Is Paris Burning?

[happy.ness]

I guess everyone must know how agitated our nights (knights) are this week in the suburbs of Paris...
If you wander on the network of BBC or CNN you'll understand that a major crash is about to come in the "city of fights" as they say.
The movement is starting to spread all over France. Next step is the army.
To sum up: 400 cars and 30 buses burned down just last night.
How the hell is this gonna end?
Anyone's opinion on the fact that these gangs are federated or not?
Hope this ninth night will be "more quiet"...
__________________

[Ali]

I guess everyone must know how agitated our nights (knights) are this week in the suburbs of Paris...
If you wander on the network of BBC or CNN you'll understand that a major crash is about to come in the "city of fights" as they say.
The movement is starting to spread all over France. Next step is the army.
To sum up: 400 cars and 30 buses burned down just last night.
How the hell is this gonna end?
Anyone's opinion on the fact that these gangs are federated or not?
Hope this ninth night will be "more quiet"...
__________________It was a situation waiting to happen for a while, which the government has been trying to ignore. Those areas are horrible.

Sarko and Villepin are not helping things by using it as a political football, but I don't know what can be done about it. More force will be met by more resistance.

I think that the violence will escalate.

[Ali]

In a worrying sign, the rampages that have gripped the poorer immigrant-populated outskirts of Paris since October 27 spread, for the first time, to other parts of the country, to Dijon, Marseille and Normandy, and inside the capital itself.

They have also taken on an increasingly dangerous tone, with buckshot fired at riot squad vans -- and prosecutors revealing that a handicapped woman was deliberately set on fire the night before.

According to prosecutors Friday, the 56-year-old woman was unable to get off a bus targeted by a Molotov cocktail late Wednesday in the northern Paris suburb of Sevran. She was allegedly doused with petrol by one youth, then others threw a flaming rag on her. Rescued by the driver, she was taken to hospital with severe burns to 20 percent of her body.Niiice.

Cue collective conservative 'I told you so' re. immigration and the dangers of Islam.

This is a direct result of the unspoken discrimination which immigrants face in France. Unfortuantely, and as usual, the actions of a vicious few are going to be used to brand the many, many decent, hardworking people who've come to France and silently endured generations of unfair treatment by the same people who begged them to come and do the jobs they wouldn't.

The wheel turns.

[valvano]

What about the "Let them eat cake" saying, doesnt that have French origins?

[Ali]

What about the "Let them eat cake" saying, doesnt that have French origins?Yup. She got her head chopped off.

Some things don't change very much, do they?

[valvano]

i have not followed this much, but apparently this was set off because 2 kids were running away from the police, had an accident, and got electrocuted? why would it be the cops fault? might as well blame the electric company as well based on that logic

[happy.ness]

quote from herald tribune http://www.heraldtribune.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20051104/API/511040531

The rioting started Oct. 27, after youths were angered over the deaths of two teenagers - Bouna Traore, 15, and Zyed Benna, 17. They were electrocuted in a power substation where they hid, thinking police were chased them.

Traore's brother, Siyakah Traore, on Friday urged protesters to "calm down and stop ransacking everything."

"This is not how we are going to have our voices heard," he said on RTL radio.

[sam i am]

Niiice.

Cue collective conservative 'I told you so' re. immigration and the dangers of Islam.

This is a direct result of the unspoken discrimination which immigrants face in France. Unfortuantely, and as usual, the actions of a vicious few are going to be used to brand the many, many decent, hardworking people who've come to France and silently endured generations of unfair treatment by the same people who begged them to come and do the jobs they wouldn't.

The wheel turns.

Ali....I would NEVER say "I told you so." Ironic, though, eh?

Anyhow, I was waiting to see if anyone else would post about this because we have ahd some discussions focused on the integration of immigrants into societies. I would truly be curious to see what you think about the situation as a whole : did you foresee this happening? Is latent discrimination a problem or not? Have you followed any of the rise of neo-Nazis at soccer (sorry, "futbol" ;) ) matches recently?

I saw some kind of special report on HBO recently that talked about whole sections of stadiums being taken over by neo-Nazis in many European cities and non-natives being beaten during and after matches. Why are these groups allowed to foster their hate indiscriminately and has it led to riots and suspicion like what we're seeing in France currently?

I'd like to have some kind of substantive discourse, if you're game.....

[Ali]

Ali....I would NEVER say "I told you so." Ironic, though, eh?

Very... this is your chance!

Anyhow, I was waiting to see if anyone else would post about this because we have ahd some discussions focused on the integration of immigrants into societies. I would truly be curious to see what you think about the situation as a whole : did you foresee this happening? Is latent discrimination a problem or not? Have you followed any of the rise of neo-Nazis at soccer (sorry, "futbol" ;) ) matches recently?

I saw some kind of special report on HBO recently that talked about whole sections of stadiums being taken over by neo-Nazis in many European cities and non-natives being beaten during and after matches. Why are these groups allowed to foster their hate indiscriminately and has it led to riots and suspicion like what we're seeing in France currently?

I'd like to have some kind of substantive discourse, if you're game.....I knew that things were not exactly rosy in the Paris suburbs and I am aware of the latent discrimination that is present in French society... but I never realised how deep feelings ran in the suburbs .

I must say that my immediate reaction to reading about the disabled woman who was set on fire was a very angry "send them all back!". However, upon discussion with my French colleagues, it seems that it was the French who encouraged immigration from the former colonies, to fill the jobs they didn't want. The rioters are apparently descendents of these immigrants born in France, French speaking, but ultimately marginalised by French society and harrassed by the cops. Nicolas Sarkozy's 'iron fist' policy since becoming Interior mimister and his comments in the media of late have definitely sparked things off, but, as I've said it was waiting to happen.

I don't know about football nazis, but it seems that the sport seems to attract a certain, how can I put this? "breed" of person... I watch rugby. You never see the sort of behaviour, characteristic of Football fans, displayed by Rugby fans.

[valvano]

no matter you nationality, religion, etc,.............you'd have to be pretty stupid to hide in an electric substation

[sam i am]

Very... this is your chance!

I knew that things were not exactly rosy in the Paris suburbs and I am aware of the latent discrimination that is present in French society... but I never realised how deep feelings ran in the suburbs .

I must say that my immediate reaction to reading about the disabled woman who was set on fire was a very angry "send them all back!". However, upon discussion with my French colleagues, it seems that it was the French who encouraged immigration from the former colonies, to fill the jobs they didn't want. The rioters are apparently descendents of these immigrants born in France, French speaking, but ultimately marginalised by French society and harrassed by the cops. Nicolas Sarkozy's 'iron fist' policy since becoming Interior mimister and his comments in the media of late have definitely sparked things off, but, as I've said it was waiting to happen.

I don't know about football nazis, but it seems that the sport seems to attract a certain, how can I put this? "breed" of person... I watch rugby. You never see the sort of behaviour, characteristic of Football fans, displayed by Rugby fans.

Interesting.

Ok......I TOLD YOU SO! :p

Actually, I DO feel a little better now..... :o

Anyhow, the invitation of immigrants was a great idea, but it will have consequences. I remember posting about a TV show I saw recently which stated the number of immigrants needed to continue to support Europe's social welfare system as something like 400 million people over the next 50 years or so. I could be a bit off, but it does make some sense when you consider the declining birthrates, etc.

Oh, well. Guess SOME French people are not as enlightened as we'd like them to be. This kind of crap happens all the time in the US, unfortunately. We have stupid race riots and latent discrimination all over the place. I sure wish people could resist their baser instincts and judge based on intelligence and productivity, rather than skin color or denomination or creed or sex or sexual preference or whatever. The world would sure be a better place.

[sam i am]

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20051104/ts_nm/france_riots_dc

^^^^^^^
Latest update.

What a mess.

When will it end? :(

[DroppinScience]

It's like "Do The Right Thing" or Rodney King is spreading all over France now... :eek:

[sam i am]

It's like "Do The Right Thing" or Rodney King is spreading all over France now... :eek:

What a fantatstic reference, DS. (y)

You the man!

[yeahwho]

Is anyone else surprised that the French government hasn't surrendered to these rioters yet?

Thank you very much, I'll be here all week. Drive home safely...

[K-nowledge]

^ (y)

Rioting. The best way to bring on awareness. :rolleyes:

[sam i am]

Is anyone else surprised that the French government hasn't surrendered to these rioters yet?

Thank you very much, I'll be here all week. Drive home safely...

I said it on another thread, but well put here as well.....

[yeahwho]

I read the headline and secretly hoped that Paris Hilton had eaten a bad Taco Bell Mega Bean Burrito, lit a match, and pyroflatulated.

Thanks again ladies and gentlemen and don't forget to tip the waitresses.

[sam i am]

I read the headline and secretly hoped that Paris Hilton had eaten a bad Taco Bell Mega Bean Burrito, lit a match, and pyroflatulated.

Thanks again ladies and gentlemen and don't forget to tip the waitresses.

<<< BIG ROUND OF APPLAUSE >>> **** Cries of "Encore! Encore!" ****

You're on FIRE, yeahwho! (y)

[sam i am]

And the beat goes on....

http://news.yahoo.com/fc/world/France

[DroppinScience]

One thing I'm finding interesting about this rioting is that it's occuring in the suburbs of Paris (which are impoverished and filled with minorities).

Odd, in North America, suburbs are filled with rich white people and the inner city is impoverished.

Interesting to see the differences...

[sam i am]

One thing I'm finding interesting about this rioting is that it's occuring in the suburbs of Paris (which are impoverished and filled with minorities).

Odd, in North America, suburbs are filled with rich white people and the inner city is impoverished.

Interesting to see the differences...

Nice observation.

[Funkaloyd]

It's like "Do The Right Thing" or Rodney King is spreading all over France now... :eek:
I think it bears a closer resemblance to the Sydney riots (http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/3491299.stm) of a while back. Very similar causes.

[Medellia]

You're on FIRE, yeahwho! (y)
Kinda like Paris. *romshit*

[happy.ness]

Ninth nights of arsons in France.
897 cars burned down, 200 people arrested.

WORST THEN EVER AND THE WEEK-END'S ONLY STARTING...
http://www.lemonde.fr/web/article/0,1-0@2-706693,36-706821@51-704172,0.html

There's no U-Turn ahead

For the first time since the beginning of the riots there has been a helicopter flying all over paris and the suburbs chasing for the bandits... Anybody's seen or heard it? It surprised me and I felt a bit like of an emergency state rising, surrounded by the police sirens...

I really believe there's a kinda organization between the gangs. To protect their underground economy.

http://www.heraldtribune.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20051105/API/511050546

[sam i am]

Ninth nights of arsons in France.
897 cars burned down, 200 people arrested.

WORST THEN EVER AND THE WEEK-END'S ONLY STARTING...
http://www.lemonde.fr/web/article/0,1-0@2-706693,36-706821@51-704172,0.html

There's no U-Turn ahead

For the first time since the beginning of the riots there has been a helicopter flying all over paris and the suburbs chasing for the bandits... Anybody's seen or heard it? It surprised me and I felt a bit like of an emergency state rising, surrounded by the police sirens...

I really believe there's a kinda organization between the gangs. To protect their underground economy.

http://www.heraldtribune.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20051105/API/511050546

Wow.

It seems to be getting worse and worse.

When will it end? :(

[valvano]

they need some kind of UN Inspections of the rioters?

:)

[EN[i]GMA]

These riots are doomed to fail because there is no good French riot music.

No Rage Against the Machine, no Public Enemy, nothing, just crappy French accordion music or whatever it is they listen to over there.

Cheese music or something.

[happy.ness]

Sunday morning review

918 cars spontaneous combustion

And the night's been even more violent... But hey it was saturday-

French report:
http://www.afp.com/francais/news/st...9.qeq16eqn.html

Analysis of the crise:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/france/st...1635431,00.html

english report:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/france/st...1635530,00.html

Nice to fall asleep with the sweet sound of helicopters and police sirens. Once again

[DroppinScience]

GMA']These riots are doomed to fail because there is no good French riot music.

No Rage Against the Machine, no Public Enemy, nothing, just crappy French accordion music or whatever it is they listen to over there.

