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4.05am
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27 November 2016
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So… what you’re saying is f*** the poor?
Personally I don’t feel like discriminating against people in financial hardship is a good idea, or fair in any way, shape or form – and government subsidies are the way to help that.
And think of all the spare money we’d have to fund it if we actually enforced the massive companies’ taxes… we’d have billions, possibly trillions of dollars spare to help people who were born into a situation where money is a real issue.
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6.21am
1 November 2013
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In my opinion, there’s too much government money in it all together, which causes the administration to be bloated unnecessarily and drive tuition up because colleges know they can just get student loan money.
So looks like there is a problem with the goverment money distribution and the loan system in the US. If loans are harder to get and the goverment money has more targeted oversight, that could also be effective.
More so than cutting goverment spending since they would just raise tuition to cover thr loss in money.
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6.35am
9 March 2017
Offline Why do we have to eff over anyone, why not just let people build their own houses on public land and let them hunt squirrels and crows to feed them and their family. This way, Bill Gates can enjoy his fortune, homelessness can be eradicated, and we can start saying taxation is theft again because we no longer need it.
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7.04am
1 November 2013
Offline Ok, sure. We are now a hunter/gather society! Congratulations. We did it folks! Oh what’s that? Your skill set isn’t optimized for the hunter/gatherer life style? Well toooooo bad! You are going to hunter/gatherer and you will like it!
Someone is asking about how the roads will be managed or any other government run stuff? Well no more, we now just hunt and we just gather, the end and if it doesn’t work for you, well that is what survival of the fittest is for!
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26 January 2017
Offline Ah, shoot. I have to go to a lecture right now, but I will do a full response to this later.
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BeatlebugI've been up on the mountain, and I've seen his wondrous grace,
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He seemed a little haggard, but it did not slow him down,
he was humming to the neon of the universal sound.
9.14am
15 November 2018
Offline Dark Overlord said
Why do we have to eff over anyone, why not just let people build their own houses on public land and let them hunt squirrels and crows to feed them and their family. This way, Bill Gates can enjoy his fortune, homelessness can be eradicated, and we can start saying taxation is theft again because we no longer need it.
Of course, of course. And what happens next? How will Bill Gates “enjoy his fortune” with a city of people building houses on his front lawn? (And don’t tell me “that’s not public land!” because without a government there’s no longer a difference). How do the squirrels and crows feel about this? When the populations start dying out what will the people do for food? What if people don’t get proper nutrition because they’re only eating crow meat, or what if they get a disease? Where are they supposed to go? Not like they could afford healthcare if they’re Hunter-gatherers making no money. What are they gonna do about it? Great plan, truly great. Not to mention the fact that without a government to keep things in check the country will be run by the wealthiest corporations and I shudder to imagine that world.
I don’t know what the right decision is for college money but I think if people want to go they should be able to, whether or not they have rich parents.
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9.26am
Moderators
15 February 2015
Offline QuarryMan said
Ah, shoot. I have to go to a lecture right now, but I will do a full response to this later.
I can’t tell you how many times I’ve said this to myself and then later got buried in other posts and never materialized 
Gee @The Hole Got Fixed, no wonder you haven’t won “most respectful even through disagreements”. I understand y’all are breathing up all that smoke down there and it can’t be good for the temper, but I’m honestly rather disappointed that, after typing for an hour and a half, all you got out of it was “So whAt You’re sAyIng iS f**k poor people”. 
Of course I don’t want to screw anyone over, but I also don’t think government subsidies are always necessarily the best way to help people.
Don’t get me wrong, I’m not against all government programs — there’s a time and place for them, and they can certainly be lifesaving to people who have hit a pothole in the road of life. I might not be here if my mother and her family hadn’t had food stamps to get them by when they first came to America. I am just contesting, on intellectual grounds, because I love to argue, your claim that it’s “not fair to discriminate against poor people” (i.e. not give things away). Should you be a dick to someone because they’re poor? Of course not. That’s not what we’re talking about.
