Portrait of an American Hero

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Gary Childress
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Re: Portrait of an American Hero

Post by Gary Childress »

RCSaunders wrote: Mon Jun 29, 2020 1:36 am Frankly, if I'm a victim of crime, it's my own fault. I know what the risks are and take measures to protect myself from them. There is no guarantee I'll always be successful in my own defense, but it's no riskier than depending on some government police force. As they say, when seconds count, the police are only minutes away.
At least sometimes the police catch people after the fact and can get your stolen property back for you. Also, it seems to me that police also track down known criminals and take them off the street. In that way, they seem to keep the public safe from violent people or repeat offenders.
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RCSaunders
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Re: Portrait of an American Hero

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gaffo wrote: Mon Jun 29, 2020 2:15 am i don't like folks that pick and choose - either you support the 1st or you don't, its that simple.
You don't have to worry about that. I have no use for any government documents, especially when I'm told they are a contract to which I'm bound but never had a chance to sign or agree to.

I believe only in individual freedom and I don't need a government to supply it.
Gary Childress
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Re: Portrait of an American Hero

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RCSaunders wrote: Mon Jun 29, 2020 3:15 am
gaffo wrote: Mon Jun 29, 2020 2:15 am i don't like folks that pick and choose - either you support the 1st or you don't, its that simple.
You don't have to worry about that. I have no use for any government documents, especially when I'm told they are a contract to which I'm bound but never had a chance to sign or agree to.

I believe only in individual freedom and I don't need a government to supply it.
Would you describe yourself as an anarchist, then?
Dubious
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Re: Portrait of an American Hero

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RCSaunders wrote: Mon Jun 29, 2020 3:15 am
gaffo wrote: Mon Jun 29, 2020 2:15 am i don't like folks that pick and choose - either you support the 1st or you don't, its that simple.
You don't have to worry about that. I have no use for any government documents, especially when I'm told they are a contract to which I'm bound but never had a chance to sign or agree to.

I believe only in individual freedom and I don't need a government to supply it.
In spite of my low opinion of governments, yes you do. If not protected, other's stronger than you can take it away. Also, if a government can revoke rights they can also grant it unless you make yourself invisible with not even a mailbox or internet connection.
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RCSaunders
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Re: Portrait of an American Hero

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Gary Childress wrote: Mon Jun 29, 2020 6:23 am
RCSaunders wrote: Mon Jun 29, 2020 3:15 am
gaffo wrote: Mon Jun 29, 2020 2:15 am i don't like folks that pick and choose - either you support the 1st or you don't, its that simple.
You don't have to worry about that. I have no use for any government documents, especially when I'm told they are a contract to which I'm bound but never had a chance to sign or agree to.

I believe only in individual freedom and I don't need a government to supply it.
Would you describe yourself as an anarchist, then?
Definitely not. There are governments because that's what most people want. Almost no one wants freedom, because freedom means responsibility. Most people prefer security and a sense of safety that a government gives them and relief from having to decide for themselves how to live their lives. They would prefer to be enslaved to a government that promises to keep them safe and provide for them no matter how badly they screw up their lives. I'm not interested in interfering in anyone else's life, just keeping mine out of the clutches of government. I'm no threat to anyone else's precious governments, but that does not mean I have to support them either materially or ideologically.
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RCSaunders
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Re: Portrait of an American Hero

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Dubious wrote: Mon Jun 29, 2020 7:55 am
RCSaunders wrote: Mon Jun 29, 2020 3:15 am
gaffo wrote: Mon Jun 29, 2020 2:15 am i don't like folks that pick and choose - either you support the 1st or you don't, its that simple.
You don't have to worry about that. I have no use for any government documents, especially when I'm told they are a contract to which I'm bound but never had a chance to sign or agree to.

I believe only in individual freedom and I don't need a government to supply it.
In spite of my low opinion of governments, yes you do. If not protected, other's stronger than you can take it away. Also, if a government can revoke rights they can also grant it unless you make yourself invisible with not even a mailbox or internet connection.
In this world, governments are ubiquitous, like disease, so of course it is not possible to live without the presence of government. I would hardly call the fact that government cannot be eliminated from the world, just as disease cannot be eliminated from the world, something I need. I would be a lot better off if there were no government, just as I would be better off if there were no disease.

I treat government the same way I do an vicious animal. I avoid it in every possible way, make myself invisible to it and never intentionally antagonize it as much as possible, and even when using those things governments have usurped, like utilities and means of communication, it is quite easy to prevent government from having any interest in me. When government is unavoidable, as disease sometime is, I just do what is necessary (called paying the squeeze) and move on. You'd be surprised how easy it is to avoid government, even in a totalitarian state, as many are doing today in places like Venezuela, China, and Africa.

