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I think that " bodily autonomy ", by itself, is a horrible reason to justify abortion. CMV. | I want to conduct a thought experiment with you. Consider this situation : You wake up one morning and find another adult attached to you via a hose. This person depends on this hose to receive nutrients from you. If you sever this hose, the person will die. This person is a fully functioning adult with life experiences, just as you are. Do you have the right to have this hose severed? I'm not asking you if you think it's justified or morally okay. I'm asking you if you have the right to decide if you want to have the hose severed. | cmv |
The phrase'man up'is sexist no matter who it is spoken to, spoken by, or whether it is spoken with the intent of being sexist. CMV. | It's a matter of how you interpret " man up ". My wife isn't easily offended. I tell her to " man up " all the time! She says it back. We both notice the potential sexist interpretation but choose to ignore it. If you don't like the phrase then don't use it! | cmv |
I believe that economic issues should be paramount to social issues in elections. CMV | It's generally easier to dance around economic issues in elections ( and have people let your wibbly - wobbly answers go ), rather than social issues. Ex : Romney kept saying he had this economic plan to get the country back on track, but he never revealed what his plan was. All the Romney campaign would say is that they " had a plan. " You can't do the same thing with social views - " Where you do stand on abortion / gay marriage / teaching creationism? " can't be as easily answered with " I have views on all of those things " and then not express any of those views. | cmv |
I believe that economic issues should be paramount to social issues in elections. CMV | Now I'm not saying I do believe this, but let's say I'm pro - life and I believe that each and every abortion is a murder just like any other. Wouldn't I also believe that preventing all those murders is far more important than stimulating the economy, and wouldn't it be logical for my vote to reflect that? Or let's say that I believe that education is truly the key to our future, and that until that is fixed, nothing will get better - shouldn't my choice of a candidate reflect that? Or let's say that I believe that global warming will be disastrous and wipe out a large segment of the human population if not stopped - shouldn't my candidate be an environmentally friendly one, before a economically sound one? My vote will reflect what's important to me. For many people, that means that the economy is not going to be the most important issue. | cmv |
I believe that economic issues should be paramount to social issues in elections. CMV | This depends completely on your point of view. If you are a straight white upper middle class man, likely economic issues are the most important and your voting history likely reflects that. However, if your oppressed in some way you may feel that having money isn't as important as having freedom. You would almost certainly feel that way if you were a black man living in the south in the 50s. I am a married straight white middle class man in my late 40s. In my point of view, there is NO politician who is looking out for my best interests economically. I don't expect to see one, and don't believe that one could get elected if he existed. I think some are likely to be more disastrous than others and it informs my voting decisions but it simply isn't my top priority. I care about oppression too, though, and feel that oppression exists in America, and that many of our elected leaders support it. I can make a difference in this regard, so I consider it a higher priority. | cmv |
I believe that economic issues should be paramount to social issues in elections. CMV | The problem is that 95 % of americans cannot judge economic issues. Social issues can be reduced down to moral issues, in which everyone and their dog has a ( valid? ) opinion. Economic issues can be purely reduced to science and an absolute truth, and those are hard / impossible to judge without extensive background in economics. | cmv |
I believe that women ( and men ) who go on welfare should have their benefits revoked if they have more children. CMV | Here's a bit of a different approach : What if it's not as simple as not having kids? Imagine a hypothetical culture in which women are not afforded much respect or agency. ( Really asking you to stretch your imagination, I know. ) Now, imagine a low - income woman in this culture. She is socially pressured to ( a ) have sex she might not otherwise consent to, and when she becomes pregnant, she is socially pressured to ( b ) keep and raise the child that she might otherwise choose not to. The reasons why are left as an exercise to the reader. While it's easy to sit back and say that we would take the fiscally responsible option if we were suddenly in this situation, it probably isn't that simple for the woman if this actually happens to her. Taking away her benefits, then, would hurt both the woman AND her children, along with further cementing her lack of agency. | cmv |
I believe all money sent to charities should be sent to charities that only help humans, not animals. CMV | You argue that people should give to human focused charities rather than animal focused ones because we are self serving and giving to a human focused charity is more self serving than giving to an animal focused one. You show that we are self serving, but you fail to show that we should be. Even if your theory that all human actions are / should be self serving is true, plenty of people still choose to donate to animal charities when they could donate to human ones. Perhaps for them donating to an animal charity provides more utility than donating to a human one? Perhaps they get more good feelings from protecting animals than from protecting humans? | cmv |
I believe all money sent to charities should be sent to charities that only help humans, not animals. CMV | You seem to severely underestimate how dependent we humans are on animals. I could give the speech about the ecosystem and the domino effect on the surviving species due to the extinction of another. But I think that you're likely to be aware of it. So putting aside the environmental factors, lets look at some psychological ones. A compelling argument could be made that all humans are self - serving because anything we do that makes us happy is " self - serving ". But you claim that giving to humans is more self - serving than giving to animals. But this is as wrong as claiming that black is the best color. What is self - serving is just as subjective as a persons favourite color or music. Some people find just as much happiness, possibly even more, in helping animals. And since it's money that they have earned, it's their right to spend it as they see fit. | cmv |
I believe all money sent to charities should be sent to charities that only help humans, not animals. CMV | A few questions for you : Why is human life more valuable than animal life? What empirical evidence do you have to justify your claim that " As humans, we are self - serving individuals and everything we do is to benefit ourselves "? Why is it good to be self - serving? | cmv |
CMV : I believe that the use of chemical weapons is no worse than any other type of weapon, and it should not be treated any differently | As other people have brought up chemical weapons kill indiscriminately, but the same could be said of most explosives as well. One of the biggest issues with chemical weapons, though, is that they have a far more significant long term impact on the environment and population. Chemical weapons, while effective, don't always kill their victims. Often victims will receive a small enough dose or receive treatment quickly enough to avoid death. While they weren't killed directly, victims will still be subjected to a variety of medical complications such as cancer and birth defects in their children. Tanks, bullets and bombs may kill people, but they don't continue to maim or kill people after the fact. | cmv |
CMV : I believe that the use of chemical weapons is no worse than any other type of weapon, and it should not be treated any differently | Conventional weapons are designed for stopping power. Our bullets are designed to bring someone down and not to kill. A smaller caliber would actually be more lethal, as the bullet would bounce around internal organs. Chemical weapons are used for terror, and not even necessarily for immediate stopping power. People will suffer for days to years after chemical weapon attacks. The suffering caused by it led them to be outlawed internationally. | cmv |
