domain:parrhesia.substack.com
PokerPirate
1d ago
Econ majors understand calculus to the same extent that anthro majors actually read the assigned reading...
So for good students in good schools, yes, absolutely; for bad students in bad schools, it's chatgpt all the way.
Rov_Scam
1d ago
As I said in another comment, and would be blindingly obvious if you had read the official report, Epstein wasn't in the general population. He had limited contact with other prisoners. Furthermore, this was more of a jail than a prison, with people moving in and out regularly. Epstein was intentionally segregated from other prisoners for the explicit purpose of protection; this theory doesn't comport with the known facts.
It's not, but there's a sucker born in the MIC every minute.
And your article says the Army announced a plan to think about maybe at some point asking a guy about ordering a hundred thousand M7s. That's not "fielded" in any way shape or form. My guess is even that won't happen, but if it does there's a kickback.
Rov_Scam
1d ago
Epstein wasn't in general population. He didn't have a cellmate at the time. No other inmates had any access to him unless a guard let him out of his cell and into Epstein's, which we know didn't happen because there's nothing on tape showing that anyone went in the direction of Epstein's cell all night. Unless it's your contention that during the missing three minutes a guard went up the stairs, let one preselected prisoner out of his cell and into Epstein's, waited while the prisoner murdered Epstein and fashioned a noose from bedsheets, then let the prisoner back into his cell and walked downstairs, and somehow everyone who had access to the tape from the Electronics Technician on up the chain was also bought off or intimidated. That behavior goes beyond looking the other way for a few minutes and tends towards being an active participant liable to be indicted for a capital crime.
I don't know what state you're in, but "quite a few" doesn't mean much considering how many COs are in the state. If you're in Vermont, with only 600 officers, even if one was getting caught every week, and there were just as many who didn't get caught, and all were susceptible to bribery, that still leaves at 5/6 chance that the guy you pick doesn't participate and goes to the police, which is more common if you're using intimidation as a tactic and there's nothing in it for the CO. Even in Vermont, someone would have to be getting caught nearly every other day for the odds to even get to 50/50. Remember, you can't just pick the most susceptible guard; you have to pick someone who actually has access to Epstein, and since they don't work alone you need at least two people. So even if half of the guards are compromised you still only have a 25% chance of your gambit not resulting in a lengthy prison sentence, or at least a very uncomfortable conversation with police whereby your powerful employer's cover is completely blown.
JTarrou
1d ago
When you're down to mind reading a whole country, you might as well hang up the argument.
The moderators are allowed to run the site however they want---they managed to make something providing significant value that's hard to find anywhere else. It's only frustrating when they continuously claim that the site is something that it isn't.
Advertising a place like this as purely a place
for people who want to move past shady thinking and test their ideas in a court of people who don't all share the same biases. Our goal is to optimize for light, not heat; this is a group effort, and all commentators are asked to do their part.
is basically a sneaky way to wage the culture war by sanewashing a lot of very sketchy racist arguments through giving them a very tilted playing field and a sort of "controlled opposition" (for this and many other reasons).
RoyGBivensAction
Zensunni Scientologist
1d ago
I don't think so. Even at the most dysfunctional facilities, a total outsider bribing his way through strikes me as implausible.
I don't know the exact layout of the jail in question. Usually there is a lobby/front desk with multiple guards checking IDs and they're behind bulletproof glass. There is usually a camera in the lobby. Might not be working, but the guards there might not know whether it's working on any given day. The assassin flashes a briefcase of cash to the front desk guard who is behind bulletproof glass and hopes the others don't see? He pays them all off?
Those guards almost never leave the front desk. They radio the next guard in the chain to come escort the visitor. Maybe that guy doesn't need to be bribed, but what's he told? If they say the visitor is a lawyer for a legal visit (not a terrible cover if the assassin looks professional), then he's taken to a legal room for a visit, not to the cell. Same for a religious visit. There might be multiple levels of escorts (depends on the size of the facility). Even at dysfunctional facilities, there will be other guards around and possible supervisors who might ask about why someone is being taken directly to a cell instead of a visitation room. Are all those guards and supervisors being bribed as well? There are all the cameras throughout the facility, but of course those might not be working. Unless they've been broken long-term (possible), guards on any given day wouldn't know if they're working that day.
