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On October 24 2011 06:15 OsoVega wrote:Show nested quote +On October 24 2011 06:13 Josealtron wrote:On October 24 2011 06:07 OsoVega wrote:On October 24 2011 06:01 semantics wrote:
I've always found it funny how people frame starvation and poverty as a choice as if people would chose that over being treated like shit. Just because people will nearly always choose the better option does not mean it is not a choice. When an employer offers an unskilled worker a low paying, harsh job, he is only giving that person another option. The worker is free to refuse it but he often will not because that low paying, harsh job is the best option he has. By offering that job, that employer has not forced anything on anyone but has given the worker a chance to better his life in a mutually beneficial relationship. The fact is, the choice between starvation and a low paying job, is a choice, no matter how you put it. The fact that people will not choose the worse option does not make it not a choice, it's just that the latter is a better choice that people will take. Replace the word "starvation" with death(because that's what it is), and you'll probably realize how ridiculous that sounds. No, it's the exact same. People can choose between life and death. They do it all the time. They generally choose life. It doesn't even sound all that different because everyone knows that starvation leads to death. The choice between an inferior choice (death) and a superior choice (life, working, etc.) is still a choice and there is nothing wrong with offering that superior choice to people.
Slaves also has a choice: they can suicide if they want out. lie down and die. Quit.
So because there is a choice, slavery is OK, right?
+ Show Spoiler +Yet, slavery is outlawed? WHY!?!?!?!?!?!?
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If you admit that life is unfair, and that there’s only so much you can do about that at the starting line, then you can try to ameliorate the consequences of that unfairness. Life is unfair. Suffering is real.
Therefore, we should try to create the society each of us would want if we didn’t know in advance who we’d be.
It isn't immoral to deprive the winners in society of a portion of their winnings. They got those winnings through the birth lottery anyway. This includes inherited wealth as well as wealth they got by being smart/creative/hard working individuals in the right place at the right time. There are literally billions of smart/creative/hard working individuals who never got nearly as much as you have. Taking advantage of the society you were born into, the inherited wealth you received, and your other natural advantages doesn't make any of your winning less of a lottery. It isn't immoral to redistribute some of your wealth to the less fortunate.
It is immoral to exploit the poor through a capitalist system to enrich yourself at the expense of the workers simply because you were a winner in the birth lottery.
The confusion comes in when people think they "make choices" and "work hard" and therefore "deserve" everything they have. You don't. You are a product of your genes and environment. Free will doesn't exist. Stop being such immoral fuckheads. You don't even need a "strong government" to solve this injustice. You just need to prevent ownership of the means of production. Ownership of ideas, ownership of the means of production, these are both sociological fictions that perpetuate injustice.
Market fundamentalists live in a fantasy world. Crony capitalism is intrinsic to the capitalist system. Without regulation, the winners in the market will exploit the losers and accumulate more and more wealth for themselves. They will rewrite the rules of society to benefit themselves. You market fundamentalists who don't even believe in breaking up monopolies might not suffer from the cognitive dissonance of supporting a society completely without regulation while still preventing the formation of monopolies, but you clearly live in some fantasy world that chooses to forget how monopolies form and how they entrench themselves.
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On October 24 2011 07:54 IgnE wrote:
If you admit that life is unfair, and that there’s only so much you can do about that at the starting line, then you can try to ameliorate the consequences of that unfairness. Life is unfair. Suffering is real.
Therefore, we should try to create the society each of us would want if we didn’t know in advance who we’d be.
It isn't immoral to deprive the winners in society of a portion of their winnings. They got those winnings through the birth lottery anyway. This includes inherited wealth as well as wealth they got by being smart/creative/hard working individuals in the right place at the right time. There are literally billions of smart/creative/hard working individuals who never got nearly as much as you have. Taking advantage of the society you were born into, the inherited wealth you received, and your other natural advantages doesn't make any of your winning less of a lottery. It isn't immoral to redistribute some of your wealth to the less fortunate.
It is immoral to exploit the poor through a capitalist system to enrich yourself at the expense of the workers simply because you were a winner in the birth lottery.
The confusion comes in when people think they "make choices" and "work hard" and therefore "deserve" everything they have. You don't. You are a product of your genes and environment. Free will doesn't exist. Stop being such immoral fuckheads. You don't even need a "strong government" to solve this injustice. You just need to prevent ownership of the means of production. Ownership of ideas, ownership of the means of production, these are both sociological fictions that perpetuate injustice.
Market fundamentalists live in a fantasy world. Crony capitalism is intrinsic to the capitalist system. Without regulation, the winners in the market will exploit the losers and accumulate more and more wealth for themselves. They will rewrite the rules of society to benefit themselves. You market fundamentalists who don't even believe in breaking up monopolies might not suffer from the cognitive dissonance of supporting a society completely without regulation while still preventing the formation of monopolies, but you clearly live in some fantasy world that chooses to forget how monopolies form and how they entrench themselves.
Everything in italics is from this:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Theory_of_Justice
I don't think Rawls would support the pseudo-communism that you end up on though. Rawls justifies wealth distribution, he doesn't forbid capitalism, including ownership of both ideas and production tools and facilities.
Nonetheless I agree wholeheartedly with your last paragraph.
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On October 24 2011 07:40 HCastorp wrote:Show nested quote +On October 24 2011 06:04 tskarzyn wrote:
I'm sorry if I don't want some lazy, "average" joe to get an MD and operate on me. Or that some people would rather sit around and complain than bust their ass in school to land a job at Goldman's and work 80-90 hours/week. Seriously, when did America turn into a country full of undereducated and lazy whiners?
To paraphrase Jesus, "The lazy you will always have with you". However, to characterize the current rise in unemployment as a rise in laziness is absurd. It is obvious that the pool of unemployed is going to consist of, on average, people who are less able than those with employment. However, there are a finite and shrinking number of jobs. So, if those unemployed people all worked harder, they may solve their personal "unemployment problem", but, since they would simply be replacing someone else, there would be no effect on unemployment as a whole. BONUS: History according to tskarzyn: Beginning in October 1929, an epidemic of laziness broke out in the United States. People everywhere put down their tools and refused to work, many even preferred starvation to having to lift a finger. Many of the country's hardest working men were so distraught at what was happening to the values of the nation that they threw themselves from the windows of their workplaces in despair. The government tried many times to spur the masses to put their nose to the grindstone, but to no avail. In the end, only the outbreak of World War II proved sufficiently motivating for the nation to return to work. Those people who grew up in this time and rejected the lazy ways of their parents are often referred to today as the "Greatest Generation".
