It's all a matter of scale. by Fremdfirma

REAL WORLD EVENT DISCUSSIONS

It's all a matter of scale.

POSTED BY: FREMDFIRMA
UPDATED: Thursday, December 30, 2010 18:21
SHORT URL:
VIEWED: 2087
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Monday, December 27, 2010 7:57 AM

Scale, and perceived legitmacy, that is.

Am posting this sans more commentary at the moment, cause I gotta clean up the remains of a schism due to the biz equivalent of a palace coup, since I refused to take money or orders from jackboots and others don't seem to care about ethics when fat wads of cash are in the offering....

But I do, even evil has standards, after all.

-Frem
PS. Yes, I got something of a *personal* gripe concerning Nicaragua, thanks for noticing, really... I might even explain, later.

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Monday, December 27, 2010 1:20 PM

CANTTAKESKY

ROFL. I love Schoolhouse Rock, esp this kind.

Can't Take (my gorram) Sky
------
Everything I say is just my opinion, not fact.

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Monday, December 27, 2010 2:00 PM

AURAPTOR

America loves a winner!

What a gorram load of go se.

" I do not love the bright sword for its sharpness, nor the arrow for its swiftness, nor the warrior for his glory. I love only that which they defend. "

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Monday, December 27, 2010 8:53 PM

FREMDFIRMA

Pftth, all the denial in the world doesn't change nasty realities, Rappy - only action can do that, and the first step is recognizing and admitting what the facts are, and your failure to ever do that, nor take responsibility for your inaction is why I have so little respect for you.

As for the security biz, that coulda gone a lot uglier than it did save for the fact that little miss moppet has apparently learned somewhere along the way the value of song as a psychological effect, which is odd since she'll still prettymuch disappear into the wallpaper when nasty feelings get aired - I was kinda willing to "paint the walls" with a couple of em and on the verge of doin just that, which wouldn't have helped the situation a bit, but while slow to burn I *do* have a temper...

And she starts singing "True Colors" from behind the filing cabinet.

So I pitched my uniform jacket at em and walked the hell out, bout a third of em came with me, and so it goes - three of our clients sided with me too, so it ain't like imma be unemployed, hell, long as theres a handful of people on earth, end of the day, someone is gonna want someone else stomped, ergo I doubt I'll ever go hungry, but still, the principle of the thing irks the hell out of me, the malice people are willing to stoop to for mere money, as if money makes those horrible memories which crash down on you in the depths of the night with the weight of all your sins go away, yeahhh... right.

Honestly no curse I could lay to em is any worse than what they'll do to themselves - it just didn't really do wonders for my mental state coming on the heels of watching yet another segment of my familys endless cycle of savagery and self-destruction which leaves so few survivors it's a wonder the line continues at all.

So we stopped at the Grange on the way back so she could have some fun at the family dance whilst I grumbled about the state of humanity into a mug of beer with local farmers of similar mein, who commisserated a bit.

And now she's baking muffins with her scientifically precise method, as she's yet to realize cooking is more art than science, and exact measurements don't mean exact results, but hey, muffins... only I wish to hell she wouldn't try to cheer me up with some of the most nerve-grating stuff imagineable, although damned if imma TELL her how much that song annoys me.

Cause, yanno, *somebody* oughta be happy, right?

-Frem
I do not serve the Blind God.

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Tuesday, December 28, 2010 7:12 AM

ANTHONYT

Freedom is Important because People are Important

Quote:
Originally posted by AURaptor:

What a gorram load of go se.

" I do not love the bright sword for its sharpness, nor the arrow for its swiftness, nor the warrior for his glory. I love only that which they defend. "

Hello,

Perhaps you'd care to point out articles where the educational video misrepresented the facts?

-Anthony

Assured by friends that the signal-to-noise ratio has improved on this forum, I have disabled web filtering.

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Tuesday, December 28, 2010 8:12 AM

WULFENSTAR

http://youtu.be/VUnGTXRxGHg

Frems video actually made a good point.

Where we screwed up (and by we, I mean the U.S.) is by trying to be an empire. By trying to control the world. Trying to head off threats before they became threats.

Ya'll know me, ya'll know I'm strictly against foreign entanglements.

We need to get out of other peoples business, unless they represent a clear and present danger.

