As someone who lives in a socialist country (well, we ALL live in socialist countries to some extend, but a most socialist one than the US), I disagree. The goal ISN'T to "give people every chance to exceed their reach", as you put it, but to make sure people can always pick themselves up and keep contributing to society. To make it so that when life isn't fair it isn't as bad as it could be and it isn't the end. If you lose everything, you still have access to health care, to shelter, to services to help you find a job and work to get it back.

EI exists so that, if you lose your job, you won't find yourself on the street if you can't find a new one before next month's rent it due. Public healthcare is there so that if you're only making minimum wage, and you develop a heart condition, you won't die from a lack of funds to fix it. Education subsidization lets you develop skills to let you better your own life and at the same time better contribute to society as a whole. Socialism is the mantra of "today you, tomorrow me" restructured into a political system. It's an acknowledgement that everyone in a society is in a symbiotic relationship with everyone else in it and that working together is better than killing each other over every last scrap we can personally get our hands on.

wait, am I the parent poster? are you using the royal we? or are you talking about the person I'm responding to?

Neither I nor my parent claimed to have a brain disease, though he claimed to know someone who did, so I assume you're talking to him. Also, you're very hard to read, which is hurting your claim to superior debate skills. Comprehension is important in debates.

I think we all argue with ourself/talk to people who aren't really there. It's something that society tends to associate with mental illness but really, it's just internal dialogue/daydreams which some of us happen to do out loud without realizing it. And it's hardly a scam, my uncle was schizophrenic and left to his own devices he went missing for years and wandered the streets until he lost a leg to frostbite. That's how I first saw him when I was a child. On a hospital bed, with a bandaged stump, barely able to string a sentence together. My grandmother had it too, refused to leave the house for the last 10 years of her life. She was apparently afraid of what was out there, thought there were men out to get her. I think the percentage of Schizophrenics who could function in society is very low.
Either paranoia or disordered thought gets most of them in the end.

I assume they studied the brains of schizophrenics, found they were producing a lot more dopamine than normal and then tried to figure out what that would do to a person based on what purposes dopamine serves and what symptoms could possibly be caused by those purposed going into overdrive.

Ignoring == determining relevance.

You ignore and quickly forget the information that isn't relevant and retain and think about that information that is is. Eidetic memory would allow them to retain all the information but still ignore what didn't matter. If they needed to, they could pull up what colour shoes they wore at age 12, but they would be able to determine that this information was "not important". Hyperlearning says that schizophrenia prevents this so that you can't tell the difference in importance between what you had for lunch last week and what you got on your last math test. This means that your brain is overloading itself trying to figure our WHY all these things matter and piece together connections between them when it shouldn't be.

Ah. Yeah, in the UK Doctor Who is mainstream. But over here it's still a nerd thing. And any anime that's well known is considered "children's programming" and anyone over 12 who admits to watching it is seen as a tad off.

I agree entirely. That's my point. Grandparent was claiming anime and Dr Who were mainstream and popular and that it was totally normal for people to watch and be really into them. This is in no way the case and both these things are still the purview of geeks, freaks and nerds.

I disagree, normal people are now AWARE Doctor Who exists. They might even now know David Tennant or Matt Smith by name. But they don't, by and large, watch it, and they sure as hell don't reference it in casual conversation. Trust me, my room mate drags me to parties with art and business students. For every one who watches Dr Who there are 20 who give me a blank stare or look at me like a freak when I mention it. Same with Anime. The stuff on Cartoon Network is popularish... kinda. But not really the way Big Bang is. and even the stuff that's well known isn't popular, the people involved in the fandom aren't normal people. They're geeks. People who don't fit into the rest of society. Who obsess over obscure things other people don't care about and get too defensive about their pet shows and don't understand social conventions.
 
I'm not a hacker type. I don't really CARE how most things work as long as they work. I'm a computer programmer because I'm GOOD at computer programming. I understand complex concepts because I'm smart, not because of any deep inquisitive nature. I spend my free time reading comics, playing video games, going to conventions and watching obscure shows.
 
