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Salamandre
Admirable
Omnipresent Hero
Wog refugee
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posted February 04, 2015 02:15 AM |
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Good will is a vast concept and debatable for centuries. Actually you can't become politician (translate = be elected) if you speak out of your heart, if you don't filter your language, if you are passionate (translate = out of control sometimes), in sum if you are a conflictual individual, as every person is in his deepest.
So finally we get people who, certainly, want to do good will, but don't have the guts to do also what is needed. Or they don't even feel it necessary, their blood is lukewarm constant. Such as preserving nations identities (see out of control immigration) because they feel proud of and CAN say it, as retaliating with lethal wrath (see Isis/Al Quaida actions), as refusing all kind of social assistance abusing because it creates even more demands, as having the balls to support the elites vs the mediocrity rampage because they guarantee the wealth and the future, as recruiting skilled people from all politic sides and making compromises for the whole nation's good, in sum having an outspoken politic based on national feelings and quality criteria and not on humanistic or "equal rights" utopia.
People are not equal. But politicians are always equal to them selves unfortunately.
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Era II mods and utilities
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artu
Promising
Undefeatable Hero
My BS sensor is tingling again
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posted February 04, 2015 02:31 AM |
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This seems rather like your objection to the current situation in France, I wont comment about that in particular, since I dont follow it as close as you do. But people are equal in terms of the rights they have. Anyway, it's 3 30 in the morning here, I'm in music mood drunk, treating Youtube like a magic radio, see you later.
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Are you pretty? This is my occasion. - Ghost
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Salamandre
Admirable
Omnipresent Hero
Wog refugee
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posted February 04, 2015 03:01 AM |
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This notion of "equal rights", at base translating how laws apply and to whom, is now metamorphosing into absurd definitions, and there is where the problem starts. A ring bells in most people heads then they want to have equal: incomes, holidays, cars, vacancy destinations, homes etc. The jalousie is now the pinnacle of human interactions: mobs hate the rich, government listen to mobs, government penalise the rich, mobs are happy, mobs re-elect the government.
A person who accomplished its dreams and displays a consequent wealth now is working 9 months/year for the state (75% tax), while a person who never accomplished anything is profiting from the former and directly takes this money while giving nothing in returns. A country where the success is penalized and the mediocrity is rewarded is a dying country. And all those are political choices.
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artu
Promising
Undefeatable Hero
My BS sensor is tingling again
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posted February 04, 2015 03:22 AM |
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Edited by artu at 03:36, 04 Feb 2015.
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Ok Sal, let's asume all of that is precisely true, and someone got into politics to change exactly what you complain about, once he's in, he will be asked to make many compromises, so that his demands are part of the bargain. That's what I mean when I say "the game" forces you to level. You and I, we can tell people to go snow themselves if we feel like it, politics is (also) to hold back on that. Now, that feels weird when you build your ethics on telling it like it is; artists are like that, scientists are like that, philosophers are like that. Politicians cant be like that. But is it really because they are all evil? I mean, can you assume a world where there are some people who are scum of the earth and they go "well, let me be a politician then!" There are, of course, power crazy lunatics but I wouldnt generalize all politicians to be only that.
Edit: Btw, to make the distinction clearer, I oversimplified. An artist can act political just like a politician can act impulsive or creative. The dominant mindset will be different though.
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Are you pretty? This is my occasion. - Ghost
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Salamandre
Admirable
Omnipresent Hero
Wog refugee
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posted February 04, 2015 04:51 AM |
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I didn't say they are evil and I don't think so. I only disagree with the elections pattern, where every citizen has equal voice. For example you have a wise economist which says: this must be done, it implies sacrifices but in the end you will prevail, so vote John. Then you have a fishwife whose business will decline at short term within John's government, so she will vote Jim because Jim decided all fishwives get an extra fish per year. But with Jim fish will be gone after a few years.
Who cares, fish now!
And in polls, fishwife's vote has same weight as the economist's one. The problem is that for every skilled economist we have 10 000 weak-minded fishwives, so you see the outcome. Just a prosaic example showing how national interest can be easily debunked by individual interest and why our national debts are astronomical. And why politics obsessions are and will remain "look good first, efficacy second".
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artu
Promising
Undefeatable Hero
My BS sensor is tingling again
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posted February 04, 2015 06:14 AM |
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Democracy is very troubling sometimes. It's not built on expertise, on the contrary, it's built on the idea that if experts try to get away with things just because they are experts, they'll get caught in the end, because everybody is capable of watching out for their own primal interest. This notion, in the very long term, works better than trusting authority.