That's cute ^^. The sad truth is, there ARE many people that would rather live on welfare checks than apply themselves. There ARE people that would rather skip class and party with their friends than study. There ARE people who would rather play SC2 for 4 hours every night than go to night school while working full-time to improve their skill set and earn a higher salary. Shocking, I know because according to OWSers the 1% didn't actually earn their money. They were just born smarter/richer/luckier than everyone else.
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On October 24 2011 08:18 tskarzyn wrote:Show nested quote +On October 24 2011 07:40 HCastorp wrote:On October 24 2011 06:04 tskarzyn wrote:
I'm sorry if I don't want some lazy, "average" joe to get an MD and operate on me. Or that some people would rather sit around and complain than bust their ass in school to land a job at Goldman's and work 80-90 hours/week. Seriously, when did America turn into a country full of undereducated and lazy whiners?
To paraphrase Jesus, "The lazy you will always have with you". However, to characterize the current rise in unemployment as a rise in laziness is absurd. It is obvious that the pool of unemployed is going to consist of, on average, people who are less able than those with employment. However, there are a finite and shrinking number of jobs. So, if those unemployed people all worked harder, they may solve their personal "unemployment problem", but, since they would simply be replacing someone else, there would be no effect on unemployment as a whole. BONUS: History according to tskarzyn: Beginning in October 1929, an epidemic of laziness broke out in the United States. People everywhere put down their tools and refused to work, many even preferred starvation to having to lift a finger. Many of the country's hardest working men were so distraught at what was happening to the values of the nation that they threw themselves from the windows of their workplaces in despair. The government tried many times to spur the masses to put their nose to the grindstone, but to no avail. In the end, only the outbreak of World War II proved sufficiently motivating for the nation to return to work. Those people who grew up in this time and rejected the lazy ways of their parents are often referred to today as the "Greatest Generation". That's cute ^^. The sad truth is, there ARE many people that would rather live on welfare checks than apply themselves. There ARE people that would rather skip class and party with their friends than study. There ARE people who would rather play SC2 for 4 hours every night than go to night school while working full-time to improve their skill set and earn a higher salary. Shocking, I know because according to OWSers the 1% didn't actually earn their money. They were just born smarter/richer/luckier than everyone else.
There are also people like that who are still in that 1%. Hardly work, have a small skillset, yet are given the opportunity and income of those that outperform them. Laziness will hardly define your circumstances, as shown by upwards and downwards mobility trends.
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On October 24 2011 08:18 tskarzyn wrote:Show nested quote +On October 24 2011 07:40 HCastorp wrote:On October 24 2011 06:04 tskarzyn wrote:
I'm sorry if I don't want some lazy, "average" joe to get an MD and operate on me. Or that some people would rather sit around and complain than bust their ass in school to land a job at Goldman's and work 80-90 hours/week. Seriously, when did America turn into a country full of undereducated and lazy whiners?
To paraphrase Jesus, "The lazy you will always have with you". However, to characterize the current rise in unemployment as a rise in laziness is absurd. It is obvious that the pool of unemployed is going to consist of, on average, people who are less able than those with employment. However, there are a finite and shrinking number of jobs. So, if those unemployed people all worked harder, they may solve their personal "unemployment problem", but, since they would simply be replacing someone else, there would be no effect on unemployment as a whole. BONUS: History according to tskarzyn: Beginning in October 1929, an epidemic of laziness broke out in the United States. People everywhere put down their tools and refused to work, many even preferred starvation to having to lift a finger. Many of the country's hardest working men were so distraught at what was happening to the values of the nation that they threw themselves from the windows of their workplaces in despair. The government tried many times to spur the masses to put their nose to the grindstone, but to no avail. In the end, only the outbreak of World War II proved sufficiently motivating for the nation to return to work. Those people who grew up in this time and rejected the lazy ways of their parents are often referred to today as the "Greatest Generation". That's cute ^^. The sad truth is, there ARE many people that would rather live on welfare checks than apply themselves. There ARE people that would rather skip class and party with their friends than study. There ARE people who would rather play SC2 for 4 hours every night than go to night school while working full-time to improve their skill set and earn a higher salary. Shocking, I know because according to OWSers the 1% didn't actually earn their money. They were just born smarter/richer/luckier than everyone else.
And why would those people exist? Perhaps they feel like their work is not valued, like it offers no useful contribution to society? People are not machines, how can you expect people to want to work as a slave in a sweatshop? How is this work satisfactory in any way? It's not even necessary, we could replace all humans who do robot tasks with robots right now! The only things that are stopping this are old economic and societal paradigms.
Some might prefer to skip class but this has it's reasons too. It has much more to do with society and the workings of society than the people that are in it.
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/B5TgS.jpg)
Myself, I used to skip some classes (and it was allowed) because I didn't need them to get good grades...
You are also implying those "lazy" people are a majority when they are a tiny tiny minority.
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On October 24 2011 08:34 H0i wrote:Show nested quote +On October 24 2011 08:18 tskarzyn wrote:On October 24 2011 07:40 HCastorp wrote:On October 24 2011 06:04 tskarzyn wrote:
I'm sorry if I don't want some lazy, "average" joe to get an MD and operate on me. Or that some people would rather sit around and complain than bust their ass in school to land a job at Goldman's and work 80-90 hours/week. Seriously, when did America turn into a country full of undereducated and lazy whiners?
To paraphrase Jesus, "The lazy you will always have with you". However, to characterize the current rise in unemployment as a rise in laziness is absurd. It is obvious that the pool of unemployed is going to consist of, on average, people who are less able than those with employment. However, there are a finite and shrinking number of jobs. So, if those unemployed people all worked harder, they may solve their personal "unemployment problem", but, since they would simply be replacing someone else, there would be no effect on unemployment as a whole. BONUS: History according to tskarzyn: Beginning in October 1929, an epidemic of laziness broke out in the United States. People everywhere put down their tools and refused to work, many even preferred starvation to having to lift a finger. Many of the country's hardest working men were so distraught at what was happening to the values of the nation that they threw themselves from the windows of their workplaces in despair. The government tried many times to spur the masses to put their nose to the grindstone, but to no avail. In the end, only the outbreak of World War II proved sufficiently motivating for the nation to return to work. Those people who grew up in this time and rejected the lazy ways of their parents are often referred to today as the "Greatest Generation". That's cute ^^. The sad truth is, there ARE many people that would rather live on welfare checks than apply themselves. There ARE people that would rather skip class and party with their friends than study. There ARE people who would rather play SC2 for 4 hours every night than go to night school while working full-time to improve their skill set and earn a higher salary. Shocking, I know because according to OWSers the 1% didn't actually earn their money. They were just born smarter/richer/luckier than everyone else. And why would those people exist? Perhaps they feel like their work is not valued, like it offers no useful contribution to society? People are not machines, how can you expect people to want to work as a slave in a sweatshop? How is this work satisfactory in any way? It's not even necessary, we could replace all humans who do robot tasks with robots right now! The only things that are stopping this are old economic and societal paradigms. Some might prefer to skip class but this has it's reasons too. It has much more to do with society and the workings of society than the people that are in it. Myself, I used to skip some classes (and it was allowed) because I didn't need them to get good grades... You are also implying those "lazy" people are a majority when they are a tiny tiny minority.