You think it’s not fair to leave people out in the cold, but I think by Nature’s standards that is perfectly fair. It’s not nice, but it’s “fair”. However, we humans have evolved a sense of empathy and responsibility to others, such that we don’t want to leave people out in the cold, and that’s a fine thing; but it isn’t strictly “fair”, either, to take from those who have to reward those who have been less disciplined or just had bad luck. It’s a semantics issue.
Also @Dark Overlord that’s a very quaint fantasy but the human population is simply too large at this point for it to be feasible. I think with technology we can find better, progressive ways to be more efficient rather than regressing to a hunter-gatherer society.
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9.43am
15 November 2018
Offline I see what you’re saying, Beatlebug, I’m just not sure I agree. Why is it unfair to help people with bad luck? I think better welfare systems will benefit the poor a lot more than they will harm the rich. If Bill Gates lost a million dollars, he might not even notice- it certainly wouldn’t make a difference in his life. But if you gave a poor person one thousand of those dollars, it could make a huge difference to them. I see it sort of like a risk v. reward sort of thing; the risk of hurting the people the money is coming from is very low compared to the reward of helping the people the money is going to. That said, your way of seeing things is a perfectly valid way of seeing things. I wonder if there’s some sort of compromise that could help those who need it without causing any harm/loss to those who are providing the help.
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10.37am
Moderators
15 February 2015
Offline @50yearslate the problem with that is that it’s a very simplistic way of seeing it, and I’m not trying to be mean to you personally, but the reality is a bit more complicated.
For one thing, a lot of the wealth people talk about is not in a money bin or bank somewhere, but rather in the form of assets. Wealth =/= money.
For another thing, people who have had to work hard to earn something usually are better at managing it in ways that encourage the continuation of their wealth. Most inherited wealth is lost by the third generation, and when people win the lottery they often just blow it all and end up as badly-off as they were before. Of course some people start off from a better place than others, and levelling the playing field is definitely an important issue, but that’s to be done before the game starts, not after the game has been won and lost and trophies awarded.
Then there’s the problem of steep wealth taxes discouraging people from keeping their businesses or assets in an area. Sure, it makes sense in theory for those who have to give to those who have not, but people are individuals, not figures on appear or cogs in a machine, and taxes are not a good incentive to essentially selfish human nature. When business people have lots of money that they’re not worried about being taken from them by the government to pay for people that they have no personal reason to care about, they’re probably going to be more willing to invest it in teaching people to fish and that sort of thing, both through business and through charity.
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11.41am
15 November 2018
Offline That’s a decent point about the assets, I didn’t think of that. But I think I may have been unclear in my analogies- I don’t think that it’s a good idea to just give money to people. I do think it’s a good idea to use money to provide services like education and healthcare, which benefit people without putting money directly in their hands. But those are some interesting points to think about, thank you.
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12.32pm
Moderators
15 February 2015
Offline Whether you’re putting money directly into their hands or providing free services, it’s the same idea. Money is just resources, and resources are what you’re redistributing. Resources are limited. Even setting the ethical aspects of the argument aside, it always comes back down to “Who’s gonna pay for this s**t?” Because nothing is free. And it’s always going to end up that some are going to pay more than others who end up taking more from the system.
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1.17pm
9 March 2017
Offline I think everyone’s misunderstanding my post. The idea is that people would have the option to live like that. This means that the poor can live off the grid without having to pay any taxes while those who can afford it will live a more typical life and will be taxed reasonably. Also, Bill Gates owns his front lawn, hospitals should be a charity, and populations regrow as long as you let them.
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1.18pm
26 January 2017
Offline @Beatlebug I did forget for a few hours but I’m here now 
On the point of left wing vs right wing violence, I don’t think it would be a very productive conversation, since the most likely scenario is that it would just be “no your side is worse” “no YOUR side is worse”, and that doesn’t seem to be worthwhile for either of us 
As for the student debt thing, it’s not surprising at all to me that the right wing solution to the crisis is to say ‘sorry, but it’s your fault’ and leave it there. For one thing, that doesn’t solve one problem for one person, for another it actively disincentives people from getting an education, but most of all it’s just bad economic policy. Ever-richer billionaires do not a healthy economy make; your country is suffering vastly due to failing infrastructure, a disappearing middle class, slumping levels of home ownership, medical debt ruining the lives of millions, and an entire generation of college graduates who are straddled with crushing debt. And the libertarian diagnosis of this problem is, what? More privatisation? More free market? Continuing the trends of the last forty years that led the US into these crises is just going to exacerbate the problems and enrich the billionaires further at the expense of ordinary working people.