Paying a guard to take drugs into a facility is one thing. Paying levels of guards to get an outsider into a cell is another. In another comment here, I put forward a possible explanation that strikes me as more plausible.
Hieronymus
1d ago
Fornication was usually punished with a fine, though it could be punished with whipping when the fine was too far out of reach. Both men and women were prosecuted, with an exception that took me embarrassingly long to understand: When accusing a married couple (for conduct before the wedding, naturally), it was common to prosecute only the groom. This is an unspoken discount for the couple out of respect for their subsequent marriage, without having to admit it and undermine the social norm.
Even if we assume that most fornicating couples got away with it (a fair assumption, I think), it still reflects a very different set of norms than those of modern dating.
SSCReader
1d ago
Right this is exactly my experience (though nowadays it's Tik-Tok not Tumblr). These kids come in already complaining about Israel and with pro-Palestine flags and what not. I or my colleagues didn't teach them that. Which is not to say that some of my colleagues don't share those sympathies somewhat (though obviously varies on Jewishness level) but it's more acts of omission than commission in my experience.
sun_the_second
could survive a COD lobby and a gay furry discord server
1d ago
I do not believe emulating African tribes is a good idea when it comes to maturity rituals, either with this or your idea from the other post about getting beaten up by 10 guys in a row. Firstly, it doesn't seem correct to me that a ghetto thug should be ahead of a glass-jaw nerd on any maturity test in a first-world country (even if the thug is objectively more "fit" for life, the status is wasted on him). Secondly, immediate pain is not a well-optimized maturity test for a first-world country regardless. What brings prosperity in first-world countries is long-term thinking and the ability to lock in over months and years. Not enduring physical pain for half an hour.
Even if Gom Jabbar tests a necessary quality it is far from sufficient.
Celestial-body-NOS
Why should Man not rebel against Nature, when Nature herself is in rebellion against Justice?
1d ago
hydroacetylene
1d ago
These ideas flow up, actually. Tumblr bullshit infects the students who spread it around campus and the professors may let them because they’re sympathetic but they also don’t have the power to stop them- this is a one star resort for unsupervised teenagers, not a strictly disciplined educational institution.
FtSoA
1d ago
"Direct action guys" are a tiny percentage of the U.S. military and frequently do not use standard-issue small arms because they have their own inventory.
I am pretty sure thought that they cannot simply use an actual personally owned weapon for a bunch of reasons about logistics and liability. Why would they pay out of pocket when they get large budgets for sweet custom weaponry?
Compared to the M9 safety, the ergonomics are better, but it's true the direction is different and there's no red dot. With the M9, I think it was SOP to carry safety off outside the wire. Not sure what it is for the M18, but it's pretty common in general to holster with the safety engaged and then disengage it. (The manual safety is apparently not a relevant factor for the discharges.)
hydroacetylene
1d ago
This is 100% what prison guards have relayed to me as the behavior of their coworkers(obviously not themselves, of course. They’re very clear about that). And, while people willing to kill are in shorter supply than Hollywood would have you believe, prison is the place to look for them- and they also don’t like child molesters much.
EverythingIsFine
Well, is eventually fine
1d ago
Might depend on the program. I was next door in stats but I knew a few Econ-Math or Econ-Stats double majors and the first semester Econ class was the most notorious on all of campus.
hydroacetylene
1d ago
Seduction laws, on the other hand, were enforced. It’s probably impossible to have this setup without them- get married and hope for the best is a great alternative to getting prosecuted.
hydroacetylene
1d ago
Specifically, this makes women legally children again.
conversely, teaching econ to an anthro major won't go well because the anthro major won't have any intuition for calculus
Do econ majors have any actual intuition for calculus either?
A long running joke where I live has been that one degree program in a local technical university is ”business studies for people who know math”.