CMV : I believe that the use of chemical weapons is no worse than any other type of weapon, and it should not be treated any differently | Kinda late to the party here and I haven't had a chance yet to look through all the comments, but have you considered the fact that the implications of an attack are even more important than the actions or methods? It's not necessarily about the one chemical weapons attack that killed hundreds. It's about the future chemical weapons attacks that could significantly increase the rate at which civilians are dying. Killing 200 people in a firefight, or with explosives is pretty rare. With chemical weapons, its a lot easier to achieve higher death tolls and the killing is completely indiscriminate. If we allow one chemical weapon attack to go without repercussions, it sends the message that future chemical weapons attacks will also be tolerated - and this will lead to a significantly higher death toll. | cmv |
CMV : I believe that the use of chemical weapons is no worse than any other type of weapon, and it should not be treated any differently | Imagine that chemical weapons became widely accepted as just another weapon of war. It's doubtless that the US military would start investing billions in more efficient and deadly chemical weapons. Look at the relatively mass destruction that has taken place under black - market scientific conditions. We have a very good chance of seeing nuclear - scale weapons that can wipe out entire cities, leading to total - war secnarios. TL ; DR : We don't want to encourage scientific development in chemical weapons. | cmv |
CMV : I believe that the use of chemical weapons is no worse than any other type of weapon, and it should not be treated any differently | Chemical weapons are ditinct in that their prime use is against unprepared civilian targets. Against any post WW2 military they are going to be stopped dead by gas masks and the like. A prepared force is highly resistant to such tactics. Using something that is optmized to kill people unprepared to fight is bad form. Chemical weapons are tools of murderers, not soldiers. | cmv |
CMV : I believe that the use of chemical weapons is no worse than any other type of weapon, and it should not be treated any differently | It should say something that after WWI men who had seen worse than Hell and back said that we need to draw a line with chemical weapons. In WWII entire city's wee targeted because they could supply men to fight, and these city's are burnt to the ground. I believe because these weapons kill in an unconventional level that destroys your body from the inside out, slowly, to slow. | cmv |
CMV : I believe that the use of chemical weapons is no worse than any other type of weapon, and it should not be treated any differently | The reason why chemical weapons are considered to be unethical is much the same reason why landmines are ; they kill indiscriminately and they do so after they're deployed. Chemicals aren't contained like an explosion is, they can be swept up by the wind and carried to other areas. Just as a land mine isn't " targeted " on an enemy, chemical weapons can't effectively " target " its victims in the same way an explosive weapon can. We can more easily gauge potential collateral damage with a one targeted explosive device than with chemical weapons. There's also the ethical problem of how one is killed. Conventional weapons can instantaneously kill someone, and it's typically considered to be unethical to " shoot to maim " or more applicably to " shoot to only mortally wound " because it's unnecessarily causing pain, which isn't the point of war. It's the same reason why we don't ( or at least we ethically shouldn't ) torture prisoners or criminals. Though explosives don't always outright kill their targets without suffering, they're different from chemical weapons which never do. Condoning the use of chemical weapons is akin to saying that we should be able to torture people before killing them. In other words, war is hell, but at the very least we ought to try to make it as humane as possible - at least from an ethical standpoint. | cmv |
CMV : I believe that the use of chemical weapons is no worse than any other type of weapon, and it should not be treated any differently | Chemical weapons are indiscriminate terror weapons, with few military applications. They sink into the ground and linger, but they don't do much against tanks or mobile forces. A modern military or guerrilla force can move ; gas bombs and rockets are all much more effective. That's why chemical weapons are bad : not because they are somehow good or effective weapons but because they are terrible and uneffective weapons. Unless you want to cause collateral damage and inflict terror. | cmv |
CMV : I believe that the use of chemical weapons is no worse than any other type of weapon, and it should not be treated any differently | Just spend some time looking at the pictures of children that have been effected by depleted uranium.. it's horrifying. Besides the initial damage, some chemical warfare stays around for a long time.. harming much more innocents than the original targeted. Such atrocities must be prevented and I think as a moral peoples we should not actively deform the unborn. | cmv |
CMV : I believe that the use of chemical weapons is no worse than any other type of weapon, and it should not be treated any differently | The issue with chemical weapons is that they are a very effective and cheap way to kill large numbers of civilians very quickly. They don't tend to be hugely effective against armies - soldiers can easily wear gas masks. They're very effective for terrorist attacks. Conventional weapons have killed a lot of people, and that's terrible. The worry is that if one person starts using chemical weapons others will too, indiscriminately slaughtering civilians. All of the big three - nuclear, biological, chemical, all are very good at mass killings of people. People have a stronger than expected dislike of chemical weapons to prevent mass future use. | cmv |
I don't believe transgendered people should be addressed by their preferred sex. CMV | Are nicknames allowed, or do we have to go by the full, formal names our parents put on the birth certificate? Maybe you just need to deal with it. How does it change you life that someone wants to be referred to as her, rather than him, any more than wanting to be called Jimmy, rather than James? | cmv |
All governments will crumble soon and they should. CMV. | It is necessarily true that governments restrain freedom, so without gone we can never experience " true freedom ". However, the real question is whether that's desirable. The only reason you have any practical rights ( as opposed to theoretical and inalienable ones ) is because the government enforces and protects them. Your right to freedom is protected by the government protecting you from foreign threats. Your right to property is protected by the government enforcing the law, and so on and so on. " True freedom " isn't some fairly tale utopia, it's quite the opposite. The removal of government ( or more specifically, a political authority ) presents a situation by which might actually does make right. Your freedom only extends so far as you're personally able to protect it. Which is why people form governments in the first place, to protect themselves from the state of nature. | cmv |
All governments will crumble soon and they should. CMV. | The biggest argument against this is the complete lack of specificity in how the governments will crumble. You talk about the government " growing ", people " waking up ", ideas " spreading ", and the state " running our lives " - and all of this happening " soon ". In the end, these are just buzzwords with little meaning themselves. That being said, its important to think of the implications involved in overthrowing a government. It's not just the old guys in Washington that lose their jobs. IMO the negative consequences of overthrowing stable world governments outweighs any positive benefits. | cmv |
All governments will crumble soon and they should. CMV. | Sorry, but I don't see how the American people are " waking up ". What does that mean? What exactly do you mean by " no need for a state to run our lives " - - what is your alternative? Anarchy, libertarianism? How do you define true freedom? | cmv |
I believe that the individual people working in the American government have good intentions and only want the best for the people. CMV. | I believe that the American government has committed terrible war crimes since the Cold War, particularly in the past decade. The NSA spying, The Patriot Act, supplying arms to ignite revolutions overseas, false flag operations to promote wars. Millions of people have been killed in wars started by the United States, many of which are against a particular race. This is no different than the numbers killed by Hitler and Nazi Germany. Once this information becomes more available and accepted, the backlash against the red, white and blue will ultimately leave the flag as a symbol of corporatism, greed and war. | cmv |