Cheese music or something.

Come now, Edith Piaf's "Je Ne Regrette Pas Rien" is bound to make you wanna throw a brick into the window of a store.

[DroppinScience]

Sunday morning review

918 cars spontaneous combustion

And the night's been even more violent... But hey it was saturday-

French report:
http://www.afp.com/francais/news/st...9.qeq16eqn.html

Analysis of the crise:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/france/st...1635431,00.html

english report:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/france/st...1635530,00.html

Nice to fall asleep with the sweet sound of helicopters and police sirens. Once again

That's just brutal. Stay safe in Paris, mon ami...

[happy.ness]

That's just brutal. Stay safe in Paris, mon ami...


Thanks for the kind words DroppinScience, ton amie.

There had actually been 1300 cars burned last night. And Chirac is still on the mute position... But he's having a meeting with his ministers since an hour at l'Elysée.

quote from the Herald Tribune

Chirac Calls Security Meeting Over Riots

By ELAINE GANLEY
Associated Press Writer
PARIS -- French President Jacques Chirac called a security meeting of his top ministers Sunday after urban rioting spread - with arsonists striking from the Mediterranean to the German border and into central Paris for the first time.

The meeting, planned for Sunday evening, came as Chirac faced mounting criticism from opposition politicians for not speaking publicly about the violence that has fanned out from Paris' tough northeastern suburbs.

[Tomtomtom]

http://fr.news.yahoo.com/06112005/5/jacques-chirac-s-exprimera-l-issue-du-conseil-de-securite.html

" L'Elysée a fait savoir samedi qu'il s'exprimerait "le moment venu et s'il l'estime nécessaire"." :eek: !!!!!!!!

Yesterday Chirac was saying that he would talk" if he would juge it necessary"!!

Oh come on, does this man live in France??

[yeahwho]

Just for some contrast, the Watts riots lasted six days, and the 1992 Los Angeles riots three.

After eight days of rioting, there have been no deaths and only one serious injury reported.

In contrast, the Watts riots resulted in 34 deaths, the 1992 riots in L.A. had at least 53 dead and almost 2,000 injured.





Even at rioting, Americans are better than the French. ;)

[sam i am]

Just for some contrast, the Watts riots lasted six days, and the 1992 Los Angeles riots three.

After eight days of rioting, there have been no deaths and only one serious injury reported.

In contrast, the Watts riots resulted in 34 deaths, the 1992 riots in L.A. had at least 53 dead and almost 2,000 injured.





Even at rioting, Americans are better than the French. ;)

LMAO.

Yeahwho, you are fast becoming my favorite opposite-of-everything-I-believe-in poster!

[Ali]

I wonder how much rioting there would be if there was no news coverage?

I wonder how many thrill-seeking kids (which is who most of the rioters are) would be whooping and high-fiving their buddies when watching a bus they burned on TV or seeing themselves throwing rocks at cops?

I wonder how much of this is fuelled by the media?

[Tomtomtom]

Exactly.

Because of the medias a sort of contest has been organized, like "Our neighbourhood is gonna burn more cars than yours" etc...

I think what could help to stop those violences would be a colder weather with lot of rain, like we do have normally in november!

By the way, a 60 something years old man died form a punch received 3 days ago, after being in a coma....

[yeahwho]

It's apparent that France is out of control. We need to send in US troops to oust the dictatorial Sarkozy regime and establish a democratic government.


I guarantee the French will be throwing flower petals in our path when we invade.

[sam i am]

I wonder how much rioting there would be if there was no news coverage?

I wonder how many thrill-seeking kids (which is who most of the rioters are) would be whooping and high-fiving their buddies when watching a bus they burned on TV or seeing themselves throwing rocks at cops?

I wonder how much of this is fuelled by the media?

Can you continue to believe this now that the riots are spreading to Belgium and (possibly) Germany as well? Isn't there a true endemic problem that has simply been waiting for the proper spark to ignite?

http://news.yahoo.com/fc/world/france

[Ali]

Can you continue to believe this now that the riots are spreading to Belgium and (possibly) Germany as well? Isn't there a true endemic problem that has simply been waiting for the proper spark to ignite?

http://news.yahoo.com/fc/world/franceIt happened in England (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/1430437.stm) a few years back, although that was more race-related (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/in_depth/uk/2001/summer_of_violence/default.stm) than what's happening in Europe now.

[ms.peachy]

It happened in England (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/1430437.stm) a few years back, although that was more race-related (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/in_depth/uk/2001/summer_of_violence/default.stm) than what's happening in Europe now.

Don't you watch the BBC, mate? It was happening here last week. Gooooooo Bradford!

[valvano]

what they need to do is send in UN weapons inspectors to visit with the rioters so France know excactly what they are dealing with.......

:rolleyes:

[Ali]

Don't you watch the BBC, mate? It was happening here last week. Gooooooo Bradford!Naw, geez. I don't even watch TF1.

Anyway. Ali Jr keeps me on my toes from the moment I walk through the door.

Not a peep on bbc.co.uk (http://news.bbc.co.uk/), though. All about the French riots.

Are you sure that wasn't a re-run of the Bradford riot? :p

[ms.peachy]

Not a peep on bbc.co.uk (http://news.bbc.co.uk/), though. All about the French riots.

Are you sure that wasn't a re-run of the Bradford riot? :p

Ooop! I mean, gooooooo Birmingham! (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/4373040.stm)

[Tomtomtom]

what they need to do is send in UN weapons inspectors to visit with the rioters so France know excactly what they are dealing with.......

:rolleyes:

That's the 2nd time you're making this joke in 2 days.
Got a new one?

[DroppinScience]

I wonder how much rioting there would be if there was no news coverage?

I wonder how many thrill-seeking kids (which is who most of the rioters are) would be whooping and high-fiving their buddies when watching a bus they burned on TV or seeing themselves throwing rocks at cops?

I wonder how much of this is fuelled by the media?

So if the media didn't cover the riots, the riots would cease to exist? Look away and nothing happens? :confused:

[yeahwho]

So if the media didn't cover the riots, the riots would cease to exist? Look away and nothing happens? :confused:

Yeah. Don't you remember when the media beat the crap out of Rodney King?

[Mr.Right]

A man who got beaten up by some rioters died from the injuries, casualty number one...

I'm afraid I don't have an English link.

[happy.ness]

Curfew is the word...

[Tomtomtom]

Tonight I was driving on the Champs Elysées.
There was a big party with lights, big red curtains, big cars parked on the front. I guess it was the inauguration of the new Louis Vuitton building.

I smiled.

[yeahwho]

Tonight I was driving on the Champs Elysées.
There was a big party with lights, big red curtains, big cars parked on the front. I guess it was the inauguration of the new Louis Vuitton building.

I smiled.

Great story, it reminded me of Cat Stevens. Thanks


I hope you have a lot of nice things to wear
But then a lot of nice things turn bad out there
Oh, baby, baby, It's a wild world. It's hard to get by just upon a smile. ;)

[franscar]

Well, I can't see any potential situation occuring that would mean a curfew would be completely ineffecitve. Nope. Not at all. Curfew is the way to go.

[Tomtomtom]

Great story, it reminded me of Cat Stevens. Thanks


I hope you have a lot of nice things to wear
But then a lot of nice things turn bad out there
Oh, baby, baby, It's a wild world. It's hard to get by just upon a smile. ;)

My pleasure...
(actually my level of english is too weak to know if you were ironic or not)

But your Cat stevens quote make me think that maybe the police should use megaphones and play some Cat stavens's songs, or Beach boys..Well something to calm down those populations.

(Ok I'm afraid that The beach boys could make those bad boys angrier...but the solution is maybe there...)

[yeahwho]

My pleasure...
(actually my level of english is too weak to know if you were ironic or not)

But your Cat stevens quote make me think that maybe the police should use megaphones and play some Cat stavens's songs, or Beach boys..Well something to calm down those populations.

(Ok I'm afraid that The beach boys could make those bad boys angrier...but the solution is maybe there...)
No irony intended. Just the very first thing that popped in my head when I read your story, besides being jealous that your in Paris and I'm in the burbs of Seattle.

Your right Tomtomtom, they should play music for the rioters, James Taylor type of stuff. No Arthur Brown (http://www.godofhellfire.co.uk/60s.htm)

[sam i am]

It happened in England (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/1430437.stm) a few years back, although that was more race-related (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/in_depth/uk/2001/summer_of_violence/default.stm) than what's happening in Europe now.

I've been hearing and reading a lot of conflicting reports about whether it is more race or religion or economic based.

What's your take?

[jennyb]

Just for some contrast, the Watts riots lasted six days, and the 1992 Los Angeles riots three.

After eight days of rioting, there have been no deaths and only one serious injury reported.

In contrast, the Watts riots resulted in 34 deaths, the 1992 riots in L.A. had at least 53 dead and almost 2,000 injured.





Even at rioting, Americans are better than the French. ;)

Are you kidding me? In my town they riot when the Basketball team wins a national championship! Yay, our team won! Now let's burn shit! In like 1999 I was all fucked up during the final Laker's game and had this bright idea of going down to the Staples Center after they won. I was sooooo stoked! As we got further and further down Venice blvd, uh, let's just say it wasn't good and we got the heck outta there!

Seriously though, hang in there Paris!

[Documad]

I've been hearing and reading a lot of conflicting reports about whether it is more race or religion or economic based.

What's your take?
I don't know, but it's shedding new light on the Oprah-getting-turned-away-from-the-store-for-appearing-to-be-African thing.


How glad are Americans whenever they see another country with a race problem?

[DroppinScience]

I don't know, but it's shedding new light on the Oprah-getting-turned-away-from-the-store-for-appearing-to-be-African thing.

Damn, I can't believe Oprah has incited violence. Maybe France should be signed up for one of her book clubs...

[yeahwho]

I've been reading alot about these nightly riots and it really didn't hit me until I started to look at the photos of overturned cars set afire littered throughout France, the firefighters are in every photo working their collective asses off.

They really should give it a rest. Once you have the worlds attention, do something constructive.

[Ali]

Tonight I was driving on the Champs Elysées.
There was a big party with lights, big red curtains, big cars parked on the front. I guess it was the inauguration of the new Louis Vuitton building.

I smiled.You smiled while driving on the Champs Elysées!?!?

Were you stoned or something?

Only stoned people smile behind the wheel in Paris.

Originally Posted by Documad
I don't know, but it's shedding new light on the Oprah-getting-turned-away-from-the-store-for-appearing-to-be-African thing.Yeah. The rioters are all pissed because some filthy rich American tried to bully her way into a Luxury Department store after it had closed.

I doubt the racaille will shop there any more, as a gesture. They'll go to Printemps or Bonne Marché from now on. </saaaaaarchasm>

Question for Frenchies: Sarko or Villepin for President?

I say Sarko. He's not afraid to say what he thinks and he's not a clone of Chirac.

Most French people I speak to say Villepin because he's better-looking than Sarko. Seriously.

[happy.ness]

Definitely not De Villepin. His comments yesterday on TV proved he has not the calibre of a president... About Sarkozy I think he has shown his real face at the "assemblée nationale". Pretty scary, no?

[Ali]

About Sarkozy I think he has shown his real face at the "assemblée nationale". Pretty scary, no?His real ugly face :p

Um, are you referring to the curfew?

[happy.ness]

His real ugly face :p

Um, are you referring to the curfew?


I was refering to the session of last week where he'd lost his temper...
Listening to today's assemblée, it seems like they're distributing some rewards after these riots, while the opposition appears like "rag picker" (chiffonnier?)

[Tomtomtom]

Question for Frenchies: Sarko or Villepin for President?

I say Sarko. He's not afraid to say what he thinks and he's not a clone of Chirac.

Most French people I speak to say Villepin because he's better-looking than Sarko. Seriously.


If it's the only choice I'm leaving the country...

But hey...where are the other choices?

[Qdrop]

So,
do you all view this as an "anti-discrimination" riot...like that of Watts in the US?

or do see this as another muslim-movement supporting violence (many of the rioting youths are muslims from African immigration)?

is the muslim connection purely a red-herring here?
is the real root just youthful radicalism?

is this not terrorism we are seeing...at least on some level?