But that part gets hazy. Does a nuclear North Korea represent a danger to us? Maybe.

Does a broken Somalia represent danger to us? Probably not.

Lets be completely open here. There is no country, no government, no group of people ON EARTH that can come over and occupy us. Its just not within the realm of possibility. Not Russia, not Korea, not China... noone.

"Cus we've got the bomb." Dennis Leary

What can be done, however, is influence the people to hand over our soverignty.

4 planes didn't cripple our liberties... we did that to ourselves.

"Hope is a good thing, maybe the best of things, and no good thing ever dies"

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Tuesday, December 28, 2010 9:01 AM

FREMDFIRMA

Fuck "The Bomb", it's more a matter of no one in their right freakin mind would invade - not only would every gangbanger, gun bunny, crazed militia, right wing nutwad and mall ninja wannabe all gang up on them, our very culture would drive them batshit insane...

Do you have ANY IDEA how bad it would wig someone from another culture if we turned on every TV we had and maxed the volume dial all at once ?

And that ain't the half of it, we would, quite literally, drive them right out of their minds, just by being who we are, and on top of that, much as we all hate each others guts, we all hate the idea of some foreign goons takin over even WORSE, they couldn't take America with a million troops, not ten million, for the same reason we can't take Afghanistan - cause you'd have to fight EVERYBODY, and the ones not fighting you at the moment would be building car bombs, sabotaging your equipment, stealing your supplies and generally fucking with you in every humanly possible way, in combination with tremendously devastating psychological and cultural warfare.

Not to mention we're prideful, stubborn and just won't quit, even when it's really obvious we're hosed - look how long it took us to get out of vietnam, how foolishly we're clinging to lost causes in the middle east, that'd be ten times, a hundred times WORSE with home field advantage and a war-machine infrastructure distributed so thickly that we could build military equipment and throw it at em with catapults and STILL bury them.

Rest of the world knows this, folks, it's frankly not possible, nor desirable, to engage us that way - the only way to destroy us is to bait us into strangling ourselves economically, socially, and politically by a combination of halfass imperialism, an all consuming warfare-welfare complex and a security state that eventually collapses into itself and sucks the nation with it, kind like what happened to the Soviet Union, who are no doubt laughing up their sleeves at us while THEY ship weapons to Afghanistan this time around and watch us repeat their own demise.

Our greatest enemy these days isn't some band of ragtag shit talking morons several thousand miles away, no air force, no navy, and no ability to really harm us in any *significant* kind of way to begin with - and it's sure as shit not some dipshit country with a single warhead and no delivery system which can even REACH us even if they were stupid enough to provoke a bunch of the most triggerhappy fuckers on the planet into dumping a couple MIRVS on their ass....

Nope, our greatest enemy is our own so-called protectors and their increasingly lunatic schemes to grab more power and relevance even at the expense of everything they were ever supposed to be protecting in the first goddamn place.

All the bad guys gotta do is keep poking the beast, till it destroys itself in its frantic flailing while trying to smash a gnat with a sledgehammer - it is the very act of taking these shits so seriously that enables them, that gives them power, making them big, scary "international terrorists", booga-booga, instead of treating them like the common criminals they are.

Fuck that, you wanna hurt em, stop being AFRAID of them, fuck em, LAUGH IN THEIR FACES, make them irrelevant, futile, and then help those who might have supported them cast them out themselves, without condition or exploitation, without repeating the wrongs we've done in the past.

But then, eventually we *WILL* have to deal with our own so-called protectors, and I've no pleasant answer for that, cause there isn't one, they will not back down, and if we choose not to tolerate their misconduct, that will get ugly, very ugly, very quickly.

-Frem

I do not serve the Blind God.

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Wednesday, December 29, 2010 4:59 AM

AURAPTOR

America loves a winner!

Quote:
Originally posted by AnthonyT:
Quote:
Originally posted by AURaptor:

What a gorram load of go se.

" I do not love the bright sword for its sharpness, nor the arrow for its swiftness, nor the warrior for his glory. I love only that which they defend. "

Hello,

Perhaps you'd care to point out articles where the educational video misrepresented the facts?

-Anthony

One does not need " articles " to poke holes in the false premises this silly cartoon promotes.

