Occupy

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

I think that the root of the kind of smug judgmentalism inherent in Libertarianism is, at its root, fear. Because if you believe that the reason you are successful is 90% that you've made good decisions and only 10% pure dumb luck, then you can feel secure in your position in life, whereas if you accept that good luck (including the luck of being able to make good decisions) probably accounts for closer to 80% of your success, life can feel a little precarious because then you're also accepting that chance could pull the rug out from under you at any time. Not like all those dumbfucks on the streets; obviously, they made bad decisions, and you're better than them so that would never happen to you.

That last post was pretty antagonistic.  But then, your replies seems pretty damn antagonistic and almost demand a similar retort.

I think we covered this bit in the other thread.  I have changed my script to acknowledge I was born with certain advantages, even as I was given certain disadvantages that required me to change and overcome, or fall into a repeating pattern.

Yeap, that's the problem with libertards.  The ones who were destitute and made it out have blinders about the luck that helped getting them out of it.

I'm working on that.  I appreciate yours and Freeky's assistance in that.  

Bitch.    

Did I poke a nerve? Fuck you. I'm done with you, except inasmuch as I can make your time spent here as unpleasant as possible. I have addressed you pretty politely in this thread, I have complimented the obvious advantages you have over other people even while I pointed out that it was very lucky for you to be granted such advantages. In return, you call me names and intimate that my convictions must make me a ball-buster in relationships.

Wow.

Because, obviously, it's not like I might be sensitive at all about my tenuous and heartbreaking relationship status, or struggling with personal issues, or have any normal girly feelings. Just go right for the personal stuff.

[Disco Pickle]

That last line of yours puts you on my shit list for as long as I remember that you said it. Which might not be long, if you're lucky. Seriously? Dragging my love life into this discussion? That was completely tacky and uncalled-for.

completely uncalled for.  

cheap shot was cheap.  

I could blame it on the alcohol but that would be disingenuous.  

It was just a dick move designed to get a rile out of you.

I won't do it again.  I'll talk with you on the subject.

Sorry about that.  I know that's no conciliation.

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

Clearly, the best way to shut down a woman in an argument is to either call her a slut or inform her that her strong opinions are the reason she can't keep a man.

Conciliation? You don't even have the balls to apologize. You are a cheap, trashy coward.

[Phox]

Funny thing, Pickles, is your seeming in ability to divorce yourself from the stereotype long enough for us to think you are different than the folks who you link. The thing with that article you linked... it's so horribly flawed that we can barely stop laughing long enough to try to logically address it.

For the record, Pickles, I was gifted with many of the same advantages as you, and in a slightly better situation to boot (my parents were drugged up), and I'm damn lucky that I'm living comfortably right now.  Thing is, I know how lucky I am/was, and I know just how tenuous my position is. I don't have an iPhone. I don't have designer clothes, as my wardrobe consists mostly of hand-me-downs from my sister, and I certainly ain't no rags-to-riches story (and neither is she).

Gah... I can't think right now.... let me see if I can't flesh that out more later...

[Freeky]

I think that the root of the kind of smug judgmentalism inherent in Libertarianism is, at its root, fear. Because if you believe that the reason you are successful is 90% that you've made good decisions and only 10% pure dumb luck, then you can feel secure in your position in life, whereas if you accept that good luck (including the luck of being able to make good decisions) probably accounts for closer to 80% of your success, life can feel a little precarious because then you're also accepting that chance could pull the rug out from under you at any time. Not like all those dumbfucks on the streets; obviously, they made bad decisions, and you're better than them so that would never happen to you.

That last post was pretty antagonistic.  But then, your replies seems pretty damn antagonistic and almost demand a similar retort.

I think we covered this bit in the other thread.  I have changed my script to acknowledge I was born with certain advantages, even as I was given certain disadvantages that required me to change and overcome, or fall into a repeating pattern.

Yeap, that's the problem with libertards.  The ones who were destitute and made it out have blinders about the luck that helped getting them out of it.

I'm working on that.  I appreciate yours and Freeky's assistance in that.  

Bitch.    

Woah, dude.  I (and probably Nigel too, am not mind reader) actually WAS trying to help you, and then you come over all passive aggressive and do this shit?  You fucking use me as ammunition because Nigel touched a nerve?  What the fucking hell is wrong with you?  Why are you digging your heels in like a goddamn monkey, proving every single point made against libertarianism on this board?  Do you think this is going to make you friends?  Make you right?  

