Is this to be your robo-post in any thread where two other posters carry an exchange beyond two posts? No, seriously, you've cited "your side" as having millennia of scientific accomplishment, which is certainly true. And, while I'll grant you the absence of Black Dove's "America, Fuck Yeah!" jingoism, the rest is accurate: It's nice that science is on your side, but what have you done for science lately?
And that's a far cry from claiming anyone else's accomplishments. That was wrong, and you know it was wrong. So, apologize. Preferably, with tears and snot. But, I'll take the mumbled one with no eye contact too. Either way.
Which is basically how I have always looked at it. Look even the pope said that Genesis was allegorical and shit didnt just pop up in 6 days. It's also why I have never understood Christians, though it seem to be centered around Baptists, who will tell you flat out that they know that they are going to heaven. Do they have God's 800 number and have verified their reservations? Another sign of being pretty fucking ballsy to me
This had the possiblity of being one of the most interesting threads on here and some of you had to go fuck that up.
It's that whole "I accept Jesus as my Personal Savior [but I can do whatever the fuck I want]" mentality. I've never understood it, either. Then there are the sects that actually cite a figure of "the number saved."
Just to get the Catholic schoolboy out of my system: it's not "even" the Pope; the Catholic Church has *always* held that the Bible can't just be interpreted literally; and in fact, that it is not necessarily the direct word of God. It's the Protestants that make the text, rather than the continuous tradition of the church, the cornerstone of their faith.
Gun control is one for me, going from pretty strongly pro-gun control to pretty strongly pro-gun rights. Wordforge has probably been a small part of that change, but most of it came from moving at 18 from a liberal East Coast state to a rural Midwestern state where I ended up knowing lots of hunters. Another is labor law ... though I never thought a whole lot about it, I was pretty much pro-union by default before ... that changed when I moved to Michigan and saw the ludicrous excesses and overwhelming corruption and sense of entitlement that pervades union culture here. Now, although I recognize some gray area and I'm not entirely decided, I'm generally in favor of right-to-work and look at most unions with a level of distrust.
I am with you regarding the excesses some unions have gone to, I no longer support right-to-work as it stands today. I live in a right-to-work state and the only rights protected are the employers.
Not trolling, serious question. Considering you've seen unions destroy your home town economy, but recently have had to join one, I'd be interesting in hearing what you think about them now that you've been with the UFCW for a bit..... Do you or Jenn do table top games? Fuck, should have invited you guys odwn for game night. do you like to drink and play Munchkin? Next week....
Ok, now that I've added a non-contributive post to this thread, I suppose I should add in something of substance. My views have largely evolved over the years, to the point it's hard to recall what my original stance was (and it could well be that a particular issue just didn't mean anything to me at the time). Essentially, though, I've gone from a more Nader-centric idealism to a centrist, Libertarian type views with a very high regard for Theodore Roosevelt. In terms of social views, particularly gays, I was more of the 'conservative' side until Oregon's Measure 36 came up on the ballot (defining marriage as man and woman), and my church of course encouraged us to vote our conscience (hint hint), and something struck me rather hard: Mormons are supposed to be big on the free agency thing, but by supporting Measure 36, that cuts against the free agency of a group of people, of which I'd been learning in my Human Sexuality classes in uni that they don't choose to be gay, bi or straight. I voted against 36 (it passed). Since then, it gets frustrating to see gays and lesbians have mud slung at them, even though largely, it doesn't affect me, nor would I go out of the way to champion their cause. If this whole Christian business has any merit, it's not my job to render any judgement. It's my job to accept them for who they are, what kind of person they are, not their sexual preferences (kiddy diddlers need not apply).
Unions: My father had something seriously against them, so I grew up thinking they were a bad thing. When I finally got into one, I discovered he was right! Or at least we had a sucky union that was basically useless and powerless, with self-serving officials. I finally got out of it and moved to a salaried job. MUCH better.
New info! Turns out the Washington State (including cities and counties) wastes 200 Million dollars a year enforcing pot laws: http://slog.thestranger.com/slog/ar...pent-about-200-million-busting-people-for-pot So the State says it will MAKE 2 Billion Dollars over 5 years by legalizing and taxing MJ, and we'd stop spending the 200 Million a year we spend enforcing it... 200 Million x 5 years.... ANOTHER BILLION! And we haven't even gotten to costs of locking people up for Pot, or the societal costs of having so many felons running around with lifetime decreased wage potential Man! We keep adding all these Billions up and soon we'll be talking about some real money!