Equating the collection of taxes to the acts of a pirate or thief is beyond absurd. While there are abuses by gov't on what it takes and under what pretenses, there is a positive function served, when gov't is run properly.

No such claim can be made when pirates or thieves take from others and offer nothing in return.

After that, the one sided treatment of the fight w/ communists in the western hemisphere smacks of the worst sort of propaganda. Much like what we see today, where US troops are accused of routinely targeting civilians, on purpose.

A heinous act of distortion and lies.

" I do not love the bright sword for its sharpness, nor the arrow for its swiftness, nor the warrior for his glory. I love only that which they defend. "

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Wednesday, December 29, 2010 6:02 AM

CANTTAKESKY

Quote:
Originally posted by AURaptor:
there is a positive function served, when gov't is run properly.

I've never seen the govt run properly.

And also, not true of thieves and pirates that they don't serve a "positive" function. When they steal money, they spend it. Much like "trickle down" economics, piracy distributes wealth to populations who otherwise would not get any.

Can't Take (my gorram) Sky
------
Everything I say is just my opinion, not fact.

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Wednesday, December 29, 2010 6:11 AM

ANTHONYT

Freedom is Important because People are Important

Hello,

Admittedly not a pirate... but the mafia man and the government will offer you the same deal.

Pay us protection money.

As for fighting Communism in the Western Hemisphere, if you are not wholly disgusted by the actions of the U.S. government via the CIA under the auspices of 'fighting Communism' then you are most likely ill-informed.

I cannot stress enough how harmful, self-defeating, and often impotent the U.S. was in its fight against Communism. I believe if you reach out and learn the facts of the matter, you will be horrified, as I was, at the gross incompetence and negative impact of our government in that battle. A battle, incidentally, which may not have ever needed to be fought.

--Anthony

Assured by friends that the signal-to-noise ratio has improved on this forum, I have disabled web filtering.

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Wednesday, December 29, 2010 7:43 AM

RAHLMACLAREN

"Damn yokels, can't even tell a transport ship ain't got no guns on it." - Jayne Cobb

Quote:
Originally posted by AURaptor:
No such claim can be made when pirates or thieves take from others and offer nothing in return.

Professor Raptor, please remind the class of what we get from our Gov't in return.

--------------------------------------------------
Find here the Serenity you seek. -Tara Maclay

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Wednesday, December 29, 2010 9:56 AM

HKCAVALIER

See, the thing is: people who grow up in abusive families learn that the abuse is the price they pay for the benefits they get from the arrangement. Those in power (at first parents, later a nation's government) are special--different from us (at first children, later childish citizens). They're different because they face all manner of risks so we don't have to. Sound familiar?

For people who think along these lines, the government = the military. This is something I see a lot of lefties not quite understanding. You ask a person who thinks like this, "When has government ever run properly?" and they will think, though they may not tell you: when the government defeated Communism or Nazism, on the shores of Iwo Jima or Normandy, etc. That's why Reagan is a god to these people: he defeated Communism, don'tcha know. For some, even the success/failure of one of our wars is immaterial. It's far more important THAT we went to war with the particular evil doer--gave it our all, suffered terrible losses--than whether or not such ventures are effective or economically sound (side bar: to such a person, folk complaining about how much a war costs are beneath contempt).

It's very hard, unless you have been yourself targeted by your military to question the righteousness of that military--about as hard as a child of six, say, recognizing that her father, who so far as she knows has only beat the shit out of strangers, is a bastard. Interestingly, of course, many ex-military are also anti-military, because the military invariably targets its own, one way or another.

That's the difference between the pirate and the emperor: the emperor is your dad and the pirate wants to hurt your dad. When you're a member of a crime family, then: the pirate is your dad and the emperor wants to hurt your dad.

You won't have a minute's success arguing with such people.

Hey fellow Anarchists and Anarchist-symps! What was it that did it for you? When did you first learn that not only had the Emperor no clothes, but that he didn't really care if you lived or died either?

For me it was when I found out that my father simply threw away all the drawings and other artwork that I'd kept as a kind of personal history since I could first hold a crayon or wield a pair of round-edged scissors. I'd drawn and made art all my life and kept samples from every period of my creativity in 3 drawers in my bedroom until I went away to college and my dad chucked it all.

