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yronic heroism posted:Speaking of syfy. El Al security is terrible (sorry, Conservagood) enough as it is, with all the blatant racial profiling, without needing to imagine even more atrocious measures.
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May 28, 2013 18:36
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darthbob88 posted:In fairness, I've seen a lot of analysts and articles expressing concern over China's military capabilities, especially the Dong-Feng carrier killer and J-20 stealth fighter. If it comes down to a shooting war, China can probably keep US forces from doing anything west of Hawaii. Even so, the best preparation for war with China is not to ramp up spending, it's to make our defense dollars go further and trim some of the fat in the MIC. If those articles are from defense think tanks I'd not rely on them too hard. It is certainly in the defense industries' interest to play up the threat of China, because, well you don't need a new generation of super carriers or attack subs to beat insurgencies. I've heard both those projects are ages away from being viable and still won't be on par with American tech. Also the Navy is so protective of its carriers if the Chinese military said they were developing a carrier eating giant tiger they'd start pissing themselves.
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May 28, 2013 18:36
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vyelkin posted:It takes a special kind of person to watch a movie with a bad guy whose goal is to take over the planet and exterminate everyone he deems inferior (which is like 99% of humanity) and think "Yeah, you know what? That's the kind of leader we need in real life." That kind of person always believes that they would stand in front of their psychopathic leader and be spared. Like somehow the fact they agree with this ubermench is enough that he wouldn't deem them inferior and they could go off on a magical, genocidal adventure!
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May 28, 2013 18:58
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Not to mention that the whole point was that the character is a warning for "those that fight monsters." The character is literally a throwback from a bygone era that is being used to respond to a threat that the "civilized" future generations can't cope with. To the shock of loving no one, playing with matches starts a wild fire and a minor compromise to the principles of peace and scientific discovery leads to untold destruction. The whole thing is a thinly veiled metaphor and for someone to just completely miss that or even want that is just pretty terrible.
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May 28, 2013 19:13
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Topic is about sales tax.quote:This is ridiculous. Sales tax is not regressive or progressive. "Regression and progression", as they apply to economics and finance, are emotional concepts. I don't even... 
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May 28, 2013 23:08
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Phone posted:Topic is about sales tax. I don't see what's wrong with that. Rich people got to where they are by the following 6-point plan: 1. Toil away at their minimum wage jobs 2. Scrimp and save, making sure not to spend too much money on frivolous things like food 3. Put those extra pennies they didn't spend into a piggy bank 4. Wait one (1) long horizon 5. Here's the fun part: smash open that piggy bank! 6. Go to the store and buy a multinational corporation
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May 28, 2013 23:26
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Long Horizons also allow you to cheat the fine-grain timing like "I lost X this year" and shift it around a little.
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May 28, 2013 23:27
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zoux posted:Well I got in a huge argument with my grandpa and dad about how we should cut defense spending severely and it was the threat of China they used as their main rebuttal. What I keep running into with regards to cutting military spending is that it's supposedly going to wreak havoc on the global economy because it's the US being deployed everywhere that keeps the trade lanes safe.
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May 29, 2013 00:36
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gradenko_2000 posted:What I keep running into with regards to cutting military spending is that it's supposedly going to wreak havoc on the global economy because it's the US being deployed everywhere that keeps the trade lanes safe. This just makes me want to cut our defense spending and become a pirate.
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May 29, 2013 00:48
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Obviously we should bring back privateering!
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May 29, 2013 01:11
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Ghost of Reagan Past posted:Because without the US doing...something...there will be a new golden age of piracy...? The Kriegsmarine are still hiding out in their unterseebooten, waiting for America's oceanic dominance to wane, I guess. WE NEED MORE BATTLESHIPS! 
