EPTTime to Wake Up - Page 2
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Ghin
United States2391 Posts
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HardlyNever
United States1258 Posts
On December 21 2012 13:06 AnachronisticAnarchy wrote: I really hate how a lot of people are bashing on this line: People are far too lazy these days and are in the habit of believing whatever bullshit they're fed. If you just read something and take it for fact, that can very often end up being a major mistake. It has nothing to do with lazy. It is a stupid line. If you read a scientific paper that started with "we have evidence for what we are about to tell you about, but go do the research/experimentation for yourself or you are part of the problem" you would (hopefully) rightly dismiss it. I imagine he isn't posting his "sources" from some combination of: 1)They are scattered and this is an amalgamation of stuff he has read/heard over the course of time. 2)They would be ridiculed as unreliable, biased or outright crack-potish. That isn't how you present an argument if you want to be taken seriously. Given some of these claims, I'm not sure he does... Also, as an aside, do you not grasp the irony of your statement? You say we shouldn't believe everything we read without evidence, but then you want us to believe what we are reading here... without... evidence? Are you trolling? | ||
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Treehead
999 Posts
I do, however, have a couple nitpicks on points you make. On December 21 2012 11:19 Barrin wrote: ... The federal reserve (controlled by private bankers unchecked by other branches of government) is constantly making money out of thin air which continuously devalues each of your dollars. ... Our public school systems are terrible at teaching critical thinking to children; so many people believe so much crazy shit and yet a lot of them can't even accept global warming. Science classrooms are under attack by religious fanatics who really dislike the fact of evolution. ... The most vigilant of those remaining are the people's militias (who somehow have a negative stigma) that the constitution literally tells us to create & maintain... but they can't be a militia if they're unarmed. ... 1. Most people don't have real dollars anymore. Most people have almost all of their value in their home - and many owe nearly as much as that. Homes will grow in value with inflation - what will not grow with inflation is the debt that they take on in order to acquire said homes. People are getting poorer, no doubt, but it has absolutely nothing to do with quantitative easing and the Federal Reserve. 2. Our public schools also aren't really trying that hard to teach children critical thinking. They're emphasizing confidence, and hoping they figure out critical thinking themselves. Children do naturally lack confidence - so this may not be a bad thing, but my personal belief is that the reason critical thinking hasn't become more prominent in school is because so many parents are not pushing it. Consider most school subjects - which ones most emphasize critical thinking? Math and science primarily. And while no one is trying to push these out of our schools, neither is anyone preaching that we should teach more math in schools. If anything, parents these days (not teachers) are trying to "protect" their children from the "useless" math that they wish they never had to learn. I've worked at a mathematics department in a university, and seen the parents. 3. The will of the people is not enforced by the right to bear arms anymore - this is the reason militias get a bad rap. Real armies have tanks, missiles, aircraft carriers and fighter jets. And even beyond that, the U.S. now has drones. How many armed militiamen do you think it'd really take to fight those (hint: it's a lot)? The "power" that the U.S. civilian has is (as your youtube link references) in the social and political realms. It's that if enough people hate what the government is doing, they have the political and social (not military) power to make things different. The only reason this would ever not be the case is if a lot of heads are conspiring against the U.S. citizen, which seems highly unlikely given how much the heads of commerce, politics, finance, and military seem to get along with each other - let alone between factions. | ||
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BirdKiller
United States428 Posts
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ParkwayDrive
United States328 Posts
On December 21 2012 13:58 Treehead wrote: Great blog. You have an opinion, and you voice it. You ask people to be more involved in their government and what their society is doing. I do, however, have a couple nitpicks on points you make. 1. Most people don't have real dollars anymore. Most people have almost all of their value in their home - and many owe nearly as much as that. Homes will grow in value with inflation - what will not grow with inflation is the debt that they take on in order to acquire said homes. People are getting poorer, no doubt, but it has absolutely nothing to do with quantitative easing and the Federal Reserve. except it has almost everything to do with the federal reserve because they are manipulating interest rates away from what the market would dictate which causes consumers and investors alike to make poor decisions with their money because they are being fed bad information. it gives people the idea that they have the room to borrow money now instead of saving like they should be or vice versa depending on how they want to fudge the rate. | ||
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AnachronisticAnarchy
United States2957 Posts