Guess what.  Go fuck yourself.  If this is the way you're going to treat my attempt at breaking you of a bad habit (particularly faulty logic) then you can suck my left nut.  Goddammit.  GOD FUCKING DAMN IT.

[Disco Pickle]

Clearly, the best way to shut down a woman in an argument is to either call her a slut or inform her that her strong opinions are the reason she can't keep a man.

Conciliation? You don't even have the balls to apologize. You are a cheap, trashy coward.

I sincerely apologise.  as much as I possibly can across an entire continent.

I let me emotions get in the way of what should have been a reasoned discussion.

I did take your replies to be personal and that was my mistake.

I should never have brought your personal relationships into the discussion as a reflection on you.  

That was wrong.  

I'll never do that again.

If this isn't enough of an apology to you, considering I'm just some electrons on the other side of the world, I'm not sure what will ever be.

I'm sorry.

That might seem disingenuous from someone else, but I really mean it.  

I was a dick there.  Nothing you have said deserved that dickishness.

I hope we can get past it at some point.  I learn a lot from you.

lot of spaces in between those statements, isn't there?

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

I think that the root of the kind of smug judgmentalism inherent in Libertarianism is, at its root, fear. Because if you believe that the reason you are successful is 90% that you've made good decisions and only 10% pure dumb luck, then you can feel secure in your position in life, whereas if you accept that good luck (including the luck of being able to make good decisions) probably accounts for closer to 80% of your success, life can feel a little precarious because then you're also accepting that chance could pull the rug out from under you at any time. Not like all those dumbfucks on the streets; obviously, they made bad decisions, and you're better than them so that would never happen to you.

That last post was pretty antagonistic.  But then, your replies seems pretty damn antagonistic and almost demand a similar retort.

I think we covered this bit in the other thread.  I have changed my script to acknowledge I was born with certain advantages, even as I was given certain disadvantages that required me to change and overcome, or fall into a repeating pattern.

Yeap, that's the problem with libertards.  The ones who were destitute and made it out have blinders about the luck that helped getting them out of it.

I'm working on that.  I appreciate yours and Freeky's assistance in that.  

Bitch.    

Woah, dude.  I (and probably Nigel too, am not mind reader) actually WAS trying to help you, and then you come over all passive aggressive and do this shit?  You fucking use me as ammunition because Nigel touched a nerve?  What the fucking hell is wrong with you?  Why are you digging your heels in like a goddamn monkey, proving every single point made against libertarianism on this board?  Do you think this is going to make you friends?  Make you right?  

Guess what.  Go fuck yourself.  If this is the way you're going to treat my attempt at breaking you of a bad habit (particularly faulty logic) then you can suck my left nut.  Goddammit.  GOD FUCKING DAMN IT.

Very seriously, the last guy I knew who had the mindset that external influences shape our lives much less than internal influences went into a severe depression and tried to kill himself when his girlfriend dumped him and he lost his job & couldn't find a new one despite being a very well-regarded, highly talented and hardworking CGI animator. He lost his shit because, according to his worldview, he must have done something wrong. It had to be his fault.

Luckily, the suicide attempt left him with a certain degree of personality-altering brain damage, and while he's much more of a dick now, he's also a lot happier. Upside!



(Incidentally, while he was in the mental institution in the months following his suicide attempt, I had his car towed. I felt so guilty; I didn't know it was his and it had been in front of my house for weeks.)

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

Clearly, the best way to shut down a woman in an argument is to either call her a slut or inform her that her strong opinions are the reason she can't keep a man.

Conciliation? You don't even have the balls to apologize. You are a cheap, trashy coward.

I sincerely apologise.  as much as I possibly can across an entire continent.

I let me emotions get in the way of what should have been a reasoned discussion.

I did take your replies to be personal and that was my mistake.

I should never have brought your personal relationships into the discussion as a reflection on you.  

That was wrong.  

I'll never do that again.

If this isn't enough of an apology to you, considering I'm just some electrons on the other side of the world, I'm not sure what will ever be.

I'm sorry.

That might seem disingenuous from someone else, but I really mean it.  

I was a dick there.  Nothing you have said deserved that dickishness.

I hope we can get past it at some point.  I learn a lot from you.

lot of spaces in between those statements, isn't there?

OK, thank you.

[Anna Mae Bollocks]

Clearly, the best way to shut down a woman in an argument is to either call her a slut or inform her that her strong opinions are the reason she can't keep a man.