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Are you pretty? This is my occasion. - Ghost
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Zenofex
Responsible
Legendary Hero
Kreegan-atheist
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posted February 04, 2015 08:35 AM |
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Experts don't necessarily have adequate political views because they are experts (in a given field). Semi-related to the topic, we have one "economist" who was invited to comment the Odessa atrocities in the studio of one of the mainstream TVs. The fella said, literally, that the whole event is orchestrated and the victims more or less burned themselves so they can put the blame on the Ukrainians.  The very same person is considered some sort of authority, at least according to some media, when some political or economical topics need to be discussed.
Even real intellectuals can have very naive and short-sighted political views, plenty of working brain cells don't make you immune to manipulation and are no guarantee that you'll contribute to the society in any positive way. The Nazi had great many intellectuals in their ranks, people who had joined voluntarily and who loved their jobs in service of the regime. Education (as unbiased as possible) usually helps to create a mindset that is less vulnerable to anti-social ideas and ideologies but ultimately nobody is immune to such. In some cases intellectuals are even easier to manipulate.
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Salamandre
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Omnipresent Hero
Wog refugee
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posted February 04, 2015 10:39 AM |
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No system is perfect, I know. But in every case experts are way harder to manipulate than Mr. Nobody, which will vote against every restrictive -at short term- action. If we look back, nothing changed in the economical waste Europe is inflicting upon itself. Same method is used again and again, we take the money we don't have from here and we move it there. Usually education is the first to suffer financially.
Personally I am ready for austerity measures if they call a dog a dog, but much less wholeheartedly I will let them rob us as long as they just switch problems until bankruptcy follows, as in Greece.
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markkur
Honorable
Legendary Hero
Once upon a time
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posted February 04, 2015 12:14 PM |
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Zenofex said:
Experts don't necessarily have adequate political views because they are experts (in a given field).
Just be glad you are not living in the U.S. Serious stuff goes down and "Actors" are interviewed. Like any sane person gives a flip about what a pretender thinks about anything. Then again, we have <ahem> "think-in-tanks" buried 100 feet underground, void of human contact ....what a combo!
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Pawek_13
Supreme Hero
Maths, maths everywhere!
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posted February 04, 2015 03:41 PM |
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markkur said:
Zenofex said:
Experts don't necessarily have adequate political views because they are experts (in a given field).
Just be glad you are not living in the U.S. Serious stuff goes down and "Actors" are interviewed. Like any sane person gives a flip about what a pretender thinks about anything.
But that is what people care about! The fact that Kim Kardashian has a new sex-tape is much more interesting than a series of minor skirmishes in an unimportant coutry thousands of kilometres. In Poland people care about Ukraine because it is our neighbour state and a host of society is against Russia and Putin. However, when recently there was a massacre in Nigeria, it got virtually no media coverage because it was in a distant country with no major relation with us. To be honest, there is quite vocal group of people on Facebook that state that our major news channels should focus solely on news from Poland. People think locally, not globally and they want from TV entertainment, not information which would they have to later process.
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Zenofex
Responsible
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Kreegan-atheist
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posted February 04, 2015 07:51 PM |
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Salamandre said:
No system is perfect, I know. But in every case experts are way harder to manipulate than Mr. Nobody, which will vote against every restrictive -at short term- action.
Manipulation works both ways though and restrictions can be (and usually are) designed for the middle and the lower classes while the "1%" remains largely unaffected. Most states can gather huge amount of money by hardening their policy toward tax evasions, contraband and generally reducing corruption but that requires politicians who are actually willing to do so. It's usually much easier to take money from a mass composed of fairly defenseless individuals (as long as they don't unite), convincing them that there's no other way. But that's a topic for a different discussion.
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kipshasz
Undefeatable Hero
Elvin's Darkside
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posted February 04, 2015 09:15 PM |
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Edited by kipshasz at 21:18, 04 Feb 2015.
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page strecthing image.
a photo picturing some "counter protesters" and Ukraine "supporters", who came to provoke a riot during an anti NATO protest today.
such stout supporters that out of their sheer determination forgot which side of the Ukrainian flag is correct.
hey, free circus.
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"Kip is the Gavin McInnes of HC" - Salamandre
"Ashan to the Trashcan", "I got PTSD from H7. " - LizardWarrior
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Zenofex
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Kreegan-atheist
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posted February 05, 2015 10:09 AM |
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Poroshenko asks NATO to deliver "modern weapons". The Ukrainian army is probably being supplied mostly with Warsaw pact-era weaponry from Poland and other countries which have it in great quantities so the NATO involvement doesn't look as obvious as it is and apparently Russia provides the separatists with more up to date tools. It's interesting though, who will shoot with these weapons. The Western media is silent - as it can be expected - but the mobilisation attempts of the Kiev government don't seem to go smoothly at all and the thugs from the Right Sector are hardly an army (and probably have given a lot of casualties already).