[Ace42X]

is this not terrorism we are seeing...at least on some level?

It's a sociological thing. There are riots all over the place at the moment, and it is not "Muslim extremists" stirring it up as far as I know.

From a wider perspective, I'd put it down to social unrest caused by fundamental flaws in current societal models. Only a narrower scale, the disenfranchisement of immigrants in France by the Republican (French, nothing to do with Bushites) model of "we are all the same, we do not acknowledge your minority individuality" combined with poverty and backwards neglect of key urban areas.

From a wider one, the fact that capitalist societies are inherantly unjust and sooner or later unrest is bound to occur, no matter how unfocused and chaotic / arbitrary.

[sam i am]

So,
do you all view this as an "anti-discrimination" riot...like that of Watts in the US?

or do see this as another muslim-movement supporting violence (many of the rioting youths are muslims from African immigration)?

is the muslim connection purely a red-herring here?
is the real root just youthful radicalism?

is this not terrorism we are seeing...at least on some level?

Probably ali and happy and tom are most qualified to answer these questions, as they are actually there.

The news reporting on this has been strange, to say the least. I guess because there have been few deaths, the media (generally, worldwide) has not been hysterical or wanton in its' coverage.

Getting an impression of the true causes/outcomes is hard via the traditional outlets at this juncture, so opinions are open to flourishing....

[Ali]

or do see this as another muslim-movement supporting violence (many of the rioting youths are muslims from African immigration)?No. Muslim groups are opposed to it.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,13509-1862160,00.html

BEARDED Muslim activists have been wading into the night-time mayhem of the housing estates, megaphone in hand, and addressing the rioters “in the name of Allah”.

Far from inciting the violence, they have been urging the rioting teenagers to stop destroying property and go home. For the Government, the Muslim mediators have been playing a useful role calming youngsters from the mainly Arab estates who respect their authority far more than that of the police and local officials.

is the muslim connection purely a red-herring here?
is the real root just youthful radicalism?

is this not terrorism we are seeing...at least on some level?Is this what you're being fen in the States, that this is those pesky Muslims causing trouble again?

[sam i am]

From a wider one, the fact that capitalist societies are inherantly unjust and sooner or later unrest is bound to occur, no matter how unfocused and chaotic / arbitrary.

Are non-capitalistic societies any less likely to have unrest, no matter how unfocused and chaotic / arbitrary? If they aren't, then your analysis is off base, as the unrest is then not inherently unjust due to capitialism, but rather due to human nature, more likely, or due to the inherent injustices in any other societal system.

[sam i am]

Is this what you're being fen in the States, that this is those pesky Muslims causing trouble again?

At least partially, yes.

What are the actual causes, then, in your opinion? Are they mainly economic or not?

[sam i am]

If it's the only choice I'm leaving the country...

But hey...where are the other choices?


Le Pen? :eek:

Scary.....

[Tomtomtom]

Le Pen? :eek:

Scary.....



WHAT???? oh come on!!!! I was more evoking the abscence of the Left "wing"!!!

I'm quite disapointed to see that there is for you only two possibilities: the Right or Extream-Right...

[sam i am]

WHAT???? oh come on!!!! I was more evoking the abscence of the Left "wing"!!!

I'm quite disapointed to see that there is for you only two possibilities: the Right or Extream-Right...

Dude...I'm not French.

I know who Le Pen, Villepin, Sarkozy, and Chirac are....but that's about it for the current French political scene....

[Tomtomtom]

At least partially, yes.

What are the actual causes, then, in your opinion? Are they mainly economic or not?


Yes they are. I think Ace42x has a right analysis of this crisis. The causes are economic and social: unemployment, poverty, dicrimination, discrimination.
Those riots ar not lead by some Islamics groups. There are no religious claims. But, the thing is that there such a lack of social links, an "abandon" of the State in those neighborhood that now the influence of the religious people is growing, cause they are the only "frame" for this youth.

This problem is growing in France since 25 years now. None of the last governments worked on this problem seriously.
But for example, since 2002 (2nd election of Chirac), there has been a budget reduction of about 40% for the associations working in those neighborhoods (sports, cultural, social etc...) Those associations represents a very strong social link in those "Cités".
Their decreasing is also a cause of the increasing of the religious influence on this youth.


Ok, I'm sorry for my shitty english.

By the way, I guess Public Enemy is in concert tonight in Paris. I'm very curious to know what could have been said about all that...

[Tomtomtom]

Dude...I'm not French.

I know who Le Pen, Villepin, Sarkozy, and Chirac are....but that's about it for the current French political scene....

Sorry Dude...

I answered very quickly..didnt checked about the author...

[sam i am]

Sorry Dude...

I answered very quickly..didnt checked about the author...

No problem, mate.

Most Americans are not well informed on the political scene in most other countries around the world. I read the newspaper daily and check on foreign developments through the internet, so I MIGHT be a bit more up than most of my colleagues here on the board.

It kinda goes back to the whole America vs. the rest of the world mentality - I would venture to guess that the vast majority of Americans are not well-informed on world events and could not name the leaders of most countries around the world.

In many ways, we're still a pretty insular society.

[sam i am]

Yes they are. I think Ace42x has a right analysis of this crisis. The causes are economic and social: unemployment, poverty, dicrimination, discrimination.

But Ace did not directly implicate economics as the cause. He said the primary consideration was sociological.....which, I know, he thinks are synonyms for each other...but they're not.

Discrimination is surely sociological and cultural at it's root. Many rich AND poor people are discriminatory in their thoughts, words, and deeds.

Unemployment and poverty are endemic. Are those two pillars of social upheaval only prevalent in the rioting communities? Are there other areas of the country/world where unemployment and poverty are high, yet the people do not riot as they are now in France?

Seems to me, from what I gather here and through the various media, that there exists a pretty strong "rebellious" undertone and that it is centered on the youth, not adults.

[sam i am]

More from France :

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20051108/ap_on_re_eu/france_rioting_blogs_fr1_2

The power of the Blog, eh?

[Ali]

But for example, since 2002 (2nd election of Chirac), there has been a budget reduction of about 40% for the associations working in those neighborhoods (sports, cultural, social etc...) Those associations represents a very strong social link in those "Cités".
Their decreasing is also a cause of the increasing of the religious influence on this youth.The GOP should take careful note of this and reconsider their own budget cuts... shitty social circumstances are a breeding ground for lawlessness and when state-sponsored welfare programs are cut, religious extremists are free to operate.

I blame the shift towards Capitalism. France need a more socialist administration to replace the UMP. We've seen what their Pro-Capital policies have wrought... oppressing the masses and exploiting the workers inevitably leads to the type of lawlessness we've seen here.

Let's hope the French People remember this the next time they get the chance to vote and get rid of the UMP altogether!

[happy.ness]

I don't think the curfew will slow down this mess. But the sanctions will probably freeze the wave...
http://www.lemonde.fr/web/article/0...1-704172,0.html
(sorry I don't have it in english...!)

[happy.ness]

I don't think the curfew will slow down this mess. But the sanctions will probably freeze the wave...
http://www.lemonde.fr/web/article/0...1-704172,0.html
(sorry I don't have it in english...!)


Sorry here's the new link
http://www.lemonde.fr/web/article/0,1-0@2-3226,36-708596@51-704172,0.html

[Ace42X]

http://www.guardian.co.uk/comment/story/0,3604,1637155,00.html

http://www.guardian.co.uk/comment/story/0,3604,1637161,00.html

[EN[i]GMA]

From a wider perspective, I'd put it down to social unrest caused by fundamental flaws in current societal models. Only a narrower scale, the disenfranchisement of immigrants in France by the Republican (French, nothing to do with Bushites) model of "we are all the same, we do not acknowledge your minority individuality" combined with poverty and backwards neglect of key urban areas.

I believe there is an unemployment rate of 30-something percent among the young minority youth.

These definitely influences things.

But I must ask, instead of 'we are all the same', how should they react?

I just don't 'get' this whole 'culture' thing.


From a wider one, the fact that capitalist societies are inherantly unjust and sooner or later unrest is bound to occur, no matter how unfocused and chaotic / arbitrary.

Yes.

But I think it would be even more accurate to say 'human societies'.

[Ace42X]

GMA']
But I must ask, instead of 'we are all the same', how should they react?

I just don't 'get' this whole 'culture' thing.

There can be no tolerance of differences if we do not acknowledge differences. While the Republican law has a noble aim, that of egalitarianism, in effect it works like sticking your fingers in your ears and pretending the problems do not exist. The result of this denial is visible in undeniable double-spreads in every newspaper on the stands. Equality is something that has to be strived for, it cannot just be assumed.

But I think it would be even more accurate to say 'human societies'.

There have been no utopian societies to compare it against. However, as all societies have been based around slavery in varying degrees and disguises (Capitalism being the most widespread and pernicious) this is unsurprising. Is slavery inherant to human nature? Not in my opinion.

[EN[i]GMA]

http://www.guardian.co.uk/comment/story/0,3604,1637155,00.html


I don't understand this.

Do they want 'seperate but equal'?

This seems to run contradictory to modern 'liberal' thinking (And my own thinking).

For example:


France's refusal to see the ethnicity of some of its people as relevant translates into de facto racism. If human beings were free of prejudice, the French republican ideal would work beautifully. Because we are not, it allows racism a free hand.

Don't these divisions just cause resentment?

How can you continually say these people are 'X' and these people are 'Y' and still say you have the goal of abolishing (Or at least diminishing) this features of society?

Being un-racist is actually being racist?


The US has a model of integration which is the reverse of France's: it positively encourages new migrants to hold on to their first culture, happy to let them hyphenate as Italian-Americans or Irish-Americans.

Presumably hyphen use is disparaged in France as well?

I seem to notice a significant contingent of Americans who are wary of other cultures, want foreignors to assimilate and are somewhat xenophobic.

I belive they're called Republicans.

I can't really say which country is more 'racist', or even how you could figure such a thing out, but America isn't doing well in the department either.

Britain has an emerging model too, one we call multiculturalism. It did not arrive from nowhere, but partly came out of our own experience of race riots in the 1980s. Unlike France's, it recognises difference and has passed legislation to protect it. But it also yearns for some affirmation of common identity. It knows there are differences between us - but it wants there to be ties that bind. What those ties should be, what notion of Britishness might hold us all together, nobody seems quite sure.

So we're to supposed to recognize difference (Which is undoubtably done in France, just not 'officially, i.e. governmentally) and to recognize similarity?

How...obvious.

And I particularly like the helpful advice at the end.

'Nobody seems quite sure' is generally not a good way to make a suggestion.

And doesn't Britain have some oath that requires allegiance to Britian and the Queen?


How is racism to be combated, if it's not institutional, but societal?

How can we quantify this 'racism'?

[Ace42X]

GMA']I don't understand this.

The French have a tradition of not acknowledging racial differences. Statistics about ethnicity are illegal for the state to collect or consider. Likewise, programs targetted at sections of the population are against their ethos. This means that while a French newspaper can send two identical CVs off to hundreds of jobs with one typically 'French' name and one 'non-native name' and discover that 75% of jobs are happy to take Francois, whereas only 17% are happy to take on the identically qualified 'Abdul'; the government is powerless to confirm this, or do anything about this.

While their laws might prevent 'institutionalised' racism in the strictest sense, it also prevents any action against societal racism.

That, as I understand it, is the crux of the problem.

[D_Raay]

And then there is this... It is a bit confusing what is transpiring over there.

What say you Ali?

http://www.breitbart.com/news/2005/11/09/D8DP4IE02.html

French far-right leader Jean-Marie Le Pen claimed Wednesday his National Front party has been "submerged" with prospective members and supportive e-mail since rioting erupted in heavily immigrant communities near Paris.

In an interview with The Associated Press, Le Pen described the recent violence as "just the start" of conflicts caused by "massive immigration from countries of the Third World that is threatening not just France but the whole continent."

Le Pen said people with immigrant backgrounds who commit crimes should be stripped of their French nationality and sent "back to their country of origin."

Reminded that the vast majority of youths taking part in the arson and rioting are French, born in France to immigrant parents, he said: "What does that mean? Are they French because they have a French identity card?"

