I guess that's where we differ.

I find it funny precisely because such things really happen.

In a world where no such cruelty exists, I think this kind of material would then become empty and pointless. Comedy thrives on the defiance of our misery.

I dare say it would get less of a laugh in Sweden for this very reason.

I'm clearly in the minority here, but then I suspect few people have developed the same sense of cynical detachment I have (working with the severely mentally I'll and dieing will do that to you).

The humour is definitely there, I guess you just need a suitably fucked up perspective to appreciate it.

Out of curiosity, did you find Jim's old bit about the child getting shot when he was in Iraq funny? I might suggest that is an even more cruel and fucked up situation than the subject matter being discussed here.

Would that only become funny when children are no longer victims of wars? Or is it funny precisely because of the incomprehensible cruelty and misfortune underlying it?

Perhaps you have an easier time detaching yourself from something that isn't as likely to happen to you? This seems reasonable, but I don't see how it precludes such material from being funny, only more challenging for one to engage with. (and thus more powerful if one can do so)

To bring in a thread from another reply "And this is the brilliance of Louis -- that he lays bare the humanity of even pedophiles. The truth of pedophiles."

In what sense is Jim not doing the same thing here? He is flippantly exploring Cosby's desire to victimise women, we all have desires and sometimes act on those impulses when we shouldn't.
Rape is an extreme example, but the thought process is ultimately the same thing writ large. "I want a thing I can't have, but I'm doing it anyway".
I might argue he is laying bare the universal human condition in just the same way, albeit with something closer to home for most people than paedophilia.

Presumably it's the other thread that's proving challenging, i.e. the masochistic idea of enjoying ones abuse? And again, there is something deeply fucked up at the heat of the human condition here. Deriving pleasure from victim hood, or having messed up priorities about fame and opportunity.
Stockholm syndrome, abused partners loving their spouses, groupies allowing themselves to be abused just to be near their idols.

We are really that fucked up as a species sometimes, cognitive dissonance is almost a way of life for most of us in our own little ways. It's clearly a deeply risque subject, but there is something dark at the core of the human condition there none the less.

The actual victims don't need to have the kind of mixed up priorities Jim is alluding to, we only have to recognise that we posses the capacity for that dissonance ourselves. (The joke being at the expense of our own inherent hypocrisies, not specific victims)

The only big difference I can really see is that child rape is much rarer than the kind being discussed here. (and thus I suppose easier for most to detach themselves from)

Is it really any less horrific? Surely if anything it is far more terrible for most victims and usually seems to cause more damage to their lives.

How does Louis's material on Child rape remain funny in a world where children are raped, yet Jim's material about women being raped only become funny in a world where they do not get raped?

Paedophiles have a culture too. They form groups, exchange materials, praise each others work etc. etc. Not to mention grooming rings and other such reprehensible things.

I understand that a particular subject can strike too close to home, but for me that was my failing to rise above my own fears and traumas. When I finally got to a place where I could laugh at my own victim hood, it was one of the most liberating experiences of my life. (Don't get me wrong, that shit never completely goes away)

*length=2:00 of her 15 minutes of fame ugg

We have always been a gun violence culture up until the post WW2 era. Think frontier, wild west, duels, and mafia shootouts. We glorify violence everyday, we even give sickos who shoot up groups of people mass media coverage. For a person who wants to go out in a blaze of infamy, we are custom tailored to give them their last 15 minutes of 'fame'.

Again, we have a nebulous definition of what it takes to get on the watch list. I could be placed on it simply by stating something to the effect that "I support ISIS", even though I don't. Restricting people who manage to end up on a government list is the same as removing their right to a firearm after committing a felony offense, only you have removed every single bit of their right to a legal defense. There is no due process to being placed on a US watchlist, you get put on and fuck you if it was a mistake. Maybe they'll take you off later, who knows?

I am not going to defend a slippery slope argument on this, I don't have to. It's already happened in the years since 2001. The Patriot Act, meant to be a well intended set of rules to help us protect ourselves, has been perverted to lessen quite a few of our rights. Not only our rights, but other countries. We have violated their security, spied on their people and leaders, and we perform acts of war on their territories with impugnity. All because we lost two buildings and 2,996 people; a heinous act, but one our government exploited to put us into 2 wars with a death toll to people who may not even be our enemies that dwarf our loss. In short, we fucking have the slippery slope process down to a SCIENCE.

Don't you want him for your dad? When the fame has passed, you will have an incredible trove of the fricking best home movies ever.

