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| What's wrong with cops these days? | |
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| Topic Started: Jul 20 2010, 10:22 PM (2,293 Views) | |
| Comrade Queen | Jul 23 2010, 10:52 PM Post #51 |
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Comrade Bitchqueen
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I'm sorry, you must be mistaking me for the other guy. I just said all I care about are people's rights. If you want to move around or embrace another culture, go for it. |
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| Toussaint | Jul 23 2010, 11:18 PM Post #52 |
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Major
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Hey, Att: If you want to move to Italy, learn Italian. Apply for Italian citizenship. Adopt the culture of your new homeland. Don't move somewhere, insist they speak your language, accommodate your culture, and give you special recognition because you're American. If you wan to move to Italy, then become Italian. I don't think anyone here has talked about locking everybody into their land of birth. If you adopt a new patrimony, adopt it's customs too. |
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| Quaon | Jul 24 2010, 12:17 AM Post #53 |
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A Prince Amoung Men-Shoot First and Ask Questions Later
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If I remember correctly, you're Irish, right, Harumf? There was most certainly a time when they didn't want your lot influencing the culture. Same with Italians on my end, and Jews. They said that the Irish were criminals and were going to destroy the country with their Papish religion. They weren't even European, right? They were white negroes. Just like those Mexicans, whom we decided suddenly were red, not white. The Irish and the Italians brought crime over, that's certainly true, the Italians probably moreso, what with the mafia. And yet both groups are now integral parts of the American society, the Irish, in fact, being the second biggest ethnic group. America should be a melting pot, I agree, and English and American culture should be protected. The thing is, a beautiful thing called cultural osmosis tends to happen; e.g., the sons and daughters of Mexican immigrants, legal or illegal, learn English and begin integrating into American culture, even if their parents haven't done so fully. The demographics of America will change; they always change. If they didn't, it would still be an English majority country. But American culture will remain. Opposing immigration is antithetical to the national ethos of the country. Now, opposing illegal immigration is entirely different. Though the most effective way to deal with illegals is not to target them directly; there are too damned many. How about make it a federal crime to employ someone at less than the minimum wage and ruthlessly enforce said law? |
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| Nag Ehgoeg | Jul 24 2010, 12:29 AM Post #54 |
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The Devil's Advocate
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Hear hear. Flumes, I agree with your point... mostly. Should an Italian who moves to the States be barred from making proper pizza? Should they have to eat Hamburgers instead of spaghetti? It's ok to respect the customs of your birthplace, so long as you don't force them on others. That's the difference between positive and negative immigration. Integration is fine and good, but Little Italy is not perverting the course of the American Great Nation. |
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| East Anarx | Jul 24 2010, 09:00 AM Post #55 |
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Anarchitect
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What's wrong with cops? Let's see, first of all, they get paid in stolen money. Why don't they go and get real jobs and do something productive that people will actually pay for voluntarily? If they're so necessary to society, then surely they could find some way to fund their activities without threatening violence on their "customers." Don't be fooled by the "public servant" rhetoric. Numerous friends of mine have been kidnapped for daring to film these thugs in action. Pigs exist to serve and protect the state. One time I asked a cop, "if you found that what you were doing was unethical, would you stop doing it?" He said flatly, "No." These people don't give a fuck about the rule of law, or keeping the peace, or protecting people, they just get paid to be bullies. |
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| New Harumf | Jul 24 2010, 09:19 AM Post #56 |
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Bloodthirsty Unicorn
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Nag: I did not say let Western culture stagnate. It has been growing and changing for 4,000 years, and will continue to do so. I do not want to see that cultural line end. Hell, you can't even take a Western Civ class in college any more! Q: I am 1/2 Scottish and 1/2 German. No papist blood flows through these reformed veins! Also, except for two brief periods last century, my ancestors did not engage in any organized crime activities, plus in both sides of my liniage, they came to America for religious freedom! My grandfather would not allow German to be spoken in his home. My great-great-great grandfather did not plow his fields wearing a kilt. They fit in. E: Cops are petty potentates with guns, do nothing to serve or protect us, and are hired to rob us as often as they can. |
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| Nag Ehgoeg | Jul 24 2010, 09:24 AM Post #57 |
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The Devil's Advocate
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Sometimes the law is unethical. It is not the beat cops job to choose when to enforce the law and when not to - thank god. It's merely his job to enforce the law. Universally, without bias. We have trial by our peers to protect us from unethical law, not the subjective judgment of a man in uniform. The sun provides a necessary service in providing massive amounts of gravity, light and heat. Think the private sector can do better by responding to that need with a free market solution? Just because something is necessary, doesn't mean that society has the means to supply it via egalitarianism. Hitler was an evil tyrant, he was stopped by other tyrants forcing people to don a uniform and go die for arbitrary lines on a map. Without conscription and without government, he wouldn't have been stopped. The new modern army of the French resistance was laughable, and yet it was the closest thing to a free market response you'll ever see. Volunteers to stop Hitler also proved woefully inadequate. Sometimes it takes tyranny to prevent greater tyranny. Which is why we put brutes in uniforms and try to regulate their behavior. |