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May 29, 2013 01:13
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I've debated posting this for a while because I think, at bottom, this guy meant to be positive. Despite that, I felt nothing but revulsion when I read it. This was posted the day after the recent tornadoes in Oklahoma by a facebook friend who's a youth pastor.facebook youth pastor posted:I just find it funny that mentioning the fact that one might be praying for another is politically incorrect until something catastrophic and tragic happens, then everyone wants to turn to prayer... If we would submerge our lives in prayer, yes bad things will continue to happen, but just maybe God would begin again to show mercy on us as people and to our nation. Look, say what you want but if you can't see the fact that the more corrupt and jacked up our country gets and all the sudden we are experiencing historical rise in devastating natural disasters, if you can't put the two together, quoting a man from back in the day, "I pity the fool." People better wake up, everyone always wants to say, where is God in these situations and blame Him for what they feel is His absence. My question is where are you, where you at that God owes so much to you and yours? That's the beauty of it though. He owes us nothing, He paid a price we can't pay back. We owe Him yet He still meets us where we're at and loves us for who we are. All he wants is a relationship with us, some communication. So where you at? Bump the legalism and just call on God in the name of His Son Jesus and find out first hand what He's capable of. "Not a sermon, just a thought."
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May 29, 2013 01:53
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I'm sad that Mr T from Rocky 3 is considered back in the day. This also factors into my impression with "pastors" that they always say terrible things. I don't think type of person cares a lot about Nixon, the Golden Age, slavery, civil rights abuses, Vietnam, imperialism in Central America, etc so I can only assume he is dog whistling progressive social issues as the cause of God's wrath when he talks about recent curruption. Even if given the benefit of the doubt and he is just referring to some vague loss of morality he is totally saying is that if you don't have a communication with God, even though he loves and could save you, he will totally let you and your family be killed by horrendous acts of nature. That's really not very convincing of a modern moral code a lot of people are that interested in. He's also ripping off Lon Solomon's catch phrase which used to get played on the radio here in Northern Virginia radio endlessly. Eggplant Squire fucked around with this message at 02:15 on May 29, 2013 |
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May 29, 2013 02:13
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I would probably this youth pastor is simply looking at it from an observer's perspective and without empathy. I consider myself a functionalist so I try to see everything as "what purpose/good can come from this". This is easy when it is from that outsider's perspective but if you put me into an active engaged member of the situation, I may not feel the same way. If this pastor was placed in that situation, he may not be asking why he did not pray enough.
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May 29, 2013 02:13
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JohnClark posted:All I get when I read this is that the people whose lives were destroyed by this storm had it coming, that they simply didn't love God enough for him to spare them. I find that sentiment disgusting, and yet this post was shared over a dozen times by a pretty diverse group of folks. Is my militant atheism blinding me to the loveliness of this post? It's shared because a bunch of people in this country are victim-blaming assholes. I got the exact same sentiment out of the message. I've also dealt with similar stuff out of a former friend on facebook before over Sandyhook. When I confronted them about how messed up it is to believe in group guilt (I think I might have called it sippenhaft to make my point a little more clear) I only "Well that's what I believe" as if that's an excuse. The idea that a god actually gives a poo poo about arbitrary political boundaries is absurd. Obviously the moral value of a community and its inhabitants changes immediately upon its capture by another country.
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May 29, 2013 03:19
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Seriously, the notion that because people in Alaska, California and New York don't pray enough means God is going to unleash a tornado on Oklahoma that demolishes a school and kills little children because of collective American guilt from turning away from Christianity is either insane, or you believe in a really hosed up, psychopathic God.
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May 29, 2013 04:00
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I've always felt that ancient religions got it right by making their gods selfish, flawed assholes. Once you start worshiping a perfect, omnipotent being who loves you very much but will gently caress you up royally the moment you step out of line a lot of uncomfortable questions start cropping up.
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May 29, 2013 04:04
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The problem of evil and theodicy. I do like the Irenaean explanation that bad things happen so we can conquer them; natural disasters happen so we can learn to stop them, people do bad things so that we can become better people. It still doesn't mean the solution is more prayer, though.