I believe that the individual people working in the American government have good intentions and only want the best for the people. CMV. | It's all about perspectives really. I don't have the perspective of a very rich and powerful person, so I can't know what goes through their minds. In the same way, the rich and powerful don't have the perspectives of the poor and disadvantages, so they can't know what goes through their minds. Though you can bet that they can pay a think tank to give them a presentation on how to exploit it in the long run. | cmv |
Inheritance tax should be at or close to 100 %, CMV | What about family heirlooms and estates? Or are you only talking about cash? What's to stop people from buying expensive jewelry or land in that case? For those who are very wealthy, what's to stop them from giving most of their fortune to their kids before they die? | cmv |
Inheritance tax should be at or close to 100 %, CMV | You seem to be concerned about people " living off " of other people's fortunes. I'm not sure why that is, but let's hypothesize what would happen if inheritance was taxed at 100 % and couldn't be avoided. A rich person would simply spend all that money throughout his lifetime on extremely extravagant purchases. Is that somehow better? At least if the money isn't being spent, it means it's being invested, which usually improves the economy. I don't see how it's helpful to society to force rich people to buy even more yachts and private jets than they currently have. On a similar point, the money that the person is living off of gets taxed as it is spent ( and in my ideal world, a rich person has a higher consumption tax than a poor person ). Taxing it as it is spent is a much better taxation regime and solves all the problems you mentioned. I don't think one should otherwise care that someone has a bunch of electronic zeroes in their bank account. | cmv |
Inheritance tax should be at or close to 100 %, CMV | Why should you care if somebody else is living off of an inherited fortune and never has to work for the rest of their lives? Their life being easy has no impact on how difficult your life is. What right do you have to tell billionaire Bob that he can't give his family or somebody else all of his money when he dies? He has that money because other people willing gave it to him. It's his and he should be able to decide how he spends it both in life and upon death. The bottom line is that Bob's money belongs to him and how he uses it does not concern you or the rest of society so you should stop trying to take away other people's money out of jealousy with death as an excuse. If you think better social / welfare programs or healthcare needs to be improved than either you can pay for it's improvement yourself or everybody can chip in instead of unfairly taking the money away from the rich when they die. | cmv |
Inheritance tax should be at or close to 100 %, CMV | A couple loop holes that makes this idea incredibly stupid 1. People will still be greedy either way, old people would then just pass down everything a few years earlier before they die 2. If a young family with the parents making, lets say, 5 million dollars, with 2 dependant kids ( under 18 ) and suddenly their parents die. you just screwed over two kids who would have otherwise some money. I dont see ANY sane person would vote for this law. | cmv |
Inheritance tax should be at or close to 100 %, CMV | All you would accomplish by increasing an inheritance tax is force the wealthy to either give their money away before they die or place it in trusts, which a lot of them do anyway. Increasing the inheritance tax to extremely high levels would just result in more money going to lawyers, not more money going to the government. Which, as a lawyer, I'm all for, hurray raising taxes! | cmv |
Inheritance tax should be at or close to 100 %, CMV | First of all, if the rates are jacked up this high, people will find ways to avoid them. Loopholes are unavoidable but, at current rates, there isn't as much incentive to exploit them. Racking it up to 100 % will cause everybody to start using them. Secondly, there are plenty of houses worth far more than £325k. If most of a parents money is tied up in the property, then their children won't be able to pay the tax required on transferring it to them. What would happen to the house then? Would it go to the state or would they be forced to remortgage? Seems harsh to force people into massive debt due to a death. | cmv |
Inheritance tax should be at or close to 100 %, CMV | People will never bequeath money to heirs, they will just set up bank account s before their death and put money in it. Then a joint account holder will disperse all money after death. Or just by having a joint account holder, you cannot charge your crazy percentage on the money itself. It is their money. The property will just be put jointly. This can all be avoided by adding another persons name on everything. Idea failed | cmv |
Inheritance tax should be at or close to 100 %, CMV | Alright, but let's say I come from a poor, lower income family and my dad had been saving to afford sending me through college, nothing fancy, just an in - state institution. But then, tragedy occurs, and my father dies in an accident. All that money according to you would be " redistributed " to the other people in poverty, essentially robbing me of my education. | cmv |
Inheritance tax should be at or close to 100 %, CMV | Let's assume that your law gets enacted. What is to keep people from only having £325k in private bank accounts, and then shifting the remainder of their assets into a family trust or a shared account? What is to keep someone from simply buying stockpiles of gold or real estate? This would only reduce the quantity of liquid assets available to banks to loan out as investment. It would also inflate the price of real estate if rich people started buying up land simply because they weren't allowed to sit on their cash. | cmv |
Inheritance tax should be at or close to 100 %, CMV | If I become a multi - millionaire and the inheritance tax rate was near 100 % then I would work very hard to get around it. Most likely I would found a company ( it doesn't matter what it does, but it might be incorporated in another country ) invest everything I own into that company, and make my wife and children ( and anybody else I want to give my money to ) partners. This way when I die they will retain full ownership of my company and all of its investments / cash. Sure, it might obviously be a scam, but I'll be spending a ton of money on some really good lawyers. Now assuming that you somehow manage to close all loopholes and it works exactly the way you want it to... There are always unintended consequences to laws that are passed. I wouldn't spend my final years as a billionaire quietly wasting away, I'd try to go out with a bang and spend all of my money on frivolous things. I'd buy an island and build the tallest building in the world on it for no other reason than I can. You will have taken away all reason to be responsible with my money so I'll just do whatever fun things I can think of. Alternatively, I might just stop trying to make money once I have enough to last me the rest of my life. I'd stop contributing because nothing I do from then on will benefit me or the people I care about. | cmv |
Inheritance tax should be at or close to 100 %, CMV | I'm going to focus on the realistic component of this ( instead of moral / ethical ). If I'm a dying millionaire and I know my money is going to the state, I'm going to start frantically giving it to my heirs ( like I would have in my will anyway ) as quickly as I can. People who die suddenly would not get this opportunity and would lose their money. You are effectively discriminating against families who lose loved ones in sudden and usually tragic ways. Others have pointed out that rich people would use shell companies and foreign holdings to get around this anyway. It's just not practical. ( I also feel it's not moral, but that argument has been thoroughly explained in other posts so I won't re - hash it ) | cmv |
Inheritance tax should be at or close to 100 %, CMV | Are you sure this would not lead to destruction of wealth? The children of successful enterpreneurs are often far more capable in managing and directing their companies than the government or others could be. Taking it away from them and giving it to the government or breaking it up and redistributing to others ( according to which key? ) could result in destruction of the company and all the unique know - how it contains. I think that leaving the company in their hands and simply taxing it would over time bring more wealth to the state than this one time confiscation of assets. | cmv |