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| East Anarx | Jul 24 2010, 09:35 AM Post #58 |
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Anarchitect
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Actually, cops have the right to use discretion. If the law says to round up the jews and ship them to concentration camps and then gas them to death, then the cop better do his job, right? Are you suggesting that without government, the sun wouldn't shine? I don't know where you're going with that talk about the private sector doing better than the sun. I'm seriously at a loss. Without conscription and without government, Hitler wouldn't even have been able to start. He'd have been an obscure painter. Putting brutes in uniforms and then trying to regulate their behavior results in brutes in uniforms regulating your behavior. |
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| Union | Jul 24 2010, 10:53 AM Post #59 |
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Pyrenees Republic
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People do not have a right to move wherever they want. It is the right of a society to reject interlopers it does not want - such as Mexican aliens in Arizona, for example. If you do move somewhere, they have the right to place conditions on that movement - in particular, you will find most countries, unlike the US, require you speak the native language, and integrate yourself into their culture. This is fine, and should be encouraged to discourage cultural dilution. Culture will naturally evolve through movement, interaction, and trade. However, what is unnecessary is what we see in Europe or in the United States with Muslims and Latinos, respectively. They do not integrate, and form cultural communities within the greater society. These communities are at odds with one another, and this leads to violence. Whenever one culture cannot decide for itself its own laws, and is instead held to the standards of another, there will be violence. While I have no issue with immigrants keeping parts of their own culture alive when they immigrate, they need to largely assimilate or be turned back at the border. |
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| Menhad | Jul 24 2010, 11:53 AM Post #60 |
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ET2(IDW)
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This is a pretty damn good debate you guys got going here. Which I'll let it run it course before I open my big mouth but I do have this to say to E. Rent-a-cops, body guards, security guards and yes cops, exist for a reason. There are real, bad, people out there, who do real, bad, things. And most people can't defend them selves, they rely on the training/strengths of others, so they can continue with their lives free from fear of the wolves. So you mean to tell me that those who can't afford to hire some private force, who do not have the time, nor the training/equipment to defend them selves deserve to stolen from, raped, murdered, enslaved, or all sorts of other crimes committed against them? If that is what you believe, then you sir, are a soulless monster. Even I, as a Machiavellian, despise those type of beliefs. (I do agree that being unarmed is one of the greatest sins, and that cops have become largely inefficient, but I don't believe we should do away with police altogether. I also think people hate cops because they are the enforcers of the law, I know I don't like being told I'm doing something wrong.) |
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| Comrade Queen | Jul 24 2010, 01:02 PM Post #61 |
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Comrade Bitchqueen
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Thank you for bringing back the sanity to this conversation. It was getting hard to follow with the culture tangent. |
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| Union | Jul 24 2010, 01:35 PM Post #62 |
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Pyrenees Republic
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Nowhere did I advocate such a thing, but even if I had, it is the right of a group to choose whether or not they want you to join them. They have the right to reject any individual for any reason - including those mentioned. You do not have a right to immigrate, and never have. You only have a right to emigrate. |
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| Union | Jul 24 2010, 02:03 PM Post #63 |
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Pyrenees Republic
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I did not say a complete shut out. Even in ancient times, traders visited many places, and immigration was not unknown. I simply want state barriers to emerge where geographic barriers were once sufficient. |
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| NRE | Jul 24 2010, 04:51 PM Post #64 |
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Map Tsar and Southern Gentleman
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I highly doubt Hitler would have had time to paint, given that painting like most arts is a luxury. An who would be able to enjoy such luxuries when you'd have your hands full beating the next guy over the head with your club in an effort to protect what resources you've gathered to sustain your life. Resources (and yourself) that you would be protecting against every murder, rapist, warmonger, pedophile, serial killer, etc etc. etc. But then again, what do I know.... :dry: ;) |
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| Quaon | Jul 24 2010, 05:02 PM Post #65 |
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A Prince Amoung Men-Shoot First and Ask Questions Later
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Lack of central government works out great - just ask the Somalis. Anarchy as you define it - peaceful relations between an individualist stateless society - would only work if everybody in said society a hippie anarchist. If you have even a small group of people unwilling to accept that state of affairs, then either a government will arise or you'll have anarchy in the pejorative sense. Edited by Quaon, Jul 24 2010, 05:04 PM.