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May 29, 2013 04:21
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JohnClark posted:I've debated posting this for a while because I think, at bottom, this guy meant to be positive. Despite that, I felt nothing but revulsion when I read it. This was posted the day after the recent tornadoes in Oklahoma by a facebook friend who's a youth pastor. I think this is the specific part that most irks me: quote:Look, say what you want but if you can't see the fact that the more corrupt and jacked up our country gets and all the sudden we are experiencing historical rise in devastating natural disasters, if you can't put the two together, quoting a man from back in the day, "I pity the fool." Okay, I will say what I want. If this is truly what you believe, then your version of god is a shallow prick who slaughters the innocent as some sort of mutual punishment for other people's "wrongdoings" according to him, and he's also terrible at enacting change because without a clear line of cause and effect people won't give a poo poo. You know who deserves thanks and recognition and praise? First responders and emergency personnel; scientists who expand our knowledge of weather patterns and climate to improve our ability to forecast severe weather in advance; public funding for emergency broadcast systems to alert the general populace when said severe weather is threatening their homes and lives and communities; charitable individuals who donate time, money, blood, food, or other supplies for people who are displaced because of such storms, and the safety nets we put in place for those victims too. Those are people who make a difference and save lives, not you telling people they should pray more, so stop trying to pretend that whatever flavor of deity you believe in deserves some more attention here. This of course is entirely taking your premise as accurate, not even looking at the logical inconsistencies or the lack of basic comprehension about the difference between correlation and causation. ---- Maybew not the best response if you want to remain on decent terms with the guy instead of blasting him for being an insensitive jerk, but boy is it a dick move to suggest severe weather events are the result of some sort of ambiguous moral failing of other people.
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May 29, 2013 04:25
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darthbob88 posted:The problem of evil and theodicy. I do like the Irenaean explanation that bad things happen so we can conquer them; natural disasters happen so we can learn to stop them, people do bad things so that we can become better people. It still doesn't mean the solution is more prayer, though. Lisbon earthquake
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May 29, 2013 04:26
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Here's another gem I've gotten aggravated about recently.
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May 29, 2013 04:28
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thegalagakid posted:Here's another gem I've gotten aggravated about recently.  I think you're forgetting that when Saint Ronald calls in a strike from the situation room it's heroic, whereas when
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May 29, 2013 04:34
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Phone posted:Topic is about sales tax. quote:You know how the vast majority of the extremely wealthy became extremely wealthy? They spent less than they earned over a long horizon. If we're really talking about "the vast majority", I'm pretty sure the answer is "they were born into it." Good for them for keeping their expenditures below their managed investment income!
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May 29, 2013 05:20
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thegalagakid posted:Here's another gem I've gotten aggravated about recently. Yeah but http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1983_Beirut_barracks_bombing Look at Reagan loving killing out troops then cutting and running.
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May 29, 2013 05:25
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thegalagakid posted:Here's another gem I've gotten aggravated about recently. Reply with this : 
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May 29, 2013 05:30
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evilbastard posted:Reply with this : OH YES
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May 29, 2013 05:32
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evilbastard posted:Reply with this :  There's really no better comeback than that.
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May 29, 2013 05:35
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thegalagakid posted:Here's another gem I've gotten aggravated about recently. Uh, if bombing the ever-living crap out of said leader and helping a rebellion to overthrow him counts as an "apology", sure.  (By the by, does anyone have a good run-down explaining how the intervention didn't cause Benghazi?)
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May 29, 2013 05:46
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I wish Obama really had gone on an apology tour.
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May 29, 2013 05:57
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Gen. Ripper posted:Uh, if bombing the ever-living crap out of said leader and helping a rebellion to overthrow him counts as an "apology", sure. Right-wing pundits are actually correct on that- they just got a bit confused. You see, Obama's favorite drone is named "Apology". It's been touring around the Middle East for years now! 
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May 29, 2013 06:06
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TerminalSaint posted:I wish Obama really had gone on an apology tour. I would have bought the t-shirt.