Inheritance tax should be at or close to 100 %, CMV | An effective 100 % inheritance tax pretty much requires taking away the freedom to leave the country. One possible loophole with a straight inheritance tax is that you could just leave the country, with all of your assets, and retire somewhere that doesn't have this inheritance tax. To close that loophole, you have to extract an " exit tax " at roughly the same rate as the inheritance tax. You also need " gift taxes " and other restrictions, to prevent people from moving their assets around to sidestep the inheritance tax. Now, imagine a 100 % or near - 100 % exit tax. IIUC, that's basically what it was like in Soviet Bloc countries : You didn't really have the freedom to emigrate, because none of your " possessions " were actually yours. | cmv |
Inheritance tax should be at or close to 100 %, CMV | One issue with this is the potential to kill small businesses and encourage the growth of huge conglomerations. Think about family farms or ranches. Farmers are typically very asset rich, and cash poor. They have large chunks of land, but typically not huge cash incomes. Now, whenever a farmer dies, because only a small amount of the land would be transferable to their heirs, a few large companies would end up buying up most of the land. I can see the same thing happening for many other small businesses. | cmv |
I believe that having only two ( major ) political parties is ruining the United States. CMV. | The best case scenario is that somebody wins the presidency with only 35 % of the vote. The worst case it that nobody wins a majority of the electoral votes and that the election is decided by the House of Representatives ( a little known part of the Constitution ). Without a constitutional amendment, a third party simply isn't viable. On top of that, any issues the third party ran on would just be taken up by the big two. We got a really good view of this in 1992, when third party candidate Ross Perot took enough votes away from Bill Clinton and George Bush to allow Bill Clinton to win an electoral landslide with only 43 % of the vote. Most of his issues were ultimately absorbed into the Republican platform. | cmv |
I believe that men should not be responsible, financially or otherwise, for caring for a child if only the mother elects to keep it. CMV | A man who desires a " financial abortion " ( as they are often called ) is asking to be freed from the responsibility to care for a live human being that they helped bring into the world. A woman who chooses to terminate her pregnancy is choosing to prevent that human being from being brought into the world in the first place. Note the difference. | cmv |
I believe that men should not be responsible, financially or otherwise, for caring for a child if only the mother elects to keep it. CMV | In a country where the welfare system will fully support a single mother and her child, I completely agree. Unfortunately, many of us don't live in such a country. In a country where that doesn't happen, there's a very troubling concern : what happens to the child? | cmv |
I believe that men should not be responsible, financially or otherwise, for caring for a child if only the mother elects to keep it. CMV | Your potential economic burden does not supersede the suffering the child endures inherently from your absence. A mother can choose to absolve both individuals of parental responsibilities. On what grounds should the father simply be able to remove himself from the familial equation? He's the only person who remotely benefits from that. It is not a fair or just action. You not intending to create a life does not absolve you of the consequences. | cmv |
I believe that men should not be responsible, financially or otherwise, for caring for a child if only the mother elects to keep it. CMV | To rephrase, you think that the following consequences should apply to couples who conceive a child : Man : Free option to either be responsible for the child or not. No involuntary consequence whatsoever. Woman : If man elects not to be responsible, either undergo surgery ( which may violate your core beliefs ), or carry the child to term and provide 100 % of its needs with no support. Unavoidable, involuntary consequence either way, you just get to choose which one. That doesn't sound as equal as you imagined, does it? | cmv |
I don't see any problem with voter ID Laws. CMV | The only issue I have with voter ID laws is that states usually charge for IDs. This can be seen as prohibitive against those with a low socioeconomic status, and potentially disenfranchising. If there was also a system for distributing free IDs, I'd have less of a problem with it, but I don't believe there is such a system in place. | cmv |
I don't see any problem with voter ID Laws. CMV | The devil is in the details. And in this case, the reasons for proposing such a law. Voter fraud is on the microscopic level. It wasn't actually proposed to curb fraud. It was proposed to deter many non - conservatives from being able to cast their vote, at least without a ton of hassle. Many see it as an underhanded morally - disgusting thing to do only to eliminate competition and help ensure conservatives win more elections. To change your view, or in this case, to hopefully add perspective and make sure you see the whole situation : I just wanted to point out the less - than - noble motivations and intentions of those who propose this. Of course on paper your view makes complete sense. | cmv |
I don't see any problem with voter ID Laws. CMV | anything that impedes the ability of citizens to vote introduces potential for abuse. since these systems tend to be administered by fallible humans, they are vulnerable to manipulation over time as power shifts occur and different opinions fall in and out of favor among the majority. how can you be sure that some future machinations won't compromise the implementation of voter ID requirements in a way that is explicitly discriminatory? as an example, note that our predecessors never elected to regulate and normalize poll taxes and literacy tests - they outright banned them ( in the former, with a constitutional amendment! ). that's a pretty clear indication that mechanisms that limit voting are too dangerous and liable for abuse to exist. ( as an aside : given the potential for serious abuse, one would have to believe that there are great benefits to restricting voting - i. e. reducing voter fraud. i don't have time to google, but it's well demonstrated that the opposite is true. voter fraud is a surprisingly rare occurrence, at least in the US. ) | cmv |
I don't see any problem with voter ID Laws. CMV | Short version : People should absolutely have to prove that they're citizens in order to vote, but the only way this could be fair would be if IDs were free. Most countries provide their citizens with IDs and even passports for free, it's mind - boggling to me that we don't do that in the US. Even if an ID costs ten bucks, you're still being required to pay money in order to vote, and that's a poll tax. No one should have to pay in order to vote. | cmv |
I don't see any problem with voter ID Laws. CMV | I used to share your same viewpoint, I live in a Southern state that recently passed voter id laws, and the Secretary of State is currently hammering out all the details to make it work. Where I live they are going so far as to mail an id to everyone that somehow doesn't already have a government issued id. I was debating this issue with my girlfriend one evening when she said a line that changed my view on the subject, " With current voter turnout as dismal as it currently is, why should we be putting another hurdle to vote? " According to this, 58. 2 % of all eligible voters voted in the 2012 general election. I know that where I live a significant portion of the population will regard the new voter id requirements a barrier to voting, or another hurdle to overcome ( such as getting to their polling station ). If it was as effortless and easy to vote before, and they couldn't be bothered to vote, than how likely are they to vote knowing there's an extra step? Also the absence of any major voting fraud scandals mostly deflates the proponents cause for voter id in my opinion. | cmv |
I don't see any problem with voter ID Laws. CMV | Here is the issue that everyone seems to gloss over : You are already required to prove you are who you say you are when you register to vote. Why should you have to do it again when you actually get to the polls? Your Voter registration card can only be used ONE time at a polling location. | cmv |