If he wants credibility, he probably should have made this video when you noticed it, not after going home, calling them, waiting for a reply, and being denied. He also probably should post the video in better resolution than 144p. It's hard to tell if it's even in the same writing and/or color with this terrible quality, so impossible for me to decide if I think he's a liar that did it himself and posted it in low res to hide that, or if I think he actually had this happen to him. I hope others will also reserve judgement until better evidence one way or the other surfaces....although I see the poster has made his opinion clear with the tags. EDIT: OK, there is clear evidence out there that this was a fraud, see below.
This is *controversy if it really happened, and also controversy if it didn't and he's a liar looking for his 5 minutes of fame.
No vote without more info. If it's been debunked, lets see that debunking.

All that said, it wouldn't be surprising in Austin. Yes, there are many tolerant people there, but still plenty of intolerant people for this to not be out of the question.

Oh yeah, I forgot, it was a while ago on another thread, but that still doesn't answer why you think being one precludes being the other. ;-)
EDIT: I hope you notice that I didn't actually CALL you either a pig or Palin, I simply asked if you were either (or both). ;-)

1)all we have are test results showing how they failed multiple tests of it's required capabilities, and other reports saying the military changed the test requirements after the fact to turn those 'fails' into 'barely passed the tests'.
2) mostly, yes. Not 100%. For the most part, the general media does not have a real understanding of anything they 'report'.
3) I'm making claims about it becoming obsolete in <10 years, not repeating any media claim, based on past lifespans of electronic secrets. It's more prone to obsolesce than previous planes because it's main, and really only 'claim to fame' (as you've repeatedly said) are it's electronics, both stealth and targeting, and when those are 'gone' it's a flying golden pig. I think giving it 10 years is really being quite generous, secrets rarely last that long these days.

It was a huge victory in his 15 year old eyes and the eyes of his friends. Hopefully he takes the advice of the cop and this isn't the height of his 'fame'.

A bit of background on his childhood.
https://www.quora.com/What-was-Elon-Musks-experience-with-bullying-as-a-child

I don't know about the revenge part, I'd guess his fame, wealth and attempting to do good by humanity is his revenge.

I think article linked below on reading level is important to note in regards to this.
https://contently.com/strategist/2015/01/28/this-surprising-reading-level-analysis-will-change-the-way-you-write/ By keeping his language simple, he is able to reach, and have his keywords understood by a larger American audience. Of course understanding speech and reading are slightly different, but it's word choice still becomes important.

As this video notes. Trump is a salesman. And he's selling his crap expertly well. He circumvents the answer with babble that never actually answers the question. He never answered if it's un-American to have a religious litmus test to allow people to visit the US, he just says we have a problem, and implicates all the people of one faith in that, which ISIL itself said sometime ago was their goal, to turn the world against all of Islam to make it easier to recruit and radicalize more people... which is off topic. He doesn't address the point of the question, he sort of skirts it and generalizes it into his overall framework. One could argue that yes, saying there's a problem is itself an answer to the question, but it isn't a direct answer.

I don't know as if he's intentionally talking at that low a level though, or if he's just his style period.

It'd also be interesting to see if Hitler's run-up to being elected, if he used similar style. That is if he used a simple style to appeal to the masses. Not just Hitler, but other leaders of his ilk. I choose Hitler here as more an example of an elected leader gone wrong, that had mass appeal to his people, but later regretted to the point of shame.

Even if Britt's famed Warning Signs of Fascism isn't fully accurate by all scholars (and I'm aware he doesn't actually have academic scholarship) many do come close. I think most can agree that it requires at least Extreme Nationalism, warmongering, a loss of civil liberties and rights (Patriot Act, wanting to increase the spy power of the NSA, etc), corporatism a merger of the state and corporate power, racism (Britt's warning signs says sexism, but I think racism is more apt and I don't think what people normally think about sexism applies, though we need more of a racism slash something, to note those who "sin" differently than others, such as the gays).

Didn't watch the video, but did skim the comments... Christ...

First off, moving to Canada and any other decent first world nation be it New Zealand, Australia, the UK, Iceland, Netherlands, Canada etc... not as easy as just packing up and moving. You need a very narrow set of skills to move to those countries. We looked into all this countries, and all of their entry requirements exceeded what we had to offer them. People always say if you don't like it leave, but that ignores several facts. It isn't we don't like it, we just think it can be improved, change isn't bad. Humanity isn't bad. Caring for those less fortunate isn't bad. Guaranteeing everyone a minimum level of affordable health care isn't bad. Working to insure that all workers get a living wage (the way we used to have before the employers/owners started getting greedy and redistributing more wealth to themselves), isn't a bad goal, in fact it's a very good thing. The famed clip from the Newsroom's first episode when he goes on about how America isn't great anymore but it used to be...

