July 25, 2012

Two that never get old for me...

June 30, 2012

How about a Non-Joiners' Group?

Mavericks and lone wolves need a home too, ya know.

Nobody would join of course, but just post ad hoc.

June 27, 2012

There is a sort of quasi-legal maxim, "truth is a defense".

The statement is true. So are you saying that we should not be allowed to comment on anyone's looks, good or bad? Or was it said in a sexist way, if so, how should it have been said?

This sort of thing quickly becomes "how many angels can dance on the head of a pin". In other words, absurd slicing and dicing of minutiae toward the end result of no worthwhile purpose.

All it does is force people to think up obtuse ways to say the obvious. This is not a children's site and that is a waste of time and thought.

The fact is, the rules as they are are perfectly fine for everyone else except HoF, and they have their own special place to have things just as they want them. We in the community at large have nowhere to have them and their never-ending demands out of our face, and it's about time some consideration was given to that.

I am a woman too. I am tired of being subjected to HoF. If they REALLY want peace, this is NOT the way to get it. In fact, I'm quite sure there will be a super big stink if they proceed with this. So I guess we'll know what they really want when we see if they push this further or not. My suggestion would be to drop it, and let well enough alone before it goes too far.

June 26, 2012

A minor change request / suggestion

At the bottom left corner of an OP there is a button to click marked "Thread Info". This show stats of various kinds, including "Recommendations".

Could it also include the number of people trashing the thread? It's a small thing, but if it isn't too much trouble to create, it could be interesting to see among the other info there.

The thought occurred to me as I was trashing a few today just to get them out of my way -- on subjects that I know I'm not going to comment on or read.

No biggie, just a thought. Thanks.

June 16, 2012

Arguing uncivilly against incivility

deserves to be dismissed out of hand. And that is happening, rightfully so.

The backlash cometh, complete with jury nullification. Is this surprising? It shouldn't be. When you are openly mean to someone to make your point about how you deserve so much better treatment from them, they tend to turn off. And then, first chance they get, they will oppose you in any way that is available to them... such as jury votes.

What reaction do we see to this? Do we see getting the point? Nope, we see whining about how unfair it is. Is it unfair? It is cause and effect. It is common sense. It is inevitable. Of course it is fair. It is eminently fair. Arguing uncivilly against incivility deserves a smackdown, and it gets one. The system works, at least sometimes. This is not surprising, it is to be expected.

This whole harangue is a bunch of blather. Slicing and dicing it, and arguing about reasons why, won't give it rationality which isn't there. It is nonsense, from beginning to end and all the way through. It is a dog chasing its own tail.

There isn't misogeny in general on DU. There is rejection of the behavior of some who bring it up. There is a lesson to be learned. Take it, or leave it.

The guardians of civility wouldn't know civility if they tripped over it. That is abundantly clear by now. Once again, we have a case of the blind demanding to lead everyone, and dictate to everyone on a subject they clearly know nothing about. I say "once again" because it reminds me of the right wing. It's the same attitude at work. On DU "the people" have spoken, and will probably (have to) do so again... until the point gets through.

Arguing uncivilly against incivility deserves to be dismissed out of hand. If anyone would like to deny that statement and argue that isn't true, be my guest.

If you want respect, show it. If you want tolerance, show it. If you want equality, show it. If you want consideration, show it. If you want open-mindedness, show it. There really is no way to get consideration from people, with your arguments or your demands, that your own behavior denies. It is very simple. It is human nature. No amount of whining will make that work. It doesn't deserve to work.

June 15, 2012

A few for you.

June 7, 2012

What are opinions on this

Is it ok for members of an "oppressed class" to be hurtful and mean to those in the majority? What do you think, DU? On both an individual basis and on a broad-brush whole-group basis -- is it ok to attack a majority? Do we need to observe the same standards, or are standards of conduct irrelevant if one is in a minority group?

I constantly see members of a minority being extremely picky about how they themselves are treated, and then those same folks turn around and are outright vicious to someone in a designated majority.

Although it's seen in all sorts of threads and it doesn't only pertain to this particular minority/majority situation, this post below crystallized the question in my mind, so I'm including it here for reference. But I'm starting this OP because I'd be interested in seeing what a larger number of DUers think about this question. (Please read the post that the one below was in response to as well -- #123.) Thanks.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/1240105603#post153


*** This is intended as an overall hypothetical moral question about standards of conduct, and not as a "dig up history back to the end of time" flame fest about specific posters or groups. Very simply... should there be one standard (that we hold ourselves to and expect the same in return), or should there be a double standard based on minority status?

June 7, 2012

An "oppressed class" has carte blanche to be as nasty as they please, got it.

Well that certainly explains a lot! One of DU's major conundrums has been solved now.

See, I never knew this before. This is what has confused me on DU. I've certainly seen people act that way, and I couldn't understand it. But I never knew that there was a taken-for-granted right to act that way, which was well-known to everyone except me. And I never knew there was an exception like that in the DU rules too... that members of an "oppressed class" of course do not have to consider or show any human respect whatsoever to someone who may be designated as part of a majority, and to think otherwise is hilarious.

Silly me! Of course, that explains it all. Now I get it!

Maybe you can quote that exception for me in the DU TOS and CS.

Oh wait...

June 1, 2012

The 1% are eating the goose that lays the golden eggs

because that's just how damn dumb they are. Expertise, my ass. They are frauds, perpetrating frauds. And the sooner we realize that and take steps like Francois Hollande is proposing to do in France, the better. It's common sense cause-and-effect, not rocket science.

Economics only exists to numberfy and mystify the subject so that more webs can be spun. GHW Bush said it... "smoke and mirrors", "voo doo economics". Every once in a while, one of them tells the truth. I go back to that saying, "when someone tells you who they are, believe them".

This can be turned around, anytime we (the 99%) want to deal with reality and not ideology. To paraphrase FDR, the only thing we have to fear, is bullshit.

Excellent article. Good to see some prominent people are still working on making the case for the obvious. It'll take a lot more for the message to get through to most of the 99%. To a large degree, since Reagan, Americans have been living in a la-la-land sick fantasy. To a large degree, I fault the "intellectuals" on our side for not shooting down this nonsense idealogy adequately. The brains are supposedly on our side predominantly, so I can only think that they were largely bought off. Either that, or they are vastly overrated. We should not have lost the "argument competition" this badly for this long.

The "experts" on our side have a lot of work to do, to clean this thought-mess up. They need to keep at it until "trickle down" is dead and gone forever, never to be revived.

I'm waiting to see when the experts will get brave enough to come out and say that CDS's are frauds which should be declared void and made illegal. That day will inevitably come sometime and it should be now. It should've been 4+ years ago.

May 25, 2012

Link to Top 100 songs each year from 1950 to 2011

For those who are into oldies:

http://www.musicoutfitters.com/top-100-songs.htm