French nationality should be given only to those who ask for it and "who are worthy of it," he said. "Those who got nationality automatically, who don't consider themselves French and who even say publicly that they consider France their enemy should not be treated as French."

Le Pen said he is convinced that what he described as a surge in support for his "zero immigration" platform would translate into votes at the ballot box for his National Front party.

French voters "are saying to themselves 'Le Pen was right. We were told that Le Pen is an extremist because he said that immigration problems would lead to disorder. The facts have shown that he was right,'" he said.

------

There also seems to be quite a mounting opposition to Sarkozy (http://www.guardian.co.uk/france/story/0,11882,1638520,00.html)
as well. Isn't there a left leaning candidate?

[EN[i]GMA]

There can be no tolerance of differences if we do not acknowledge differences. While the Republican law has a noble aim, that of egalitarianism, in effect it works like sticking your fingers in your ears and pretending the problems do not exist. The result of this denial is visible in undeniable double-spreads in every newspaper on the stands. Equality is something that has to be strived for, it cannot just be assumed.

But how?

You can't simply make a law saying 'There will be no racism'.

They tried. And failed.


There have been no utopian societies to compare it against. However, as all societies have been based around slavery in varying degrees and disguises

Tell me, how would a society not be based on 'slavery', using your definition?


(Capitalism being the most widespread and pernicious)

Tendentious beyond the point of responding to.


Is slavery inherant to human nature? Not in my opinion.

I don't think capitalism is 'slavery', and I don't think slavery is innate.

[Funkaloyd]

GMA']But how?
You can't simply make a law saying 'There will be no racism'.

If France's current legislation is similar to what the right wants to implement in NZ, then that's essentially what they have at the moment. Only they take that to mean that the government shouldn't at any time acknowledge racial differences.

And, as Ace said, that's a nice little policy, but the fact remains that there are differences. In particular, minorities pretty much always have specific problems in Western society, such as the 30-something percent youth unemployment that rate you mentioned.

[Ace42X]

GMA']But how?

Through the rule of law, education and policy.
Those are overt means.
If necessary it could be achieved by covert means, such as indoctrination.

Tell me, how would a society not be based on 'slavery', using your definition?

'My' definition? Which is?

According to the dictionary's definition:

slav·er·y Audio pronunciation of "slavery" ( P ) Pronunciation Key (slv-r, slvr)
n. pl. slav·er·ies

1. The state of one bound in servitude as the property of a slaveholder or household.
2. A mode of production in which slaves constitute the principal work force.
3. The condition of being subject or addicted to a specified influence.
4. A condition of hard work and subjection: wage slavery.

This could be elleviated by eliminating the need for human servitude; human labour (manual and other); human reliance on external entitites (corporations); and obligation.

Tendentious beyond the point of responding to.

Partisan? Certainly. Also inscrutable, evidently.

Capitalism is system which operates on a principal of slavery as described above. People are addicted to and thus reliant on products of the capitalist machinery. This results in the consumer being under the hegemony of the provider, and obliged to work (and work hard) in order to maintain this. These "wage slaves" are undeniably the principle work force. And, being poor and thus without power (and having no power whatsoever in a pure capitalist system) they are certainly bound in servitude. What 'freedom' do the poor have?

The owner giving his slaves food, clothes and shelter doesn't make them any less slaves, nor does giving them tokens they can exchange for food clothes and shelter. If you give them the choice between which plantation to work on, does THAT make them any less a slave? Letting them sing whatever songs they want? At what point does it cease to be slavery? When you don't chain them, but rely on guard dogs? Or starvation? Or there being nowhere to run to? When you rely on the law to bring them back?

Given the rate of population growth, and the fall of communist and monarchical regimes, surely you concede that capitalism (in some form or other) is the system under which the majority of people in the world live? Clearly that makes it the most widespread. And with such 'popularity' it clearly has to be the most pernicious. Assuming you accept that slavery is wicked, and I certainly should hope you do.

I don't think capitalism is 'slavery'

It curtails peoples freedoms and obliges them to work. I'd say that makes it slavery.

[EN[i]GMA]

Through the rule of law, education and policy.

'Rule of law'? France already has that.

Education? Aren't people educated to be non-racist?

Policy? Such as?


Those are overt means.
If necessary it could be achieved by covert means, such as indoctrination.

How would this be brought about?


'My' definition? Which is?

How you're interpreting it.


According to the dictionary's definition:

slav·er·y Audio pronunciation of "slavery" ( P ) Pronunciation Key (slv-r, slvr)
n. pl. slav·er·ies

1. The state of one bound in servitude as the property of a slaveholder or household.
2. A mode of production in which slaves constitute the principal work force.
3. The condition of being subject or addicted to a specified influence.
4. A condition of hard work and subjection: wage slavery.

This could be elleviated by eliminating the need for human servitude; human labour (manual and other); human reliance on external entitites (corporations); and obligation.

Eliminate the need for human servititude? How do you go about this?

Abolish human labor? That is the goal.

Abolish obligation? To what?


Partisan? Certainly. Also inscrutable, evidently.




Capitalism is system which operates on a principal of slavery as described above.

I disagree.


People are addicted to and thus reliant on products of the capitalist machinery.

'Addicted to'? Perhaps they simply desire them.

Perhaps they even want to be addicted to them.

And what 'products' are these? Food, shelter and medicine?


This results in the consumer being under the hegemony of the provider, and obliged to work (and work hard) in order to maintain this.

How can you not be under the hegemony of a provider?

Unless you produce everything you need yourself, SOMEONE else has to be the provider, and you are at his whim, to some degree.

If we were not 'obliged to work', how would anything be accomplished?

Being 'obliged to work' is not necessarily a bad thing.

THe vast majority of the poor on earth would love being 'obliged to work'.


These "wage slaves" are undeniably the principle work force. And, being poor and thus without power (and having no power whatsoever in a pure capitalist system) they are certainly bound in servitude.

Leaping accross logic.

The 'wage slaves' are not powerless, they have their wage (And in a democracy, their vote).

How are they powerless if they can choose where to spend their money?

Bound in servitude? Because they have to work? How can the human race not be 'bound in servititude'. If we don't serve ourselves, who will serve us?


What 'freedom' do the poor have?

Considerable freedom.

Need I list them? Life, Liberty, Pursuit of happiness et al.


The owner giving his slaves food, clothes and shelter doesn't make them any less slaves, nor does giving them tokens they can exchange for food clothes and shelter.

When the owner does not own them, cannot force them to work for him, cannot force them to buy his products and cannot deighn over their lives outside of the authority mutually granted between them, for their mutual benefit.


If you give them the choice between which plantation to work on, does THAT make them any less a slave?

At all analagous as to how I am a 'slave' to your loaded and specious question?


Letting them sing whatever songs they want? At what point does it cease to be slavery?

When you let them DO what they want.


When you don't chain them, but rely on guard dogs? Or starvation? Or there being nowhere to run to? When you rely on the law to bring them back?

I don't Ace, when DOES it stop being slavery? Fill me in here.


Given the rate of population growth, and the fall of communist and monarchical regimes, surely you concede that capitalism (in some form or other) is the system under which the majority of people in the world live?

Certainly.


Clearly that makes it the most widespread. And with such 'popularity' it clearly has to be the most pernicious.

Oh, if it only it were that easy.

I maintain that it is the most beneficial.

Everything you see around you was built by capitalism or built on capitalism.

Is the world not better off than it was 200 years ago?

The system that's raising the entire world's standard of living drastically is somehow 'pernicious'?


Assuming you accept that slavery is wicked, and I certainly should hope you do.

Well ... it's a tough call.

:rolleyes:

Obviously.


It curtails peoples freedoms and obliges them to work. I'd say that makes it slavery.

Curtails your freedoms? Which ones?

Obliges you to work? I should hope so.

[Funkaloyd]

Oh, we're doing this again.

[EN[i]GMA]

Oh, we're doing this again.

I hope not.

[z-boy]

all of the problems that Paris is experiencing are attributable to one treacherous source - crazy cheese

[freetibet]

Answer: Yes, yes it is.

They didn't want Iraq in Iraq, they have Iraq in Paris. Splendid.

Interesting observation: first few days of riots - those scums were called aything but 'muslims'. 'Gangsters, mafia, drug dealers, hooligans' etc. Why not 'family of murdered boys, relatives in grief' ?

I imagine it like that: You talk about French fascism towards minorities and that capitalism is the one to blame, while behind Your windows sons of those 'decent, hardworking' people burn like 1500 cars and buses and kill a decent, retired from hard work French man. Or try to burn an elderly lady.

Funny. Just imagine - You typing on the keyboard and flashes of fire on the walls of Your cosy bedroom.

How come none of 'decent, hardworking' Europeans does such violent things?

P.S. "We will not die for Paris" vide Sept 1939.

ROLL EYES ROLL EYES ROLL EYES ROLL EYES ROLL EYES

[Ali]

Isn't there a left leaning candidate?Indeed there is (http://www.parti-socialiste.fr/).

Le Pen hasn't a fucking chance. He was hammered into oblivion at the last election and it will happen again.

As far as I can make out, and I could be very wrong: there are two main parties in France: The Ruling UMP (http://www.u-m-p.org/site/index.php), which is described as "Centre-Right" and the Parti Socialiste (http://www.parti-socialiste.fr/), which is the more left leaning party and which ruled until 1995, when Chirac and the UMP took power.

Then there are a few more extremist parties, such as Le Pen's FN (http://www.fnidf.com/). He has no support in France, except on the borders and he was utterly stomped upon in 2002, when the Frenchies went to the polls for a second time after Le Pen's Fascists became the opposition after beating Lionel Jospin of the PS.

The ONLY REASON that Le Pen managed to beat Jospin, as far as I can tell, was that the French people disliked both the PS and UMP candidates so much, that few bothered to vote, orvoted for one of the Fringe parties - except for the FN supporters, who ALL went to vote. Luckily for everyone, the French voting system allows you two chances to vote and Chirac won the second election by a landslide. Le Pen is full of shit and hasn't a chance here in France. It seems he gets more publicity in the US than he does here!

Sarko's comment last night of expelling all the "etrangers" bumped him and the UMP a little further to the right and the PS are going to profit from it, even though 57% of Le Parisien readers would vote for him in 2007.

I'm going to leave my car parked here at work this weekend, even though I live in the 7th arrondissement. I heard that there's going to be a huge demonstration underneath the Eiffel Tower this weekend, and that's only a few blocks from where I live!

[racer5.0stang]

I saw Ace on Fox News setting a bus on fire. :D

[Ace42X]

GMA']'Rule of law'? France already has that.

And yet no laws against racial descrimination when it comes to hiring employees.

Education? Aren't people educated to be non-racist?

Clearly not.

Policy? Such as?

Affirmative action. Do try to keep up, all of the above was quite obvious.

How would this be brought about?

By the same means that encourages people to vote for Bush under the misapprehension that his policies coincide with the policies they support. By the same means that convince people that poorly made shoes that cost hundreds of dollars are worth more than superior shoes that cost twenty.

How you're interpreting it.

Was that tautology necessary? It wasn't even entertaining.

Eliminate the need for human servititude? How do you go about this?

The same way Ford eliminated the need for a qualified workforce of highly trained artificers. By embarking on programs of social, technological and economic development that make the obligation to work in meaningless job unnecessary.

Abolish human labor? That is the goal.

And yet Capitalism relies on human labour. If human labour were to be abolished (because all needs were catered for already), there would be no need to accumulate wealth, and so accrewed money would be irrelevant. Human suffering is what makes money so desirable, and the capitalist wheel keep turning.

'Addicted to'? Perhaps they simply desire them.

No, it is an addiction. Not only does thwarted consumerism cause increase in rates of clinical depression, not only does aquisition of goods or wealth "not make you happy" (The rich always want more, more than they can spend in a lifetime), not only do people beg, steal and kill to get a fix, but it is also something on which people are physically dependant.

People do not 'desire' petrol for their car, they NEED it in order to get to their jobs, and thus earn a LIVING (IE that which they need to stay alive) and thus purchase food and shelter (both essential to human survival).