Conciliation? You don't even have the balls to apologize. You are a cheap, trashy coward.

Look at the crap he posts, look at the crap he links to.
I'm only surprised that he hasn't called anyone a "feminazi".

[Anna Mae Bollocks]

Apologies were in order, but they don't make everything all better, DP. We know you're like that now.

[Cain]

Called it

I heard about this on the radio. I'm rather surprised that this is actually happening, and I am eagerly awaiting the tales of mass disruption.

QUICK, place your bets on how long it will be before the propaganda machine tries to connect the Occupiers to terrorism!

The moment they realize the problem is too large to ignore it, there will be accusations of terrorism, and also most likely some horrific violence which will be blamed on the Occupiers. I predict a bombing. This will be used to "justify" extreme police violence against the Occupiers.

I think what will happen if it starts to get too large, and I'm already seeing signs of this, is the movement will be co-opted and neutered by mainstream establishment Democrats.

In the comments, someone gives a good way Wall Street and the NYPD could come out of this smelling like roses.  I'll quote it, because it's a good one:

My father is a historian, whose specialty is the history of the French revolution(s) – so I absorbed a lot of stuff on that topic as a young pup, rather inadvertently. I grew up reading Saul Alinksi's "Rules for Radicals" – unlike, apparently, whoever 'organized' the OWS effort.

One of the reasons protests like OWS are important is because they happen at all, and how they end. Generally, the first few protests are fairly peaceful unless they are met with violence, and the best response of the forces in power is to defuse them by allowing them to get bored. The quintessential example of this was some protests at NSA back in the 90s, in which a few dozen people hopped up and down outside the barbed wire. NSA sent a spokesperson with a couple minions, some tables, chairs, kool-ade (it was a hot day) and ice, and made the protestors comfortable while the spokesperson "engaged" with the people – not with an intent of changing anyone's mind but of simply letting them talk themselves out and boring them to tears. It worked. One of the points that Alinsky makes is that the organizer of a movement is screwed if they have no agenda, or if they have an agenda that is easy to meet. Indeed, when you go out to organize the masses, the thing you want to ask for is an unachievable goal, because your opponent can pull your fangs by the simple expedient of promising you whatever it is you asked for, and then reneging on it after everyone has gone home and gotten comfortable on the couch, again.

The OWS protest will go on longer than it should have, thanks to officer Bologna and his ill-advised pepper spray, who gave them a perfect example of what they are standing against. If I were his superior, I would have him out there, right now, with a table and a gigantic quantity of donuts and coffee with NYPD napkins and paper cups serving the protestors. If I were on the other side, I'd rummage around some Wall St companies and get them to send human resources people with job postings and turn the occupation into a jobs fair. Alinsky makes the point, over and over that whoever can maintain the most stark distinction between "us" and "them" will be able to maintain a coherent force, whereas the other side can always be pressured by encouraging them to "become part of 'us'" Protests like this are not revolutions, yet, they should be more like an amoeba than a praying mantis: surround, absorb, digest later.

The 60s were a time when there still were professional radicals, offering a counter-current ideology that was plausible enough to attract adherents. Marxism sounds really good, because it's mostly idealistic bafflegab, especially through loud speakers at a rally, where nobody has a chance to question whether it's really a viable alternative. And, that's what OWS (and the Tea Party) lack – a viable alternative. In the 60s there still were professional radicals who could fire up a crowd with ideological cant. The OWS crowd and the Tea Party have ideology but it's all anti-this, anti-that – you only get a revolution, in those situations, if the state responds with excessive force and there is a serious long-standing popular grudge. One of the things most people never learn is that there was not just "one" French revolution – there were a series, which culminated in the big one. For a country to reach a level of discontent that severe, the plutocracy has to be horribly dysfunctional (viz: the Romanoffs, The Bourbons) and the political unbalance must be massive. Or, the state has to lead with its chin by getting violent and the "real revolution" turning-point is virtually always the moment when the standing military decides it's not going to take orders. (That's why the Chinese imported a mechanized corps from the north to break up Tienamen Square – it'd be hard to get local residents to open fire on streets that they know)

The short form of all of this is that we don't look like we've got anything remotely like a level of discontent that would spark a real revolution. In the 60s, with apartheid and people being drafted to die pointlessly in Vietnam, it was potentially there – which is why the rulers loosened the leash a bit.