My father and I had had a falling out because I didn't call him from college as often as he'd expected. The man had something of an iron grasp on me when I lived at home--friendless, girlfriendless, never had occasion to go anywhere that he didn't know about--he needed that kind of control, because I knew (though I wasn't really even aware of it at the time) secrets that could get my father fired or even in serious trouble with the law (or so he believed). He needed to know that I hadn't turned on him and so needed to hear my sympathetic voice on the phone, oh say, once or twice a week.

But I found that when I got to college, the last thing in the world I wanted to do was call my dad. I never understood why he couldn't be content with calling me--which he did, usually in a rage because I hadn't called him. But me calling him would have given him the assurance that he still ran things in my life, still was safe.

So, in retaliation, though he denied it vociferously, my dad destroyed everything in those 3 drawers with the excuse that he was moving out of our house and he "didn't think" I wanted it anymore. Though I knew by then that my family was pretty "wacko" it took this astonishing act of destruction to flip the switch and get me to see: hey, maybe I could do with some therapy right about now to deal with this.

And then therapy pretty much closed the door on my "fusion with the abuser" for good and all.

Anyone else? When did you become an Anarchist?

HKCavalier

Hey, hey, hey, don't be mean. We don't have to be mean, because, remember, no matter where you go, there you are.

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Wednesday, December 29, 2010 10:02 AM

WULFENSTAR

http://youtu.be/VUnGTXRxGHg

I'm not an Anarchist... but I see the value in some of their beliefs.

Same way I feel about DemoLibs, and ReligoRepubs.

"Hope is a good thing, maybe the best of things, and no good thing ever dies"

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Wednesday, December 29, 2010 10:10 AM

HKCAVALIER

This one's just for you, Wulf. I believe in this video, you and I can find common cause:

HKCavalier

Hey, hey, hey, don't be mean. We don't have to be mean, because, remember, no matter where you go, there you are.

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Wednesday, December 29, 2010 11:11 AM

WULFENSTAR

http://youtu.be/VUnGTXRxGHg

I just threw up in my mouth a little bit... and had to swallow it.

Thanks, HK you sonuvabitch.

Respect authority? Since when?

"Hope is a good thing, maybe the best of things, and no good thing ever dies"

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Wednesday, December 29, 2010 11:30 AM

FREMDFIRMA

Ok, that vid completely creeps me out, and I don't think I need to explain why, but I shall do so anyway, cause I think it matters.

Remember, I've gotten to see what *happens* to kids who even QUESTION, much less fail to subserviently respect, that kind of authority and those who wield it - in fact the first fatality VI ever suffered was in attempt to retrieve a kid sent to a "deprogramming" facility for the evils of literature and heavy metal by his grandparents, who would up chained by one hand to a desk in a clapboard shack with insufficient lighting and sanitation arrangements, forced to memorize scripture in exchange for the minimal amounts of bread and water which was his only sustenance - when his parents found out, they freaked, but no one would *DO* any goddamn thing since our laws don't hardly consider children human and the grandparents had money and influence.

So in desperation the parents went to the dark side, and found us, just as we were coming into our own - trying to become something other than a pack of saboteurs and vandals, fighting a form of madness which was so far from the public consciousness to even mention it was to be dismissed as a conspiracy theorist.

Due to the issue of custody, back then when we'd raid one of these places we would have social services show up simultaneously so that they could take custody of the minor, saving endless legal hassle of trying to get a temp-custody or other legal order, that way they could inspect the place, maybe even shut it down, while we got the primary out of there and back into the hands of the supportive end of their family - again, we were trying to go legit, more fool us, I suppose.

As is all too common with the small towns affiliated with these places, the local law enforcement and social services were in cahoots with them, something which we didn't have so much awareness of the time, and the social services people rolled us, pulled a no-show, and the bastards opened fire on us when we showed up.
When the police finally got there, mostly cause there was some return fire and there were gonna be questions, it wound up going down on paper as a tragic misunderstanding, mistaken intentions and identity, and shoved under the rug, otherwise they were gonna have to arrest a damn lot of people, even some of their own, and things were nasty enough cause the incident drew too many people to keep the horrible conditions of the place quiet.

Heaven only knows how that might have went if two of us hadn't been packing, legally or not, and it really brought home just what a damn fool idea it was to try to play by the rules of the bastards who rigged the system to begin with, needless to say the idea of going legit went down with one of our own that day.
As for the facility, it did get shut down, and the Promise Keepers wanted my freakin head for that, still do, far as I know, and as for the kid - his name is Justin, and he's now the one in charge of VI.