At the comic: To be fair, the job/activity at which they are being judged for could be a antenna tower technician. =P
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On October 24 2011 08:18 tskarzyn wrote:Show nested quote +On October 24 2011 07:40 HCastorp wrote:On October 24 2011 06:04 tskarzyn wrote:
I'm sorry if I don't want some lazy, "average" joe to get an MD and operate on me. Or that some people would rather sit around and complain than bust their ass in school to land a job at Goldman's and work 80-90 hours/week. Seriously, when did America turn into a country full of undereducated and lazy whiners?
To paraphrase Jesus, "The lazy you will always have with you". However, to characterize the current rise in unemployment as a rise in laziness is absurd. It is obvious that the pool of unemployed is going to consist of, on average, people who are less able than those with employment. However, there are a finite and shrinking number of jobs. So, if those unemployed people all worked harder, they may solve their personal "unemployment problem", but, since they would simply be replacing someone else, there would be no effect on unemployment as a whole. BONUS: History according to tskarzyn: Beginning in October 1929, an epidemic of laziness broke out in the United States. People everywhere put down their tools and refused to work, many even preferred starvation to having to lift a finger. Many of the country's hardest working men were so distraught at what was happening to the values of the nation that they threw themselves from the windows of their workplaces in despair. The government tried many times to spur the masses to put their nose to the grindstone, but to no avail. In the end, only the outbreak of World War II proved sufficiently motivating for the nation to return to work. Those people who grew up in this time and rejected the lazy ways of their parents are often referred to today as the "Greatest Generation". That's cute ^^. The sad truth is, there ARE many people that would rather live on welfare checks than apply themselves. There ARE people that would rather skip class and party with their friends than study. There ARE people who would rather play SC2 for 4 hours every night than go to night school while working full-time to improve their skill set and earn a higher salary. Shocking, I know because according to OWSers the 1% didn't actually earn their money. They were just born smarter/richer/luckier than everyone else.
You're contrasting two things that have nothing to do with each other. There are people who would rather live on welfare, but there are not as many as you'd think and they are an extreme exception, rather than a rule.
Just because the people you're talking about do exist doesn't mean that people who have money have actually earned it. They have not earned it - or at least they have not earned the vast majority of it. Their money for the most part has blood, fraud, corruption or all of that combined written all over it, and many of them have in fact been born richer and luckier than everybody else.
What most of them have actually earned for their work is a lengthy time in prison. The only reason why we don't get that is because they have made themselves superior to you, given themselves more rights than you have - and effectively taken away some of yours in the process. But it's the imaginary lazy people that bother you. That makes perfect sense.
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On October 24 2011 08:46 aksfjh wrote:Show nested quote +On October 24 2011 08:34 H0i wrote:On October 24 2011 08:18 tskarzyn wrote:On October 24 2011 07:40 HCastorp wrote:On October 24 2011 06:04 tskarzyn wrote:
I'm sorry if I don't want some lazy, "average" joe to get an MD and operate on me. Or that some people would rather sit around and complain than bust their ass in school to land a job at Goldman's and work 80-90 hours/week. Seriously, when did America turn into a country full of undereducated and lazy whiners?
To paraphrase Jesus, "The lazy you will always have with you". However, to characterize the current rise in unemployment as a rise in laziness is absurd. It is obvious that the pool of unemployed is going to consist of, on average, people who are less able than those with employment. However, there are a finite and shrinking number of jobs. So, if those unemployed people all worked harder, they may solve their personal "unemployment problem", but, since they would simply be replacing someone else, there would be no effect on unemployment as a whole. BONUS: History according to tskarzyn: Beginning in October 1929, an epidemic of laziness broke out in the United States. People everywhere put down their tools and refused to work, many even preferred starvation to having to lift a finger. Many of the country's hardest working men were so distraught at what was happening to the values of the nation that they threw themselves from the windows of their workplaces in despair. The government tried many times to spur the masses to put their nose to the grindstone, but to no avail. In the end, only the outbreak of World War II proved sufficiently motivating for the nation to return to work. Those people who grew up in this time and rejected the lazy ways of their parents are often referred to today as the "Greatest Generation". That's cute ^^. The sad truth is, there ARE many people that would rather live on welfare checks than apply themselves. There ARE people that would rather skip class and party with their friends than study. There ARE people who would rather play SC2 for 4 hours every night than go to night school while working full-time to improve their skill set and earn a higher salary. Shocking, I know because according to OWSers the 1% didn't actually earn their money. They were just born smarter/richer/luckier than everyone else. And why would those people exist? Perhaps they feel like their work is not valued, like it offers no useful contribution to society? People are not machines, how can you expect people to want to work as a slave in a sweatshop? How is this work satisfactory in any way? It's not even necessary, we could replace all humans who do robot tasks with robots right now! The only things that are stopping this are old economic and societal paradigms. Some might prefer to skip class but this has it's reasons too. It has much more to do with society and the workings of society than the people that are in it. Myself, I used to skip some classes (and it was allowed) because I didn't need them to get good grades... You are also implying those "lazy" people are a majority when they are a tiny tiny minority. At the comic: To be fair, the job/activity at which they are being judged for could be a antenna tower technician. =P
It's about the school system, from lower school to university 
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On October 24 2011 08:18 tskarzyn wrote:Show nested quote +On October 24 2011 07:40 HCastorp wrote:On October 24 2011 06:04 tskarzyn wrote:
I'm sorry if I don't want some lazy, "average" joe to get an MD and operate on me. Or that some people would rather sit around and complain than bust their ass in school to land a job at Goldman's and work 80-90 hours/week. Seriously, when did America turn into a country full of undereducated and lazy whiners?