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May 29, 2013 06:09
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Anniversary posted:Because the author himself didn't either and refuses to accept that interpretation. What?! It's not even subtext, it's text, his shadow government handlers explicitly discuss his psychopathy and how it is useful to their ends. They call him a psychopath. He flips out and kills two kids in the course of the book! He has repeated nightmares that develop into waking hallucinations. He shuts down and goes into a semi-catatonic state twice. Ender is intentionally written as a mentally broken person; the government broke him on purpose to create the perfect general for their genocidal mission. It's all there in the text. I get that people want to will away that part and just read a story about a kid who was the best at winning, but I can't believe the author refuses a straight read of the text as an "interpretation." I can only guess that Card got crazy in his old age and somehow wants to deny all the things that are plain to see on the page. darthbob88 posted:In fairness, I've seen a lot of analysts and articles expressing concern over China's military capabilities, especially the Dong-Feng carrier killer and J-20 stealth fighter. If it comes down to a shooting war, China can probably keep US forces from doing anything west of Hawaii. Even so, the best preparation for war with China is not to ramp up spending, it's to make our defense dollars go further and trim some of the fat in the MIC. You've seen a lot of analysts and articles that don't know a whole lot about China, but they do know what side their bread is buttered on. The military and defense industry will always urge the public to give them more money and buy more weapons, stop falling for it. Arglebargle III fucked around with this message at 09:41 on May 29, 2013 |
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May 29, 2013 09:37
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Arglebargle III posted:What?! It's not even subtext, it's text, his shadow government handlers explicitly discuss his psychopathy and how it is useful to their ends. They call him a psychopath. He flips out and kills two kids in the course of the book! He has repeated nightmares that develop into waking hallucinations. He shuts down and goes into a semi-catatonic state twice. Ender is intentionally written as a mentally broken person; the government broke him on purpose to create the perfect general for their genocidal mission. It's all there in the text. I get that people want to will away that part and just read a story about a kid who was the best at winning, but I can't believe the author refuses a straight read of the text as an "interpretation." In retrospect, I can't remember what exactly Card's commentary on Ender was in the Game era, so it might not be fair for me to have thrown that accusation at him. But if you read literary analysis of Ender's Game they often bring up how Ender is constantly portrayed as the blameless victim who doesn't know what he did, so I might have mistakenly assumed that was Card's actual view of Ender then. He did definitely bring up the bit about Speaker of the Dead Ender being an some sort of ideal family figure according to some psychologists. Also that he didn't write Ender's fight scenes in Game as graphically violent, that's just how people imagine them. I hadn't read the book when I attended the speech, but looking back it was a lot of 
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May 29, 2013 11:33
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Fandyien posted:I have a conservative friend who believes if we cut any military funding they will literally sail over here on ships and invade. But what about our 2nd Amendment freedoms? Surely if our guns allow us to can stand up to tyranny and the most powerful army on Earth, we can defeat some lousy 2nd rate Red Chinese army.
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May 29, 2013 11:42
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I've since helped her out, but I wanted to show you guys something along these lines that hit me pretty hard. I've got a gastrointestinal stromal tumor. It's a somewhat rare kind of cancer that's super treatable. Like with any medical thing, there are a few really great internet communities that have helped tremendously. quote:There are rumors circulating that, under Obamacare, cancer patients will be denied treatment after the age of 76. Snopes claims this to be untrue, but I personally do not trust Snopes. Does anyone out there have information on this? This woman is seventy years old, lives in Virginia, and isn't trying to make a political point. She's legit wondering if the new law is going to mandate that she not receive treatment and certain people have poisoned the well so goddamn badly that she can't research it on her own. People are consciously lying to elderly cancer patients because that fear is profitable. It's easy to laugh at dumb forwards, I do it all the time, but also remember that they come from some lovely, dark places.
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May 29, 2013 13:49
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My favorite part about the "extremely wealthy" thing is that most people have no loving idea what kind of incomes exist at the top. There's folks who make more in a week than I probably will in my entire life. The idea that savings is what produces wealth, leaving aside the insanity of believing that savings actually helps the economy, is disconnected from reality.