My views haven't really be altered by being on WF, although I would say it has given me a better uderstanding of the attitudes and motivations of many Americans. My views in general have changed over the years but not because of WF, but rather in spite of it. By being lucky enough to have travelled a lot and also also by meeting people from many different places and cultures jusy through a day's work I have had the benefit of listening to many different viewpoints with all kinds of social and cultural attitudes. That has taught me more about the world then you can ever get from TV, books or internet bluster. It has become invaluable, giving me many different perspectives on issues, and I am very, very grateful for it.
This is a great topic, and one of the better threads I can remember ever being posted here. I was part of TNZ starting back in 2000 when I was 19 and still quite blind to the real world. I didn't make the initial move to WF since I was deployed in Iraq but joined up here upon return. As you'd expect 19 year old Tex was a drastically different poster than 31 year old Tex. Actually, 24 year old Tex is also very different than 31 year old Tex. These days I view people very differently than I used to. The best analogy I can think of is from The Matrix. People either take the Blue Pill and everything is always the same as what they were taught growing up or they take the Red Pill and learn to think for themselves and challenge everything they've ever been told. Most of the people I meet in the real world unfortunately choose the Blue Pill and never wake up from their binary view points which have been instilled in them by their parents, churches, schools, and Republican or Democrat talking heads (depending on where their parents aligned). 19 year old Tex was very much still in the Matrix. My dad was very conservative. He listened to Rush Limbaugh every day and for a while when I was young while Rush had a TV show he would watch it every night. I would listen to him tell me about liberals and the evils of welfare and how Bill Clinton was ruining America and I bought right into it. To his credit though, he definitely took the Red Pill. He came to these conclusions on his own and his Republican alignment was based on staunch capitalism and a purist view of the US Constitution and wasn't religiously motivated in any way. My mom took me and my brother to church and we both bought into it like pretty much any child would. I was a God fearing child whose belief was based around more of a fear of going to hell than anything else. At 19 years old I was a Republican who didn’t think about why I was a very Nationalistic-Team America-Religious Republican, I just believed whatever Fox News told me and wasn’t afraid to spout off those views at TNZ. 19 year old Tex’s views: Religion – The only way not to go to hell was Jesus. Gay Rights – To me this one is embarrassing. I was very anti-gay, I thought what I was told at Church; Gay is a choice and Gay people therefore were morally corrupt and definitely going to hell. The Death Penalty – 19 year old Tex would tell you to just line’em up and shoot’em. Illegal Drugs - If someone went to prison it is because they deserved it and if something was against the law it was because it was bad. Cops can be trusted. Marijuana wasn’t evil but it was a risk and you knew what you were getting into so you should deal with the consequences if you get caught. Abortion – Illegal no matter what. I was very prolife. Political Party – Religious Republican 31 year old Tex’s views: Religion – Unlike my younger self who believed in Christianity despite that Billions of people must be going to hell under their standard logic and that this was supposed to be a ‘loving God’ that although was omnipotent; Still created people knowing they would be condemned to hell for all eternity the vast majority of the time unless they happened to be born in the right place and right time to have been taught about Jesus as their savior and those lucky ones represent a very small fraction of all the people that have ever lived. Gay Rights – All people should be treated as equals. Right now what is going on in this country will be looked back on by our grandchildren as we look at the Racism from previous generations. Gays should be able to marry their partners and have all the same rights as straight people. The Death Penalty – Azure covered this topic nicely. The thread about Texas Executing an innocent man stands out as the eye opener there. In theory the death penalty is just, in practice the margin for error is just too high for me to be comfortable with it being something the government has the power to do. Illegal Drugs – Why are we telling consenting adults what they are allowed to do to their own bodies? Why does it make sense to spend billions of dollars on a war on drugs and to incarcerate people for doing something that isn’t harming anyone else? Why aren’t we earning money through taxation on these products? The Prison Industrial Complex is evil. Other countries have abandoned such ridiculous thinking with great success. The money spent to send people to crime college (prison) would be far better spent on Rehabilitation programs and education. Meth and Heroin are horrible drugs and if we were to leave them illegal I wouldn’t be opposed to that but I am opposed to anything other than mandatory drug rehab and education being used as the punishments. Marijuana should be legalized and taxed like cigarettes. The war on drugs should be abandoned and the savings would