To paraphrase Jesus, "The lazy you will always have with you". However, to characterize the current rise in unemployment as a rise in laziness is absurd. It is obvious that the pool of unemployed is going to consist of, on average, people who are less able than those with employment. However, there are a finite and shrinking number of jobs. So, if those unemployed people all worked harder, they may solve their personal "unemployment problem", but, since they would simply be replacing someone else, there would be no effect on unemployment as a whole. BONUS: History according to tskarzyn: Beginning in October 1929, an epidemic of laziness broke out in the United States. People everywhere put down their tools and refused to work, many even preferred starvation to having to lift a finger. Many of the country's hardest working men were so distraught at what was happening to the values of the nation that they threw themselves from the windows of their workplaces in despair. The government tried many times to spur the masses to put their nose to the grindstone, but to no avail. In the end, only the outbreak of World War II proved sufficiently motivating for the nation to return to work. Those people who grew up in this time and rejected the lazy ways of their parents are often referred to today as the "Greatest Generation". That's cute ^^. The sad truth is, there ARE many people that would rather live on welfare checks than apply themselves. There ARE people that would rather skip class and party with their friends than study. There ARE people who would rather play SC2 for 4 hours every night than go to night school while working full-time to improve their skill set and earn a higher salary. Shocking, I know because according to OWSers the 1% didn't actually earn their money. They were just born smarter/richer/luckier than everyone else.
I'm glad you liked it. I enjoyed writing it. "Why don't you go get a job" is one of the most common, and most pernicious criticisms of the protests I have encountered. However, when unemployment is at the level it is today, treating the unemployed as worthless layabouts is absurd. 15-20% unemployment is a problem for society as a whole, not simply the unemployed.
It should also be noted that while those actually sleeping in the park long-term are indeed mostly unemployed, those without jobs are actually a minority within the movement as a whole. A few days ago there was a survey of protesters in Zuccotti Park. About half made over 25k/year. The next day, anther survey came out. Only half of US workers made over 26k/year. So in fact, the protesters are far more representative of the country as a whole than many think.
With respect to "hard work", this is another red herring. I'm sure Mafia Dons also work hard. If banks on the whole improve society, they are good, no matter how much money they make or how lazy their CEOs are. If they damage it, they are bad, no matter how many hours their workers put in. To make it personal, if you have enriched yourself by damaging the society around you, "working hard" is no defense - it is simply changing the subject.
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On October 24 2011 06:04 tskarzyn wrote:
I'm sorry if I don't want some lazy, "average" joe to get an MD and operate on me. Or that some people would rather sit around and complain than bust their ass in school to land a job at Goldman's and work 80-90 hours/week. Seriously, when did America turn into a country full of undereducated and lazy whiners?
80-90 hours a week, really?
Honestly I admit to being lazy, but then again I don't plan on getting an MD and operating on you either. My philosophy is you live once, and you should enjoy it, spending 90 hours a week working my ass off sounds fucking awful. The whole, work hard and you get somewhere has worked for some of my family, they've owned small business, been successful, and they made it and are now retired, selling their business for pretty decent amounts. Several of my family are sitting on quite a bit of money( at least in relation to what I got anyways, they will live comfortably till they die and not worry about a roof over their heads, or food on their plates, situations my immediate family has been through). On the other hand my step dad worked for 30 years for a single company, moved up, was doing well, then company got bought out and decided to move the factory to italy I believe, he ended up dying a few years down the line at a really young age, but he worked his ass off during life, and died with virtually nothing left to show for all that work, very few pennies in the bank, lost our house in vegas during the foreclosure crisis, etc. My father also works every day, manual physical labor, and he makes decent wages, but he's not going to retire comfortably any time soon if ever. My great grandma worked every year of her life until 87, never retired cause she couldn't afford too, was she doing really hard labor, no, but. I mean full 8 hour days for an 87 year old woman is pretty crazy, the last time I saw her I thought the situation was insane, my grandma used to find all her bills and pay them all every time she was at her place just so she could stay afloat.
The whole idea that working hard gets you somewhere is kind of a skewed perception that the elite want you to think. Yes the model works for some, and those people tend to turn a blind eye to those that have lost their homes, live on the streets made some poor decisions, taken out huge school loans and can't get work etc. If the model works for you, your not gonna think of all those that it doesn't work for, I've seen and benefited from the model, and I've seen the awful things that happen to those within the same model, and I don't think that me being comfortable is worth the sufferings of others. Morally, I can't accept the current financial distribution of wealth in this country, it's plain wrong. I think we need to take a key from places in the world where the quality of living is much higher, I'm thinking of Scandinavian countries.
Of course I'm not an expert etc but I feel like looking at it like, well you don't want to put 60+ hours a week of work in, your lazy, sorry you don't deserve shit... lol that's freaking awful. The whole idea behind the system is that the factory workers make tons and tons of money for some guy who doesn't do shit at the top of the food chain, then factory workers lose their jobs, get laid off, then complain, and rest of america calls them lazy cause that's what they've been brought up to think, the whole if you don't work your lazy. These huge corporations need people to throw away their lives, work every day, have nothing and awful living conditions, so that they can have billions and billions, and it's freaking wrong. Some companies do care about their employee's it used to be that way, but the philosophy of these big powers have really changed, and I'ts cause it's working for them, and they are getting away with fucking over the little guys.
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On October 24 2011 06:38 aksfjh wrote:Show nested quote +On October 24 2011 06:07 OsoVega wrote:On October 24 2011 06:01 semantics wrote:
I've always found it funny how people frame starvation and poverty as a choice as if people would chose that over being treated like shit. Just because people will nearly always choose the better option does not mean it is not a choice. When an employer offers an unskilled worker a low paying, harsh job, he is only giving that person another option. The worker is free to refuse it but he often will not because that low paying, harsh job is the best option he has. By offering that job, that employer has not forced anything on anyone but has given the worker a chance to better his life in a mutually beneficial relationship. The fact is, the choice between starvation and a low paying job, is a choice, no matter how you put it. The fact that people will not choose the worse option does not make it not a choice, it's just that the latter is a better choice that people will take. I know I sound redundant but I'm trying to be as clear as possible. The choice between an inferior choice and a superior choice is still a choice and there is nothing wrong with offering someone a superior choice. Except factory owners are given an unfair advantage in the process. They get to choose where to put their factory to minimize costs (with 100s or 1000s of choices), while the workers only have 2 choices. The market price is unfairly determined by one side since the mobility of workers isn't as great as the mobility of factories.
There is, normally, no reason to think that the mobility of factories is bigger than the mobility of workers. Furthermore, as long as there is more than one business in the economy, there will be competition for the workers. So it simply isn't true that the market wage is solely determined by the capitalists, as if they had the upper hand.