EverythingIsFine
Well, is eventually fine
1d ago
That’s fair to an extent. I think it hews much more closely to the history of the West Bank though. Also, how much has Israel tried to do anything real with the PA in recent decades, let’s be honest, not much at all. My understanding of the timeline is the nation-building was decent for the first five years or so but the Second Intifada, Camp David failure, and re-occupation in 2002ish wiped it almost all out, both trust and infrastructure, to fitfully restart a bit again for a few years, until Bibi 2.0 around 2009. Basically as soon as he showed up it went into a permanent stall/holding pattern at best, and Bibi’s preference was deliberately for a weak PA, so if anything state unofficial policy has been to undermine the PA where possible. That’s been the status ever since, for 15 years or so now. I should also note that the few years immediately before 10/7, this was especially noticeable (eg the PA was ignored in the Abraham accords). For fairness we should note 2009 is also when Abbas began clinging to power undemocratically.
The Gaza situation is a bit harder to parse. We follow a similar trajectory but with more radicalism and less autonomy and more violence on both sides (not equipped to discern scale but I think in this time some assassinations took place). Until the increasing violence, withdrawal, and 2006 elections with Hamas getting a plurality followed by a swift 2007 civil war overthrow. I think with respect to the analogy, for Gaza the clock on the analogy basically restarts there: a failed and violent state with religious extremist terrorists in charge, a total war of annihilation, occupation, all the things I compared.
So for West Bank you’d be fairly accurate in saying nation-building was tried (and the relative stability of West Bank is probably owed to this!) but for Gaza I think the Israelis need to seriously consider a similar game plan as the US.
hydroacetylene
1d ago
Yes, two people can both be wrong in this framework- unlike the neo-morality view that there is a victim and an oppressor.
Celestial-body-NOS
Why should Man not rebel against Nature, when Nature herself is in rebellion against Justice?
1d ago
· Edited 1d ago
Which is why I really would prefer there to be some 'objective' "test of willpower" element involved. If you force them to endure some sort of uncomfortable experience without giving in to temptation or dropping out before the finish, its MUCH harder to rig the system.
Yes, this could be the literal equivalent of The Gom Jabbar (but with less severe consequences). If you can't endure a couple minutes of excruciating (but not injurious) pain... I DARESAY you probably aren't 'mature' enough to handle real life.
One problem with that is that some people are born with high pain tolerance and would be able to pass such a test well before they are even close to mental maturity, while others are born with low pain tolerance and could not pass such a test at any age despite having far better judgement than the former.
(Another issue is that the entire point of improving society is to reduce the amount of human suffering [some would include animal suffering in this] in the world, and such measures would be a gigantic step backwards for very uncertain, if any, benefit.)
Edit: Would a society, which officially considers those with lower pain tolerance to be lesser, be willing to offer a child undergoing chirurgery for a malfunctioning gallbladder pain management beyond 'bite the leather strap'?
VoxelVexillologist
Multidimensional Radical Centrist
1d ago
Peripherally, I think your point has a kernel of truth, but I worry that you're constructing a worldview in a direction that is prone to revanchism and decoupling from reality. Your complaints sound uncomfortably close to the logic behind that infamous Smithsonian poster, but complaining about blue, rather than white power structures.
At least, it makes me uncomfortable even though I think there are certainly elements of truth to it.
It does not matter that Israel has not signed on to the first Additional Protocol, because it’s now customary international law, making it binding to Israel (and to everyone). This was even reiterated in 2020 by Israel:
Israel is not a party to the Additional Protocols, but is fully committed to the customary law rules that are reflected in some of their provisions. In this regard, Israel reiterates its position, which it shares with other States, that some provisions in the Additional Protocols do not reflect customary law. In Israel's view, among those provisions is the First Additional Protocol that, in whole or in part, do not reflect customary law, are, for example, the provisions found in articles 1(4), 35(3), 55, 43 to 45, 37(1) and the articles concerning belligerent reprisals, alongside a considerable number of other provisions in the First and Second Additional Protocols that we will not elaborate upon here in the interest of time. Assertions to the contrary, made by certain actors, lack substantiation in sufficient State practice and opinio juris.