I believe that if you are willing to break the law and release classified documents you should be willing to live with the consequences. CMV. | Adam Kokesh went from being a growing entity for accepting the punishment to almost a non - factor because he was painted as some dude that just acted up for attention. I truly think his intentions are pure, but his record shows otherwise... and that is what people see. Punishment silenced Kokesh ( I am aware he is still an active activist ). Had either Manning or Snowden accepted an unjust punishment, they would inevitably received an unjust trial and we would hear nothing more from them. By leaving the country, and their lives, behind, they have built a foundation from which they can continue to inform the people. They have sacrificed much so that we may know the truth and learn to protect ourselves. They broke the law of a corrupt government intent on keeping us blind and ended up opening many peoples'eyes. | cmv |
I believe that if you are willing to break the law and release classified documents you should be willing to live with the consequences. CMV. | Henry David Thoreau, author of the landmark essay Civil Disobedience that influenced countless from Gandhi to Martin Luther King, was so disgusted by both slavery and the Mexican - American War that he refused to pay his taxes. He was imprisoned for one day. Bradley Manning, an American soldier motivated by his conscience and knowing that if he did nothing he was complicit, exposed war crimes committed by the American government and other " embarrassing " information, while also taking the time with Wikileaks to censor any information that could lead to the endangerment of others. He was imprisoned in solitary confinement for 2. 5 years - a recognised form of torture - made to sleep naked and undergo constant strip searches, denied a speedy trial and ultimately sentenced to 30 years imprisonment. Things have changed. In face of such treatment, pragmatism rules over principle. No one should have to submit themselves to torture on principle. Moreover, following such a principle would not have made anything Snowden or Manning did somehow less " wrong " to those who believe them to be wrong. All this talk over principle is just another of many distractions from the crimes and worrisome actions these people have actually exposed. | cmv |
I believe people who believe in US government wide conspiracies are ridiculous. CMV. | The government really isn't that bad at keeping secrets. There were also plenty of shady activities that the CIA was involved in throughout the last decade that were only found out about through FOIA requests. Project MKUltra to name one. | cmv |
I believe bailouts are bad. CMV. | To make a simple comparisons, Imagine trying to play Monoply without a bank. It doesn't work. And for the same reason, our economy ceases to work without banks. The deeper you go in how exactly the economy works, the more absurd the thoughts of an economy without banks ( or equivalent ) becomes. | cmv |
I believe bailouts are bad. CMV. | Big business must be supported by the government because they have means to spur the economy that the government will never have. They can create jobs and can influence economies. Whybtailor to them and not Joe Public you ask? Because poor people don't sign paychecks nor do they spend millions each year on commodities in other industries. | cmv |
I believe bailouts are bad. CMV. | While I agree that the bailouts in the long term are bad in the short term the economy would be in shambles. If the government let businesses fail to free up their labor and capital in the short term there would be a negative shock to both employment and production but in the long run these people and resources would be reinvested into meaningful profitable businesses. Not to mention if you bail out banks when they fail they think they can just gamble with people's money and if they lose they just get a bailout. | cmv |
I believe bailouts are bad. CMV. | What about ford, chevy, and gm? While those are all huge companies employing tens of thousands, they support a much larger ecosystem of companies supplying things like wheels, and tires, and other car parts employing millions of americans. The big 3 were facing a temporary crisis that out of blindness, hedge fund managers making billion dollar yearly bonuses missed a huge goldmine in supporting these companies, and the government stepped in. Made tens of millions of dollars in profits, and saved the jobs of millions of americans. Why shouldn't the government have done that. How much would it have cost to save those millions of americans who would have gone jobless from starvation. How would the global economy reacted when millions of american workers suddenly couldn't buy things. Suddenly video game sales are down, suddenly computer sales are down, suddenly cell phone sales are down by a million. A million fewer $ 500 iphones are being sold. DVDs aren't being sold, music's not being sold. | cmv |
The US should intervene in civil wars around the world by clearly picking sides, even if we don't like those we support. CMV | War is a terrible thing, but at times it is the only way for a difference between two groups to be settled. The Syrian people deserve the chance to fight for what they believe in regardless of which side they are on. Foreign intervention on either side serves only the political and economic interests of those outside nations. | cmv |
The US should intervene in civil wars around the world by clearly picking sides, even if we don't like those we support. CMV | So, just to be clear : You would be okay with the US going into a foreign country and killing people just because they are in the minority? If we are to intervene and achieve a decisive victory, it will involve killing hundreds, if not thousands of combatants and civilians. In Iraq, the split is 65 % Shia, 35 % Sunni. It won't be easy to suppress 35 % of the population. And once the majority reaches power, it won't be enough to say " don't make me come back there again " and hope that everyone's treated fairly. There's also the fact that the US doesn't have the military resources to fight more than two major combat missions at a time. The US military was severely stretched in Iraq and Afghanistan. We don't have the capability to ensure a decisive victory in every civil war. | cmv |
I believe arming school staff is a bad idea CMV | Every state now has concealed carry. Why are teachers ( who would have to meet the same qualifications as anyone else in their respective states ) somehow more of a risk? Similarly, what is so special about schools that individuals licensed to carry concealed weapons can't do it there? | cmv |
I think if you receive a substantial amount of government assistance ( forms of welfare ) you should not have the right to vote. CMV | OP, I have some solidarity for you. " Once the people find out they can vote themselves money, that will herald the end of the Republic. " - Benjamin Franklin Your thought is not a new thought, and Benjamin Franklin agreed with you. | cmv |
I think if you receive a substantial amount of government assistance ( forms of welfare ) you should not have the right to vote. CMV | You are right that million of individuals are essentially holding a percentage of the population hostage. The only rational answer to stopping abuse of welfare is to end welfare, because it inherently can be ( and is being ) taken advantage of. And as you pointed out, it will continue to get worse as more and more people vote themselves free money. Of course, the federal government never had the right to create such a program, but the constitution is essentially a thing of the past nowadays. | cmv |
I think if you receive a substantial amount of government assistance ( forms of welfare ) you should not have the right to vote. CMV | Someone is on welfare because of health reasons ; they couldn't get help when the condition was still treatable. Now they're on welfare so they can't vote for things that would improve health care, something which would prevent others from going on welfare. Someone is on welfare because they were raped and it gave them PTSD to the point they couldn't function anymore ; it caused them to lose their job and they became homeless, until they got on section 8. Now they're on welfare and they can't vote on things that will make sure punishments for rapists are worse, which would discourage rape, or things to provide support for victims of rape with PTSD to help them function in society again. See the issue? | cmv |
I think if you receive a substantial amount of government assistance ( forms of welfare ) you should not have the right to vote. CMV | What about a veteran who was severely wounded protecting the country, and now can't work because our his injury? What if he was forced to go against his will, drafted, he had no choice in the matter. Should he not be allowed to vote? Our country forces him to fight in a war against his will, he's permanently disabled and his life ruined by what the country forced him to do, and now you say he should have his ability to vote in that country taken too? | cmv |
