poor woman went to help -- she had nothing to lose.
The Chinese government has been attempting to change that culture, in part by changing laws (I think. Didn't I read that somewhere?)
Here is how calloused I have become -- I thought for a moment (and I still sort of do) that this was a set up by the Government. A visual campaign to educate the public. They made the guy a hero, showed how the government has the services to help. The hole in the pavement was too weird, as noted here, people crowded around the hole with zero concern that more would give way. They didn't interview the girl at all, didn't show her face.
It's not a bad thing, to attempt to create a Good Samaritan culture in the face of thousands of years without one. I am just cynical about the feel-goodness of this clip.
Calloused. I am calloused.

That feeling of unboundedness we have with regards to our choices is I think what Carroll was trying to get to. And it's not just a feeling either -- it's difficult to describe in words, but there is a qualitative difference, beyond it just being convenient to talk about humans that way. Babies have a different (reduced?) set of factors guiding their behaviour. We identify them as missing the ability to consciously choose what they do. They act on impulse only. We adults have the conscious choice of what we do, at least in comparison to babies, and that's what we call "free will".

Our free wills are indeed not randomizers, because then they would be free, but lack will. Rather, they follow laws, which could bring about a direction, but remove freedom. Either way, we clearly have more internal influence on our decisions than babies. Perhaps what we adults uniquely have is self-awareness, including the awareness that we can choose our behaviour. Other creatures don't know that. How does that sit as a definition of what we call "free will"?

Accepting this puts "free will" in the category of social constructs, like friendship, jobs, and personal property. Does anybody argue that friendship, jobs and personal property don't exist? No, as a social construct, something we can talk about and identify with surely exists. Whether we really have any control over what we do outside of determinism is a different question, and IMO the answer can only be "No".

As for Compatibilism, the beginning of the Wikipedia article says it well: "Compatibilism is the belief that free will and determinism are compatible ideas, and that it is possible to believe both without being logically inconsistent. It may, however, be more accurate to say that compatibilists define "free will" in a way that allows it to co-exist with determinism (in the same way that incompatibilists define "free will" such that it cannot)". Inasmuch as we know the general human concept of free will, it exists, and is compatible with determinism. Inasmuch as our will and actions are 100% determined by conditions and physical laws, they are not free, thus it cannot exist.>> ^GeeSussFreeK:

One of my favorite quotes on this is from Schopenhauer
"We can do as we will, but we cannot will as we will"
I have never heard a good explanation for free will ever. Properly defined to the strength we all mean it by, it makes no sense, and try and change it into something we can make sense of, it is no longer the thing which we meant by free will. Let me expand on that.
What we all want to mean when we first set out on talking about free will is the notion that we (our consciousness) are self determining demigods in a sense. That our consciousness somehow is able to transcend all conditions, and make unbound and almost other worldly interjections on our behalf. I am not a materialist, so this isn't a problem for me on the onset. However, even if our brains contains some otherworldly processing engine, the data which populates it for most all decisions in life are from this existence. And those "things" all seem to behave in a way that is bound by predetermined rules. In fact, it is impossible to think of a realty that is not bound by conditions and rules. All reality that we can understand comes from reason and associations. In a world where something could exist by not existing, or where circles are also squares...would make no sense to us. The only world we can understand is a world where things change in a way reason can map to. This undermines the entire notion of a transcendent, boundless "free will", for even the will itself would have a set of rules and conditions it was playing by, or else just be a random number generator of sorts. And when we talk about free will, random number generation isn't what comes to mind, but it is the only thing that can remain if you take away reason, and determinism.
However, I do submit that our choices "feel" unbounded. There is a "feeling" of free will that defies an ability to define it well. But that is typically how feelings operate, outside of ways to completely explain them. But that doesn't make what they appear to represent any more real, only the feeling is real. I can have a feeling that contradictions exist, for example, but be bound by the laws of how I think to not be able to resolve that in reality (IE, if I believe conditions exist, I could still not preform one, like draw a circular square).
That is why many philosophers turns to certain forms of Compatibilism, while others changed what free will meant in their Compatibilism. I think the latter is cheating, and the former is how we as humans experience "free will". Ultimately, if the universe doesn't exist on causality, then my argument will be undermine, and indeed, some form of Occasionalism might be the true nature of reality. Even so, even Occasionalism can't account for free will, only random number generation can, and that isn't what we mean by freedom, or willing.