It is, in fact, the competition over the workers that, in part, brought about higher wages for factory workers in the first place. Otherwise, people wouldn't much rather apply for factory jobs than agriculture jobs. The fact is, there are more than just two options for these workers. It's just that they chose factory work over agriculture, crime, starvation or prostitution.
On October 24 2011 07:48 Undrass wrote:Show nested quote +On October 24 2011 06:15 OsoVega wrote:On October 24 2011 06:13 Josealtron wrote:On October 24 2011 06:07 OsoVega wrote:On October 24 2011 06:01 semantics wrote:
I've always found it funny how people frame starvation and poverty as a choice as if people would chose that over being treated like shit. Just because people will nearly always choose the better option does not mean it is not a choice. When an employer offers an unskilled worker a low paying, harsh job, he is only giving that person another option. The worker is free to refuse it but he often will not because that low paying, harsh job is the best option he has. By offering that job, that employer has not forced anything on anyone but has given the worker a chance to better his life in a mutually beneficial relationship. The fact is, the choice between starvation and a low paying job, is a choice, no matter how you put it. The fact that people will not choose the worse option does not make it not a choice, it's just that the latter is a better choice that people will take. Replace the word "starvation" with death(because that's what it is), and you'll probably realize how ridiculous that sounds. No, it's the exact same. People can choose between life and death. They do it all the time. They generally choose life. It doesn't even sound all that different because everyone knows that starvation leads to death. The choice between an inferior choice (death) and a superior choice (life, working, etc.) is still a choice and there is nothing wrong with offering that superior choice to people. Slaves also has a choice: they can suicide if they want out. lie down and die. Quit. So because there is a choice, slavery is OK, right? + Show Spoiler +Yet, slavery is outlawed? WHY!?!?!?!?!?!?
To enslave someone is to take options away from them by the initiation of force. When you enslave someone you hold a gun to their head and tell them work for me or die. When you open a factory in a poor area you tell people work for me for pay or don't if you don't want to. Slavery takes options away through the use of force, offering jobs gives people the choice of working for you. To enslave someone is to violate their rights.
On October 24 2011 07:00 radiatoren wrote:Show nested quote +On October 24 2011 06:35 OsoVega wrote:On October 24 2011 06:28 KiaL.Kiwi wrote:On October 24 2011 06:22 OsoVega wrote:On October 24 2011 06:18 KiaL.Kiwi wrote:On October 24 2011 06:15 OsoVega wrote:On October 24 2011 06:13 Josealtron wrote:On October 24 2011 06:07 OsoVega wrote:On October 24 2011 06:01 semantics wrote:
I've always found it funny how people frame starvation and poverty as a choice as if people would chose that over being treated like shit. Just because people will nearly always choose the better option does not mean it is not a choice. When an employer offers an unskilled worker a low paying, harsh job, he is only giving that person another option. The worker is free to refuse it but he often will not because that low paying, harsh job is the best option he has. By offering that job, that employer has not forced anything on anyone but has given the worker a chance to better his life in a mutually beneficial relationship. The fact is, the choice between starvation and a low paying job, is a choice, no matter how you put it. The fact that people will not choose the worse option does not make it not a choice, it's just that the latter is a better choice that people will take. Replace the word "starvation" with death(because that's what it is), and you'll probably realize how ridiculous that sounds. No, it's the exact same. People can choose between life and death. They do it all the time. It doesn't even sound all that different because everyone knows that starvation leads to death. The choice between an inferior choice (death) and a superior choice (life, working, etc.) is still a choice and there is nothing wrong with offering that superior choice to people. But no healthy (physically as well as mentally) being will chose death over living. The threat of death is the biggest possible force an individual can face - calling that a choice isn't even cynical anymore, it's just inhuman. You can sugarcoat it all you want by calling it a choice and thereby implying that the individual is the one in control. If you're choice is death or working under inhumane conditions while being complelty exploited by your company to barely continue living, the choice will always be awful life instead of death, as history has proven millions of times, and still proves every day. What is so bad about an employer offering an "awful life" when the alternative is death? That he'd usually be easily able to offer a decent, if not good life easily, but doesn't do so, because companies don't care for people, but for profit. The whole jada jada about an unregulated market magically providing the best for people has disproven itself hundred years ago - capitalism treated people like cattle and environment like a waste dump before unions and governments began to regulate it. So you're basically expecting altruism of the employer? Why should the employer offer the employee more than the market value of the employee's work? I've never in my life heard a legitimate reason to practice true altruism. Yes, the employer could offer higher wages but why should he? No, the employer does not necessarily care for his employees but in order to get them to work for him and earn him a profit he must give them a reason to. That reason is by making working for him a better choice than any other option they have. Capitalism has never existed but we've seen that as we came close to capitalism, the living standards, of even the poorest of the capitalist societies were raised to levels never before seen on Earth. It's not magic. When people are free they will be most productive and this benefits everyone. I am not sure you actually see it, but essentially you are saying slavery (jobs for only food and housing) is a good deal if the alternative is death.
It's not slavery unless the person is forced into the job. Slavery isn't about some arbitrary distinction between the point of only earning enough for food and housing and having an excess. That has nothing to do with it at all.Slavery is however not generally seen as advantageous to a society economically since those people never interact with the economy of said society.
Again, what you're talking about is not slavery but it is more advantageous for these people to be producing products in factories than either starving or working fields. These people do interact with the economy. They produce wealth by working at the factory and get paid for it. They spend that wealth on things such as food and clothes among other things.Putting everything up against this kind of "market value" will essentially end up with a society based on: "If he ain't worth needing, he ain't worth feeding!"
No it won't. It will create a society in which production is rewarded and the destruction of wealth (bad investments) will be punished. That, however doesn't mean there wouldn't be any charity, it just mean that this charity wouldn't be forced. Charity is often a self interested thing to give. "libertarian" Government with military still? Guess they don´t need weapons or the true lobby of that kind of a "libertarian" government would be the weapon-producers fighting for spending money on weapons and maybe using them, just to keep a steady demand...
No, the military would be run as efficiently as possible for the purpose of defending it's people's rights. People would have to stay vigilant to make sure military budgets aren't spent frivolously or for purposes other than the protection of the rights of it's people. All democratic countries with militaries should be looking out for this. The United States doesn't do a good job of it and people should be protesting against it on Pennsylvania Avenue, not Wall Street.It is not as easy as some people think to change society to something better. If it is done right it might work with a "free market" and minimal government, but if you need serious regulation to make it work, is it really what you are fighting for?