These are not desires, these are REQUIREMENTS. They are provided by capitalists, just like drugs are provided by dealers.

Perhaps they even want to be addicted to them.

'And perhaps the niggers in the field want to be slaves'

Meanwhile, in reality, there are plenty of addicts who want good shot of skag into their veins irrespective of the addiction, what does that justify?

And what 'products' are these? Food, shelter and medicine?

Yes, and the products needed to have a job which allows you to acquire enough of these to achieve a subsistence.

How can you not be under the hegemony of a provider?

Unless you produce everything you need yourself, SOMEONE else has to be the provider, and you are at his whim, to some degree.

Heh, capitalists. The whole point is that if you are not in a devisive socio-economic structure you (plural) are the provider for yourselves (collective plural). Yes you are at the whim of an owner who can choose to withhold materials. But if there is no proprietary system, then there is no-one to beholden unto. THAT is equality. Not being subserviant to someone because of what they own, whether it be a gun or a whip or your next meal.

If we were not 'obliged to work', how would anything be accomplished?

Take a look around the Internet and count the number of not-for-profit projects on the go. Come back and finish the argument then. I know plenty of people who do things without hoping for financial renumeration. But then, I don't live in a greedy capitalist society - all the people I hang around with are socialists.

Being 'obliged to work' is not necessarily a bad thing.

Yes, tell the slaves that built the pyramids how privlidged they are to be working on such a lasting testament to human achievement.

(Although this analogy is a bit weak as the Egyptian labourers were quite possibly not slaves, but you get the point. I didn't want to reuse the plantation slaves for two analogies in one post)

THe vast majority of the poor on earth would love being 'obliged to work'.

I think you'll find that they are (by virtue of their poverty) obliged to work already. Or do you think the blind old ladies picking carcenogenic garbage tips are doing it for fun?

The 'wage slaves' are not powerless, they have their wage (And in a democracy, their vote).

How are they powerless if they can choose where to spend their money?

They cannot choose where to spend their money though. That is the whole point of being poor. If you were not so incredibly pampered and thus divorced from the reality of living on a budget, you'd know that when you are poor you do not get to choose, you have what you can afford, and what you can afford is what the manufacturers choose to give you.

The poor can't go "Oh, I won't eat this month - then I'll be able to show those capitalists that I won't settle for a bad deal!"
They can't jsut go "hmmmm, that place costs more than I can afford, but it is so much better. I know, I'll rent it every other week!"
They can't even go "This country is a crock of shit, I'll just hitch a lift with a transatlantic plane to a better one" to escape the situation.
They can't spend half of their earnings on the gas needed to travel to the next town to get stuff from a cheaper shop, they can't buy loads in one go at discount price.

The poor don't HAVE purchasing power, because they have no money to purchase with.

Bound in servitude? Because they have to work? How can the human race not be 'bound in servititude'. If we don't serve ourselves, who will serve us?

Robots.

Considerable freedom.

Need I list them? Life, Liberty, Pursuit of happiness et al.

And this is the crux, the poor have none of these things and the only reason you do not know this as incontrovertible fact is that you live in a rose-tinted world.

The poor do not have "life" - poverty has a measurable impact on the mortality rate. It is the poor that cannot afford organic foods, it is the poor that cannot afford to live far away from airports, motorways, factories, power stations. All areas which negatively effect health. It is the poor areas with higher rates of violence, murder, rapings. It is the poor that cannot afford better security.

Freedom? Freedom to leave the country? Most countries do not accept immigration from people who do not have qualifications (which require money to achieve) or sponsorship (more money) and need paperwork which often needs to be paid for (money yet again) not to mention a plane-flight to get there (even more money.)
Freedom to run for President? Do you think someone with nothing, no matter what their talent, could become President without support from the rich? Do you think it is a coincidence that both Bushes came from wealthy families? That Kerry married into money? That both went to Yale?
Freedom to live without the fear of being shot in a drive-by? By buying a house in a safe area with all the money that they DON'T HAVE?

Pursuit of happiness? When do they pursue happiness when they work every hour that they can just to have a full stomach?

Can you not smell the steaming shitpile you just served me?

When the owner does not own them,

So, if a slaver in the deep South told slaves "hey, I don't own you anymore" but didn't unchain them, didn't stop the whipping, didn't change one other damn thing - they would cease to be slaves?

cannot force them to work for him,

So everyone really loves their job then? No? So if, according to you, no-one is obliged to do work that the do not want to, why do people do it? Because they want to do something that they actualyl don't want to?

And the slaves wanting to eat, and thus being obliged to do work they hate, meant they weren't slaves.

cannot force them to buy his products

An indian scavenging trash who earns 1p a day can't afford a 50p tin of beans.

"A slaver can't force slaves to work. Yes the slaves will starve if they don't acquiesse, but they have the CHOICE not to work."

and cannot deighn over their lives outside of the authority mutually granted between them,

Afterall, a multinational couldn't build a motorway next to a poor person's house, thereby making it unlivable and obliging them to move out or go deaf... Oh wait, THEY CAN! And, of course, the poor person can then use all the money they don't have to take legal action against the rich company that can afford the best lawyers! How just, how equitable, how better than slavery.

for their mutual benefit.

Just like the mutually satisfactory transaction between pimp and ho, dealer and smackhead, smoker and tobacco manufacturer.

Just like the mutually beneficial deal between the slave who gets a roof over his head and a meal if he works.

At all analagous as to how I am a 'slave' to your loaded and specious question?

Apart from that sentence not making any sense, you are a 'slave' because every single definition of 'freedom' you've given could equally apply to a slave.

When you let them DO what they want.

So free people can do whatever they want? Poor people can't do whatever they want. Poor people have everything dictated to them. What education they can attain, what jobs are offered to them, what products they can (afford to) buy.

I don't Ace, when DOES it stop being slavery? Fill me in here.

When the only reason you work is because you want to work for the sake of the work. Not until.

Everything you see around you was built by capitalism or built on capitalism.

Built during capitalism. Plenty of artistic endeavours have been done for arts sake. If I were to look at the first vehicle in space, it would not have been built by capitalism. That in itself proves that capitalism is not the proprietor of technological development. Infact, technological development has occured under plenty of non-capitalistic systems. Everything I see around me was built by *technology*.

If I look at a Cathedral, that was not built by capitalism. But, of course, I live in a country with a strong socialist past, and before that a history that goes back a great deal further than a measly 200 years of specifically capitalist development. But yes, I see plenty of great edifices built by slavery (both literal and figurative) and capitalism. I also see guns, and tanks, and missiles and planes and gas-chambers and barbed wire, and hunger-strikes and marches on London from Jarrow, and hangings and tyranny.

I see Bush on the US throne, and hundreds of thousands of people dying in the streets for the oil beneath their feet.

Is the world not better off than it was 200 years ago?

It depends. Why not ask those killed in Hiroshima if they found their deaths more satisfying than someone drowned as a witch? Why not ask the millions of people who died in the world wars if they are glad to have been cut down by machine gun fire, or drowned in mustard gas, as opposed to brained by a war-hammer?

Why not ask the Vietnamese if their country is better off than it was thirty years ago? Why not ask all of the morbidly obese Americans who are going to die of organ failure? Why not ask John Wayne and all his co-workers who died of cancer after being exposed to radiation while filming Attila?

The system that's raising the entire world's standard of living drastically is somehow 'pernicious'?

Hmmm, let's see. It is capitalism that is driving the destruction of the Amazonian rainforests. Deforestation has increased exponentially within my generation. Pernicious means destructive, and one of the largest and most important areas of land in the world is being raped, because of capitalism, exlusively now (as opposed to 200 years ago) under capitalism that has been exported to an otherwise untouched region.

Zing. But surely, if you took your specs off for a second, you could see millions of other examples of capitalism being destructive.

Curtails your freedoms? Which ones?


Which ones does it not curtail? Freedom to travel? Requires money to travel. Freedom of speech? Requires money for a lawyer when you get your ass sued. Freedom to bear arms? Need to buy the gun. Freedom to defend yourself? Need more power than the person that you are defending yourself from, which means money on guns, training, technology, and to give you time to improve yourself. Freedom of assembly? You're not getting paid when you are off talking to other people.

[Ace42X]

I saw Ace on Fox News setting a bus on fire. :D

No, you blind dolt, your God appeared to me as a burning bus. He did the same for moses, your bible just has a typo in it.

PS, Your God says you are a moron.

[racer5.0stang]

No, you blind dolt, your God appeared to me as a burning bus. He did the same for moses, your bible just has a typo in it.

Seems to me that you were breathing too deeply around that burning bus.

[Ace42X]

Seems to me that you were breathing too deeply around that burning bus.

Yeah, God said you'd say that. He also said you were a dickweed.

[racer5.0stang]

Yeah, God said you'd say that. He also said you were a dickweed.

Dickweed?

Wow, pretty quick to name calling. Whats the matter, those fumes killing your brains cells?

[Ace42X]

Dickweed?
Wow, pretty quick to name calling.

Hey, it's your God who said it. Not my fault he doesn't like ignorant hicks like you. Take it up with him if you have a problem with it.

Whats the matter, those fumes killing your brains cells?

Yeah and at a pretty quick rate too. Who knows, after a few years of exposure I might end up as backward as you.

[racer5.0stang]

Yeah and at a pretty quick rate too. Who knows, after a few years of exposure I might end up as backward as you.

I'm not so sure, seeing that I was born like this. :D

But I'm sure you will try anyways.

Good luck with that.

[Ace42X]

Incidently, on Question Time just now they are discussing this topic. I think Rona Cameron (who I usually find to be quite annoying or average) was quite right in pointing out that it was "imperialism come home to roost".

I think a legacy has come to haunt a lot of European nations, and it is only the positive things achieved that have minimised and removed a focus for the troubles were are seeing across the world.

This is comeback lite for globalisation, capitalism, imperialism, expantionism, wars, oppression, posturing, grandstanding, intimidating, etc etc.

[EN[i]GMA]

And yet no laws against racial descrimination when it comes to hiring employees.


Clearly not.

At my place of schooling, from a young age, we were fed a steady diet of 'treat others the way you want to be treated', taught the horrors of racism, taught tolerance and 'Golden Rule', yet racism was still present both in the school (Almost exclusively white) and the surrounding society (Ditto. Rural.).

I would honestly say (And this is something I don't like to say) that it's society's fault.

How can you expect to have a clear view of blacks when the only images you get of blacks are sports stars and rappers?



Affirmative action.

We have, quote , 'Affirmitive Action' over hear, yet I would say racism is still quite a problem.

There is probably some form of 'Affirmative action' that would work better, but how do we find it? Do try to keep up, all of the above was quite obvious.[/quote]

I ask them only to lead.

Presuming is not a good way to conduct a discussion.


By the same means that encourages people to vote for Bush under the misapprehension that his policies coincide with the policies they support. By the same means that convince people that poorly made shoes that cost hundreds of dollars are worth more than superior shoes that cost twenty.

Abolish stupidity? Capital idea.

[quot]
Was that tautology necessary? It wasn't even entertaining.[/quote]

Apologies, I've used my allowance of good witticisms for the week in arguments on other forums.


The same way Ford eliminated the need for a qualified workforce of highly trained artificers. By embarking on programs of social, technological and economic development that make the obligation to work in meaningless job unnecessary.

So if Ford can do it, why can't others?


And yet Capitalism relies on human labour.

At this stage of society, any economic system will rely on human labor.

For all of the forseeable future it will rely on at least intellectual labor.

I can't see how we mechanize that process.


If human labour were to be abolished (because all needs were catered for already), there would be no need to accumulate wealth, and so accrewed money would be irrelevant.

Why would there be no need to accumulate wealth?

And is your goal of 'abolishing human labor' practical, in the short term?

I could easily see myself supporting an egalitarian system if indeed 'robots' could do all the work for us, but I don't see that as a possibility for quite some time.

I'm no expert on robotics though.


Human suffering is what makes money so desirable, and the capitalist wheel keep turning.

So I desire money because I so enjoy human suffering?


No, it is an addiction. Not only does thwarted consumerism cause increase in rates of clinical depression,

Elaborate.