Actually went and looked up the law. Because as more evidence comes out, I still thought that a teenager being followed by a much older adult (~10 years) should result in that teenager being covered under the SYG (Stand Your Ground) Law.

So looking at the text. Trayvon could use justfied force, in accordance with 776.012 and deadly force if he met the criteria of 776.012 (1). He was the person SYG, being stalked for unknown reason by a complete stranger. This is ignoring Zimmerman's comments and just looking at his actions. He followed a kid heedless of advice and the standard op of a neighborhood watch - call it in and remove yourself if no crime is taking place.

776.032 should not apply to Zimmerman, because he caused the confrontation by following. There was no defensive nature in stalking someone to the point of them defending themself from you.

776.041 could apply to Zimmerman as he is the clear aggressor (Again lots of people feel that aggressor means you threw the first punch, that's not what the law says, it's all about reasonable belief that you are in danger and I think being stalked = reasonable). The police had to verify that under 776.041 (1) wasn't happening, which I don't think it is easily proven that Zimmerman was commiting a hate crime via the stalking/profiling/shooting. 776.041 (2) only grants immunity if (A) OR (B) are fulfilled. I have not seen that the police have established (A) or (B) were fulfilled.

(A) Did Zimmerman exhaust every reasonable means of escape the danger of Trayvon? Does yelling help count? My argument here is that persistent following and disregard of advice of written material for conduct PLUS verbal command from dispatch shows that he is incapable of acting reasonably. The reasonable act would be to call it in and leave it the fuck alone. Plus he had no reason to be out of his vehicle after Trayvon.

(B) There is no evidence that Zimmerman tried to withdraw from conflict. There is evidence he was getting thrashed on the ground by his victim after he forced the confrontation on Trayvon, but not that he tried to de-escalate the encounter by either (A) or (B).

So again, I wonder why Zimmerman was let go when he there is no evidence to suggest he didn't force the encounter by his rash and impulsive decisions to get the people "who always get away". Then you count the "fucking coons", which according to many is "fucking punks" or "fucking goons" because "coon" is something no one under 40 has said in a decade. But coons sounds nothing like punks and goons is what all the kids are saying these days (sarcasm).


I've had this discussion on other sites. And overall people seem to keep preaching that you should apply the evidence and the evidence shows that Zimmerman was attacked. Following isn't illegal and questioning someone isn't illegal, and calling the police isn't illegal, and saying "fucking coons" isn't illegal, and ignoring advice of dispatch isn't illegal, and using lethal force in defense of yourself isn't illegal, and.....blah. But taken together, it shows that Zimmerman did a lot of stupid shit to provoke an incident that WOULD NOT HAVE HAPPENED if a reasonable and rational person had been in his place. And according to the SYG law, Martin was covered under it more so than Zimmerman. Yet far too many people are all about believing the police THIS TIME because......of some reason...whether it be Zimmerman is white, an adult, or is alive to "say so". Yet Martin is unbelievable because he is black, a teen, or hit Zimmerman (many believe unprovoked at that).

Over all, it has a lot of earmarks of a case of road rage. Where Martin does something to upset Zimmerman. Zimmerman follows Martin, violence goes down. In most cases I've heard, the guy who does the following and forces an encounter = guilty. Because it's unreasonable anger/decision making leading up to the event and there may not have been an offense in the first place...especially because there's no evidence of an offense to require that kind of action on the part of the guy following you to your home, work, or whatever destination...getting out and starting shit.


2011 Florida Statutes CHAPTER 776 JUSTIFIABLE USE OF FORCE[14]

776.012 Use of force in defense of person.—A person is justified in using force, except deadly force, against another when and to the extent that the person reasonably believes that such conduct is necessary to defend himself or herself or another against the other’s imminent use of unlawful force. However, a person is justified in the use of deadly force and does not have a duty to retreat if:

(1) He or she reasonably believes that such force is necessary to prevent imminent death or great bodily harm to himself or herself or another or to prevent the imminent commission of a forcible felony; or
(2) Under those circumstances permitted pursuant to s. 776.013.

776.032 Immunity from criminal prosecution and civil action for justifiable use of force.—

(1) A person who uses force as permitted in s. 776.012, s. 776.013, or s. 776.031 is justified in using such force and is immune from criminal prosecution and civil action for the use of such force, unless the person against whom force was used is a law enforcement officer, as defined in s. 943.10(14), who was acting in the performance of his or her official duties and the officer identified himself or herself in accordance with any applicable law or the person using force knew or reasonably should have known that the person was a law enforcement officer. As used in this subsection, the term “criminal prosecution” includes arresting, detaining in custody, and charging or prosecuting the defendant.

