Mother, mother, mother - there's too many of you crying.

[Pretty Little Flower]

Originally Posted by sebastian_dangerfield

I agree Ds are willing to compromise and Rs are not.

I prefer working outside the system because the system is sclerotic, and designed to preserve the current status quo (all established systems do this, of course). If the system is built to fuck you, or is regularly fucking you, you don’t benefit from fighting within it. You need to disrupt it. Or destroy it.

All great and important change is created by challenging, sabotaging, or subverting systems. What’s tech but a giant system disruption?

Grieving your issues within the redress procedures of a society won’t change that society quickly and in any significant fashion. If you’re being screwed unfairly under the current governing structures, the only real redress is to seek to avoid, destroy, or render ineffectual those structures.

"Disruption." You are devolving into one of those hacks who gives motivational speeches as a thinly disguised marketing scheme to sell his motivational books, and who energetically, engagingly, and meaninglessly strings together a bunch of the latest buzzwords to the frequent applause of the morons who have gathered in some convention center in order to get inspired to get their lives on track, and maybe buy a really great book from an engaging motivational speaker.

My college roommate's brother was an electrical engineering major set to graduate with honors, but became more and more involved in homeless advocacy and anarchism, and eventually dropped out of school with one semester to go to work full time at food shelves, soup kitchens, etc. But he found these organizations to be too bureaucratic and tied to The System, so he and his little band of anarchist followers would break into one of the many crack houses not far from campus, and he would hack into the electrical and water systems and create underground homeless shelters, in which he himself also lived. He was working outside the system. I have my doubts that you are also working outside the system in the same or similar sort of way, but I guess I don't know.

[Greedy,Greedy,Greedy]

Originally Posted by sebastian_dangerfield

I agree Ds are willing to compromise and Rs are not.

I prefer working outside the system because the system is sclerotic, and designed to preserve the current status quo (all established systems do this, of course). If the system is built to fuck you, or is regularly fucking you, you don’t benefit from fighting within it. You need to disrupt it. Or destroy it.

All great and important change is created by challenging, sabotaging, or subverting systems. What’s tech but a giant system disruption?

Grieving your issues within the redress procedures of a society won’t change that society quickly and in any significant fashion. If you’re being screwed unfairly under the current governing structures, the only real redress is to seek to avoid, destroy, or render ineffectual those structures.

Good News!!! The stock market has been disrupted!!!

[ferrets_bueller]

The stock market has entered The Pit of Misery! Dilly Dilly!

[Greedy,Greedy,Greedy]

Originally Posted by ferrets_bueller

The stock market has entered The Pit of Misery! Dilly Dilly!

I was asked today to help set up a "bake off" for a Cannabis company doing an IPO and have been giggling ever sense.

Don't worry, the market can go higher.

[sebastian_dangerfield]

I'm not really sure what you mean by working outside the current status quo. Because of where I live and what I do, I am surrounded by people extolling "disruption" 24/7 and the word no longer means anything.

Your area is a bright spot - the kinda "wild west" status quo I think we all ought to enjoy.

How do you think the political status quo should be "disrupted"? And don't even talk about destruction, or rendering politics "ineffectual." You don't really mean it, and you don't want to live in Somalia. Those are just empty buzzwords.

Why would rendering politics ineffectual put us in Somalia? Politics is already largely ineffectual and the world is doing fine.

If you were looking to amass the greatest level of power on this planet, would you choose to control the ten biggest nations, or the twenty biggest multinational corporations? (Trick Question: If you controlled the top twenty corporations, you'd control a majority percentage of each of the top ten nations.)

eta: Also, not also "disruption" is good. Mitch McConnell disrupted traditional norms by refusing to give Obama's pick for the Supreme Court a vote. Sarah Huckabee Sanders is disrupting the traditional role of the press secretary by lying from the White House podium. Trump is disrupting the traditional role of DOJ by attacking it. I'm guessing that you don't like these changes, even though they are disruptive.

I disagree. I think bad disruption of the kind you describe will cause a whiplash effect. When people realize how much this damages the core of society, they'll demand a return to norms.

However, this may split the country in two. There will be those of us who demand some adherence to objective facts. And there will be the idiots who wish to craft their own realities.

And Huckabee isn't doing anything unique. She's just doing it less cleverly then many predecessors, without plausible deniability.

[sebastian_dangerfield]

Originally Posted by Pretty Little Flower

"Disruption." You are devolving into one of those hacks who gives motivational speeches as a thinly disguised marketing scheme to sell his motivational books, and who energetically, engagingly, and meaninglessly strings together a bunch of the latest buzzwords to the frequent applause of the morons who have gathered in some convention center in order to get inspired to get their lives on track, and maybe buy a really great book from an engaging motivational speaker.

My college roommate's brother was an electrical engineering major set to graduate with honors, but became more and more involved in homeless advocacy and anarchism, and eventually dropped out of school with one semester to go to work full time at food shelves, soup kitchens, etc. But he found these organizations to be too bureaucratic and tied to The System, so he and his little band of anarchist followers would break into one of the many crack houses not far from campus, and he would hack into the electrical and water systems and create underground homeless shelters, in which he himself also lived. He was working outside the system. I have my doubts that you are also working outside the system in the same or similar sort of way, but I guess I don't know.

I'm not working outside it at all. I'm suggesting others who are being fucked by it do so.

If you can't get redress within the system because the system is designed to avoid giving it to you (meaning you're oppressed, as countless people are), how the hell are you going to effect change you desire through the system?