I would think this uniform to all goals that are thwarted.


not only does aquisition of goods or wealth "not make you happy"

So someone with no material goods would be as happy as somone with a surfeit?

In and of themselves they do not necessarily make you happy, but they can help.

For instance, my computer and my books make me rather happy.


(The rich always want more, more than they can spend in a lifetime),

ALWAYS!?

Let's not generalize here. It doesn't behoove you.


not only do people beg, steal and kill to get a fix, but it is also something on which people are physically dependant.

How can you NOT be physically dependant on certain things?

How could the economy run without gasoline, or whatever product you care to mention.

If they were 'socialist' products not 'capitalist' products, people would NEED them just the same.


People do not 'desire' petrol for their car, they NEED it in order to get to their jobs, and thus earn a LIVING (IE that which they need to stay alive) and thus purchase food and shelter (both essential to human survival).

And oil is NEEDED to transport food from the farm to the store, regardles of the economic system, and oil is NEEDED to produce the fertilizers that go on the food, and it is NEEDED to pack the food, and so on and so forth.

You can't get around NEEDING things.


These are not desires, these are REQUIREMENTS. They are provided by capitalists, just like drugs are provided by dealers.

And would be provided by 'socialists' or 'robots' the same way.


'And perhaps the niggers in the field want to be slaves'

Nice job evading the point.


Meanwhile, in reality, there are plenty of addicts who want good shot of skag into their veins irrespective of the addiction, what does that justify?

The addiction.

pquote]
Heh, capitalists. The whole point is that if you are not in a devisive socio-economic structure you (plural) are the provider for yourselves (collective plural). Yes you are at the whim of an owner who can choose to withhold materials.[/quote]

Yes an owner can choose to withold materials, but unless he is monopoly, he is inneffective.


But if there is no proprietary system, then there is no-one to beholden unto. THAT is equality. Not being subserviant to someone because of what they own, whether it be a gun or a whip or your next meal.

Whether or not anyone 'owned' the next meal, there would be constraints on its making that could just as easily delay or thwart its arrival.


Take a look around the Internet and count the number of not-for-profit projects on the go. Come back and finish the argument then.

People can be altruistic; what's the point?

The existant of not-for-profit things does not invalidate for-profit things in the way for-profit things to not invalidate not-for-profit things.

Open source is fine and dandy, but I've yet to see 'open source food'.

It's very easy to code something and spread at low cost (With the advent of Bittorrent and similar things), wheras it's very hard, and more importantly, resource intensive, to make a car, for instance.


I know plenty of people who do things without hoping for financial renumeration. But then, I don't live in a greedy capitalist society - all the people I hang around with are socialists.

I play Age of Empires 3 without any real hope for 'financial renumeration' but I don't act as if I'm somehow fighting the 'greedy capitalist society'.


Yes, tell the slaves that built the pyramids how privlidged they are to be working on such a lasting testament to human achievement.

(Although this analogy is a bit weak as the Egyptian labourers were quite possibly not slaves, but you get the point. I didn't want to reuse the plantation slaves for two analogies in one post)

Go ahead. Make them Jewish Vietnamese slaves who died at Hiroshima and were turned into zombies to be killed by the US imperialists in Iraq for all I care.

And I particularly like how you take my statement that being obliged to work was not necessarily bad to mean slave labor is good.

It seems like quite the leap in logic to me.


I think you'll find that they are (by virtue of their poverty) obliged to work already. Or do you think the blind old ladies picking carcenogenic garbage tips are doing it for fun?

I hear it's all the rage.

But if 'old women' didn't pick them, who would? Robots?


They cannot choose where to spend their money though. That is the whole point of being poor. If you were not so incredibly pampered and thus divorced from the reality of living on a budget, you'd know that when you are poor you do not get to choose, you have what you can afford, and what you can afford is what the manufacturers choose to give you.

Except that there are many manufacturers with varying products.


The poor can't go "Oh, I won't eat this month - then I'll be able to show those capitalists that I won't settle for a bad deal!"

But they can choose what they eat.


They can't jsut go "hmmmm, that place costs more than I can afford, but it is so much better. I know, I'll rent it every other week!"

They can choose a different home.


They can't even go "This country is a crock of shit, I'll just hitch a lift with a transatlantic plane to a better one" to escape the situation.

Many do move to better countries.


They can't spend half of their earnings on the gas needed to travel to the next town to get stuff from a cheaper shop, they can't buy loads in one go at discount price.

Car-pool.


The poor don't HAVE purchasing power, because they have no money to purchase with.

If they have any money to purchase anything with, they have purchasing power, albiet little.


Robots.

:rolleyes:


And this is the crux, the poor have none of these things and the only reason you do not know this as incontrovertible fact is that you live in a rose-tinted world.

Certainly being poor would influence my outlook on life.


The poor do not have "life" - poverty has a measurable impact on the mortality rate. It is the poor that cannot afford organic foods, it is the poor that cannot afford to live far away from airports, motorways, factories, power stations. All areas which negatively effect health. It is the poor areas with higher rates of violence, murder, rapings. It is the poor that cannot afford better security.

The poor do have a 'life'.

Is it as good as the one's the rich have? No.


Freedom? Freedom to leave the country? Most countries do not accept immigration from people who do not have qualifications (which require money to achieve) or sponsorship (more money) and need paperwork which often needs to be paid for (money yet again) not to mention a plane-flight to get there (even more money.)
Freedom to run for President? Do you think someone with nothing, no matter what their talent, could become President without support from the rich? Do you think it is a coincidence that both Bushes came from wealthy families? That Kerry married into money? That both went to Yale?
Freedom to live without the fear of being shot in a drive-by? By buying a house in a safe area with all the money that they DON'T HAVE?

What's the point? Being poor sucks?

You're not telling me anything I don't know.

How many of those regulations do you think I support?


Pursuit of happiness? When do they pursue happiness when they work every hour that they can just to have a full stomach?

How is one supposed to respond to an emotioanally charged non-question?


Can you not smell the steaming shitpile you just served me?




So, if a slaver in the deep South told slaves "hey, I don't own you anymore" but didn't unchain them, didn't stop the whipping, didn't change one other damn thing - they would cease to be slaves?

Yes Ace, that was exactly what I was saying.

No projection or misrepresenation at all.

Comparing modern capitalism to slavery is a joke.


So everyone really loves their job then? No? So if, according to you, no-one is obliged to do work that the do not want to, why do people do it? Because they want to do something that they actualyl don't want to?

And the slaves wanting to eat, and thus being obliged to do work they hate, meant they weren't slaves.

And so in socialism, when you are also obliged to work, will you still be a 'slave', obliged to work? Or will people work out of the kindness of their hearts? Or will robots do it?

Or will you and your socialist friends feed us with open source software?


An indian scavenging trash who earns 1p a day can't afford a 50p tin of beans.

"A slaver can't force slaves to work. Yes the slaves will starve if they don't acquiesse, but they have the CHOICE not to work."

Or they can work somewhere else, under better conditions, conditions that aren't slavery.

Tell me, how will your society not have what you so broadly define as slavery?


Afterall, a multinational couldn't build a motorway next to a poor person's house, thereby making it unlivable and obliging them to move out or go deaf... Oh wait, THEY CAN! And, of course, the poor person can then use all the money they don't have to take legal action against the rich company that can afford the best lawyers! How just, how equitable, how better than slavery.

And of course multi-nationals are doing this all time.

I mean, their building a Pepsi Express outside my house as we speak.


Just like the mutually satisfactory transaction between pimp and ho, dealer and smackhead, smoker and tobacco manufacture.



Just like the mutually beneficial deal between the slave who gets a roof over his head and a meal if he works.[/quote]

Compared to what?


So free people can do whatever they want? Poor people can't do whatever they want. Poor people have everything dictated to them. What education they can attain, what jobs are offered to them, what products they can (afford to) buy.

Public education and public schooling via loans and scholerships, all sorts of jobs, and millions of products.


When the only reason you work is because you want to work for the sake of the work. Not until.

And is to arrive some time next week?


Built during capitalism. Plenty of artistic endeavours have been done for arts sake.

Which is relevent how?


If I were to look at the first vehicle in space, it would not have been built by capitalism.

What incentive would capitalists have to go to the moon?


That in itself proves that capitalism is not the proprietor of technological development.

Not pointless development.

Going to space was a political ploy of little real value.

I could think of a million better things to spend the money on.


Infact, technological development has occured under plenty of non-capitalistic systems. Everything I see around me was built by *technology*.

And technology is not spurred by capitalism?


If I look at a Cathedral, that was not built by capitalism.

Let's try to ignore the Cathedral.


But, of course, I live in a country with a strong socialist past, and before that a history that goes back a great deal further than a measly 200 years of specifically capitalist development. But yes, I see plenty of great edifices built by slavery (both literal and figurative) and capitalism. I also see guns, and tanks, and missiles and planes and gas-chambers and barbed wire, and hunger-strikes and marches on London from Jarrow, and hangings and tyranny.

World sucks, what else is new?

I also dislike all of that.

What's your point?


I see Bush on the US throne, and hundreds of thousands of people dying in the streets for the oil beneath their feet.

As do I.


It depends. Why not ask those killed in Hiroshima if they found their deaths more satisfying than someone drowned as a witch? Why not ask the millions of people who died in the world wars if they are glad to have been cut down by machine gun fire, or drowned in mustard gas, as opposed to brained by a war-hammer?

Why not ask the Vietnamese if their country is better off than it was thirty years ago? Why not ask all of the morbidly obese Americans who are going to die of organ failure? Why not ask John Wayne and all his co-workers who died of cancer after being exposed to radiation while filming Attila?

Seeing as most of these people are dead, asking them will be quite the challenge.

But more on point, what IS your point?

I see war, imperialism, carcinogins, obese people and witches; where's the capitalism?

Oh let me guess, inexplicably, those ARE capitalism!


Hmmm, let's see. It is capitalism that is driving the destruction of the Amazonian rainforests. Deforestation has increased exponentially within my generation. Pernicious means destructive, and one of the largest and most important areas of land in the world is being raped, because of capitalism, exlusively now (as opposed to 200 years ago) under capitalism that has been exported to an otherwise untouched region.

Isn't it being cut down for farmland? Isn't that farmland necessary?

Isn't the wood being used for construction?


Zing. But surely, if you took your specs off for a second, you could see millions of other examples of capitalism being destructive.

And if you would do likewise, you would see examples of capitalism being constructive.


Which ones does it not curtail? Freedom to travel? Requires money to travel. Freedom of speech? Requires money for a lawyer when you get your ass sued. Freedom to bear arms? Need to buy the gun. Freedom to defend yourself? Need more power than the person that you are defending yourself from, which means money on guns, training, technology, and to give you time to improve yourself. Freedom of assembly? You're not getting paid when you are off talking to other people.

Which one of those does material reality not curtail?

I don't see how this is uniquely a capitalistic problem.

[WodahsEht]

It curtails peoples freedoms and obliges them to work. I'd say that makes it slavery.

That's absolutely absurd. The fact that if you wish to eat, drink, live, obliges you to work. You don't want freedom from capitalism, you want freedom from adult responsibilities, such as feeding yourself. You're still a child.

[WodahsEht]

Freedom to travel? Requires money to travel.

Go foxtrox. But, you know, walking takes work. Don't want to walk? Buy a car, jet, or boat. Don't want to work to compensate others for the work they do to provide you with conveniences? Build a vehicle yourself. But, again, that takes work, and knowledge, which requires time and effort to accumulate. Not to mention materials.

Freedom of speech? Requires money for a lawyer when you get your ass sued.

You're more than welcome to represent yourself. People od that, you know, though it isn't recommended. At the very least, study law for yourself, so you can present a reasonable defense. But, again.. You'd be 'obliged' to work towards gaining such knowledge.

Freedom to bear arms? Need to buy the gun.

A bow is terrible easy to construct, if you know what kind of materials to use. But damn, you'll have to practice with it, which, you know, requires work. If that doesn't suit you, any piece of wood a foot or longer will do in a pinch as a decent weapon. Better yet, learn gunsmithing. Sadly, it all takes work, even picking up that piece of wood.