You think about the horrors I have seen in the name of that kind of authority and the ones who wield power in it's name, stuff so ugly just *describing* it to you could mentally harm you, and ponder that I look at those kids and feel a deep and terrible sadness that some day I may have to do harm unto them, to prevent them from doing harm unto others, who chose NOT to respect an authority so brutal, sadistic and bloodthirsty I consider it one of the prime evils of the world.

Every advancement we've ever made, every step forward towards enlightenment in any way - has come from an act of heresy, questioning authority, questioning the way things are, it is our very ability to *do* that which brought us civilization in the first place, which is IMHO only a first step upon the path, and not it's finale.
And on the other side, often crushing those heretics into paste, breaking them on the wheel, was "Authority".

So my feelings about this are little different than if they were wearing brown shirts and doing the ole sig-heil, hurt and sadness, combined with rage at those who taught them this meme, because I know where it goes.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Wave_%28novel%29

-Frem

I do not serve the Blind God.

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Wednesday, December 29, 2010 12:33 PM

FREMDFIRMA

When did I become an Anarchist ?

Well, hell, one can almost say I was born one - I think the exact moment though was when I stabbed my father in the leg with a steak knife for smacking my mother around, and then refused to meekly drop the knife and surrender, that bastard was gonna HAVE to take it from me, I might not have understood what "Molon Labe!" meant at around five or six, but I damn sure had the concept down pat, at which point he took a header for a decade and then some.

What really codified it though was the sheer malice of the public school society and structure, from the idea that I should be nasty to people who were a little different cause their skin was darker (a concept I felt was so flaming STUPID it caused me to start thinking adults in general were morons) to having to be all but force-fed political and religous beliefs I felt were either flat out lies.. ("And justice for all ?" HA, since when do kids get justice?) or downright wicked, like the fact that the meanest, nastiest, most hateful people I knew were all the church-goin, bible-pounding types, might not have been able to spell hypocrisy but I damn sure knew what it was, and I hated it, hated them, and hated "their god" with a burning passion as purely as only a child can hate.

I refused to say the pledge, mind you, which started a hell of a row, but as my mother was supportive it was eventually accepted I did not have to - this was in 1978, and yet we *STILL* bash people who refuse to spout that fascist crap.
http://nmisscommentor.com/law/lawyer-jailed-by-chancellor-for-failing-
to-rise-and-recite-pledge-of-allegiance/
Believe me, when I see a kid these days also refuse, I tend to leap quickly to their defense...

Later that year, some kid who had been bullied quite badly stood off those three punks (who were much larger and tougher, having been held back a grade) with a teensy little pocketknife, who then ran to the principal and ratted him out for this, who despite dismissing their aggression as just boys being boys, was right quick to confiscate that kids weapon and punish him severely (don't even get me started on corporal punishment in school, just fekkin don't.) and on the heels of that the same punks cornered him in a stairwell soon after...
And kicked him to death.
Of course, that went down as an accident, boys being boys, just roughousing that got out of hand, yeah, right, sure - if you care to look it up, that incident is in the 1978 NEA report on school violence which indicated that if the current atmosphere and situation continued, eventually some kid was gonna bring a gun to school and start shooting people, not that any damn body listened.
Me, I saw that as the authorities being knowingly and intentionally complicit in a murder, in fact I suffered a three day suspension for CALLING them murderers over it, something which likely provoked the same trio to later throw *my* ass down the stairs next AND follow it with a thorough stomping which sent puny little me to the emergency room.

It came clear to me then that the real "crime" of the now-deceased wasn't even possession or use of a weapon, but defiance of a social order that I had already decided in my own mind was disgusting, evil, vile...
I guess my mother felt the same way, because after being rebuffed by the "authorities" when trying to have something done, and then flat TOLD by the principal that the victim would ALWAYS get the blame cause it was easier to deal with one irate parent than six irate parents... she bought me my first real blade, not some toy or tool, but a small dagger, a weapon with no other purpose but to fuck people up.(1)

And the NEXT time those shitheels went after me, right after school, on school grounds (which I wrote a couple editorials about, given how many kids DIE that way, disarmed and left swinging at the windy corner by folk who fail to protect them cause it's "after hours") they got a hard lesson of the needin-stitches variety, and I got expelled, cause how dare I not obey the social order and just take the beating, right ?