Of course the whole concept of American exceptionalism, or any nation exceptionalism is flawed. We are all humans on this planet. Being American doesn't make you superior to somebody born in China or Mexico, Ethiopia, Syria or anywhere else. Location of birth is an accident of timing... and if it is divine intervention by God that placed you here instead of Ethiopia where you may have starved to death with an inflated malnourished belly despite all your prayers, then God is an ass and not worth serving. So if he's not an ass, then it is pure accident that you are here and not there. To think oneself superior and better than somebody in another nation because of their location of birth, and the religion that comes with that location, is insanity. And I draw that all ways. The Muslims who despise Christianity for not being the true faith, and Christians who despise Islam for not being the true faith. You are your faith by accident of birth, be it location and/or parentage etc... all of which is getting away from the point. Which is simply that to say that Chinese worker doesn't deserve a job manufacturing something that you think you should be building is asinine and not respectful of their humanity and a complete lack of any sort of empathy. Christ, I have Aspergers and I have more empathy in my farts than the entire Tea Party Christian Right.

Yes we need to respect the individual, but "the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few, or the one"... and that quote is in context and not just a cherry pick sample. If it benefits just one and damages the many, then it is not a good thing. Most every faith in the world has some variation of the Golden Rule, to treat others the way you want others (not that specific person, but people as a general whole) to treat you. Christianity's Christ went further and said the greatest commandment was love, to show love to one another. Greed and selfishness is not love. Collectivism has many faults as well, but it isn't tyranny, and is certainly better for society as a whole in the long run than unrestrained greed motivated individualism. Like Pink Floyd's song, On the Turning Away, says, we are all "just a world we all must share". We can't turn away from the coldness inside towards others. We need to lift all of humanity up. Perhaps showing the Muslims love instead of hate and bigotry would convince them that perhaps Christianity isn't the enemy, that perhaps it is the answer, but showing them hate, and bigotry... and denying refugees trying to flee a horrible civil war is bigotry and hatred, and the fact that a rather disturbingly large percentage of the right can't see that isn't bigotry and hatred is scary beyond measure. I again find it amazing that people could lack that much empathy without a neurological disorder.

To invade others, tell them how to live their lives, to force democracy on them if they aren't ready, to insult them and belittle their faith, and all that isn't world building. It isn't reaching out with empathy. It's hate. It's bigotry and as noted by artician, it's what helps drive people to fly into buildings. They know that they know that their faith is the right one, and the lack of empathy to see that people of the Muslim faith have just as much faith in their religion as Christians have in theirs, that they have the same amount of knowledge and comfort from god that they are the correct faith, is what drives extremism.

And oh my god the guns. Guns would have saved the Jews. American mainland can't be invaded because too many people own guns... ask the Branch Davidians how well having not only military grade weapons but also training on how to use them worked for them against a slightly militarized police force, let alone an actual military. Yes, it would be incredibly hard, and resistance would probably eventually wear any invading force down the way the Taliban wore the Soviets down, or the Viet Cong did against the US Military might. So perhaps that can be counted as a victory, but would be long fought. Look, I support gun ownership. All I really call for is 1) allowing the CDC get back to it's job of collecting the data and finding out what's really going on with gun violence, and 2) closing the gun show loophole unless the CDC's investigation shows that it has zero effect, 3) you have to have a legal ID to own a gun and can't be on the no fly list, 4) the existing background checks kept the same, but also add a drug test, the right wants drug tests for welfare, then we should be testing for gun owenrship too. (I see little reason for "assault weapons" but aside from perhaps having perhaps a slightly better background check, I don't know if a ban yet needs to be called for, but I'm in the middle here.) Once we have have better data points from the CDC then we can really tackle the issue of gun violence. Yes, it will take years to get those answers, but I find it insane that the Republicans refuse to allow the investigation to go on, which says to me that they are afraid of what the data will show.

Unless you are nearly a pure Native American, then you are a refugee to the US.

