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Comment Re:The logical result of Libertarianism (Score 0) 201

Although amusing, this is a perfectly example of what results from Libertarian logic. If property rights override all other rights, then large property owners are effectively tyrants.

Within their property. You would always have option of not entering their little kingdoms.

How many times have there been Slashdot postings about corporate based discussion boards that censor negative comments?

And they have right to do it, regardless of the fact that it makes them look stupid and guilty.

Rand Paul came out a couple of years ago and said that racial prejudice should be legal in business, because property rights were absolute. (This time I'm not going to look it up, you go an find it on Google.)

That is not surprising, typical libertarian view is that anyone should be able to discriminate any stupid way he wants and this right is equal, ie. you could have "No $GROUP served" and "$GROUP only" shops side by side.

Personally, one of my dreams is to discriminate against a Libertarian in an economic transaction simply because of their political affiliation. In theory, they should be supportive of my position, since property rights are absolute. In practice, I think they would squeal like a stuck pig. I have a strong hunch that no Libertarian can conceive that they would be excluded from anything because of personal prejudice.

Now, that would be a funny & cool thing to do! A true believer should actually agree with your right to choose who are you doing business with, yet I think his reaction would be more like throwing a fit with "You hate libertarians? Then I don't want to do business with you anyway!"

Comment Re:Spamming and Trolling and PR (Score 1) 373

Also some people (like me) believe that they should not have to lay their entire life bare for everybody to see. My coworkers don't have need or reason to know my hobbies, my friends have no reason or need to know my work related stuff and my extended family has no need to know either.

If someone is happy with being completely open and HasNothingToHide(TM), fine for them, I'm not going to get close to exhibitionist playgrounds like FB or G+. Want to know me? Ask and maybe I'll tel.

Comment Re:Other end of the spectrum. (Score 1) 294

Does lack of censorship mean that everyone should be able to view whatever they want to?

This is exactly what "lack of censorship" means. If you ban some kind of content (be it porn, violence or anything else (like criticism of Great Leader)) it means censorship. Yes, there is that commonly accepted exception of limiting access to some stuff for kids but for adults there should be restriction.
That assumes they request the content by their own choice.

Since it is obvious that there are things that are 'off limits' that SHOULD remain censored, who decides the demarcation points?

So what are these "obvious" things that "should" be censored? Let's start with demonstrating that there are such things that must be censored, for some objective reason. I don't see any. You apparently do - so what bothers you so much?

Why is it that so few people frown upon this method of 'forcing' of opinions?

Because they don't see it as such?
Appeals to base desires, as you call it, do not force anyone to do anything. They try to convince people that some things are desirable more than other, mostly by propagating obvious lie that if you buy Brand X Whatever you'll get laid. Yet I don't remember being forced by advertising. Maybe it's beacuse I've lived in the system that DID force opinions, by arresting and sometimes killing people that did not simply repeat "the truth" (aka the Party line), so I know what forcing is.

But no... after many years of pondering on this I have come to the conclusion that it is very possible that some people for whatever reasons ranging from mental health to various circumstances in their lives are changed by beholding such wholesale carnage on the screen, and that it is very possible that the carnage bleeds over from pixels to real life.

Maybe. Or maybe it's reverse, in that violent people are more drawn to violent games. Anyway, statistics show no rise in violence that could be correlated with games, in fact there seems to be a reverse correlation. The claims of the games making people violent in real life are made frequently, yet no proof is offered. If you have one, please share it and enlighten us, otherwise please stop propagating the meme.

Comment Re:He should have stuck with the 2000 system (Score 1) 311

there will always exist a class of people who will refuse to be bothered with "useless" things like mathematics and will demand that the workings of the universe be made comprehensible to them in simple terms

Yes, you're perfectly right that anyone not enthusiastic about deriving all the equations from scratch is worthelss subhuman that should not receive any of the holy science and the knowledge should be withheld from these heathen useless animals. We shall never tell them F=ma, anyone worthy of knowing will derive that himself. Eradicate the unbelivers!

Did it, maybe, occur to you, that aside from some people who define "being humanist" as "don't know calculus and proud of it!" there is a majority of those who cannot understand higher mathematics but would like to know, even in approximate way, how the universe works? Probably not...

Comment Re:I understand these modern times and all... (Score 4, Informative) 875

Government doing anything in "efficient and cost effective manner"? What color is the sky on your planet?

Governemt may be the only way to organize some operations that are too costly/not profitable enough for a citizen or corporation to undertake, but unfortunately, it always causes a lot of waste and excessive cost. Bureaucratic overhead can be amazingly high and order of priorities tends to be seriously fucked.

Getting back to Finland... Nowadays the Scandinavian countries have significantly socialist tendencies. It may be shocking to you Americans but the citizens of those countries seem to be quite happy with the way the things are. And they're actually spending the tax money on something useful.

Comment Re:Facebook and cell phones are full of pr0n (Score 1) 408

Punish the people who actually commit crimes of child abuse.

But... but... but that would require investigation, gathering real evidence and proving they did it.

BTW, it's not only UK. The disease spreads across the world. Recently Poland was also infected with this insanity (though we top UK by making the Internet illegal (not by itself, but any link such as this is up to 2 years inprisonment)).

Comment Re:This is ... a good thing? (Score 1) 293

Because it is easier and safer to drive up the statistics by arresting people for littering, making noise at night or mooning the cameras. These criminals won't fight back and bonuses are the same.

In fact eliminating too much of the serious criminals would be counterproductive, as the fear of crime allows for easier approppriations of funds for the "law enforcement" and additional legal powers. Cynical? I do read public parts of police forums, I see how they see us: as third rate beings.

Comment Re:your argument fails, hard (Score 1) 203

War is expensive, troublesome and rarely justifiable.

You send a secret agent or five, to find the hosting company, infiltrate it and blow up the server room. Haven't seen a firewall that can stop blast from few kilos of C4...

Then you claim tourist^Wterrorist did it.

Bonus points for stealing colo's customer data, tracking down the site's author and blowing him up too.

Comment Re:UK's health care system (Score 1) 595

They spend a great deal of money on the system.

Indeed, not only UK but many other EU countries have nationalized healthcare and spend a lot of tax money on it. However, you should well understand that spending money on something does not mean that you'll get that money's worth of service.

Which is, sadly, the case with most nationalized healthcare systems.

That money just kinda evaporate on the way from the treasury to the patient. Months of waiting time for not-so-big procedures, medicines denied because some jobsworth in the ministry decided people having some disease are too costly to save (or because manufacturer did not bribe correct people)... It's slightly better than not having any health coverage at all, but far far far from being good. Hell, for the same amount that I pay in health tax I can get private coverage, where not only specialist diagnosis is next day, but also I'm treated as a valued customer instead of being considered some loser who bothers the staff.

(OK, not all this happens specifically in the UK, but I have no reason to believe it's that much different from my country - UK's healthcare is probably better as it is richer country, but still...)

No system is perfect, I hear many Americans wanting nationalized care and not a small number of EU people hating it. If you ever invent a system where everyone will be happy, you'll have a monument in every city ;-)

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