(2) A law enforcement agency may use standard procedures for investigating the use of force as described in subsection (1), but the agency may not arrest the person for using force unless it determines that there is probable cause that the force that was used was unlawful.

(3) The court shall award reasonable attorney’s fees, court costs, compensation for loss of income, and all expenses incurred by the defendant in defense of any civil action brought by a plaintiff if the court finds that the defendant is immune from prosecution as provided in subsection (1).

776.041 Use of force by aggressor. —The justification described in the preceding sections of this chapter is not available to a person who:

(1) Is attempting to commit, committing, or escaping after the commission of, a forcible felony; or

(2) Initially provokes the use of force against himself or herself, unless:

(a) Such force is so great that the person reasonably believes that he or she is in imminent danger of death or great bodily harm and that he or she has exhausted every reasonable means to escape such danger other than the use of force which is likely to cause death or great bodily harm to the assailant; or
(b) In good faith, the person withdraws from physical contact with the assailant and indicates clearly to the assailant that he or she desires to withdraw and terminate the use of force, but the assailant continues or resumes the use of force.

>> ^aurens:

Funny: I don't find it at all hard to argue with the results. It was billions of years of biological evolution—particularly the development of coping mechanisms for acute stresses—that saved Captain Udell, not his appeal to the (presumably) Christian god. (Surely I don't need to explain the difference between correlation and causation, do I?) And yes, if he really did pause to pray, then his religious impulse was self-defeating: it delayed the instinctual biological responses that eventually saved his life.
The difference between me and the Westboro Baptist Church—I'll spell it out—is in intention, delivery, and degree. Of course, your criticism lost all its punch as soon as you went off the deep end in equating me with those crazies.
I learned from the Hitch, thankfully, to be weary of people like you, people who want to chastise—or, worse, forbid—the criticism of religion on the grounds that it's unacceptably irreverent. Well, goddamn right its irreverent (in the etymological sense); that's the point.>> ^Asmo:
Both are insensitive and intolerant towards people who have not offered any overt offense. Both are self justified and self righteous. I don't see much of a difference, even if you pan it off as humour.
Besides, the humour would have been closer to the target if the guy had actually died from his "self-defeating religious impulses". As it stands, he lived versus incredible odds in spite of taking time for prayer. Kinda hard to argue with the results in this case... X D



You are weary of his calling you a douche, and he is weary of you calling a guy whose body has been blown apart and is barely holding himself together for his wife and kids an idiot.



Way to raise the level of discourse here fellas.

Funny: I don't find it at all hard to argue with the results. It was billions of years of biological evolution—particularly the development of coping mechanisms for acute stresses—that saved Captain Udell, not his appeal to the (presumably) Christian god. (Surely I don't need to explain the difference between correlation and causation, do I?) And yes, if he really did pause to pray, then his religious impulse was self-defeating: it delayed the instinctual biological responses that eventually saved his life.

The difference between me and the Westboro Baptist Church—I'll spell it out—is in intention, delivery, and degree. Of course, your criticism lost all its punch as soon as you went off the deep end in equating me with those crazies.

I learned from the Hitch, thankfully, to be weary of people like you, people who want to chastise—or, worse, forbid—the criticism of religion on the grounds that it's unacceptably irreverent. Well, goddamn right its irreverent (in the etymological sense); that's the point.>> ^Asmo:
Both are insensitive and intolerant towards people who have not offered any overt offense. Both are self justified and self righteous. I don't see much of a difference, even if you pan it off as humour.
Besides, the humour would have been closer to the target if the guy had actually died from his "self-defeating religious impulses". As it stands, he lived versus incredible odds in spite of taking time for prayer. Kinda hard to argue with the results in this case... X D

>> ^aurens:

Yep, precisely my intention. It's my considered opinion that a tongue-in-cheek Videosift comment intended to highlight the silliness of self-defeating religious impulses is the moral equivalent of anti-gay, anti-black, anti-Islamic, anti-Jewish funeral pickets.>> ^Asmo:
[...] You trying to out-douche the Westboro morons?



Both are insensitive and intolerant towards people who have not offered any overt offense. Both are self justified and self righteous. I don't see much of a difference, even if you pan it off as humour.

Besides, the humour would have been closer to the target if the guy had actually died from his "self-defeating religious impulses". As it stands, he lived versus incredible odds in spite of taking time for prayer. Kinda hard to argue with the results in this case... X D