The primary problem here and around the world is poverty and lack of proper education. This drives people to crime and extremism in religion which makes them susceptible to acting out terrorist acts, be it in the name of Allah (as is the public perceived norm) or Christ (ala the Planed Parenthood terrorist attack, the 2011 Norway attacks, etc). We need to address the growing income and wealth gaps. The way to doing that isn't by giving those at the top even more tax breaks and losing regulations (which is funny thing to complain about, too many regulations here in the US, meanwhile the same people complain about the low quality Chinese goods that aren't safe due to low regulations and poor labor conditions etc). We need to push education, and proper STEM programs, not deflated science trying to force Creationism in via so called "Intelligent Design" or "teaching the controversy" stick to the actual science. Don't object to the "new math" if it's teaching better fundamentals of understanding what the numbers are actually doing even if it doesn't teach the shortcuts we were taught... and lots of the stuff people complain about is just the fact we don't skip right to the shortcut that works. Yes, it works, but it helps if they better understand the underlying fundamentals of the numbers and the actual math. Again, change isn't a bad thing, to object just because you don't understand or don't like it compared to the simplified shortcut we all learned doesn't make it bad. Reading also needs pushed, and understanding of logical fallacies and logical and faulty thinking.

I believe that a post scarcity world is impossible due to the nature of humanity. There are far too many greedy people that will never want the world to get to that point. However, that should be the noble goal. Post scarcity society has many issues, but perhaps by the time we actually got there we'd be able to solve them.

TLDR: Basically it all comes down to empathy. To view everything as the others view it. I get the fear and panic and all that the right has, and not just because I once upon a time was a right wing evangelical Christian who called those who received food stamps lazy bums, who said that Democrats and the liberals just wanted to keep the poor trapped so they would always need help. Yes, I was there and that helps, but I can still empathize with them without that past. I've never been a Muslim raised in a nation dominated by Islam, but I can still empathize with the way they see what the US is doing to them, the way they have to see people like Donald Trump and the scary amount of Americans that support him. It's easy to see why some are driven to extremism. I can empathize with that Mexican who just wants a better life and knows that Mexico can't give it to him so he has to risk it all to try and immigrate to the US. I can empathize with the Chinese worker who has been given an opportunity to build something, to escape the poverty... for while perhaps still poverty, less poverty than before, and I'm thankful that I got that opportunity, and I'm sorry that somebody in the US doesn't get to do it, but I'm a human too. Empathy. Learn it. It can be learned, neurological disorder or not.

Only semantically. In reality, if you put their message out there because they killed people, you're rewarding them.
I'm not saying the authorities shouldn't investigate, and I'm not even saying that information shouldn't be used to inform policy makers, I'm saying the 'reasons' for the mass murders (and names of the mass murderers) should not be reported publicly, because reporting it gives incentive for the next guy with a message (or with a pathological need for 'fame') to use mass murder to spread it.

Wow. The complete disconnect from the obvious, actually stated consequences of their own actions is staggering.
I think not EVER saying his name, or investigating his 'reason' is the ONLY way to report these crimes now. As he said, otherwise you are giving them fame and a platform as a reward for their murders....and the more one kills the more air time they receive. That's asinine.

You have heard of constitutional amendments, haven't you? In fact, one of the quotes I produced from former Mayor, Ed Koch, even discussed that fact.

Please explain which FACTS that I have repeated are incorrect. So far all you have been able to do is curse me, accuse me of being retarded, and literally ignored anything I have said so that you can continue with your vitriol. I don't even know you and you seem to have a major issue with me.

The reason why I put up the list of deaths is because you don't see knee jerk actions in the news over those methods of dying, typically. You do see it over gun deaths because they are sensationalized far beyond the level of anything else, part of which is the reason I think we are having more mass shootings. If you want to go out in a blaze of glory, get your 15 minutes of fame, then shooting people is a guaranteed method.

I do believe we need additional controls on weapons; one that I think would help greatly is ACS (http://www.ammocoding.com/). I am also not an NRA member and don't agree with a lot of the methods they use. I DO believe wholeheartedly in my right to own semi automatic handguns and rifles. If you still have a problem with me over that, I can't help it. But if you continue to be confrontational, then I don't think we have anything further to talk about.

Fame at any cost.

Makes perfect sense.

Spend billions of dollars helping other countries. Socialism. Something America seems violently allergic to within it's own country (just think of the social wrongs 100 bn dollars could right, right?)

Sorry, the "story" that the US is in any other country to protect it is just out and out bullshit. The US sets up bases wherever it goes just like England set up colony's when the famed claim "The sun never sets on the British Empire" was made... Because having a thumb in every pie allows it to flex it's might in subtle (or not so subtle) ways at the drop of a hat.

Remember, this is the same country that threatened multiple foreign economies with the GFC, causing destabilisation and hardship world wide. Sound like world leaders to you?

I love American's, they are awesome people and visiting your country never disappoints me at just how wonderful almost all the people I meet are. But America is a different kettle of fish. Perhaps one day Americans will finally decide to take back their country and make it like the propaganda says it is (greatest country in the world).