I think if you receive a substantial amount of government assistance ( forms of welfare ) you should not have the right to vote. CMV | Alright, I will one up you then. Anybody involved with a corporation or industry receiving subsidies, bailouts, or corporate welfare is explicitly forbidden from voting AND donating any money to any political cause what so ever. The people on food stamps are hardly worth worrying about if you look at the amount of corporate welfare going on. Why cry about a paper cut when your arm was freshly dismembered? | cmv |
I think that mostly, religion is pointless and abortion should be legal. CMV | You've pretty much got two entirely separate arguments here ( the usefulness of religion versus abortion ) but here's one thing you should know : the idea of fetal personhood is relatively new and isn't really tied to religion. People just say it is to gain favor. I'm no bible expert, but I believe the bible refers to a fetus as " water " for a large part of the pregnancy, nothing to do with it being a person, deserving of equal treatment. No religion's official doctrine has made that clear, nobody has ever counted age starting from conception ( except the Chinese, but that was more of a cultural thing, and they don't really do that anymore ). If anything, pro - life is more rooted in sexism than religion, and religions support it because they're stuck in the past. Women are the only people responsible for pregnancy, and they have to face consequences, because the alternative is allowing them enough autonomy to have sex totally at will, and the male - dominated religious institutions want none of that. So down with abortion, down with birth control, down with sex ed, and so on. It's not because they want what's best for the fetus ( because legalized abortion and access to contraceptives saves the most ), it's because they want to shame women for acting independently and getting an unwanted pregnancy. | cmv |
People should strive to avoid hypocrisy at all times. CMV | I don't think inconsistency is that bad of a crime, it's mostly the scale of it. If hypocrisy is the worst thing imaginable, then a murderer who openly thinks it's okay to murder people is better than a Nazi supporter who uses his influence to help Jews escape on the down - low. On a less dramatic scale, parents will tell their kids not to drink, have sex, swear, etc. while doing the same things themselves regularly and without guilt. They may have done it themselves at the same age. But that doesn't mean they're wrong, they have a good reason to hold their child to a higher standard - because the kid takes a higher priority than their credibility. | cmv |
People should strive to avoid hypocrisy at all times. CMV | If they can stay consistent with their views on more than half of the normal instances they have to prove themselves, are they still hypocrites? You know what they say.. only a sith can deal in absolutes. | cmv |
People should strive to avoid hypocrisy at all times. CMV | Strictly speaking, hypocrisy can be more moral than making no effort at all. Say you have two friends and you each have $ 100. There is a charity that you can give your money to. If you using trickery get both of them to give their money, saying you will, but YOU never do, the charity still gets $ 100 MORE than if YOU simply gave, and didn't tell anyone. And it gets $ 200 more than if nobody gave. Obviously the best solution of all is it all three of you give. And obviously when people find out hypocracy it has other negatives. But keep in mind the positives that can be done with it. | cmv |
The common moral arguments against piracy are ultimately all derived entirely from it's illegality, CMV | Just because you're not stealing a unique object, such as a bow in OP's example, doesn't make the act morally permissible. Instead of looking at pirating a movie as " stealing " a good think of it as stealing a service. Services don't necessarily have finite amounts such as a bow ( just one ). Certain types of services can be done over and over ; so receiving a service without compensating the owner is stealing because it eliminates their potential to make money. The creator of anything has a right to control their property. Locke : Life, liberty, and property. Within that right the owner retains the right to use his / her discretion on the future of that good or service. They have the ability to control who can obtain the product / service and at what cost to the user ( s ). So by pirating a movie, per say, the user limits the owners ability to maintain sovereignty over their property | cmv |
The common moral arguments against piracy are ultimately all derived entirely from it's illegality, CMV | " If everyone would pirate the things that they can't afford, while continuing to pay for things that they can, that would lead to a net benefit for society ". Yes, of course you are right. Allowing priracy is fine if people only take what they can't afford and pay for everything they can afford. Also, if everybody would work their tails off all day for no pay, and then take only what they need from society, we would live in a anarcho - communitarian utopia. Unfortunately this is the real world. | cmv |
The common moral arguments against piracy are ultimately all derived entirely from it's illegality, CMV | The economical argument makes sense, regardless of the illegality. They are basically saying that artists now get their revenue from the enforced monopoly of distributing their work. Voiding that monopoly would make that revenue disappear. This is true. However, I do agree with you that there are ample possibilities of obtaining revenue without that monopoly. Any reform should take that concern of theirs into account though. | cmv |
I am an Emotivist who believes that all ethical, moral and general'good / badness'we see in the universe is opinion only, nothing more. CMV | As a christian, i believe that there is the will to bring others happiness in all people, and if you look at science it'll back me up. There are things that come naturally to people without someone telling them it's good or bad cause it's inside them to begin with. Things like murder is wrong, stealing is wrong, being nice to people is good. These things are good and bad because are DNA and are god ( weather you believe in him is irrelevant to my point ). So in saying there is no good and evil are you not deifying your own genes? | cmv |
I am an Emotivist who believes that all ethical, moral and general'good / badness'we see in the universe is opinion only, nothing more. CMV | So, when is it " good ", or " right " to have sex with a child? I mean, I get the death example, because there's nothing wrong with killing another person in self defense. But pedophilia? I'm really having a hard time thinking of a justifiable example of pedophilia. | cmv |
I am an Emotivist who believes that all ethical, moral and general'good / badness'we see in the universe is opinion only, nothing more. CMV | I would argue that the only way in which you're argument about the good and the bad makes sense is in a situation where you strip all meaning from the words good or bad. This is more of a linguistic argument than anything philosophical. Essentially, things can only be objectively good or objectively bad if " good " and " bad " have some kind of meaning. If good means beneficial to people, than rape becomes objectively bad because no one benefits from rape. The terms good and bad only have significance and objectivity so long as we give them definitions, and parameters by which we can measure so we can see if they fit the definition. An example of this would be the word air. The literal word air means nothing, has no objective significance, and is just a breath of air manipulated to form a specific sound. However, when we start to give air meaning and parameters ( ex : air is what we breath ), than it begins to have objective meaning, and we can differentiate it from things that are not air, like water. Essentially, I'll agree that the definition and parameters that we use to define good and bad can be wholly arbitrary, but once we give those words definition, we can begin to classify things that are factually good or bad. It might be hard, but it is possible. | cmv |
I am an Emotivist who believes that all ethical, moral and general'good / badness'we see in the universe is opinion only, nothing more. CMV | Perhaps examine " good " and " bad " in terms of purpose. Would you consider using a pencil as a can opener a " bad " use of a pencil? Could " human life " have a similar purpose? Could the use of a human life be considered " good " or " bad " based on how well it aligns with the intended purpose? | cmv |