You wouldn't need "serious regulation to make it work", you would need no government intervention into the economy, not only for it to work, but for it even to be what I'm talking about. A free market with serious regulation is an oxymoron. Maybe I'm misunderstanding you here. Edit: Btw. I think some people from certain ideologies are holding an occupy the occupy wall street thread.
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On October 24 2011 08:18 tskarzyn wrote:Show nested quote +On October 24 2011 07:40 HCastorp wrote:On October 24 2011 06:04 tskarzyn wrote:
I'm sorry if I don't want some lazy, "average" joe to get an MD and operate on me. Or that some people would rather sit around and complain than bust their ass in school to land a job at Goldman's and work 80-90 hours/week. Seriously, when did America turn into a country full of undereducated and lazy whiners?
To paraphrase Jesus, "The lazy you will always have with you". However, to characterize the current rise in unemployment as a rise in laziness is absurd. It is obvious that the pool of unemployed is going to consist of, on average, people who are less able than those with employment. However, there are a finite and shrinking number of jobs. So, if those unemployed people all worked harder, they may solve their personal "unemployment problem", but, since they would simply be replacing someone else, there would be no effect on unemployment as a whole. BONUS: History according to tskarzyn: Beginning in October 1929, an epidemic of laziness broke out in the United States. People everywhere put down their tools and refused to work, many even preferred starvation to having to lift a finger. Many of the country's hardest working men were so distraught at what was happening to the values of the nation that they threw themselves from the windows of their workplaces in despair. The government tried many times to spur the masses to put their nose to the grindstone, but to no avail. In the end, only the outbreak of World War II proved sufficiently motivating for the nation to return to work. Those people who grew up in this time and rejected the lazy ways of their parents are often referred to today as the "Greatest Generation". That's cute ^^. The sad truth is, there ARE many people that would rather live on welfare checks than apply themselves. There ARE people that would rather skip class and party with their friends than study. There ARE people who would rather play SC2 for 4 hours every night than go to night school while working full-time to improve their skill set and earn a higher salary. Shocking, I know because according to OWSers the 1% didn't actually earn their money. They were just born smarter/richer/luckier than everyone else.
All of those things that you mentioned about the people who would rather be on welfare than work would be true if the country had this many unemployed people in a good job market. But if there are 4-5 unemployed people for every available job, then no, that point isn't valid.
Also, I like how we aren't allowed to say that the rich might have it easy enough and can afford to help out everyone else a little bit, but everyone on welfare has such an easy and luxurious life lol.
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On October 24 2011 09:26 OsoVega wrote:Show nested quote +On October 24 2011 06:38 aksfjh wrote:On October 24 2011 06:07 OsoVega wrote:On October 24 2011 06:01 semantics wrote:
I've always found it funny how people frame starvation and poverty as a choice as if people would chose that over being treated like shit. Just because people will nearly always choose the better option does not mean it is not a choice. When an employer offers an unskilled worker a low paying, harsh job, he is only giving that person another option. The worker is free to refuse it but he often will not because that low paying, harsh job is the best option he has. By offering that job, that employer has not forced anything on anyone but has given the worker a chance to better his life in a mutually beneficial relationship. The fact is, the choice between starvation and a low paying job, is a choice, no matter how you put it. The fact that people will not choose the worse option does not make it not a choice, it's just that the latter is a better choice that people will take. I know I sound redundant but I'm trying to be as clear as possible. The choice between an inferior choice and a superior choice is still a choice and there is nothing wrong with offering someone a superior choice. Except factory owners are given an unfair advantage in the process. They get to choose where to put their factory to minimize costs (with 100s or 1000s of choices), while the workers only have 2 choices. The market price is unfairly determined by one side since the mobility of workers isn't as great as the mobility of factories. There is, normally, no reason to think that the mobility of factories is bigger than the mobility of workers. Furthermore, as long as there is more than one business in the economy, there will be competition for the workers. So it simply isn't true that the market wage is solely determined by the capitalists, as if they had the upper hand. It is, in fact, the competition over the workers that, in part, brought about higher wages for factory workers in the first place. Otherwise, people wouldn't much rather apply for factory jobs than agriculture jobs. The fact is, there are more than just two options for these workers. It's just that they chose factory work over agriculture, crime, starvation or prostitution. Show nested quote +On October 24 2011 07:48 Undrass wrote:On October 24 2011 06:15 OsoVega wrote:On October 24 2011 06:13 Josealtron wrote:On October 24 2011 06:07 OsoVega wrote:On October 24 2011 06:01 semantics wrote:
I've always found it funny how people frame starvation and poverty as a choice as if people would chose that over being treated like shit. Just because people will nearly always choose the better option does not mean it is not a choice. When an employer offers an unskilled worker a low paying, harsh job, he is only giving that person another option. The worker is free to refuse it but he often will not because that low paying, harsh job is the best option he has. By offering that job, that employer has not forced anything on anyone but has given the worker a chance to better his life in a mutually beneficial relationship. The fact is, the choice between starvation and a low paying job, is a choice, no matter how you put it. The fact that people will not choose the worse option does not make it not a choice, it's just that the latter is a better choice that people will take. Replace the word "starvation" with death(because that's what it is), and you'll probably realize how ridiculous that sounds. No, it's the exact same. People can choose between life and death. They do it all the time. They generally choose life. It doesn't even sound all that different because everyone knows that starvation leads to death. The choice between an inferior choice (death) and a superior choice (life, working, etc.) is still a choice and there is nothing wrong with offering that superior choice to people. Slaves also has a choice: they can suicide if they want out. lie down and die. Quit. So because there is a choice, slavery is OK, right? + Show Spoiler +Yet, slavery is outlawed? WHY!?!?!?!?!?!? To enslave someone is to take options away from them by the initiation of force. When you enslave someone you hold a gun to their head and tell them work for me or die. When you open a factory in a poor area you tell people work for me for pay or don't if you don't want to. Slavery takes options away through the use of force, offering jobs gives people the choice of working for you. To enslave someone is to violate their rights. Show nested quote +On October 24 2011 07:00 radiatoren wrote:On October 24 2011 06:35 OsoVega wrote:On October 24 2011 06:28 KiaL.Kiwi wrote:On October 24 2011 06:22 OsoVega wrote:On October 24 2011 06:18 KiaL.Kiwi wrote:On October 24 2011 06:15 OsoVega wrote:On October 24 2011 06:13 Josealtron wrote:On October 24 2011 06:07 OsoVega wrote:On October 24 2011 06:01 semantics wrote:
I've always found it funny how people frame starvation and poverty as a choice as if people would chose that over being treated like shit. Just because people will nearly always choose the better option does not mean it is not a choice. When an employer offers an unskilled worker a low paying, harsh job, he is only giving that person another option. The worker is free to refuse it but he often will not because that low paying, harsh job is the best option he has. By offering that job, that employer has not forced anything on anyone but has given the worker a chance to better his life in a mutually beneficial relationship. The fact is, the choice between starvation and a low paying job, is a choice, no matter how you put it. The fact that people will not choose the worse option does not make it not a choice, it's just that the latter is a better choice that people will take. Replace the word "starvation" with death(because that's what it is), and you'll probably realize how ridiculous that sounds. No, it's the exact same. People can choose between life and death. They do it all the time. It doesn't even sound all that different because everyone knows that starvation leads to death. The choice between an inferior choice (death) and a superior choice (life, working, etc.) is still a choice and there is nothing wrong with offering that superior choice to people. But no healthy (physically as well as mentally) being will chose death over living. The threat of death is the biggest possible force an individual can face - calling that a choice isn't even cynical anymore, it's just inhuman. You can sugarcoat it all you want by calling it a choice and thereby implying that the individual is the one in control. If you're choice is death or working under inhumane conditions while being complelty exploited by your company to barely continue living, the choice will always be awful life instead of death, as history has proven millions of times, and still proves every day. What is so bad about an employer offering an "awful life" when the alternative is death? That he'd usually be easily able to offer a decent, if not good life easily, but doesn't do so, because companies don't care for people, but for profit. The whole jada jada about an unregulated market magically providing the best for people has disproven itself hundred years ago - capitalism treated people like cattle and environment like a waste dump before unions and governments began to regulate it. So you're basically expecting altruism of the employer? Why should the employer offer the employee more than the market value of the employee's work? I've never in my life heard a legitimate reason to practice true altruism. Yes, the employer could offer higher wages but why should he? No, the employer does not necessarily care for his employees but in order to get them to work for him and earn him a profit he must give them a reason to. That reason is by making working for him a better choice than any other option they have. Capitalism has never existed but we've seen that as we came close to capitalism, the living standards, of even the poorest of the capitalist societies were raised to levels never before seen on Earth. It's not magic. When people are free they will be most productive and this benefits everyone. I am not sure you actually see it, but essentially you are saying slavery (jobs for only food and housing) is a good deal if the alternative is death.
It's not slavery unless the person is forced into the job. Slavery isn't about some arbitrary distinction between the point of only earning enough for food and housing and having an excess. That has nothing to do with it at all.Slavery is however not generally seen as advantageous to a society economically since those people never interact with the economy of said society.
Again, what you're talking about is not slavery but it is more advantageous for these people to be producing products in factories than either starving or working fields. These people do interact with the economy. They produce wealth by working at the factory and get paid for it. They spend that wealth on things such as food and clothes among other things.Putting everything up against this kind of "market value" will essentially end up with a society based on: "If he ain't worth needing, he ain't worth feeding!"
No it won't. It will create a society in which production is rewarded and the destruction of wealth (bad investments) will be punished. That, however doesn't mean there wouldn't be any charity, it just mean that this charity wouldn't be forced. Charity is often a self interested thing to give. "libertarian" Government with military still? Guess they don´t need weapons or the true lobby of that kind of a "libertarian" government would be the weapon-producers fighting for spending money on weapons and maybe using them, just to keep a steady demand...
No, the military would be run as efficiently as possible for the purpose of defending it's people's rights. People would have to stay vigilant to make sure military budgets aren't spent frivolously or for purposes other than the protection of the rights of it's people. All democratic countries with militaries should be looking out for this. The United States doesn't do a good job of it and people should be protesting against it on Pennsylvania Avenue, not Wall Street.It is not as easy as some people think to change society to something better. If it is done right it might work with a "free market" and minimal government, but if you need serious regulation to make it work, is it really what you are fighting for?
You wouldn't need "serious regulation to make it work", you would need no government intervention into the economy, not only for it to work, but for it even to be what I'm talking about. A free market with serious regulation is an oxymoron. Maybe I'm misunderstanding you here. Edit: Btw. I think some people from certain ideologies are holding an occupy the occupy wall street thread.
If someone has a choice: be a slave or die, this is STRUCTURAL VIOLENCE. HOW DO YOU NOT GET THIS?
Also your "competition for workers" argument is the biggest bullshit I've ever heard in my entire life. You're seriously claiming those 20%+ of the people who are unemployed in the usa are poor and unemployed because they fail to compete? What if some guy hits you with a baseball bat and this paralyses you, will you be okay with dying a slow death because of the lack of food/water? Because that's exactly the kind of (social) Darwinism you're preaching, a foolish ideology that came into existence by taking Darwin's ideas and distorting them infinitely.
And your entire argument is void, because there is NO REASON for people to be poor. That's right, we easily have enough resources to feed, clothe and provide shelter and education to the entire world. This sounds like a much better idea than giving 0.01% of the population the "opportunity" to own nearly all the wealth and enslave the others, don't you think?
Maybe you should go back in time and be a factory worker in the 1900s, I think that'll change your perspective quite fast. You know, that time when people accepted slavery more than they do today, the time where 99% of the people were happy with an (unboiled) potato for dinner.
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On October 24 2011 08:18 tskarzyn wrote:Show nested quote +On October 24 2011 07:40 HCastorp wrote:On October 24 2011 06:04 tskarzyn wrote:
I'm sorry if I don't want some lazy, "average" joe to get an MD and operate on me. Or that some people would rather sit around and complain than bust their ass in school to land a job at Goldman's and work 80-90 hours/week. Seriously, when did America turn into a country full of undereducated and lazy whiners?
To paraphrase Jesus, "The lazy you will always have with you". However, to characterize the current rise in unemployment as a rise in laziness is absurd. It is obvious that the pool of unemployed is going to consist of, on average, people who are less able than those with employment. However, there are a finite and shrinking number of jobs. So, if those unemployed people all worked harder, they may solve their personal "unemployment problem", but, since they would simply be replacing someone else, there would be no effect on unemployment as a whole. BONUS: History according to tskarzyn: Beginning in October 1929, an epidemic of laziness broke out in the United States. People everywhere put down their tools and refused to work, many even preferred starvation to having to lift a finger. Many of the country's hardest working men were so distraught at what was happening to the values of the nation that they threw themselves from the windows of their workplaces in despair. The government tried many times to spur the masses to put their nose to the grindstone, but to no avail. In the end, only the outbreak of World War II proved sufficiently motivating for the nation to return to work. Those people who grew up in this time and rejected the lazy ways of their parents are often referred to today as the "Greatest Generation". That's cute ^^. The sad truth is, there ARE many people that would rather live on welfare checks than apply themselves. There ARE people that would rather skip class and party with their friends than study. There ARE people who would rather play SC2 for 4 hours every night than go to night school while working full-time to improve their skill set and earn a higher salary. Shocking, I know because according to OWSers the 1% didn't actually earn their money. They were just born smarter/richer/luckier than everyone else.