And that was prettymuch the final nail, right there, if society was gonna make itself my enemy, I would be societys enemy, it was only much later that I decided to broaden the scale of that and try to change things for the better instead of simple retaliation and destruction, choosing to try rehabilitating it rather than taking revenge upon it - and even that started as "You will do to NO ONE ELSE, what you have done to me!".

(1) - in my mothers defense here, she was at the end of her wits, with a child who'd already stood to power, blade in hand, and was never, EVER going to be really welcome in the society he was going to have to live in, and all attempts to resolve the matter elsewise had gotten nothing but sweat and regret for her, and further harrassment for me, so what option did she really have but to support was was inevitably *going to happen anyway*, really ?

Mind you, this is also one reason I am so rabid about the concept of armed self-defense, cause it removes force from the equation as a method of persuasion - you *had* to reason with me, cause if I cared enough about something, no amount of force you could bring to bear, short of beating me unconscious was gonna deter me whatever.

Eventually this notion got across to my so-called "peers", and I was left very strictly, and very literally, ALONE - no one would speak to me, come near me, or associate with any way, since I didn't play by their "rules", spoken and unspoken, they didn't want any part of me - it was only in the last two years of high school that even other outcasts found me barely tolerable, at which point I caused all manner of chaos by creating a new social group and including everyone who wanted to be included, something the administration found utterly intolerable, and I found them utterly intolerable, and used a loophole to score a GED at sixteen just to be done with them and their bullshit.

At which point I had to dodge the fucking truant cops to get to my day job, and the damn curfew cops to get to my night shift, leaving me once again in an adversarial position with a society I had no respect for, which itself had utterly none for me.
And I swore oath to myself that I would never, EVER forget this, not one bloody moment of it, every harm, hurt or insult, every ounce of disrespect visited upon me by the "adult" world would be stored crystal clear so that I would always remember why I do many of the things I do, why they MATTER so much.

Cause they do, but most people start mentally blocking it out the moment they hit "the magic number" and try to purge those painful memories, or forget them, and in doing so, as always happens when folks forget the lessons of history, both external and internal, they repeat the same goddamn mistakes - denial is the solder which holds together the chain of violence, the endless cycle of self-destruction.

For me, Anarchism wasn't just an answer, it was the ONLY answer, the only way I was ever gonna survive a world which never wanted me, never accepted me, and which tolerates me at all only because I refuse to simply bend knee or go away, and thus it mostly ignores me and tries to pretend I don't exist, that I can not exist, cause what would people be, without someone to tell them what to do, right ?
Which I have found much of the time to be very useful.

Quote:
The greatest trick the Devil ever pulled was convincing the world he didn't exist.
-Verbal Kint

-Frem

I do not serve the Blind God.

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Wednesday, December 29, 2010 12:36 PM

FREMDFIRMA

Quote:
Originally posted by AURaptor:
Equating the collection of taxes to the acts of a pirate or thief is beyond absurd. While there are abuses by gov't on what it takes and under what pretenses, there is a positive function served, when gov't is run properly.

No such claim can be made when pirates or thieves take from others and offer nothing in return.

And yet, while you're all in defense of those damn taxes, and paying and paying and paying them - when folks want WHAT THEY PAID FOR in return, you scream a fit.

How in the HELL does that make any kind of *sense*, Rappy ?

-Frem

I do not serve the Blind God.

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Wednesday, December 29, 2010 1:24 PM

CANTTAKESKY

Quote:
Originally posted by Wulfenstar:
Thanks, HK you sonuvabitch.

In fact, I was riding the bus today, got all introspective, remembered something HK said, and thought exactly the same thing: "Thanks, HK, you sonuavabitch."

(I should put that in my signature.)

That video made me think of They Live, and Eric Cartman, and Kenny.

My 10 year old grimaced and said, "It sounds like they're singing, 'Go to jail. It rocks.'" One of those times when I'm SO glad that fruit didn't fall far from the tree.

Can't Take (my gorram) Sky
------
Everything I say is just my opinion, not fact.