Freedom to defend yourself? Need more power than the person that you are defending yourself from, which means money on guns, training, technology, and to give you time to improve yourself.

Cry me a river.

Freedom of assembly? You're not getting paid when you are off talking to other people.

Of course not. You don't get paid to screw around, you get paid to do your damn job.

[WodahsEht]

Anyway, I'm out. If you want a good ol' capitalistic ass whoopin', come on down to the protestwarrior.com forums. No need to worry about a fee, either.

[D_Raay]

Anyway, I'm out. If you want a good ol' capitalistic ass whoopin', come on down to the protestwarrior.com forums. No need to worry about a fee, either.
Woohooo, did you bring your spurs and your ten gallon hat? Do you hanker for a hunk-a-cheese?

[Ace42X]

GMA']At my place of schooling, from a young age, we were fed a steady diet of 'treat others the way you want to be treated'

And 'Cops.' Your nation is always taking one step forward and two steps back.

We have, quote , 'Affirmitive Action' over hear, yet I would say racism is still quite a problem.

So you think that if all racial law that your nation has never existed or were stripped from the statute books, things wouldn't be different?

Abolish stupidity? Capital idea.

Logic error there. "Stupid people vote for Bush" != "People vote for Bush because they are stupid." Stupid people vote for Bush because of the manipulations used against them. The same tactics can be used to get them to vote for any candidate just as well. There is nothing about Bush that intrinsically appeals to the stupid, more that they are too stupid to vote for anyone else.

Apologies,

Freely taken, I sympathise fully.

So if Ford can do it, why can't others?

Why can't other people lower the minimum living wage for an artificer? Because people would die. If capitalists could pay people less, they would, as you well know. And why can't they charge less? Socialist labour laws that are the anathema to free market capitalism.

At this stage of society, any economic system will rely on human labor.

Yes, because our society has spent more effort on designing ways to kill each other in exciting and hi-tech ways than it has on automating agricultural techniques which are not far divorced from how they were half a century ago, and those that we have developed have rendered food less nutritional and more hazardous to our health and well being.

For all of the forseeable future it will rely on at least intellectual labor.

Which is precisely the argument the South gave for keeping slaves and leaving the Union.

I can't see how we mechanize that process.

You can see how we can mechanise a process that flies a missile with dozens of hyper-lethal massively destructive warheads halfway across the world with pinpoint accuracy, but you can't see how we can plough a field or mill some flour without direct human control?

THINK HARDER MAN. Lives depend on it.

Why would there be no need to accumulate wealth?

Wealth is meaningless when you do not need to buy anything with it.

And is your goal of 'abolishing human labor' practical, in the short term?

You have to walk before you can run, but yes it is infinitly so.

I could easily see myself supporting an egalitarian system if indeed 'robots' could do all the work for us, but I don't see that as a possibility for quite some time.

And racerstang can't see how evolution can lead to intelligent man. Your point?

I'm no expert on robotics though.

Neither am I, but I do know that the technology to maintain a self-propogating and harvesting field is easily achievable if you compare it to the technology required to perform any one of a number of miracles we take for granted on a daily basis.

So I desire money because I so enjoy human suffering?

You desire money because you do not want to be the one doing the suffering - like a man pulling down bodies as he races to climb up his fellows in an attempt to escape from a scorpion infested pit.

Elaborate.

It's in Cardwell. People who are unable to purchase (through poverty or limited stock) material possessions that they desire suffer a higher incidence of clinical depression than those that don't. There was a study into it. Long and short, it sucks. However, it should be self explanatory. If marketing has convinced you that a poorly made product is essential to your existence (which is what marketing does and strives for) and you are unable to purchase this product, clearly you are going to feel bad. If people then went "oh, I don't have it and the world hasn't ended. I guess I don't need that brand name logo on my shoes after all" then marketing would be near ineffective, and consequently people wouldn't invest so much in it.

I would think this uniform to all goals that are thwarted.

Indeed, which is why Smack is illegal. No addicts, no addiction, no crime and anti-social behaviour resulting there from. Capitalism - Grade-A narcotic.

So someone with no material goods would be as happy as somone with a surfeit?

Any Christian who believes Jesus would think so. That's enough capitalists to vote Bush out.

In and of themselves they do not necessarily make you happy, but they can help.

Yeah, just like having a really good haircut doesn't make you happy, but can help. If we can put things that have little direct bearing on happiness to one side...

For instance, my computer and my books make me rather happy.

Happy enough to kill someone? If, to get these, you needed to enslave someone - would you?

And yet by giving people little pieces of paper instead of food, you think it is justified.

ALWAYS!?

Let's not generalize here. It doesn't behoove you.

Name one rich person who said "Oh, I've got enough. Time to close down the business, buy an island, and keep myself to myself from here on in."

Let's see... Bill Gates, no... Dick Cheney... No... The Bushes... No... Branson... No...

There are people who own what it would take me more than a century of constant work to own - how can MORE THAN MY ENTIRE LIFE'S LABOUR not be enough? How much labour (all done by other people, incidently) is sufficient? How many lives does their lifestyle have to be based on?

The poor have to go without so the rich can have more than they will ever be able to use. That is not an equitable system.

How can you NOT be physically dependant on certain things?

How could the economy run without gasoline, or whatever product you care to mention.

If they were 'socialist' products not 'capitalist' products, people would NEED them just the same.

I was hoping you'd say that. A dependance is unavoidable. The difference between the systems is that capitalists exploit that dependance for personal gain, where socialists cater for that dependance for the mutual benefit of all. The socialist system wants to minimalise that dependence - just like a healthcare proffessional wants less junkies in rehab taking less scag.

The drug dealer (capitalist) wants as many people as hooked as possible to line his own pockets. He doesn't hand out the drugs to ease addiction, but to maintain it. He wants the addiciton to be as unavoidable as possible. It is the same with consumerism - they want to stimulate hunger, not maximise satisfaction.

You can't get around NEEDING things.

PRECISELY. Which is why a social system based around the ammoral aquisition of wealth can never be anything other than pernicious.

Human frailty needs to be catered for, soothed. Not sharpened to a razor's edge.

And would be provided by 'socialists' or 'robots' the same way.

Except the robots and socialsits won't be driving up prices so they can buy a new SUV.

Nice job evading the point.

Which was? People want to be on the lowest rungs of capitalism otherwise they'd do something about it? How doesn't that apply to my analogy?

The addiction.

No it doesn't. You might want to rethink that.

Yes an owner can choose to withold materials, but unless he is monopoly, he is inneffective.

And monopoly is the end point of capitalism. When the goal of the system is the centralisation of wealth, it is ignorant to think that there can be anything but monopolies. Are you really trying to tell me that monopolies do not exist at the moment? That it is pure coincidence that AOL-Time-Warner and MSNBC and all the other merged companies are currently incredibly powerful and wealthy?

Oh, no, sorry, my mistake. You're quite right, I saw it on the news yesterday. Old Pa Halford set up his corner video store, and planned a buyout some time next fall...

Whether or not anyone 'owned' the next meal, there would be constraints on its making that could just as easily delay or thwart its arrival.

I fail to see what you are driving at. How does that effect anything? Unlike under a capitalist system, under a non-proprietary system if a distributor has a product which is 'sold out' (or rather is merely out of stock) there will be rioting in the streets? And what, precisely, is it about capitalism that prevents this from happening?

People can be altruistic; what's the point?

That there is no need for a fat-cat to apply the carrot and stick (and work constantly to thwart those that are not influenced by his carrot or stick) for progress to be made.

The existant of not-for-profit things does not invalidate for-profit things in the way for-profit things to not invalidate not-for-profit things.

I never said it did. I was just disproving your assumption that being obliged to work is somehow necessary. Slaves can work just has hard as non-slaves and vice versa. The distinction is that one is ethically sound and the other is not.

Open source is fine and dandy, but I've yet to see 'open source food'.

Move to the UK then, our social underclasses are not left to starve if they are impoverished. However, I have seen 'open source food' - my neighbour often grew his own vegetables in his garden, and was more than happy to slip us some green beans without any expectation of repayment.

It's very easy to code something and spread at low cost (With the advent of Bittorrent and similar things), wheras it's very hard, and more importantly, resource intensive, to make a car, for instance.

And yet coders get paid more than labourers building cars. This cannot possibly be an inconsistancy in your capitalistic glorifications can it?

I play Age of Empires 3 without any real hope for 'financial renumeration'

Which proves conclusively that a capitalist obligation to work (in order to survive or self-improve) is not required to work for achievement.

QED.

And I particularly like how you take my statement that being obliged to work was not necessarily bad to mean slave labor is good.

Being obliged to work is slavery (IE being forced to work on pain of death, IE starvation). If slavery is "not necessarily bad" then it is at best 'neutral'. As you were not saying "slavery is neither good nor bad" that can only mean that you were implying slavery is actually good.

Again, QED.

It seems like quite the leap in logic to me.

That is because you are drawing an arbitrary distinction between slavery and capitalism. It is merely a question of semantics, the practicalities are identical.

But if 'old women' didn't pick them, who would? Robots?

They could, but the old women to do not pick through trash "because it needs to be done" but because they need to in order to survive. If their needs were catered for, they could simply 'not pick through the trash'.

Except that there are many manufacturers with varying products.

Which is why oil profits are currently as near to zero as imaginable, what with the competition driving those prices down...

Please, do come join us in the real world where that DOESN'T ACTUALLY HAPPEN.

But they can choose what they eat.

Reality check #2 - when you are living on minimum wage, you cannot choose. You buy the cheapest, whatever it is, because that is all you can afford.

They can choose a different home.

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAH, Yeah, I'll just move right into the Ritz...

Jesus H Christ on a bike... Yeah, the poor love living in slums...

Many do move to better countries.

Funny, all of the Americans who've wanted to skip countries following Bush's relection told me, and I quote "As soon as I get the bucks, I'm moving to the UK."

You see, in reality, it isn't as cut and dry as that.

Car-pool.

Again, that pre-supposes money with which to own a car, taxation, and the petrol to pool on, and still have enough money left over to make it worth their while. It presupposes an alternative shop in range. Of course, that shop is as likely to be a walmart as in your own town.

If they have any money to purchase anything with, they have purchasing power, albiet little.

No, if you can only buy one item, that conveys no power whatsoever. Furthermore "albeit little" - it doesn't matter how big it is so long as it is insufficient to make an impact.

But this is all besides the point, I have already illustrated for you precisely why the theory that "capitalism finds a way to cheapness" never happens.

Certainly being poor would influence my outlook on life.

The rich always have ways to distance themselves from reality. Rationalisations, fences, islands, penthouses. You should see what it is like for real people some time.


How many of those regulations do you think I support?

As a capitalist and a libertarian, all of them. Else you'd better rethink your politics.

How is one supposed to respond to an emotioanally charged non-question?

Not so easy to recite a dogmatic litany when confronted with what it REALLY means, is it?

Yes Ace, that was exactly what I was saying.

No projection or misrepresenation at all.

Comparing modern capitalism to slavery is a joke.

See, can't answer it, can you? To you there is a world of difference between the words the slaver utters, even though to the slaves that utterance of breath makes not the slightest bit of difference.

And so in socialism, when you are also obliged to work, will you still be a 'slave', obliged to work? Or will people work out of the kindness of their hearts? Or will robots do it?

The latter two. Capitalism works at obliging people to work, socialism works at reducing that obligation. When the latter reduces the obligation to zero (and any of the little work that needs to be done is done out of charity) then there will be freedom.

Or will you and your socialist friends feed us with open source software?

Those that want to paint, will paint. They will not have to join the army and kill just to be able to eat. Those that want to grow food will grow food, they will not need to trick people into buying junk so that they, in turn, can by their junk.

Freedom from obligation leaves people free to create, or not. It leaves free for people to play fair without fear of it meaning suffering for themselves.

Who feeds us now, eh? Who? The Millionaires? We are all living in their pockets? No...

Or they can work somewhere else, under better conditions, conditions that aren't slavery.

Which is why everyone gets paid millions for a few hours a week work...