The fact of the matter is that neoliberalism doesn’t help ordinary people; a different approach is needed. Firstly, the US needs strong unions; unions built the American middle class and their absence is reflected in low wages and horrendous working conditions. Secondly, the US needs universal healthcare; this is a common-sense policy that is guaranteed by every other major developed country, none of whom have ever reversed it. Thirdly, it needs free college, so that kids no matter their background can get a university level education and thus access higher levels of employment. Fourthly, it needs campaign-finance reforming legislation to reduce the amount of corruption in congress so that the majority of politicians aren’t beholden to corporations more than their constituents.
Obviously there are more steps that should be taken, and I personally think Western economies could benefit from a long-term transition to co-operative business models as opposed to traditionally oriented capitalist ones, but these policies would be a very good start and would drastically improve the lives of hundreds of millions of people, as well as revitalising the country’s democracy. None of them are crazy authoritarian communist ideas, they are just simple common sense ideas that are supported by experts and have a track record of succeeding elsewhere.
Also, you know you can tax assets right? Just because money has been invested into something doesn’t mean you can’t tax it, that’s exactly what a wealth tax is – “a levy on the total value of personal assets, including bank deposits, real estate, assets in insurance and pension plans, ownership of unincorporated businesses, financial securities, and personal trusts.”
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lovelyritametermaidI've been up on the mountain, and I've seen his wondrous grace,
I've sat there on the barstool and I've looked him in the face.
He seemed a little haggard, but it did not slow him down,
he was humming to the neon of the universal sound.
9.35pm
Moderators
27 November 2016
Offline 
Beatlebug said
QuarryMan said
Ah, shoot. I have to go to a lecture right now, but I will do a full response to this later.
I can’t tell you how many times I’ve said this to myself and then later got buried in other posts and never materialized
Gee @The Hole Got Fixed, no wonder you haven’t won “most respectful even through disagreements”. I understand y’all are breathing up all that smoke down there and it can’t be good for the temper, but I’m honestly rather disappointed that, after typing for an hour and a half, all you got out of it was “So whAt You’re sAyIng iS f**k poor people”.
Of course I don’t want to screw anyone over, but I also don’t think government subsidies are always necessarily the best way to help people.
Don’t get me wrong, I’m not against all government programs — there’s a time and place for them, and they can certainly be lifesaving to people who have hit a pothole in the road of life. I might not be here if my mother and her family hadn’t had food stamps to get them by when they first came to America. I am just contesting, on intellectual grounds, because I love to argue, your claim that it’s “not fair to discriminate against poor people” (i.e. not give things away). Should you be a dick to someone because they’re poor? Of course not. That’s not what we’re talking about.
You think it’s not fair to leave people out in the cold, but I think by Nature’s standards that is perfectly fair. It’s not nice, but it’s “fair”. However, we humans have evolved a sense of empathy and responsibility to others, such that we don’t want to leave people out in the cold, and that’s a fine thing; but it isn’t strictly “fair”, either, to take from those who have to reward those who have been less disciplined or just had bad luck. It’s a semantics issue.
Also Dark Overlord that’s a very quaint fantasy but the human population is simply too large at this point for it to be feasible. I think with technology we can find better, progressive ways to be more efficient rather than regressing to a hunter-gatherer society.
Basically I was showing my view point in a jokey ‘haha Look At Me I’m a zoomer’ point of view – in fact I was quoting a meme I’d seen earlier in the day.