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kipshasz
Undefeatable Hero
Elvin's Darkside
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posted February 05, 2015 10:49 AM |
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Whoever will send them guns, it sure won't be the jerries. Frau Merkel told everyone to go bleep themselves regarding this issue.
well, looks like I know where those new FN SCARs will go that Lithuania's ragdoll annie guard just purchased.
gerojam slava. ura.
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"Kip is the Gavin McInnes of HC" - Salamandre
"Ashan to the Trashcan", "I got PTSD from H7. " - LizardWarrior
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Darkshadow
Legendary Hero
Cerise Princess
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posted February 05, 2015 11:36 AM |
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Seems unlikely they'll pay a dime for any weapons, might as well give them stuff of little value.
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orzie
Responsible
Supreme Hero
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posted February 05, 2015 01:32 PM |
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Edited by orzie at 16:50, 05 Feb 2015.
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Currently Donetsk region is extensively bombed by Ukrainian army. Some dudes from DF2 modding forum from there were not online for almost two days.
Well, of course OSCE doesn't notice that, unlike the case of Mariupol where the rebels were accused of bombing the city (later proven as provocation) a few hours later after the incident (OSCE group arrived immediately). These are the people of the lower grade and their deaths are not worth mentioning for the good of democracy.
Aw snow, this is Europe. This is at least geographically Europe! And we see the same barbarity where the government forces kill people like we used to see in Africa or remote Asian countries. This is so much shame for all humanity.
EDIT: The dude from Donetsk finally responded. Said that due to the artillery shot the electricity disappeared for a day.
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blizzardboy
Honorable
Undefeatable Hero
Nerf Herder
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posted February 06, 2015 02:50 AM |
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Yay, I get to agree with Zeno. This is so exotic. *shoulder punches Zeno*
Anyway, yes, it's faulty to consider maturity, goodwill, or perhaps even objectivity to be analogous with academic achievement. In certain respects, intelligentsia are actually more vulnerable, not less vulnerable, to malignant ideas that have the potential to spread, precisely because it requires a certain level of knowledge and understanding in order to pursue a novel idea. Areas where you almost have to be an expert in order to be wrong (otherwise you'd never consider it in the first place). Does that make sense? Only an engineer can build a visionary new bridge that later collapses and kills 50 people. A stupid person wouldn't be able to build such a bridge at all.
You also have to consider that intelligentsia, by default, enjoy a much higher access to social & material privileges, especially if they decide to endorse platforms that are specifically beneficial to them.
Nazis are such a common example, but that's because they're such a good one. Historically, Germany was and is a crown of educational achievement, in most respects better than England or the States, and it was through this state that there would be the greatest mass homicide in human history, both towards others and its own population. It shows how education and savagery really can synthesize into a terrifying potion if you let them. They don't have to have a ying/yang opposing relationship. Germany encompassed a broad range of talented doctors, engineers, and professors, who - in alarmingly mass number - either openly endorsed or at least slavishly complied to Nazi policy. That is because they are exposed to the same weaknesses - either through fear of reprisal or through hunger for power and prestige - that any other human is, and - as I mentioned - probably even more so, because in their privileged position, the stakes are higher. If you're some lady on the street, only the people in your immediate life might value your opinion. If you're a figure of influence, you're going to be more noticed.
If you just needed processing power to achieve a utopia, we'd already be living in one. You also need back hair, maternal nurturing, checks & balances, transparency, and patience.
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artu
Promising
Undefeatable Hero
My BS sensor is tingling again
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posted February 06, 2015 07:49 AM |
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Well, nobody claimed ANY type of education will result in political corectness or a neat, flawless ideological position. (And what exactly is that, is it the system in the US? How come they back up any coup or dictator as long as it serves them, how is that any different?)
Sal, pointed out that democracy has some dysfunctioning aspects because majority of voters will vote shortsighted and selfish to the point of irrational (as in missing the bigger picture.) Now, obviously, the answer to that is a better educated and politically more aware voter profile, not going back to monarchy or switching to some kind of authoritarianism. The very content of such consciousness-raising is crucial, not any sort of education will do and constantly bombarding people with memes such as how very special each one of them are and how they deserve everything and they should always want more in a consumerist perspective also doesnt help.
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Are you pretty? This is my occasion. - Ghost
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Zenofex
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posted February 06, 2015 08:07 AM |
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People, please start a separate thread for that (sorry for contributing to the off-topic up there).
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artu
Promising
Undefeatable Hero
My BS sensor is tingling again
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posted February 06, 2015 08:36 AM |
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58 pages of Ukrania/Russia talk aint enough?
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Are you pretty? This is my occasion. - Ghost
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This thread is pages long: 