I am an Emotivist who believes that all ethical, moral and general'good / badness'we see in the universe is opinion only, nothing more. CMV | I will admit that ethically speaking, I am largely what I believe is called a utilitarian ; thus, that I believe that actions lead to specific results, and whether or not we should take a given action, depends on whether or not we desire the given result. At the same time, however, I offer the caveat that, because of the potential reality of such things as the Butterfly Effect, and also because of human imperfection, it is not always possible to perceive the results of our actions with perfect clarity. The effects of some actions, can also take a very long time, even decades or centuries, to become apparent ; so this is not always easy. I consider emotion, by itself, to be an extremely dangerous means of determining the merit of a given act, personally. This is because emotions can be ( and in fact usually are ) divorced from logic, but it is also because emotions are not impervious to the effects of certain substances, such as antidepressants. If you use emotions as your moral guide, and then you consume a substance which disables your emotions, how then will you make moral decisions? | cmv |
I am an Emotivist who believes that all ethical, moral and general'good / badness'we see in the universe is opinion only, nothing more. CMV | You are correct that your personal feelings of good and bad influence your personal morality on every issue. It is possible to view the existence of life on Earth as bad and start a nuclear way to end it all and in your eyes that would be good. However ( since this is CMV ), it is possible to adopt a rational standard for determining good and bad, right and wrong that any society, any race, any species could agree with ( since any absolute moral standard would have to apply to all life, even space aliens ). I might not have the right standard, but here is an attempt by defining inherently wrong or bad... It is inherently wrong / bad / evil to act to the detriment of the long term survival of your species. | cmv |
I am an Emotivist who believes that all ethical, moral and general'good / badness'we see in the universe is opinion only, nothing more. CMV | So how should we determine whether or not to outlaw something in society then? What's the criteria for outlawing murder? Should we go by majority opinion to determine it? Would it be moral for a majority to enslave a minority? If the majority don't see a problem with it, then there is no moral problem? | cmv |
I am an Emotivist who believes that all ethical, moral and general'good / badness'we see in the universe is opinion only, nothing more. CMV | Do you believe that pure mathematics is " wholly subjective "? If you do, your opinion is consistent, but I believe you are wrong. If you don't, your opinion is inconsistent : pure mathematics is only " true " or " false " based on certain parameters, which are the axioms in the formal system you are using. | cmv |
I am an Emotivist who believes that all ethical, moral and general'good / badness'we see in the universe is opinion only, nothing more. CMV | " You cannot, ever, find anything at all that is'factually'good or bad. It's only ever good or bad based on certain parameters, opinions and values any one person holds, and as such is only good or bad to them. " Rape. You list this as an example in your description, but I'm interested in hearing what parameters must be set to not consider raping another person an inherently evil act. | cmv |
I am an Emotivist who believes that all ethical, moral and general'good / badness'we see in the universe is opinion only, nothing more. CMV | Ethics is existent, because it guides our actions and preserves order in society. Why don't people just steal from other people? Because being moral yields a functioning society. Your argument is weak, because we have a well - organized society that abides by ethical rules, not originated from opinions, but by logic, reasoning, and understanding. | cmv |
I am an Emotivist who believes that all ethical, moral and general'good / badness'we see in the universe is opinion only, nothing more. CMV | There is nothing logically inconsistent in your view, but it has some very unintuitive consequences, leading me to believe that an objective morality is more plausible. Take the book Nineteen Eighty - Four. According to your view, Winston and Julia were criminal and deserving of the full punishment of the law. ( If you haven't read the book, Winston and Julia fell in love and disbelieved in the absolute good of the Party, ( which formed the government ) which were both thought crimes punishable by torture and eventual execution. ) According to your view, they should have been punished according to the law just like in our society a murderer should be punished according to the law. Also, everyone agrees with the Party's rules in the book, so you can't argue that the Party was contradicting the general public's opinion on morality. To be consistent in your view, you must believe that this society is not a dystopia at all—it functions exactly the way it should according to people's morality. | cmv |
I am an Emotivist who believes that all ethical, moral and general'good / badness'we see in the universe is opinion only, nothing more. CMV | The point of ethics is to teach us how to think and behave when we are unsure. Of course it's all opinions. Some of those opinions are better than others, and analyzing those " parameters " you dismiss is the whole point of the endeavor. Total ethical nihilism accomplishes nothing and leads us to a dead end. It is the philosophical equivalent of a child's " nuh - uh. " | cmv |
I am an Emotivist who believes that all ethical, moral and general'good / badness'we see in the universe is opinion only, nothing more. CMV | If good can be wrong and bad can be right, then up can be down and sandwich can be grandma. Anyway, I think the point of assigning moral rightness and wrongness is just to keep some sort of structure / order. If you don't like order, you will be labeled insane and deemed unfit for society. If you want sandwich to be grandma, you need to find a commune where you will be allowed to continue believing that. Good luck. | cmv |
I am an Emotivist who believes that all ethical, moral and general'good / badness'we see in the universe is opinion only, nothing more. CMV | I agree that there is no real objective " right or wrong " because everything is technically an opinion. However, I do think some opinions are much more important and valuable ( to humans ) than others. With enough consensus, we as a society were able to transformed certain opinions like " murder is wrong and should be outlawed " into very specific codes of conduct. So an opinion can become a rule of moral / ethics with by way of consensus from the majority of the population. | cmv |
I believe overweight and obese persons should be subject to the same ridicule, criticism, and social and legal obligations as smokers. CMV | Fat shaming makes obesity worse. Also, smoke - shaming is similarly unlikely to persuade smokers. Helping people be informed in the risks they're taking, how to mitigate them / improve their health, and refraining from judging them seems to help. TheTruth. com is one such campaign to inform smokers of the risks without the shaming. | cmv |
I believe overweight and obese persons should be subject to the same ridicule, criticism, and social and legal obligations as smokers. CMV | Being obese doesn't harm the health of those around you, and thus all the " social and legal " obligations make absolutely zero sense to apply to overweight people. Are you trying to say that all fat people should have to take their fat - being outside? Also, not totally sure if you're aware, but as much as society has tried to change it, the cool kids still smoke. Ridicule and criticism of smokers is something we ignore quite easily, thank you. I don't really know how to try to change your view since your view doesn't really make any sense. | cmv |
I believe overweight and obese persons should be subject to the same ridicule, criticism, and social and legal obligations as smokers. CMV | So take someone ( myself / friends ) who has suffered with a mood disorder and has had to take Abilify. One of the side effects is weight gain ( doctors say it's " rare ", but every person I have met has gained weight. ) I gained significant weight ( 80 - 100 lbs ), and could only lose 5 - 10 lbs before regaining it, and then some. I went from 150 lbs to 280 lbs ( at my most ) from ages 14 to 16. Should I, and many others, be ridiculed for being fat, when the cause is ultimately out of my / they / our control? | cmv |