No hard feelings but sometimes a viewpoint expressed with a bit of humour, which is what I tried to do, does help an argument turn a little more light-hearted… and besides, no one had replied yet and I figured I may as well say something that could continue the thread.
And to be honest every time I open my mouth in this thread I just get yelled at anyway for some minor misunderstanding so I may as well leave this thread, and someone else can mod it – and as the other mods don’t visit this thread either, it’s up to you Bebu. Don’t let it turn into Lord of the Flies
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10.12pm
Moderators
15 February 2015
Offline The Hole Got Fixed said
Basically I was showing my view point in a jokey ‘haha Look At Me I’m a zoomer’ point of view – in fact I was quoting a meme I’d seen earlier in the day.
Oh christ I’m so sorry @The Hole Got Fixed that joke went wooosh I suppose I’m a little oversensitive to the unironic usage of ‘so what you’re saying’, but it did briefly cross my mind that you might be trying to make some kind of funny… but I didn’t think it was very funny so I went ahead with being a bit of a dick about it
No hard feelings but sometimes a viewpoint expressed with a bit of humour, which is what I tried to do, does help an argument turn a little more light-hearted… and besides, no one had replied yet and I figured I may as well say something that could continue the thread.
Yeah, I agree, I try to keep it lighthearted as well.
And to be honest every time I open my mouth in this thread I just get yelled at anyway for some minor misunderstanding so I may as well leave this thread, and someone else can mod it – and as the other mods don’t visit this thread either, it’s up to you Bebu. Don’t let it turn into Lord of the Flies
So sorry Holey, very unprofessional of me! Don’t worry, I’ll keep it civil in here. I’m rather enjoying myself, actually. 
And @QuarryMan I’ll get back to you later… I’m ’bout to fall asleep over here. 
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10.22pm
1 November 2013
Offline Also, if mods don’t wish to visit the threads, it should be ok since people can always report any flagrant posts.
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The Hole Got Fixed10.35pm
Moderators
27 November 2016
Offline Beatlebug said
The Hole Got Fixed said
Basically I was showing my view point in a jokey ‘haha Look At Me I’m a zoomer’ point of view – in fact I was quoting a meme I’d seen earlier in the day.
Oh christ I’m so sorry @The Hole Got Fixed that joke went wooosh
Haha that’s ok. I can see how it mightn’t have been funny but I didn’t think telegraphing the joke would have worked either as it would have ceased to be funny at all
And to be honest every time I open my mouth in this thread I just get yelled at anyway for some minor misunderstanding so I may as well leave this thread, and someone else can mod it – and as the other mods don’t visit this thread either, it’s up to you Bebu. Don’t let it turn into Lord of the Flies
So sorry Holey, very unprofessional of me!
And quarryman I’ll get back to you later… I’m ’bout to fall asleep over here.
No problem – I’ve had many problems on the internet before because one doesn’t hear the tone of voice, which is of course a big part of language! Have fun, I might pop my head in occasionally.
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10.38pm
Moderators
15 February 2015
Offline Starr Shine? said
Also, if mods don’t wish to visit the threads, it should be ok since people can always report any flagrant posts.
I don’t think that’ll be necessary, but if anyone has an issue with a post or user, we prefer to be alerted by PM. Thank you 
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8.30am
26 January 2017
Offline Beatlebug said
And @QuarryMan I’ll get back to you later… I’m ’bout to fall asleep over here.
To be fair, you don’t have to if you don’t feel like it; I massively regretted typing out a massive paragraph covering so many topics since it’ll just make any discussion take aaaaages Might I suggest we call it even and pick up on a new topic?
I've been up on the mountain, and I've seen his wondrous grace,
I've sat there on the barstool and I've looked him in the face.
He seemed a little haggard, but it did not slow him down,
he was humming to the neon of the universal sound.
9.01am
Moderators
15 February 2015
Offline As much as I hate not getting the last word, I suppose so I just want to point out one thing: I never mentioned student debt forgiveness, or lack thereof. I merely mentioned it as a problem that I wish to avoid, which of course it is for all the reasons you’ve listed. I think you projected your own argument onto mine a bit. 
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