Now, again, it doesn’t matter that Israel isn’t a signatory whatsoever, and even their opinion on what constitutes international custom isn’t determinative of anything, but it’s telling that they do not even specify article 54 as a reason for their not being signatory. (That’s, of course, the purpose of the lawyerly language that follows; but lawyerly language will not save malefactors from either God or international courts of law). This is probably because, as of few months ago, any reasonable nation would have considered “you’re not allowed to purposefully starve civilians” part of the custom of international law.
Aguilar claimed that M855 is some super special uniquely evil armor-piercing military combat KILLING
It is only by your own reading that he compares M855 to another lethal ammo type, rather than the various sub-lethal ammo types. I don’t consider this any point against him, and I think it is unreasonable to read his sentence as indicating such. He was a commander of special operations who previously fought ISIS, and previously commanded the entirety of the West Asian special operations (I’m pretty sure; from something I found online). He knows his munitions.
If it's not about M855 specifically, why'd he spend so long telling us how terrible it is?
I think he’s shocked that he was equipped like this, with lethal rounds, when tasked with giving aid to starving unarmed people. Maybe he doesn’t assume people would assume the ammo type is so lethal. He’s talking to normal people, not military guys. As I sourced to you in his video, his group was using the lethal ammunition to disperse the crowd. This all seems quite reasonable to me.
in fact the scenario you're calling a war crime -- using lethal weapons in self defense against unarmed civilians -- is not forbidden by that cite; it actually looks a lot like it's explicitly permitted.
If they’re shooting civilians, who are not endangering their lives, then it constitutes directing attacks against the civilian population. There are ample sources of Israel doing this, not just from Aguilar. So I provided you another video where he explains that this is what’s happening.
using lethal weapons in self defense against unarmed civilians -
It was not in self-defense, it was in crowd dispersal.
you just pushed it aside and baldly asserted that this behavior will be found to violate the statute once it gets to trial (which you know will never happen).
It’s very obviously against the statute to kill civilians, who are not endangering their lives, as evidenced in what I sent you, no matter what the excuse is. This is according to Aguilar’s testimony. I don’t know how many more times I can reword this to someone who is intent on finding every plausible way to misinterpret it. Remember, it’s a long video of him talking, not writing a high school thesis; the meaning of what he says is clear when you listen to the audio or even just read what he says with an holistic understanding (not just focusing on the verbiage of an isolated sentence).
The starvation charge has nothing to do with the carrying-lethal-weapons charge
Huh? It’s another example. All of this is talked about in the OP. So I’m providing you another example, if you’re for some reason intent on disagreeing with Aguilar because he didn’t talk about munitions neurotically enough or something, or if you think he meant the starving children were threatening his life.
I feel comfortable saying neither you nor Aguilar meet this minimum standard
I feel comfortable agreeing with you that you feel comfortable saying a lot of things. In this, we can find some common ground. I guess because we’re rehashing:
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You weren’t familiar, at all, with what is normatively used in crowd control scenarios in Israel, even for lethal ammo. I corrected you.
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You read his statement as implying that a lesser-lethal ammo can go in his specific gun, rather than sub-lethal ammo, which is just a misreading.
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You read his statement as indicating that the crowd was trying to assault them, which is just wrong, so I provided another source clarifying that the civilians never posed a risk.
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You had no idea about the concept of customary international law, or that the first protocol is binding to Israel insofar as it is customary
Well in Gaza Israel pulled out their own settlers and things only got worse. I'm not sure I understand what the American Afghan informed model really looks like. They did try to have the PA control Gaza, the Gazans voted for Hamas and then Hamas ended elections. The US was able to drive the Taliban into the mountains separate from the main population where they could try their nation building. You could describe what Israel is doing now as the part where America drove the Taliban out but rather than separate mountains the Hamas compounds are endless miles of tunnels under Gaza itself so you can't actually achieve this separation. I'm basically at a point of pessimism on the topic, even in the more favorable Afghan situation the Americans with even more security failed to do what you're suggesting Israel should do, this just isn't going to work any way you slice it.
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