I believe overweight and obese persons should be subject to the same ridicule, criticism, and social and legal obligations as smokers. CMV | Ahhh my time to shine. First of all - becoming overweight is a coping mechanism that helps a person that over consumes refined carbs & sugar control their blood sugar. If this is the case, we would expect that thin people with terrible diets would have WORSE symptoms, IE heart disease, diabetes, blindness, Alzheimers etc etc when compared with obese people. When you control observational studies for terrible diets, and you compare obese people with thin people, thin people are actually waaaaaay more sick!! What you probably WANT to do is punish people with bad diets. Unfortunately it's almost impossible to do this, as people lie and secretly eat terrible things. A better approach would be just to tax all food with a glycemic index over 50 or 60 VERY HEAVILY. this will pay for medical costs. This is the model used in canada to pay for smokers. So, you come from the right place, and I see what you are saying... but you need a little more education before you jump to conclusions : ) | cmv |
I believe overweight and obese persons should be subject to the same ridicule, criticism, and social and legal obligations as smokers. CMV | This is simple - no one is trying to ban you from being a smoker. They ban smoking in designated areas so that non - smokers don't have to be subject to your second hand smoke. You can't get second hand fatness. Someone being fat around you does not infringe on your health in any way. What exactly are you suggesting be done about fat people in relation to smokers i. e. non - smoking areas? It's not comparable at all. | cmv |
I believe overweight and obese persons should be subject to the same ridicule, criticism, and social and legal obligations as smokers. CMV | Ultimately it comes down to this. 100 % of smokers chose to smoke. It's their personal decision to light up and put themselves and others at risk. In my opinion they are fair game for any criticism or ridicule you throw their way. The majority of obese people choose to be obese through their lifestyle so they are fair game for criticism or ridicule. However a small percentage of obese people are obese for reasons out of their control. Off the top of my head the only one that I can list is thyroid issues. These people don't choose to be excessively skinny or fat. You can't tell the difference between obese because of thyroid issues and obese because of lifestyle apart just by looking at them. If you start an anti fat campaign that runs just like the anti smoking campaigns you end up attacking innocents who have no control over their weight. | cmv |
I believe overweight and obese persons should be subject to the same ridicule, criticism, and social and legal obligations as smokers. CMV | I don't believe that either the obese or smokers should be subject to ridicule. The attempt by governments to regulate smoking has fascist precedent ; it was something that Hitler advocated. We need to move towards a scenario where the individual decides for themselves which substances they do or don't ingest, and I don't consider that to be limited purely to smoking. As a disclaimer, any individual who reflexively responds to this post, with any mention of Godwin's non - existent " Law, " will render themselves the subject of withering contempt. | cmv |
I believe recent CMV's which necessitate equal punishment for women for crimes usually committed by men are expressed out of misogyny. CMV | This is in the same vein as previous CMVs against MRAs as being misogynistic. There was a great reply in a thread that stated that MRAs are born of the same desire to change the current patriarchal system that feminists have, but that they found themselves unwelcome in feminism and feminist forums. If you've ever heard the term'mansplaining'then you know what that means - feminists often deal with male viewpoints with the exact same sort of dismissiveness that feminists were once treated with. So men have had to build their own movement to discuss gender inequalities, and they focus on the things that they see most obviously, and because the movement is so young ( and also because of how we condition men ) they are often clumsy with expressing themselves. They go over the top about women falsely accusing men of rape and ruining their lives ( which is a very understandable thing to be upset over, btw ). But the intent is genuine and not malicious. There is some anger at the thought that male issues are not being taken seriously ( by women and men ), and there is some distrust of feminists because many men have been burned by their initial contact with feminists. But you can't write off these expressions of frustration as misogynistic rather than perhaps overzealous, the same kind of hyperbole that people use whenever they are frustrated e. g. with the bankers that caused the crash. PS Why you hate justice? MLK gonna preach at you. | cmv |
I feel most social issues are rooted in a form of pluralistic ignorance... CMV. | Differences are normally caused by clashing worldviews, not by a lack of questions. For example with the rape thing, the feminist perspective is that rape is bad, males mostly do it, and we should stop mostly males from doing it. The counter perspective is that rape is bad, everyone does it, mostly males get accused and if you're male you're going to get blamed regardless of what you do. If you do get questions you hit up against invisible assumptions in the argument like " People are raped equally / men rape women more than women rape men " and " The patriarchy is oppressing people / feminists are oppressing people. " which tends to weaken dialogue. On video games and violence that's very much a statistical matter which most people ignore in favor of their biases. There is evidence from lab testing that video games can increase violent impulses, and violence in general has declined as video games have become more common so the actual picture could be complicated. Both sides mostly ignore this and go with their biases, and only look at evidence that agrees with their viewpoint. Asking questions wouldn't resolve this since neither cares what the other side believes. If you do ask questions that just leads to a shouting match. | cmv |
Why should the state be allowed to cause a person real, tangible harm ( and in the process, spend real, tangible tax dollars ) in prosecuting them for something like indecent exposure - an act that has never caused real tangible harm to anyone? How can this practice be rationally defended? CMV | What about sudden indecent exposure that causes a legitimate fear of sexual assault? Or sudden indecent exposure that's a form of sexual harassment? Isn't there a difference between sexual exposure for the sake of protest, which is often legal, and that designed to inflict psychological harm on someone else? Also, the more we study the human mind, the more we can measure psychological harm as tangible harm. It's as much physics and chemistry there as anywhere in the universe. You can't just protect yourself from harm by asking it to keep a good attitude. It doesn't operate on magic. | cmv |
Why should the state be allowed to cause a person real, tangible harm ( and in the process, spend real, tangible tax dollars ) in prosecuting them for something like indecent exposure - an act that has never caused real tangible harm to anyone? How can this practice be rationally defended? CMV | Let me ask : in a more general sense, do you think people should be allowed to be naked in public? Because I can think of some practical reasons to restrict that freedom. This wouldn't necessarily address " indecent exposure " specifically, but I feel like the two situations would overlap quite a bit. | cmv |
I believe joining the military is honorable and a right of passage. CMV | I bet that some people were crushed when they were denied entry to the SS in WWII - era Germany. But probably they were better off for not having been admitted. Although there is a huge difference between the Schutzstaffel and the current US military, I think that the US military does a lot more harm than good. If you disagree with this, I can try to convince you of it. | cmv |
I believe that reverence towards the military, has reached an unhealthy, and imbalanced extreme within contemporary Western society. CMV. | I think that if you look at history, martial glory is at an all time low. In many ancient societies, the warrior caste was on top. Kings and emperors were made by conquest : Alexander, Caesar and most Roman emperors, Napoleon, William the Conqueror, Genghis Khan. When was the last time a major Western leader was primarily defined by his military career? Eisenhower, 60 years ago? You can argue that there is too much reverence to the military, but " has reached "? No, the trend is in the opposite direction. | cmv |
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