So, your definition of slavery has lost all the other definitions, and now comes down to the conditions you have to serve under? Slavery under a benign master is no slavery at all? Heh, yeah, YOU don't even believe that, even if you believed that capitalists were benign.

Of course, you know they aren't. Butcher, the tinker, the hooker. They are only so benign as they are obliged to be by circumstance. The rich have leverage, the poor have none. Thus the obligation is as weak as the poor, VERY.

Tell me, how will your society not have what you so broadly define as slavery?

As many needs as possible will be provided for. Thus work will be purely voluntary. Inducements will be sociological, not biological. Overt manipulation will be removed.

And of course multi-nationals are doing this all time.

I mean, their building a Pepsi Express outside my house as we speak.

And lose the custom of a wealthy person with the potential to hit back? No.

Do you get harrassed by the police? No? I wonder if that has anything to do with your racial and economic privlidge...

Do you want to know what DOES happen? Supermarket chain opens up next to ma and pa's store which is equitably run. This chain uses its massive clout to subsidise ridiculously cheap produce just long enough to run Ma and Pa out of business. With no competitors around, they can raise prices as high as they want because of their monopoly.

"High prices, in comes another business!"

Nope, because the chain just drops them again, WHAM, another bankrupcy. And again, and again and again. Even if the supermarket has to half its price for a month, when it is in monopoly it can treble it for that long before a rival sets up. At that rate it is still more profitable than entering a competition with other businesses. Given such sure fire methods for profitiability (and that the company can dicatate terms when in a local monopoly) - why would a company not use its leverage t force local residents out of their properties to allow them to make their chain? The goodness of their hearts? Pshaw. Wake up and smell the kemco.

Public education and public schooling via loans and scholerships,

And when every American has a degree in the languages of antiquity, who precisely cleans the toilets of the rich and powerful?

all sorts of jobs

So everyone takes the job of CEO, who has to clean the toilet? What do they get paid?

and millions of products.

Because all the poor can afford those iPods. They only steal because they are evil. And black.

And is to arrive some time next week?

We said that about the vote before you were born, O America.

Which is relevent how?

Because the idea that capitalism spurs anything other than its own ends (centralisation of wealth) is an illogical nonsense.

What incentive would capitalists have to go to the moon?

You mean non-capitalists, I take it? Because it is there. What incentive was there for capitalists? It was not a profitable venture. No, mankind will strive to achieve goals without a parasitic capitalist leech sucking his blood to drive him on.

Going to space was a political ploy of little real value.

Going to space is the only thing that can save humanity from inevitable destruction. It is not something to be taken so lightly.

I could think of a million better things to spend the money on.

And yet it goes into Cheney's pockets. VIVA LA CAPITALISM.

And technology is not spurred by capitalism?

No, it isn't. Plenty of technology has been driven on completely independant of capitalism. Take the linux server this forum is running on, for example.

World sucks, what else is new?

A 'third way' - but not in the nutjob Gadaffi sense.

I also dislike all of that.

What's your point?

You like the system, but you dislike what it produces.

I see war, imperialism, carcinogins, obese people and witches; where's the capitalism?

Oh let me guess, inexplicably, those ARE capitalism!

McDonalds is not capitalistic? IG Farben were not capitalistic? Herbert Prescott Bush was not capitalistic? Halliburton, lockheed martin, any one of a hundred government contractors are not capitalistic? Drowned witches are not capitalistc, but of course I did not say they were.

My POINT was that all of these injustices occured under capitalism, and when you look at the comparisons of antiquity, they are paltry by comparssion.

Isn't it being cut down for farmland? Isn't that farmland necessary?

No it isn't. "Selective Logging" involves choosing the most valuable lumber in order to prevent detection because it leaves the canopy intact. By leaving the canopy entact no farm produce can be grown on the forest floor. Nice try though.

Isn't the wood being used for construction?

Yes, nice pine coffins for when we can no longer breath and the atmosphere burns.

And if you would do likewise, you would see examples of capitalism being constructive.

Mining your house's foundations to leaden your roof is NOT construction.

Which one of those does material reality not curtail?

I don't see how this is uniquely a capitalistic problem.

You are trying to represent pragmatism, but are failing. Material reality may require work. That does not mean a system which perpetuates the uneven distribution of effort is required.

We can build Jerusalem, I have the blueprints.

[Ace42X]

Go foxtrox. But, you know, walking takes work. Don't want to walk? Buy a car, jet, or boat. Don't want to work to compensate others for the work they do to provide you with conveniences? Build a vehicle yourself. But, again, that takes work, and knowledge, which requires time and effort to accumulate. Not to mention materials.

Congratulations on demonstrating that the poor cannot travel.

You're more than welcome to represent yourself. People od that, you know, though it isn't recommended. At the very least, study law for yourself, so you can present a reasonable defense. But, again.. You'd be 'obliged' to work towards gaining such knowledge.

Congratulations on demonstrating that the poor cannot have freedom of speech.

A bow is terrible easy to construct, if you know what kind of materials to use. But damn, you'll have to practice with it, which, you know, requires work. If that doesn't suit you, any piece of wood a foot or longer will do in a pinch as a decent weapon. Better yet, learn gunsmithing. Sadly, it all takes work, even picking up that piece of wood.

Whereas owning a gun only requires money which you can have without doing any work. And no, bows are NOT easy to construct, as anyone with a knowledge of smithing will tell you. It requires tools, and those tools require tools to construct. And so on. No, it is not terribly easy.

Congratulations on demonstrating that the poor cannot have the freedom to bear arms.

Cry me a river.

Or I could just fly a plane into your sky-scraper. Let's see your capitalist fetish save you then.

Of course not. You don't get paid to screw around, you get paid to do your damn job.

Obviously you've not taken a look at the KFC work force recently. Come join us here in reality for a bit.

[sam i am]

Go foxtrox. But, you know, walking takes work. Don't want to walk? Buy a car, jet, or boat. Don't want to work to compensate others for the work they do to provide you with conveniences? Build a vehicle yourself. But, again, that takes work, and knowledge, which requires time and effort to accumulate. Not to mention materials.



You're more than welcome to represent yourself. People od that, you know, though it isn't recommended. At the very least, study law for yourself, so you can present a reasonable defense. But, again.. You'd be 'obliged' to work towards gaining such knowledge.



A bow is terrible easy to construct, if you know what kind of materials to use. But damn, you'll have to practice with it, which, you know, requires work. If that doesn't suit you, any piece of wood a foot or longer will do in a pinch as a decent weapon. Better yet, learn gunsmithing. Sadly, it all takes work, even picking up that piece of wood.



Cry me a river.



Of course not. You don't get paid to screw around, you get paid to do your damn job.

It really doesn't matter how much logic or reality you slap ace in the face with, man. You and Enigma will NEVER get ace to admit that he's wrong on any point.

If you do, all he does is shuck and jive and move on to a new set of fallacies to support his failed vision of an unworkable utopia. His whole goal is to be King Ace in reality, not just on this message board - just see his smug assertion that all he lives around are socialists....Guess he's really living in "reality" with that being the only forum he "lives" in :rolleyes:

[sam i am]

See the latest from the "malaise" that is France nowadays :

http://news.yahoo.com/fc/world/france

All the linked articles from this page are interesting as well.

Maybe I'm wrong, but I thought France was well on it's way to being a Socialist utopia prior to all this unrest and hubbub.

Maybe people don't like Socialism all that much, eh King Ace?

[fonky pizza]

Has anybody seen the movie La Haine from Mathieu Kassovitz?

If you wish to understand what's going on now you can watch it. I found a link about this filmaker opinion on N. Sarkozy and the situation
here (http://www.radiofrance.fr/chaines/france-info/depeches/detail.php?depeche_id=051115182539.x67e9r3r)


The police will not be excused the police will not behave (lyrics from a song of The Evens)

It really needs to stop cause raising violence is food for the FN! :mad:

[happy.ness]

Saint Matthieu says:

"Comme Bush, (Sarko) ne défend pas un idéal, il répond aux peurs qu'il instille lui-même dans la tête des gens"

and we all know that but it's always good to remember

THERE ARE MANY FLAMES BUT ONLY ONE FIRE

[Ali]

Some handy French phrases, for the next time you come to visit:

Ou sont les pompiers? - Where are the firemen?

* Avez-vous un extincteur? - Do you have a fire extinguisher?

* A quelle heure est le couvre-feu? - What time is the curfew?

* Pourquoi brulez vous ma voiture? - Why are you burning my car?

* Avez-vous du feu pour allumer mon cocktail molotov? - Do you have a light for my petrol bomb?

* Veuillez brûler mon Citroen parce que c'est merde - Please burn my Citroen because it's shit.

* Mes beaux citroen la voiture sont sur le feu ! - My beautiful citroen car is on fire!"

* Ne soyez pas idiot ! la merde ne brûle pas! - don't be daft! shit doesn't burn!"

* Vous avez cassé ma voiture et avez brûlé ma maison et chien, mais pourquoi pas vous tuez ma épouse laide avec ses aisselles velues? - You smashed my car and burned my house and my dog, but why didn't you kill my ugly wife with her hairy armpits?

[fonky pizza]

Saint Matthieu says:

"Comme Bush, (Sarko) ne défend pas un idéal, il répond aux peurs qu'il instille lui-même dans la tête des gens"

and we all know that but it's always good to remember

THERE ARE MANY FLAMES BUT ONLY ONE FIRE

c'est installe et pas instille- faute de frappe dans l'article.

[fucktopgirl]

Has anybody seen the movie La Haine from Mathieu Kassovitz?

If you wish to understand what's going on now you can watch it. I found a link about this filmaker opinion on N. Sarkozy and the situation
here (http://www.radiofrance.fr/chaines/france-info/depeches/detail.php?depeche_id=051115182539.x67e9r3r)


The police will not be excused the police will not behave (lyrics from a song of The Evens)

It really needs to stop cause raising violence is food for the FN! :mad:


oui je l'ai vue,hallucinament bon,et la trame sonord aussi est bonne (y)

[z-boy]

why is everone tip-toeing around the issue of crazy cheese, i'm a tell ya all why - BECAUSE YOU CANT HANDLE THE TRUTH!

[sam i am]

Some handy French phrases, for the next time you come to visit:

Ou sont les pompiers? - Where are the firemen?

* Avez-vous un extincteur? - Do you have a fire extinguisher?

* A quelle heure est le couvre-feu? - What time is the curfew?

* Pourquoi brulez vous ma voiture? - Why are you burning my car?

* Avez-vous du feu pour allumer mon cocktail molotov? - Do you have a light for my petrol bomb?

* Veuillez brûler mon Citroen parce que c'est merde - Please burn my Citroen because it's shit.

* Mes beaux citroen la voiture sont sur le feu ! - My beautiful citroen car is on fire!"

* Ne soyez pas idiot ! la merde ne brûle pas! - don't be daft! shit doesn't burn!"

* Vous avez cassé ma voiture et avez brûlé ma maison et chien, mais pourquoi pas vous tuez ma épouse laide avec ses aisselles velues? - You smashed my car and burned my house and my dog, but why didn't you kill my ugly wife with her hairy armpits?

Uh oh...... --->>> http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20051123/ap_on_re_eu/europe_merkel

A German is coming to Paris.....watch out Czech Republic!

[Ali]

However, she also said she would not allow Germans to train Iraqi troops inside Iraq, sticking with the policy of her predecessor, Gerhard Schroeder, who was a strong foe of the war. She said Germany would still provide such training in other countries in the Middle East.She's afraid of annoying the French, in case she her BMW burned! :p

[Hallo!]

Hi, my little mention.

I think most of the so called Gangbuster, Riotist .. use to smoke Pot, as a result they do not contribute to the average, all day Life. In our region we mostly use the media to get some kicks or many frauds (uho!?), in France they fill it by themselves.
They can`t learn quite good as they say, so it will take more shit.

[maldoror2030]

Ahah, no Paris isn't burning. And the French sentences you wrote are full of mistakes that's funny to read (I'm sure I make a lot of mistakes in English too anyway :) ). The truth is that young french people don't have money and we're are completely forgotten by society so, sometimes, we're in anger. But those who burn cars are isolated cases.
Peace (y)