Consider the financial crisis. I believe we would have been much better served by giving the poor free money to juice the economy at the same time we gave it to the banks, or diverting some of the $$$ given to banks to the poor, who'd more quickly spend it in the real economy.

That, of course, was not going to happen. Our system could not allow that. Instead, the money was given to banks. There are, of course, economic arguments for this. But it's also a value decision. We were fine with the moral hazard of giving banks a mulligan, not so charitable to the little guy who was collateral damage in the crisis.

So if you're the little guy, and you were fucked in 2008, what was your recourse within the system? Nothing. You could take 99 weeks of charity, food stamps if you were really fucked.

But what if all the little guys said, "Let's take our cut of the bailout by developing a national movement of people who refuse to pay their debts?" Suppose eight or ten million households decided, for just a month or two, to forego making payments to the banks? Pundits would call that reckless and un-American. They'd be wrong, of course, as that would be a true tea party of sorts. And though it would be reckless, it would only be reckless in regard to the system it was challenging. If the goal was to upend that system, it would be something else - modestly effective.

Of course, "prisoner's dilemma" all but renders this sort of mass action impossible. But if people were organized to get beyond that, there are endless ways mass actions could check the system from outside the system. Perhaps in a future where people are becoming more and more connected, this may be possible.

[Adder]

Originally Posted by sebastian_dangerfield

Consider the financial crisis. I believe we would have been much better served by giving the poor free money to juice the economy at the same time we gave it to the banks, or diverting some of the $$$ given to banks to the poor, who'd more quickly spend it in the real economy.

We have one political party that broadly agreed with you and one who had to be "bought off" with stuff that didn't help, including a smaller than needed stimulus.

But what if all the little guys said, "Let's take our cut of the bailout by developing a national movement of people who refuse to pay their debts?" Suppose eight or ten million households decided, for just a month or two, to forego making payments to the banks? Pundits would call that reckless and un-American. They'd be wrong, of course, as that would be a true tea party of sorts.

You're thinking of Occupy.

[Greedy,Greedy,Greedy]

Originally Posted by sebastian_dangerfield

Your area is a bright spot - the kinda "wild west" status quo I think we all ought to enjoy.

You desperately need a trip to San Francisco to discover just how annoying these people can be. Really, the Californians on this board are a breath of fresh air compared to the disruptor crowd.

Though, thinking of your role here on this board, maybe you'd get along with them.

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally Posted by sebastian_dangerfield

Your area is a bright spot - the kinda "wild west" status quo I think we all ought to enjoy.



Why would rendering politics ineffectual put us in Somalia? Politics is already largely ineffectual and the world is doing fine.

If you were looking to amass the greatest level of power on this planet, would you choose to control the ten biggest nations, or the twenty biggest multinational corporations? (Trick Question: If you controlled the top twenty corporations, you'd control a majority percentage of each of the top ten nations.)

I disagree. I think bad disruption of the kind you describe will cause a whiplash effect. When people realize how much this damages the core of society, they'll demand a return to norms.

However, this may split the country in two. There will be those of us who demand some adherence to objective facts. And there will be the idiots who wish to craft their own realities.

Crafting one's own reality indeed. Like many people in tech, you are using the word "disruption" to pretend that you are saying something when you're not. If you ever figure out how "politics" should be "disrupted," please post about it here.

And Huckabee isn't doing anything unique. She's just doing it less cleverly then many predecessors, without plausible deniability.

You are just so infatuated with this kind of vacuous both-sidesism. "Huckabee isn't doing anything unique." Mind-boggling.

[sebastian_dangerfield]

Originally Posted by Adder

We have one political party that broadly agreed with you and one who had to be "bought off" with stuff that didn't help, including a smaller than needed stimulus.



You're thinking of Occupy.

I’m thinking of testing the enforcement mechanisms, like, say, Uber.

Idk what litigation you’ve done, but there are few more compelling levers than having a client which is judgment proof. All leverage, all power of enforcement over your client, disappears.

If the New Oppression is inequality, and one wishes to resolve it, what better way than to prove the limitation of enforcement of property, and in particular creditor, rights?

[greatwhitenorthchick]

Originally Posted by sebastian_dangerfield

I’m thinking of testing the enforcement mechanisms, like, say, Uber.

Idk what litigation you’ve done, but there are few more compelling levers than having a client which is judgment proof. All leverage, all power of enforcement over your client, disappears.

If the New Oppression is inequality, and one wishes to resolve it, what better way than to prove the limitation of enforcement of property, and in particular creditor, rights?

I'm not sure I understand exactly what you're talking about, but an image of debtor's prison out of Dickens just popped into my head. To be clear, not in a good way.

[LessinSF]

Originally Posted by greatwhitenorthchick

I'm not sure I understand exactly what you're talking about, but an image of debtor's prison out of Dickens just popped into my head. To be clear, not in a good way.

So ... almost all of our prisons when someone can't pay the fine or bail.

[Hank Chinaski]

Originally Posted by greatwhitenorthchick

I'm not sure I understand exactly what you're talking about, but an image of debtor's prison out of Dickens just popped into my head. To be clear, not in a good way.

It's times like this I'm glad I"m poorly read.

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally Posted by Hank Chinaski

It's time like this I'm glad I"m poorly read.

I'm just glad I haven't seen Alien.

[Hank Chinaski]

Originally Posted by Tyrone Slothrop

I'm just glad I haven't seen Alien.

How about Aliens? I'd love to have that to look forward to you. Jel.