[Triple Zero]

I subscribe to a different philosophy on people than you do.  It doesn't make me 100% wrong, it doesn't make you 100% right.  

Possibly. By my admittedly rough estimate you've been wrong about 75% of the time.

Utter and complete stupidity can only account for 50% of that!

Feel free to continue to be right all of the time in spite of me.  It's an endearing quality that must make you an excellent person to be involved with intimately.

WOw you're a shithead.

I know you apologized and shit, but I just wanted to press your face in it, like housebreaking a puppy.

[Triple Zero]

In the comments, someone gives a good way Wall Street and the NYPD could come out of this smelling like roses.  I'll quote it, because it's a good one:

My father is a historian, whose specialty is the history of the French revolution(s) – so I absorbed a lot of stuff on that topic as a young pup, rather inadvertently. I grew up reading Saul Alinksi's "Rules for Radicals" – unlike, apparently, whoever 'organized' the OWS effort.

One of the reasons protests like OWS are important is because they happen at all, and how they end. Generally, the first few protests are fairly peaceful unless they are met with violence, and the best response of the forces in power is to defuse them by allowing them to get bored. The quintessential example of this was some protests at NSA back in the 90s, in which a few dozen people hopped up and down outside the barbed wire. NSA sent a spokesperson with a couple minions, some tables, chairs, kool-ade (it was a hot day) and ice, and made the protestors comfortable while the spokesperson "engaged" with the people – not with an intent of changing anyone's mind but of simply letting them talk themselves out and boring them to tears. It worked. One of the points that Alinsky makes is that the organizer of a movement is screwed if they have no agenda, or if they have an agenda that is easy to meet. Indeed, when you go out to organize the masses, the thing you want to ask for is an unachievable goal, because your opponent can pull your fangs by the simple expedient of promising you whatever it is you asked for, and then reneging on it after everyone has gone home and gotten comfortable on the couch, again.

The OWS protest will go on longer than it should have, thanks to officer Bologna and his ill-advised pepper spray, who gave them a perfect example of what they are standing against. If I were his superior, I would have him out there, right now, with a table and a gigantic quantity of donuts and coffee with NYPD napkins and paper cups serving the protestors. If I were on the other side, I'd rummage around some Wall St companies and get them to send human resources people with job postings and turn the occupation into a jobs fair. Alinsky makes the point, over and over that whoever can maintain the most stark distinction between "us" and "them" will be able to maintain a coherent force, whereas the other side can always be pressured by encouraging them to "become part of 'us'" Protests like this are not revolutions, yet, they should be more like an amoeba than a praying mantis: surround, absorb, digest later.

The 60s were a time when there still were professional radicals, offering a counter-current ideology that was plausible enough to attract adherents. Marxism sounds really good, because it's mostly idealistic bafflegab, especially through loud speakers at a rally, where nobody has a chance to question whether it's really a viable alternative. And, that's what OWS (and the Tea Party) lack – a viable alternative. In the 60s there still were professional radicals who could fire up a crowd with ideological cant. The OWS crowd and the Tea Party have ideology but it's all anti-this, anti-that – you only get a revolution, in those situations, if the state responds with excessive force and there is a serious long-standing popular grudge. One of the things most people never learn is that there was not just "one" French revolution – there were a series, which culminated in the big one. For a country to reach a level of discontent that severe, the plutocracy has to be horribly dysfunctional (viz: the Romanoffs, The Bourbons) and the political unbalance must be massive. Or, the state has to lead with its chin by getting violent and the "real revolution" turning-point is virtually always the moment when the standing military decides it's not going to take orders. (That's why the Chinese imported a mechanized corps from the north to break up Tienamen Square – it'd be hard to get local residents to open fire on streets that they know)

The short form of all of this is that we don't look like we've got anything remotely like a level of discontent that would spark a real revolution. In the 60s, with apartheid and people being drafted to die pointlessly in Vietnam, it was potentially there – which is why the rulers loosened the leash a bit.

Wowww that's a good one, very insightful!

I'm getting more and more that these protests really need "1% Agent Provocateurs" ...

[Elder Iptuous]

You think the 1% crowd could be provoked into violence?

That seems unlikely.

or, are you saying that the Occupy crowd should be provoked?

[Cain]

I believe Trip is saying the OWS crowd need agent provocateurs pretending to be the "1%" and acting like complete, entitled assholes in order to better heighten the "us and them" dynamic needed for a successful protest movement.