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Wednesday, December 29, 2010 1:38 PM

CANTTAKESKY

Quote:
Originally posted by HKCavalier:
Anyone else? When did you become an Anarchist?

Mine was a gradual path.

I loved Civil Disobedience when I read it in high school. The first line was, "Wow. Holy wow."

Quote:
I HEARTILY ACCEPT the motto, — "That government is best which governs least";(1) and I should like to see it acted up to more rapidly and systematically. Carried out, it finally amounts to this, which also I believe, — "That government is best which governs not at all"; and when men are prepared for it, that will be the kind of government which they will have.

Then I forgot about it and became a social worker. After 2 years working with the poorest of the poor (using both private and public programs), I became extremely disillusioned with the "redistribution of wealth." I was convinced public welfare very rarely helps poor people. It only keeps them satisfied just enough to stay on *this* side of a revolution. It is a system of appeasement to keep slavery in place.

That's when I started exploring libertarian ideas. That naturally moved into anarchism, which did not seem feasible to me for the longest time. Then a fellow anarchist said to me, "I believe that we were born free, and that we are meant to be free. If that is the truth, then there MUST be a way for us to live as free persons. We've just been so conditioned to obey that we can't see that truth."

Again, it hit home, like Thoreau's pronouncement. I have come full circle. I'm an anarchist, and proud of it.

Can't Take (my gorram) Sky
------
Everything I say is just my opinion, not fact.

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Thursday, December 30, 2010 8:47 AM

FREMDFIRMA

Yanno, imma expound on this, cause of yet another ridiculous incident today...

Ponder for a moment how YOU feel about the TSA personnel in an airport (and soon enough subway and bus stations, then street corners) and their ability to arbitrarily grope you and root through your stuff.
Don't like it much, do you ?
Especially since there's jack shit you can do about it, and resistance will not only get you arrested, but all the while your so-called "peers" are fucking cheering them on, kind of a nasty, hateful, misanthropic feeling starting to brew in there behind your eyes, innit ?
And of course, the notion that some badge bearing punk can rough you up with virtual impunity isn't all that damn far from a principal who has a paddle and a grudge, is it now...
So hows it taste to be treated the way we treat our youth, hmm ?

Now consider that kids and teens face that *ALL THE TIME*.
This mornings reported incident was of the usual ludicrous stripe, some girl with a paring knife in her lunchbox to cut an apple with.
http://www.wral.com/news/local/story/8845676/
But here's the rub, the part worth noting.

Quote:
Ashley Smithwick, 17, of Sanford, was suspended from Southern Lee High School in October after school personnel found a small paring knife in her lunchbox.

Smithwick said personnel found the knife while searching the belongings of several students, possibly looking for drugs.

“She got pulled into it. She doesn’t have to be a bad person to be searched,” Smithwick’s father, Joe Smithwick, said.

The lunchbox really belonged to Joe Smithwick, who packs a paring knife to slice his apple. He and his daughter have matching lunchboxes.

“It’s just an honest mistake. That was supposed to be my lunch because it was a whole apple,” he said.

Ashley Smithwick said she had never gotten in trouble before and was surprised when the principal opened her lunchbox and found the knife.

The teen was initially given a 10-day suspension, then received notice that she was suspended the rest of the school year.

"I don’t understand why they would even begin to point the finger at me and use me as an example," she said.

This month, Ashley Smithwick, a soccer player who takes college-level courses, was charged with misdemeanor possession of a weapon on school grounds. She is no longer allowed to set foot on campus.

Cause, yanno, that search and shakedown shit is an ongoing thing, gotta keep the control, gotta keep up the booga-booga, cow them down, train them to OBEY, yeahhh...

And since you didn't give a fuck when they did it to kids, now they do it to YOU.
How you likin the taste of it, then ?

Mind you, this is a fairly common bit of bullshit, just so you know, it only rarely makes the news when some parent manages to get local press interested, is all.
http://www.wftv.com/news/14858405/detail.html

At it's most extreme you get shit like this.

That was 2003 at Stratford HS in South Carolina, but fuckin hell, I could roll you TWENTY of these without even trying.
(ETA: For the record, all that and they found NOTHING, not one speck of drugs, not one weapon, not one bloody single thing - but then, you ask me, that wasn't the *purpose* of the thing, was it now ?)