The freedom I enjoy is in spite of government, as is any freedom anyone enjoys. Government and freedom are contradictions. To be free means not to be governed by anything except one's own rational choices.

As for:
If not protected, other's stronger than you can take it away.
That was probably true to some extent before the invention of guns, the great equalizers (which is why they are so hated by goverments--the most dangerous thugs there are). That statement of yours makes an assumption that others are just itching to do you harm. If there was no government, would you be a thief, rapist, murderer, or vandal? Or do you just think everyone else would?

Of course there are others who would do evil things. No government has ever prevented that. (Look up crime statistics. Which country has the largest number of citizens in its prisons.) I think the protection I can provide myself, directly or purchasing it, is better than anything any government can provide.
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Immanuel Can
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Re: Portrait of an American Hero

Post by Immanuel Can »

RCSaunders wrote: Sat Jun 27, 2020 1:52 am So much for freedom!
Freedom's not absolute. You don't have a right to steal, to embezzle, to enslave, to brutalize or to rape. Moreover, you think it's a deplorable thing that the public education system indoctrinates children (as do I)...but why? Isn't it their "freedom" to say anything they want?

And if your kind of "freedom" has that limit, what other limits does it have? :shock:
Immanuel Can wrote: Fri Jun 26, 2020 9:20 pm ... Words can create or induce harm to others. Thoughts cannot.
With the exception of using words as a means of deception (to cheat someone, for example) or as a means of slander, no words can harm anyone else in any way.
But that's exactly what Marx did. He deceived many people, he slandered the middle class, he lied about the future trajectory of history, he advocated violent revolution, he propagandized the foolish and weak, and he caused great harm thereby. In every way, he fits your definition there.
So, if someone is offended and, "hurt,"
"Offended" is not hurt. Hurt is hurt.
...to debate it is self contradictory.
It's not. Because the right to speech is not an all-or-nothing equation.

Look, R.C. I "get" your objection that far too much of the public discourse today is characterized by nonsense like "hate speech" or "oppression," or "being offended." And yes, that's all an excuse for suppressing reasonable freedom of speech, is authoritarian and is nonsense. Got it. But to say that the limits being imposed today are authoritarian, arbitrary and stifling is not the same as to say that all speech needs to be allowed.

Free conscience must be allowed, and in fact, cannot actually be taken away anyway. But the right to speak in the public square is bounded by the fact that others are present there, and if one is selfish then one can use one's speech acts to do actual harm to those people. So just like you think things in your head occasionally, as we all do, that you are too wise to say, so too ones use of the public square must respect not the mere feelings but the actual safety and well-being of the others that inhabit that square with you. And there's nothing self-contradictory about not harming others.
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Immanuel Can
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Re: Portrait of an American Hero

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Sculptor wrote: Sat Jun 27, 2020 11:29 am Jesus was responsible for:...
Show how Jesus led to any of these things you claim.
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Immanuel Can
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Re: Portrait of an American Hero

Post by Immanuel Can »

gaffo wrote: Sat Jun 27, 2020 9:57 pm
Immanuel Can wrote: Sun Jun 14, 2020 3:14 pm
RCSaunders wrote: Sun Jun 14, 2020 3:00 pm Americans are:... celebrating and eulogizing George Floyd.
I don't have a comment about George Floyd as a man, RC. I mean, is it worse if he was a saint than if he was a drugged-out thug? Either way, I don't see that being a criminal warrants one in being killed on the street
Exactly, i thank you for your humanity Sir.

- BTW not heard from you, how are you doing? well i hope.
Yes, thank you. Very well. And how about you?
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RCSaunders
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Re: Portrait of an American Hero