On December 21 2012 13:41 HardlyNever wrote: It has nothing to do with lazy. It is a stupid line. If you read a scientific paper that started with "we have evidence for what we are about to tell you about, but go do the research/experimentation for yourself or you are part of the problem" you would (hopefully) rightly dismiss it. I imagine he isn't posting his "sources" from some combination of: 1)They are scattered and this is an amalgamation of stuff he has read/heard over the course of time. 2)They would be ridiculed as unreliable, biased or outright crack-potish. That isn't how you present an argument if you want to be taken seriously. Given some of these claims, I'm not sure he does... Also, as an aside, do you not grasp the irony of your statement? You say we shouldn't believe everything we read without evidence, but then you want us to believe what we are reading here... without... evidence? Are you trolling? You need to work on your reading comprehension a bit. I never said that you should believe what you are reading here without evidence. I just don't like how people are bashing the fuck out of that line when there's a lot of truth in that particular line. People who want to incite change for the better often run into an absolutely massive obstacle: the stupidity and laziness of the masses. It's the main reason people like politicians can operate the way they do. No one can be fucked to prove that 90% of what comes out of their mouth is bullshit, they just swallow idiotic soundbites until their beliefs about both of the candidates are largely false. Presenting a well-informed opinion piece changes nothing in the long term if people just swallow it like they do everything else. The most important part is making people think and work for once. (Please note that none of this is in support of the rest of his article. I am merely discussing the part that I drew attention to) | ||
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Treehead
999 Posts
On December 21 2012 14:17 ParkwayDrive wrote: except it has almost everything to do with the federal reserve because they are manipulating interest rates away from what the market would dictate which causes consumers and investors alike to make poor decisions with their money because they are being fed bad information. it gives people the idea that they have the room to borrow money now instead of saving like they should be or vice versa depending on how they want to fudge the rate. Lower interest rates these days just mean people will actually lend money. In case you didn't notice, there was a while there when nobody wanted to lend. Some amount of encouragement between lenders and borrowers is probably a good thing until the economy stabilizes. Feel free to disagree, but I'd prefer if you do so without sticking to "the market does everything right", because not everyone believes that (I, for one, believe that the market did an awful job reacting to the gulf oil spill or hurricane sandy, for instance). | ||
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Randomaccount#77123
United States5003 Posts
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Roe
Canada6002 Posts
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farvacola
United States18825 Posts
On December 21 2012 16:20 Roe wrote: Everyone would rather go to the mall and by sneakers with lights in them....with lights in them.... Dontchoo be talkin shit bout mah L.A. Gear brah. | ||
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Randomaccount#77123
United States5003 Posts
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surfinbird1
Germany999 Posts
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Treehead
999 Posts
On December 21 2012 17:36 Barrin wrote: Does this really only get 1/5 stars? George was right. Your message is that most american citizens are being lazy and the country is suffering for it (which is true), and you ask a lot of people to stop being lazy and start doing the real, hard work of democracy - where most people have been told that this work starts and ends in the voting booth. Are you surprised most people didn't like hearing that? | ||
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Randomaccount#77123
United States5003 Posts
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ParkwayDrive
United States328 Posts
On December 21 2012 15:01 Treehead wrote: Lower interest rates these days just mean people will actually lend money. In case you didn't notice, there was a while there when nobody wanted to lend. Some amount of encouragement between lenders and borrowers is probably a good thing until the economy stabilizes. Feel free to disagree, but I'd prefer if you do so without sticking to "the market does everything right", because not everyone believes that (I, for one, believe that the market did an awful job reacting to the gulf oil spill or hurricane sandy, for instance). lol so you invite me to disagree, but i have to make my point without using a vital piece of information that you personally dont believe in? just wow. u dont have to believe in markets for them to be the most efficient way, so frankly it doesnt bother me. however i will still take the bait somewhat. i am not a free market purist. i believe there are circumstances where the makret must be adjusted or fixed by the government. mostly due to cases of corrupt capitalists and people who dont play the game fairly. but thats another thread. the free market only works when everything is transparent and people have access to right information so they can make correct decisions. what the fed does (the fed is independent of govt btw, so that is a whole nother issue) when they change rates is to increase the amount of uncertainty and give people bad information. it then becomes very hard to make good decisions with your money. lending and borrowing is not inherently good or bad so we shouldnt pretend like it is by encouraging one way or the other. we should be encouraging transparent and correct information to allow people to make the choice themselves. if for example the rate set by the fed is lower than we the market would dictate then those who are blind to the fed will make bad decisions with their money, thinking that it is the right decision. those who know what the fed is up to will simply be flooded with uncertainty as to what the real market rate is, which only acts to cloud the market even further. | ||