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| Nag Ehgoeg | Jul 25 2010, 08:42 AM Post #66 |
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The Devil's Advocate
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E's stock response is that we're not talking about hippie anarchists, but anarchy where every man has his gun and his right to protect his liberty. That when faced with such a threat all the free people would work together to quash the threat. Come on Q. You should know that by now and address your arguments accordingly. Like by saying how an organised group of oppressors would firesweep through all such unorganised resistance in an area before people knew what was going on. |
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| Quaon | Jul 25 2010, 12:11 PM Post #67 |
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A Prince Amoung Men-Shoot First and Ask Questions Later
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When I say hippie anarchist I mean peace-loving anarchists, whether they be armed or not. Anarchy is the only society that would not work if not every member of it was an ideological anarchist. |
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| Nag Ehgoeg | Jul 25 2010, 12:13 PM Post #68 |
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The Devil's Advocate
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Define: work. |
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| Quaon | Jul 25 2010, 01:14 PM Post #69 |
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A Prince Amoung Men-Shoot First and Ask Questions Later
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If we define E's anarchism as a society without coercion, the only way that could work is if every member of that society wanted to live in an anarchist society. Otherwise that society will cease to exist. |
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| New Harumf | Jul 25 2010, 03:31 PM Post #70 |
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Bloodthirsty Unicorn
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OK, sounds good to me! |
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| Union | Jul 25 2010, 04:49 PM Post #71 |
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Pyrenees Republic
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1/6.6 billion humans convinced. |
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| Tristan da Cunha | Jul 25 2010, 11:14 PM Post #72 |
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Science and Industry
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Here you've farcically conflated preference for simple living with self-sacrifice. Self-sacrifice is the wellspring of duty yet few understand the place of self-sacrifice and its consequences for society. It is easy to reject material goods and live a simple life. It is hard to live for others and toil for others. At our current standard of technology to expect the average person to do sufficient work ex gratia to, as a "duty," sustain technologically sophisticated standards of living for other people is impossible. It's a quixotic waste of resources to attempt to attain this impossibility. Socialists believe the European economic model is to be emulated because Europeans are somehow more communitarian and dutiful to their fellow men than Americans and others. How false. If you believe Europeans are paragons of social duty then I have some oceanfront property in Reno to sell you. The European models, just like the American model, are entirely based *not* on self-sacrifice but on deficit spending and forestalling consequences to the hazy future. The European models make no call for duty and self-sacrifice, but instead call for the sacrificing of future generations and a prayerful wish that everything will be alright. The present generations are burdened with nothing as unpleasant as "duty", "community," or "sacrifice." As long as the national credit card keeps going through, such things as "duty" can be spoken of with vapid earnestness. In the end the sole passion of men is to forestall, avoid, and hate consequences, and to contrive to cause the consequences of their own mistakes to fall upon others.
The Ethiopian was certainly not a very "good" person as his inability to fulfill the communist regime's agricultural quotas resulted in famine. However, the point I was trying to make is that widespread material comfort and lack of hardship makes it harder, not easier, for a society to be virtuous. If famine and utter deprivation create a desperate and unthinking society, then comfort and utter complacency create a timid and self-entitled society. Your expectation that increasing abundance is compatible with widespread duty and widespread self-sacrifice is a false one. With our scientific comforts we are well past a point of decadence of men.
Most certainly not. Men help their families willingly with implacable zeal, their country with some enthusiasm, and their countrymen grudgingly. It is simply against man's nature to extend his altruism to the vast, impersonal scales required of the modern welfare state. To attempt to contravene this nature is to invite devastating consequences: social and economic unsustainability culminating in ever more violence whether internal or external. Your faith in the virtues of voluntary poverty is as strong as your faith in the "virtues" of involuntary charity.
Easier said than done with your proposed policies in place. The consequence of socialist redistributionism is economic instability. The consequences of economic instability is mass violence. http://s3.zetaboards.com/nationstates/topic/7313495/1/
Your preoccupation with "pan-nationalism" has the same benign eccentricity as stamp collecting. Your professed ideology of the equality of cultures cannot be taken seriously. The relative superiority and inferiority of cultures is self-evident. The superior culture is not a 'one-world government' but a "light of the world and city set upon a hill". Edited by Tristan da Cunha, Jul 25 2010, 11:16 PM.
