FtttG
User ID: 1175
FtttG
6d ago
The latter. Personally, I don't think the standard gripes about a shortage of accommodation, unreliable public transport and an imperfect public health service a failed state make.
A lot of my friends are non-natives, and I often joke that, in Ireland, there are no issues, problems or inconveniences. There are only crises.
FtttG
6d ago
FtttG
6d ago
Yeah, he has these melodramatic writing tics that undermine the gravity and solemnity he's trying to project:
Tennis players would sheepishly wait for the crowd to clear so they could drive in and park. My sympathies were with them, these were their lives and happiness, after all.
Like, what? Playing tennis is your "life" and "happiness"? I don't even know what you're trying to convey here.
FtttG
7d ago
Sure, but that also describes many people who voted for Trump. Should we deport every working-age able-bodied adult who falls below a given productivity threshold?
FtttG
7d ago
"Really, you were fleeing from the dystopian failed state of... Ireland?"
I've encountered my fair share of Irish people unironically describing it as such. They lack perspective.
Years ago I talked about a movie called Wild which depicts a woman hiking the Pacific Crest Trail solo. (Don't watch it, it's trash.) One of the pieces of advice she receives from a fellow hiker is to burn her books after she's done reading them. When you're actually hiking a long distance, I imagine every pound counts; not so much when travelling by plane.
That being said, a lot of people have this odd reverence for physical books in general, wholly independent of their monetary or intellectual value, and a concomitant aversion to destroying them for any reason. It's an anachronistic holdover from a time when books were enormously expensive to produce and consequently to buy. When you've finished reading a disposable thriller novel (e.g. Dan Brown, Lee Child), the appropriate thing to do is to recycle it, the same way you would a newspaper. You are not "doing the right thing" by donating it to a charity/thrift shop: that just kicks the problem down the road when they inevitably recycle it three to six months later. (I used to volunteer in a charity shop: we never wanted for Dan Brown novels. We could have used copies of The Da Vinci Code for insulation.)
In spite of how insightful and relevant I'm finding it (and how short it is), my progress on The True Believer has been slow.
Sure. But bear in mind: this whole Amelia thing started a couple of weeks ago, and there are already videos of her quoting poetry at length that users of this board are calling moving. I'm sure the first draft of Columbia looked a little rough around the edges (and not a little racist against Native Americans) too.
FtttG
9d ago
If that's what was intended, it's not what I took from it. I wish the person who posted it would clarify.
FtttG
10d ago
- 2-3 dashes of Angostura, teaspoon of sugar, drop of water. Muddle until dissolved.
- Add 50ml of Irish whiskey, ice cubes and orange peel garnish.
- Top up with soda water (I think this is a vital step to offset the sweetness of the sugar and bitters, and often overlooked).
Obviously the whole "Amelia" meme is very culture war-loaded, but this jocular rundown of the whole thing (containing 100+ memes) made me laugh so much that it feels more appropriate for this thread. (It caught my attention because Scott liked it.)
FtttG
10d ago
What is your objection to slavery then, if not the ownership of one man by another?
And what is so hard to understand about the fact that harm can result from action and inaction, and hence that knowingly permitting harm to occur is a crime just as much as causing harm oneself? This isn't pathos, this isn't appeal to emotion, this isn't even an argument from legality, this is just – physics, really. If you concede that punishing evildoers (by which I mean people who commit crimes of commission) is a good idea because it incentivises people not to do evil, that logically implies that it's also a good idea to punish people who commit crimes of omission, for exactly the same reason.
You seem to be operating from some kind of bizarre slave morality perspective, in which harm can only result because of action, whereas people who do nothing are morally pure. This is, to put it mildly, bollocks. Failing to toss a rope to a drowning child is almost as much of a moral indictment of you as pushing her in to the water.
You're saying that my argument "implies criminality of inaction" in what I assume is meant to be a derisive tone, like that's a facially absurd claim to make. But it's factually true that certain kinds of inaction are criminal offenses in many jurisdictions, and your refusal to recognise this doesn't make it any less true, or doesn't mean it doesn't apply to you. If you think these kinds of inactions shouldn't be considered crimes, fair enough, but don't pretend they aren't and scoff at me for pointing out that they are.
FtttG
10d ago
Can you articulate what you find morally wrong with slavery?
It is wrong for one human being to own another human being. That is, in fact, the central meaning of slavery, so I'm not committing the non-central fallacy as you claim. You brought up the comparison to plantation slavery in the antebellum South, not me.
If you refuse to acknowledge the difference between killing and not-killing, we’re at an impasse.
I acknowledge the difference between "killing" and "doing nothing to prevent a killing that you knew was going to happen". I do not think they are equally heinous, and neither does the law (accessory to murder before the fact will never be punished as harshly as murder).
I think you're using the word "slavery" in a nonstandard way. The fact that someone will be punished for inaction doesn't imply that they are therefore owned by another individual.
I don't understand why you're demanding that an actor must affirmatively agree to do something in order to face punishment for failing to do so. This isn't how we treat crimes of commission ("well we found Bob standing over Carol's corpse holding a bloody knife – but he never explicitly agreed not to murder anyone, so legally our hands are tied"), so why should it be the case for crimes of omission? This sounds like some sovereign citizen nonsense: the laws of the country in which you reside apply to you, whether you approve of them or not.
If Alice knows that Bob is planning to kill Carol and does nothing to prevent it (say, reporting him to the police), that obviously implies that Carol's murder could have been prevented had Alice acted. The fact that she didn't personally stab Carol doesn't make her any less party to the crime. The fact that she never explicitly agreed to report any instances in which she had foreknowledge of a murder doesn't either.
Wow, so she's a genius? Fair play.
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