more than cover the rehab plan. Abortion – This one is tricky. When I look at my newborn son I can’t imagine life without him. I see the case for abortions, especially within the first trimester and when there has been rape, incest, danger to the life of the mother, or serious birth defects are detected. Outside of those examples I’m still pretty prolife at heart but I do not believe that I have the right to decide for other people so women should be free to choose. Political Party – None, I lean libertarian when it comes to our rights and the need for less government in many aspects of our lives but I’ve actually become more socialist when it comes to finances. It’s hard to explain this line of thinking to most people because it doesn’t work 100% with my other beliefs. But Ancalagon put it quite well when he said that what works in theory and what works in practice are very different. For the rest open the spoiler: Iraq war – I didn’t list this one above because it wasn’t going on when I was 19 but when it started I was very pro-war, Bush was a great president who could do no wrong in my eyes and I believed whatever Fox News told me. Now I think it was completely wrong and we were lied to in order to get our support. Our war policy should be avoid whenever possible, and if we do have to fight we should make it quick and dirty and get the hell out of there. No more nation building, that’s not our right or our job. I'm glad I took the Red Pill. Thinking for myself and challenging my prior beliefs has allowed me to grow as person and to live a more fulfilling life.
without getting into the weeds on the particulars - it's worth saying that one thing i recognize about "pure libertarian" economics is that they work best when they are implimented from "go" rather than injected after an imbalance already exists. I would agree to the proposition that certain pragmatic adjustments are necessary in view of the fact that we are not all starting on an even footing anymore.
It doesn't even work from the "go" point. That would turn out like a game of monopoly. Yes it's fair if everyone starts even but events would transpire to skew the wealth (and therefore the power) over time to just a very small fraction of the players. It would end just like things are now. Too few people have too much power and influence over the rest of us. At some point we'll have to assert the "there are far more of us than there are of you" logic and just take the power and wealth back from them. A breaking point will be reached eventually but I don't think we're any where near it and probably won't see it happen in our lifetimes. Morally it can be equated to stealing from the very wealthy few on one hand or looked at as evening things out on the other hand. People resist it because of the stealing angle and the fact that they can delude themselves into believing that if they work hard or come up with the right idea that one day they'll be in that few and powerful group. They may happen from time to time (Mark Zuckerberg), but is a pretty delusional viewpoint nonetheless.
In this regard, go back to the monopoly analogy. The single biggest component of success in life, no matter how evenly things start out, is blind, dumb luck. Consider further Zuckerberg. Sure, he had a good idea, but it was an idea whose time had come. Something along the lines of facebook was inevitable, even if the exact form of it wasn't. A world without Zuckerberg wouldn't be noticeably different to anyone. Zuckerberg "earned" his wealth mostly by being lucky with timing enabling him to direct online social networking profits his way, but his products and wealth would have been "created" with or without him and no one ever needed him.
I've worked hard and accumulated a little bit - way more than I ever could've hoped to collect when I was a dreaming kid - and enough to resent when people tell me I should be paying more into fedgov. My family was lower middle class (dad was a HS football coach and gym teacher and we had 5 kids) and we didn't eat out, didn't take airplane vacations, didn't enjoy any of the indicia of wealth. I went through college and law school and business school through loans and working night jobs. I've earned enough in my various jobs to begin to resent paying almost 40% of my next dollar earned in federal income taxes (when Clinton jacked it up from 25%). People achieving success through their own efforts is not as scarce as you suggest in your reply. You don't need a hundred million dollars to fit the american success story that you might earn enough so your stomach churns when you hear of the new trillions in spending, or trillions in borrowing from other states (like China) to fund destructive policies like corn ethanol mandates or to make transfer payments or theft of "retirement" money for social security that will not pay me a penny. And I made pretty much the mirror of the transition you made - from high school/college (rich and poor both work as hard as eachother, only bad luck separates them and keeps the poor guy from becoming rich, why do we even need an army, war can always be avoided, transfer payments are necessary and helpful, unemployment payments should last forever, welfare helps the poor because they need the help) until I worked for a few years as government attorney in NYC and by the time I was 30 had become as pure a free-market capitalist as the rational-economic-man decision-maker used in models.
Actually, even Monopoly doesn't work like Monopoly, click this link, and scroll down to number three.