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Immanuel Can wrote: Mon Jun 29, 2020 2:12 pm Freedom's not absolute. You don't have a right to steal, to embezzle, to enslave, to brutalize or to rape. Moreover, you think it's a deplorable thing that the public education system indoctrinates children (as do I)...but why? Isn't it their "freedom" to say anything they want?
There is no such thing as a, "right," in the political sense, so your question as asked is meaningless. If you can ask it again, without invoking the premise of rights, I'll answer it.
Immanuel Can wrote: Mon Jun 29, 2020 2:12 pm ... one can use one's speech acts to do actual harm to ... people.
So you and others, who would like to suppress speech, say. When asked to explain how speech, all by itself, can possibly harm anyone, it always turns out it is others' own thinking and emotional reaction to the speech that harms them. Nothing you say can possibly harm me, and vice versa.
Immanuel Can wrote: Mon Jun 29, 2020 2:12 pm So just like you think things in your head occasionally, as we all do, that you are too wise to say, so too ones use of the public square must respect not the mere feelings but the actual safety and well-being of the others that inhabit that square with you. And there's nothing self-contradictory about not harming others.
I admit I do not say some things in the presence of idiots who will irrationally react to what I might say in some form of force or violence. It's not because there is anything wrong with saying anything, it is only prudent self protection from those who do not know the difference between reason and force. If any harm is done as a result of anyone's speech, it is not speech that caused the harm, but idiot's reaction to it. If you want to prevent the harm you attribute to free speech, suppress the idiots, not the speakers.

Please give even one example of how a verbal expression, in speech or writing, short of slander or fraud, can possibly do anyone harm. It may be despicable, disgusting, hateful, or detestable, but it can't hurt anyone. How could one ever come to the conclusion that any ideas are wrong, despicable, disgusting, hateful, or detestable, if they were protected from ever hearing or reading such ideas. It might be nice if we all lived where there, "never is heard a discouraging word and skies are not cloudy all day," but that's a fictional world I would not choose to live in. Say your worst. I have nothing to fear from it and it cannot possibly hurt me. If you are afraid of others' words or allow them to hurt you, that's your own personal problem.
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Sculptor
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Re: Portrait of an American Hero

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Immanuel Can wrote: Mon Jun 29, 2020 2:18 pm
Sculptor wrote: Sat Jun 27, 2020 11:29 am Jesus was responsible for:...
Show how Jesus led to any of these things you claim.
Jesus has set the entire ideological background of the AD period, throughout Europe and every where she has exploited, colonised and enslaved.
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Immanuel Can
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Re: Portrait of an American Hero

Post by Immanuel Can »

RCSaunders wrote: Mon Jun 29, 2020 4:04 pm
Immanuel Can wrote: Mon Jun 29, 2020 2:12 pm Freedom's not absolute. You don't have a right to steal, to embezzle, to enslave, to brutalize or to rape. Moreover, you think it's a deplorable thing that the public education system indoctrinates children (as do I)...but why? Isn't it their "freedom" to say anything they want?
There is no such thing as a, "right," in the political sense...
There is, in the divine sense of things. There is the right to life, given by the Creator, to freedom of conscience -- meaning to give one's account to one's Creator, and to live or die by it -- and with this, the necessary right to general liberty, the freedom to do things, and property, because one must have something wherewith to do them.

All this we have explained by Locke. But beyond that, you are correct: no polity can confer rights that are not divinely established, nor can any legitimately take away rights divinely ordained. They can only do so at peril of being judged themselves for having violated such rights.
Immanuel Can wrote: Mon Jun 29, 2020 2:12 pm ... one can use one's speech acts to do actual harm to ... people.
So you and others, who would like to suppress speech, say.[/quote]
It is manifest that it is so.
When asked to explain how speech, all by itself, can possibly harm anyone, it always turns out it is others' own thinking and emotional reaction to the speech that harms them.

Well, that doesn't describe the case you already deplored, the case of propagandizing children. It is not the children's emotional reaction or sense of offence that occasions the harm; in fact, they generally feel no personal offence at all, since they know so little already, and in any case are being indoctrinated to a degree that they may well feel no offence at all.

Marx did that sort of harm.
I admit I do not say some things in the presence of idiots who will irrationally react to what I might say in some form of force or violence.
Well, Marx did.
If you want to prevent the harm you attribute to free speech, suppress the idiots, not the speakers.
Given that the average IQ in certain Western countries is about 98, and in some countries is below 70, your advice to "suppress the idiots" is going to be problematic. Large numbers of people who are substantially vulnerable to propaganda are going to exist everywhere. And even "smart" people can be fooled. For example, Charles Manson's second-in-command was a Rhodes Scholar.
Please give even one example of how a verbal expression, in speech or writing, short of slander or fraud, can possibly do anyone harm.
As above: the mobilizing of vulnerable populations to serve its purposes. The mob is ever vulnerable to stupidity -- if the last few weeks of news have taught us anything, that should be it.