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May 29, 2013 14:00
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Arglebargle III posted:What?! It's not even subtext, it's text, his shadow government handlers explicitly discuss his psychopathy and how it is useful to their ends. They call him a psychopath. He flips out and kills two kids in the course of the book! He has repeated nightmares that develop into waking hallucinations. He shuts down and goes into a semi-catatonic state twice. Ender is intentionally written as a mentally broken person; the government broke him on purpose to create the perfect general for their genocidal mission. It's all there in the text. I get that people want to will away that part and just read a story about a kid who was the best at winning, but I can't believe the author refuses a straight read of the text as an "interpretation." You have to remember that while Card really is an incredibly good writer with a genuine talent for the trade, he's also loving nuts, and that comes through in his writing a lot - what you see in the text probably isn't what he saw when writing it. One of his other works is called the 'Homecoming Series', and it's a sci-fi novelization of the Book of Mormon. Weird enough by itself, of course, but the strangest part is that in the first book of the trilogy, when the protagonists are still on their home planet, one major element of the story is that their entire planet is controlled by an omniscient, omnipotent, micromanaging, and very fickle and insane AI with the ability to read minds and even directly manipulate people's thoughts. This AI intentionally keeps human technological and scientific development suppressed and literally expunges dissenting opinions directly from people's minds; the people on the planet are basically living in a Bronze Age society, not because they choose to or because they lack the ability to advance any further, but because the master computer is actively, forcibly keeping them stagnant through what amounts to invasive mind control. Sounds like a dystopian novel, doesn't it? Nope, not to the author. Card treats this as a completely, unambiguously good thing. This is supposed to be a depiction of a Utopia, a near-Eden that the protagonists are forced to leave - not to flee the AI, but to search for parts to repair it, because it's beginning to become less powerful as it deteriorates with age. Walter posted:But what about our 2nd Amendment freedoms? Surely if our guns allow us to can stand up to tyranny and the most powerful army on Earth, we can defeat some lousy 2nd rate Red Chinese army. You'd think so, especially considering how many on the right seem to jerk off to Red Dawn fantasies all the time. A lot of the time it sounds like they want the US to be invaded so they'll have a justifiable reason to run off into the woods and shoot people. At the same time, though, I think a lot of the gun nuts and the warmongers are, deep down, just massive cowards who are loving terrified of everything in the world and need to shelter behind layers upon layers of protection in order to feel safe enough to function. The huge stockpiles of guns they tend to amass are one part of that, a kind of physical, tangible security blanket they can see and directly interact with that helps to calm the crippling everyday fear - but that alone is not enough to fully salve their terror at the 'encroaching' Red Menace and/or Muslim Menace and/or (for the older folks) Russian Menace, all of which they assume we are always permanently at the brink of war with, and all of which they assume are both willing and able to invade the US mainland in force at any time. They are convinced that there are enemies at the gates, and they won't feel safe without being sheltered by a numberless horde of gatekeepers armed with the fanciest and prettiest weapons in the world and funded so generously that they're literally drowning in cash.
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May 29, 2013 14:05
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Anniversary posted:In retrospect, I can't remember what exactly Card's commentary on Ender was in the Game era, so it might not be fair for me to have thrown that accusation at him. But if you read literary analysis of Ender's Game they often bring up how Ender is constantly portrayed as the blameless victim who doesn't know what he did, so I might have mistakenly assumed that was Card's actual view of Ender then. There's also some criticism about Ender's Game being Holocaust/genocide apologism: Sympathy for a Superman http://peachfront.diaryland.com/enderhitlte.html Creating the Innocent Killer http://www4.ncsu.edu/~tenshi/Killer_000.htm and the famous, moderately related Orson Scott Card has Always Been an Asshat http://www.kuro5hin.org/story/2005/5/28/22428/7034 OSC has been scum long before his homophobia and misogyny was made toxic by societal shifts.
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May 29, 2013 14:30
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Gourd of Taste posted:This woman is seventy years old, lives in Virginia, and isn't trying to make a political point. She's legit wondering if the new law is going to mandate that she not receive treatment and certain people have poisoned the well so goddamn badly that she can't research it on her own. People are consciously lying to elderly cancer patients because that fear is profitable.
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May 29, 2013 15:47
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Mister Bates posted:You have to remember that while Card really is an incredibly good writer with a genuine talent for the trade, he's also loving nuts, and that comes through in his writing a lot - what you see in the text probably isn't what he saw when writing it. One of his other works is called the 'Homecoming Series', and it's a sci-fi novelization of the Book of Mormon. Weird enough by itself, of course, but the strangest part is that in the first book of the trilogy, when the protagonists are still on their home planet, one major element of the story is that their entire planet is controlled by an omniscient, omnipotent, micromanaging, and very fickle and insane AI with the ability to read minds and even directly manipulate people's thoughts. This AI intentionally keeps human technological and scientific development suppressed and literally expunges dissenting opinions directly from people's minds; the people on the planet are basically living in a Bronze Age society, not because they choose to or because they lack the ability to advance any further, but because the master computer is actively, forcibly keeping them stagnant through what amounts to invasive mind control. Ha, I actually really liked that series. It's good, character driven sci-fi. And to be fair, it was a bronze age society with computers, lasers and hover wheelchairs but no wheel. The concept was that the god computer prevented technologies that would lead to mechanized warfare. I read it before I knew Card was a crazy right wing Mormon and the setting didn't strike me as odd, in the context of sci-fi world building, and mostly what I got out of it was that Card has an extremely low opinion of human beings in general.
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May 29, 2013 16:29
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