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EtherealDeath
United States8366 Posts
Edit - Correction, it is technically possible, and one has to wonder what the specialized equipment there would be used for if not that. So it's quite plausible, and I would say very probable. Edit 2 - Somehow despite my media whoring I missed the fact that in October this year, the Supreme Court heard a case on the constitutionality of the FISA extensions. Thanks mainstream media for making that a big issue. I'm glad to know that the normal "swing issues" like gay marriage get endless coverage when they end up in the Supreme Court (although it deserves coverage for sure) but shit like the sweeping coverage of FISA is pretty much ignored - and is NOT a swing issue, since both sides of aisle jump for it. Good thing NPR is great. Hope funding for it doesn't ever go to hell like was suggested in the recent Presidential election by Romney. | ||
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HardlyNever
United States1258 Posts
On December 21 2012 14:36 AnachronisticAnarchy wrote: You need to work on your reading comprehension a bit. I never said that you should believe what you are reading here without evidence. I just don't like how people are bashing the fuck out of that line when there's a lot of truth in that particular line. People who want to incite change for the better often run into an absolutely massive obstacle: the stupidity and laziness of the masses. It's the main reason people like politicians can operate the way they do. No one can be fucked to prove that 90% of what comes out of their mouth is bullshit, they just swallow idiotic soundbites until their beliefs about both of the candidates are largely false. Presenting a well-informed opinion piece changes nothing in the long term if people just swallow it like they do everything else. The most important part is making people think and work for once. (Please note that none of this is in support of the rest of his article. I am merely discussing the part that I drew attention to) I don't even... know how to respond to the sequence of logic fails here... How is there a "lot of truth" in the statement "I'm not backing up my claims with evidence because you need to find them. You are part of the problem if you don't." That isn't a true/false style statement (except the last bit). I think it's you that needs to up their reading comprehension. Are you saying anyone who doesn't research crack-pot conspiracy theory ideas is "part of the problem?" Again, if you saw that statement in any serious paper, you would immediately stop reading. I'm not sure how this is different other than it is the internet, and therefore I'm not supposed to take it seriously. | ||
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Randomaccount#77123
United States5003 Posts
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tehemperorer
United States2183 Posts
Phrases like "lazy sheeple" and "George was right" would hint at you being the possessor of some hidden knowledge, but only to those without any. Believe it or not, there are people who have already been over the material you presented, read the same books, and come to the same conclusions. However, they are at a point where further research/investigation has rendered those early conclusions invalid, and to some extent, foolish. I think that's the next step you have to get to. Things you suggest have been too generalized and in that process a lot of truth has been lost. For example, the selling of the US government to private interests is a legitimate problem not just in the US but all over the world. However, that statement is a lot more succinct than it should be. While it's true the interests of certain companies oftentimes factor into political agendas, the power of these companies to push their interests is not that great, and certainly not so great as the level you present. General Note: It so happens that media outlets frequently use oversimplification and "stretching the truth" to get subscribers to believe the message they are presenting (Fox, NBC, etc.). People who know better, like yourself, get upset and worry that other, less conscious people might be swayed into believing the message. To counteract this, these people express dissenting opinion through whatever channels available to them, trying to publicize what they believe to be the truth in hopes to dilute the original message. In doing so, they oftentimes commit the same wrongs that were done by the original media source: they oversimplify or push to hyperbole a message in hopes of swaying opinion through emotion rather than logic. Don't be guilty of that; people are smarter than you think. I do agree with your choice to not post evidence. Posting evidence makes crazy claims seem credible, and that is a dangerous thing. Smartly you have left readers of your post two choices: either dismiss it as a collection of improbable conspiracy theories, or to go actually look for the truth. | ||
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Randomaccount#77123
United States5003 Posts
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