You, sir, are confusing geek and nerd.

taking some obscure piece of pop culture way too seriously and dropping references in casual conversation despite others probably not getting it? Sounds like geeks to me.
 
I'm a geek. I don't get along with a lot of other geeks. I don't LIKE a lot of other geeks. Especially ones who complain about how cheesy and unrealistic a monster of the week family show about a 900 year old space wizard who fights trash cans with hilarious voices and plungers for arms with a sonic plotdriver is. They're usually not enjoyable company.
 
WE KNOW IT'S CHEESY! THAT'S PART OF THE APPEAL!
 
Just because two people are both geeks doesn't mean they'll automatically get along and be BFFs. I hate several entire fandoms, but that doesn't make the members of those fandoms any less geeky for being in them. No matter how superior I feel to them for like Naruto and having never heard of Evangellion.

at the time the AC was ranked 0, I was ranked 2. So to anyone with the (very common) settings of only showing 2 and up: yes.

The problem with this is that you assume the people you're marching with have the same idea of what they want as you do.

I can make my army of people for a government that cares about the greater good of the people instead of corporate interest and it sounds nice and all but what does it really mean? Are we saying we want a single payer medical system so the poor don't get left behind? or are we complaining that they even considered such an option? Are we upset about going to war or about leaving too early? Do we need the government to give us more or less gun control and what makes you sure everyone marching all agree on any of these points?

I can make my army of the people, and you can make yours and the government doesn't have to do a thing because we both consider each other a group of dangerous lunatics who must be stopped before they send our country spiraling into a warfare/welfare state. And this isn't because we're brainwashed. It's because we intrinsically don't all agree. That's why the election is so close to 50/50. I think the people who want to run around with guns and hate government healthcare are wrong and they thing the same about me. You can't make an army for the unified voice of the people because there is no "unified voice of the people".

I'm just replying so the existence of AC above me is known and their post can be seen because I feel they make a valid point.

So you're completely opposed to any sort of government or police force then? Every law that exists requires you to give up freedom for security. By your stated ideology, anarchy is the only option. There has to be a balance.

I do not and it is! The trick is to live near a No Frills grocery store and a Bulk Barn, figure out which brands AREN'T owned by them and buy exclusively from those. Not eating candy or drinking pop much and thinking bottled water is a retarded concept helps.

Also, locally raised/grown products(not farmers market local, but like, within my province) combined with cooking my own food for most meals helps. And I figured out which fast food places are Pepsi based instead of Coke if I feel like being lazy.

Yeah. Turns out I HAVE done my homework actually. Sorry if you thought you were catching some kid being all anti-corporation.

Excellent, glad to hear. Oh wait, you're being sarcastic. Nevermind. Yes, stop buying Activision video games. You don't need Assassin's Creed 7: Precambrian Age. Remember when Modern Warfare 2 came out? And there was a huge stink because they threw PC users under the bus and everyone signed petitions and bitched and moaned and said they were boycotting the game. And then the game came out and they all immediately bough it anyways?
 
  Do you also remember how they didn't fix any of the things people complained about? These things are related. Personally I did minimal whining, I didn't sign anything but what I DID do was NOT BUY THE FUCKING GAME BECAUSE THAT'S HOW A BOYCOTT WORKS! You don't need any video game, by anyone. I have personally boycotted Activision for a while now. They come out with a game I want from time to time but I spend the money on movies/music I want to support, or food, or books, or games by OTHER COMPANIES.

I don't support Coca Cola and Nestle so I don't buy there products either. Which is hard because I LIKE a lot of their products. I grew up with their products. Do you know how many companies those guys own?! It's ridiculous! But that's the thing about boycotts. They aren't fun. They aren't easy. They aren't supposed to be. They're hard and involve personal sacrifice of things you want for the hopes of making things betters.

Not buying Activision games isn't even that hard. They make overpriced games that aren't even very good. Support some independent developers instead. Or go through your catalogue of pirated games/movies/music, decide what you've genuinely gotten the most value out of and buy a legitimate copy.

I believe that's why AC said "Iceland and the PIIGS" as opposed to "Iceland and the REST OF the PIIGS". If I say "The USA and Europe" I'm not saying that the USA is part of Europe.