And it is also what Marx did.
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Immanuel Can
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Re: Portrait of an American Hero

Post by Immanuel Can »

Sculptor wrote: Mon Jun 29, 2020 4:08 pm
Immanuel Can wrote: Mon Jun 29, 2020 2:18 pm
Sculptor wrote: Sat Jun 27, 2020 11:29 am Jesus was responsible for:...
Show how Jesus led to any of these things you claim.
Jesus has set the entire ideological background...
No, no...no weaselling this one. No "entire ideological background" vagueness. Say exactly what He said that you can show caused what you attribute to Him. Show cause and effect.

Otherwise, you're bluffing. You're just saying, "Well, Jesus came first, so therefore, whatever came after must be his fault."
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RCSaunders
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Re: Portrait of an American Hero

Post by RCSaunders »

Immanuel Can wrote: Mon Jun 29, 2020 4:33 pm Well, that doesn't describe the case you already deplored, the case of propagandizing children. It is not the children's emotional reaction or sense of offence that occasions the harm; in fact, they generally feel no personal offence at all, since they know so little already, and in any case are being indoctrinated to a degree that they may well feel no offence at all.

Marx did that sort of harm.
Of course you don't see any difference between forcing children to sit it in classrooms and intimidated into remembering the nonsense they will be expected to regurgitate on tests or be penalized. With rare exception, none of those children would pay any attention to the lies they are fed if it weren't for the threats they (and their parents) are faced with. They are given no choice but to, "listen," and, "read," what is required. That's not an audience to free speech.

No one had to listen to or read Marx or take anything he said seriously. No one force anyone to adopt Marx's theories or to practice them. Those who adopted Mar's views adopted them because they liked them, because it provided with the excuses they needed to carry out their excesses. Not even Marx made anyone do that. As always you blame the wrong thing for what individuals do. It was not, "a sinful nature," or, "Marx's teachings," or anything else that made oppressive dictators. It was the choice of the dictators and the individual choices of all his sycophants and fanatics.
Immanuel Can wrote: Mon Jun 29, 2020 4:33 pm
I admit I do not say some things in the presence of idiots who will irrationally react to what I might say in some form of force or violence.
Well, Marx did.
So what? I'm not worried about the idiots threatening others, only me. If what I say incites others to do bad things, that's not my fault. If individuals had any virtues they could never do wrong things because of anything I, or Marx, or anyone else said, and if they cite what anyone said as the reason for their wrong acts, it is only an excuse. When you blame Marx for what evil men have done, you are letting the real perpetrators of evil off the hook.
Immanuel Can wrote: Mon Jun 29, 2020 4:33 pm
If you want to prevent the harm you attribute to free speech, suppress the idiots, not the speakers.
Given that the average IQ in certain Western countries is about 98, and in some countries is below 70, your advice to "suppress the idiots" is going to be problematic. Large numbers of people who are substantially vulnerable to propaganda are going to exist everywhere. And even "smart" people can be fooled. For example, Charles Manson's second-in-command was a Rhodes Scholar.
Good grief. You think being a Rhodes scholar is the equivalent of being intelligent? Rhodes Scholar = politically acceptable social justice celebrity.

So the real reason you want to suppress free speech is because you think human beings are so stupid they need intelligent censors, like you, to keep them safe from hearing dangerous things. I see. I guess you'd be for a kind of conservative Christian, Index Librorum Prohibitorum, banning such evil books as Das Kapital, The Communist Manifesto, and while we're at it, why not Thomas Paine's atheistic Age of Reason, which justified and led all those low IQ early Americans to a violent revolution.
Immanuel Can wrote: Mon Jun 29, 2020 4:33 pm
Please give even one example of how a verbal expression, in speech or writing, short of slander or fraud, can possibly do anyone harm.
As above: ...
No, you only mentioned what other people did, not how anything anyone said or wrote harmed anyone. Really, IC, if one is never to say or write anything some idiot might swallow whole, misconstrue, or take to heart and do wrong because of it, nothing of significance can ever be said or written.
Gary Childress
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Re: Portrait of an American Hero

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RCSaunders wrote: Mon Jun 29, 2020 7:34 pm
Of course you don't see any difference between forcing children to sit it in classrooms and intimidated into remembering the nonsense they will be expected to regurgitate on tests or be penalized. With rare exception, none of those children would pay any attention to the lies they are fed if it weren't for the threats they (and their parents) are faced with. They are given no choice but to, "listen," and, "read," what is required. That's not an audience to free speech.
Children seem to usually be taught the primary values of the society they grow up in (sometimes with exceptions). What should we be teaching children if not what they are currently learning? Are you suggesting children shouldn't be taught? Or what is your solution to these criticisms?
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