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| East Anarx | Jul 27 2010, 03:20 AM Post #73 |
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Anarchitect
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Speaking of the impossibility of anarchy, I already live in an anarchy. It's not utopia, (of course,) there's still a lot of gang violence, (some people continue paying the gangs calling themselves governments,) but more than 9 tenths of the people I've interacted with in the last three months are free-minded and peaceful people. And speaking of cops, I had two separate incidents tonight involving individuals calling themselves "police officers" and one was slightly positive while one was relatively neutral. A while back, my friend, Freeheart, was carjacked and accosted by some cops for not asking anyone permission to drive his own car. They kidnapped him, and had his car towed to an impound lot without Freeheart's consent. The next day, Freeheart went to the impound lot and drove his car away without asking permission or paying the car thieves. This afternoon, Freeheart, Elvis, and I went to a pizza restaurant for some calzones, and while eating them in the aforementioned car, were approached by some cops, who again proceeded to kidnap Freeheart, (this time under the pretense that when he took his car back he had somehow stolen services he never consented to in the first place.) Elvis and I declined to identify ourselves when questioned but I asked if they wouldn't mind not stealing his car and instead got the permission of the pizza restaurant's owners to let the car stay parked there until we could find a "properly licensed" driver. Before I had the chance to do such a thing or even write up my own "proper license" and simply drive it to Freeheart's house myself, Freeheart came walking up to the car like nothing happened. He told me he "dropped some libertarianism, open source, and polyamory," he agreed to go to court, and they let him go. Then, later that evening, Freeheart, Elvis, and I were again in the car when it was pulled over by cops, (this time claiming that Freeheart was driving 20 mph faster than allowed and missing a tail light.) Freeheart responded with polite conversation, did some ritualistic dance the cops called a "field sobriety test," and then proceeded to talk with the cops about the Free State Project and libertarian philosophy, all while politely but repeatedly insisting that they simply let him go on his way. Elvis and I again refused to identify ourselves or answer any of the cops' questions. One of them noticed a nearly empty rum bottle in the back seat, referenced some arcane "are-ess-ay" about "open containers" and demanded that he put it in the trunk, since they "wanted to go home" and didn't want to search his rather cluttered car or deal with the excessive paperwork required to properly kidnap three non-consenting individuals. After all three of us put on our seatbelts, they let us drive away with neither ticket, nor warning, nor further pursuit. Before leaving, we actually ended up giving the cops more paperwork than they gave us. Each cop received a copy of the "World's Smallest Political Quiz." Btw, here's an "ess-ay" that I'm officially giving an "are": RSA 4:20 |
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| Nag Ehgoeg | Jul 27 2010, 04:40 AM Post #74 |
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The Devil's Advocate
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Translation: My friend is a dangerous driver. He has no qualification that show he is capable of handling a killing machine. Those who use the roads paid for and maintained by the communal effort of the tax payer have not consented to his dangerous driving, instead they communally insist that all people who use their roads (and endanger the lives of every other road user with their two tonne weapons) submit to checks and balances to minimise that danger. My friend refused to submit to the regulations imposed by the owners of the road. Rather than try to mediate the dispute he had and negotiate a way to use the road system that he did not own, he chose to defy the legal system he was operating under and use the road without consent. (Nevermind the fact that the owners of the road system he was using have no objection to my friend using his vehicle on land that my friend owns, rather than the roads that they own.) Later that evening, my friend imbibed a poison that makes it twice as likely for him to kill someone with his two tonne weapon. In further defiance of the community that owns the road system he insists on using without consent from the owners, he took his weapon and wielded it threateningly in public, defying the safety regulations that govern safe use of his weapon (agreed upon by the owners of the road (speed and seat belts)). Edited by Nag Ehgoeg, Jul 28 2010, 05:53 AM.
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| Union | Jul 27 2010, 07:45 AM Post #75 |
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Pyrenees Republic
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The virtues of self-sacrifice are imposed socially. Technological or economic progress has little to do with it, outside of base material needs being met, to fulfill the lower level's of Maslow's hierarchy. I believe humans have a natural desire to attach meaning to their lives, and that a society will optimally function by harnessing that desire.
Source? I believe you might be confusing your own nature with those of others. Man's attitude towards society is fueled by the society in which he resides. Environment and upbringing plays a huge role in how people perceive the world. One can look at the highly collectivist philosophies of the Orient as proof that not all human societies have developed towards the individualist hedonism of the Christian West.
You have a nasty habit of reading posts the wrong way and spending a considerable amount of time dispelling claims I never make.
And which is most superior? Debating fundamental world views is tiresome, TC, and I will no longer do it. You will never convince me of the value of whatever it is you uphold, nor you of mine. My explanation of my world view was not an invitation to a debate. If you wish to debate specific issues, that is another thing entirely, but I find these broad ideological arguments to be totally pointless and tiresome. Edited by Union, Jul 27 2010, 07:47 AM.
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11:51 AM Jul 13