Who the... What the fuck?!?
http://25.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_lswy1zY1y71qfengno1_500.jpg
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Sanya12364 Posts
On October 24 2011 07:54 IgnE wrote:
If you admit that life is unfair, and that there’s only so much you can do about that at the starting line, then you can try to ameliorate the consequences of that unfairness. Life is unfair. Suffering is real.
Therefore, we should try to create the society each of us would want if we didn’t know in advance who we’d be.
It isn't immoral to deprive the winners in society of a portion of their winnings. They got those winnings through the birth lottery anyway. This includes inherited wealth as well as wealth they got by being smart/creative/hard working individuals in the right place at the right time. There are literally billions of smart/creative/hard working individuals who never got nearly as much as you have. Taking advantage of the society you were born into, the inherited wealth you received, and your other natural advantages doesn't make any of your winning less of a lottery. It isn't immoral to redistribute some of your wealth to the less fortunate.
It is immoral to exploit the poor through a capitalist system to enrich yourself at the expense of the workers simply because you were a winner in the birth lottery.
The confusion comes in when people think they "make choices" and "work hard" and therefore "deserve" everything they have. You don't. You are a product of your genes and environment. Free will doesn't exist. Stop being such immoral fuckheads. You don't even need a "strong government" to solve this injustice. You just need to prevent ownership of the means of production. Ownership of ideas, ownership of the means of production, these are both sociological fictions that perpetuate injustice.
Market fundamentalists live in a fantasy world. Crony capitalism is intrinsic to the capitalist system. Without regulation, the winners in the market will exploit the losers and accumulate more and more wealth for themselves. They will rewrite the rules of society to benefit themselves. You market fundamentalists who don't even believe in breaking up monopolies might not suffer from the cognitive dissonance of supporting a society completely without regulation while still preventing the formation of monopolies, but you clearly live in some fantasy world that chooses to forget how monopolies form and how they entrench themselves.
Throw "fuckheads" around all you want, it's not going to be convincing. Since you have a vision of how society should work. Instead of simple platitudes, let's hear some details and specifics. Free will does exist even for people that are nominally slaves, and if you assert that again, your argument is DoA and will be squashed like a gnat.
How is the size of winnings of a birth lottery determined? How does society take from these winnings?
Who deserves help? How do you dispense said help?
What is justice? How is justice achieved?
Who owns means of production? If no one legally owns means of production, who decides how to deploy the means of production? Who takes risks with means of production? Who bears creative risks?
What is your idea of regulation? What is its purpose? Who crafts the regulation? Who executes the regulation? How does regulation handle creativity?
How do you manage 1 million people? How do you manage 10 million people? How do you manage 100 million people? How do you manage 1 billion people?
Be sure to make the system robust such that the rich and powerful can't subvert it. One simple reminder, the rich and powerful will be ones making most of the decisions in your political system.
BTW, it's hard. I don't expect an answer.
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On October 24 2011 07:54 IgnE wrote:
If you admit that life is unfair, and that there’s only so much you can do about that at the starting line, then you can try to ameliorate the consequences of that unfairness. Life is unfair. Suffering is real.
Therefore, we should try to create the society each of us would want if we didn’t know in advance who we’d be.
It isn't immoral to deprive the winners in society of a portion of their winnings. They got those winnings through the birth lottery anyway. This includes inherited wealth as well as wealth they got by being smart/creative/hard working individuals in the right place at the right time. There are literally billions of smart/creative/hard working individuals who never got nearly as much as you have. Taking advantage of the society you were born into, the inherited wealth you received, and your other natural advantages doesn't make any of your winning less of a lottery. It isn't immoral to redistribute some of your wealth to the less fortunate.
It is immoral to exploit the poor through a capitalist system to enrich yourself at the expense of the workers simply because you were a winner in the birth lottery.
The confusion comes in when people think they "make choices" and "work hard" and therefore "deserve" everything they have. You don't. You are a product of your genes and environment. Free will doesn't exist. Stop being such immoral fuckheads. You don't even need a "strong government" to solve this injustice. You just need to prevent ownership of the means of production. Ownership of ideas, ownership of the means of production, these are both sociological fictions that perpetuate injustice.
Market fundamentalists live in a fantasy world. Crony capitalism is intrinsic to the capitalist system. Without regulation, the winners in the market will exploit the losers and accumulate more and more wealth for themselves. They will rewrite the rules of society to benefit themselves. You market fundamentalists who don't even believe in breaking up monopolies might not suffer from the cognitive dissonance of supporting a society completely without regulation while still preventing the formation of monopolies, but you clearly live in some fantasy world that chooses to forget how monopolies form and how they entrench themselves.
As much as I agree with your general sentiments, bringing free will (or lack of) into it is useless. Following your train of thought - that nobody 'deserves' anything since it was all the result of a birth lottery anyway - brings into question our entire system of criminal punishment since none of those criminals have free will.
As obvious as it is to you or anyone else that free will doesn't exist, it isn't an idea that can be successfully assimilated into any modern governing system.
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90 hour work week why not? Americans already work longer hours for less pay anyway, why not make it 96 hours so we work 4 days non stop eh?
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Sanya12364 Posts
On October 24 2011 10:19 {CC}StealthBlue wrote:
90 hour work week why not? Americans already work longer hours for less pay anyway, why not make it 96 hours so we work 4 days non stop eh?
Some workaholics do it. Hell I've done it at least a dozen times.
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On October 24 2011 10:32 TanGeng wrote:Show nested quote +On October 24 2011 10:19 {CC}StealthBlue wrote:
90 hour work week why not? Americans already work longer hours for less pay anyway, why not make it 96 hours so we work 4 days non stop eh? Some workaholics do it. Hell I've done it at least a dozen times.
As have I, do I want to make it a norm? Hell no, the first 32 hours are the hardest. I did it because I had to do my job and cover for somebody else, I worked at a Hospital which always has tons of coffee. My check was amazing, but I didn't get better Health Insurance etc.
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