Add on to it the ridiculous notion of Curfew Laws, which as I pointed out were a direct hinderance to gainful employment - Truancy Laws, which shouldn't have even fucking APPLIED to me, and are often used as a weapon against Homeschoolers, restricted-licensing programs which prevent teens from driving to work during the only hours many of them CAN work, *IF* they can dodge around the goddamn Curfew to do it, since many of them are in high school or college classes during the day, mind you...

And of course, despite "technical adulthood" our society and law still doesn't think you're human enough to tip back a brewskie or wine cooler, nor entitled to your second amendment rights, FOR ANOTHER THREE YEARS.
The latter is a particular problem with kids pitched out of the house the moment their parents can no longer use force against them, cause most of em wind up in the damn ghetto where you really fucking NEED a piece just to ensure your survival - and there's the law and society hanging them out to dry, cause if you do carry, you run the risk of the forever-felony-mark-of-doom, and if you don't, you run the risk of winding up very dead.

But all of this bullshit they put up with at our hands, you know, that comes back around, too.

From the hellcamps to "extraordinary rendition", to "indefinate detention"...
From "zero tolerance" and "school security" to the fucking TSA shakin you down at the airport...
Children have always been the test-bed for the powers that be to see what they can get AWAY with.

Think on it good and hard, and ponder how long before forced-medication and dissent being considered a mental illness COMES TO YOU, think about how much you hated that bullshit then, and whether you really want to have to put it with it some more - and instead of telling teens to suck it up cause you had to deal with it in turn, cause that's the way it is, why don't you go back them up by adding an "adult" voice that cannot be ignored and summarily dismissed ?

This is why you might have noted a distinct lack of sympathy coming from me towards the adults whining and whinging about the very bullshit they cheered on when it was directed at kids - not that I won't stand against it, just that I *have* been standing against it, as many of the ones now whining were not only cheerleading it, but voicing the opinion that it wasn't going far enough!

Well, is it far enough NOW, hmmm?

And I got more to say on the notion of conditioning a forgive-and-forget response (with possible spoilers for Avatar: The Last Airbender involved) and just how MUCH that comes back to bite us on the fuckin ass, but I have to go feed the munchkin, who is bouncing up and down behind me demanding food - I swear the cats are coaching her, cause THEY are batting at my pants legs and meowing too...

The primary difference between children and cats is thumbs, I swear it is!

-Frem

I do not serve the Blind God.

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Thursday, December 30, 2010 11:01 AM

NIKI2

Gettin' old, but still a hippie at heart...

Hey Wulf, we agree on something:

Quote:
Where we screwed up (and by we, I mean the U.S.) is by trying to be an empire. By trying to control the world. Trying to head off threats before they became threats.

I think that's two or three times, but I'm not keeping track.

On the other hand, when is the last time, if ever, that you said ANYTHING negative about "ReligoRepubs"? As oppoosed, that is, to calling "libs" and "dems" every name you can think of and blaming them for all the ills of the world?

Hippie Operative Nikovich Nikita Nicovna Talibani,
Contracted Agent of Veritas Oilspillus, code name “Nike”,
signing off

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Thursday, December 30, 2010 5:46 PM

DREAMTROVE

rap

just out of curiosity, have you never studied history?

the early govt taxation schemese were identical to those of the somali pirates: protection for transit of people and goods to and through their territory in exchange for a percent. the typical rate of taxation by somali pirates is 2% for transit through the gulf of aden, vs 5% by egypt for the suez canal.

of course the pirates werent elected, were they? oh right they were, many are from the former govt. but they govt of egypt is legitn. right? oh, right the cia calls it a failed democracy, so yeah, not so much

so beyond absurd? sounds like a rhetorical crazy eddie.

sounds to me like the exact same thing.

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Thursday, December 30, 2010 6:21 PM

AURAPTOR

America loves a winner!

Quote:
Originally posted by Fremdfirma:
And yet, while you're all in defense of those damn taxes, and paying and paying and paying them - when folks want WHAT THEY PAID FOR in return, you scream a fit.

How in the HELL does that make any kind of *sense*, Rappy ?

-Frem

Maybe because I've done no such thing?

" I do not love the bright sword for its sharpness, nor the arrow for its swiftness, nor the warrior for his glory. I love only that which they defend. "

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