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Richard Stallman response to Boston Police efforts

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Re: Richard Stallman response to Boston Police efforts

#181

Post by bane »

tiredofcareer wrote: post #130

I've noticed this tack a lot recently (three arguments like this in 24 hours), and I'm concerned by it. There seems to be an inability on the part of some people, apparently Richard Stallman included, to realize that active intent to harm human beings is not in the same ballpark as passive intent to harm human beings. They're not even playing the same sport. A fertilizer plant has a chance of harming someone in an ac…

Thank you.

RMS, like any intelligent sentient being is capable of thinking complex thoughts and making good points.

But I rail against his thoughtlessness. His constant...sociopathy...it's why he's ineffective in getting his views across, why he treats people like automatons (well documented) and why he's plain and simply put, "not a good person".

I never put it in these terms before, I just always felt "skeeved out" by his writings. Logically, he makes lots of sense, but personally he's as connectable as the sidewalk in front of my house. Sociopathy is the perfect term.

Anybody who can sit in Boston the last week, have a cop murdered in cold blood near his office by two men on an active terror event that just murdered and maimed dozens of people a few days before, and upon the conclusion of that event shit out this garbage before the close of the same day is a person so far removed from empathy, from society and from humanity as to be a sociopath.

I've never gone through such a wild swing of elation, joy and exhaustion, then disappointment, sadness and anger in such a short period of time as today. This isn't the kind of frustrating conspiracy nuttery that's so exasperating written by people so lost in their private world as to have lost touch with reality, this is written by a person fully cognizant of their writing and what he's saying, the time in which he's saying it and the tone in which he's saying it.

it should give you pause when dealing with them, that their conscience leads to hypothetical discussions like this.

I'm going to make active strides to remove these people from my life

Amen, and my first step is to leave this thread after this an never return. My next step is to flag any posts here about RMS. Next is to boycott any events where RMS is to be the speaker and actively lobby events who are thinking about hosting him to rethink that decision based on this writing as well as his piss poor treatment of other human beings in the past.

This is inexcusable, this is madness.

Re: Richard Stallman response to Boston Police efforts

#182

Post by marknutter »

potatolicious wrote: post #115
marknutter wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> There is no expectation of danger while spectating at the Boston Marathon. There also is no expectation of getting struck by lightning while spectating at the Boston Marathon, yet that is much more likely to happen than getting hit by a terrorist's bomb.

Yes, which is why we don't hold large public events in the middle of a thunderstorm. And when a thunderstorm rolls into major public events, we do evacuate them. Unless you're trying to say that the odds of being struct by lightning while spectating the Boston Marathon, on a clear sunny day, is high.

The odds are higher that a storm will unexpectedly roll in and strike you with lightning than you getting blown up by a terrorist, yes.

Re: Richard Stallman response to Boston Police efforts

#183

Post by wyager »

krschultz wrote: post #158
homosaur wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

90% is some BS fake skewed poll run by some organization with an anti gun agenda. It's not possibly accurate. You can make any poll say anything if you word the question skewed enough.

I own guns. My parents own guns. My brother owns guns.my cousin owns 15+ guns and is a police officer. My girlfriends father owns guns. Some of us belong to the NRA. My brother and cousin going shooting a couple times a month. In some cases, we own guns that would be banned under a lot of gun control laws. My cousins response to Newton was to buy an AR15. Yet we all support background checks. I don't find the 90% num…

>Yet we all support background checks.

Sure do love that anecdotal evidence.

Re: Richard Stallman response to Boston Police efforts

#184

Post by zanny »

mpyne wrote: post #60
deweerdt wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> but that doesn't mean this isn't a very emotional and trying time for many, I think you're right, it is a very emotional time for many. I think he's trying to put that in a more rational perspective so that we, collectively, don't forget about the big picture.

The big picture being that Bostoners should just ignore the marathon bombers so they can convene an emergency city council meeting to discuss the threat chemical plants? I thought I was pretty jaded, but it turns out I have a long way to go still. After the events of this week I was worried about the hundreds of maimed victims, "Uncle Ruslan", the families of those 4 persons killed and the possible backdrop on geopol…

Bostoners should focus on issues they can influence. Once the bombing happened, besides civilian assistance on the scene, donations, and good will, the public should not have any more concern about the incident unless instructed by the police or given ample evidence to suspect someone as guilty.

It doesn't require the concern of all those who have no further interaction with the event. They gave money, they comforted relatives and friends, they let the police go find those responsible, and they move on. You don't linger on a unique incident with nigh impossible odds of something similar happening again that close to any of them with any similarity to this event.

They can care about pollution, chemical threats (that they can influence via money or time), and the overbearing reach of federal authority.

At this point, unless you are giving time or money to the aftermath or contributing to its investment, you are wasting your time and effort having any further thoughts on the matter. It is beyond your hands and influence then. Spend your time on things that matter.

The people of Boston should not wake up tomorrow any less secure in their wellbeing than the day before. Like Stallman said, the likelihood of dying to some asshole terrorist is so slim you can accurately discount the probability and just tell everyone "you won't die to a terrorist". The chances of you meeting one person that is incorrect for is absurdly small.

What Stallman speaks of is what you can take action about. The dinner table discussions should not be "those two brothers in Boston" that were a discontinuity of expectations but of real issues that you can change.

Re: Richard Stallman response to Boston Police efforts

#185

Post by vy8vWJlco »

reader5000 wrote: post #129
lotyrin wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But it's worth sacrificing our freedoms in exchange for (only theoretically improved) safety (from causes of death that we are already extremely safe from - statistically speaking).

You and your neighbors packing assault weapons does not make you "free". It makes you "the Taliban".

Tell that to the minute-men (Minutemen), coincidentally originating in Massachusetts.

Re: Richard Stallman response to Boston Police efforts

#187

Post by kiba »

tiredofcareer wrote: post #172
kiba wrote: post #161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While intent does matter, the consequence is still the same. People die. Therefore, we should devote effort to reducing incidents of death, no matter what is the cause. People who kill others intentionally are going to be treated differently than those who ignore basic safety precaution, as a matter of justice. But we must still pay attention to the magnitude of tragedy when it comes to allocating money to reduce pro…

Agree with your first paragraph. I definitely think we should devote effort to reducing incidence of death, no matter the cause. Couldn't agree less with the remainder, because you are comparing car accidents and terrorism, which I specifically said is impossible to do; there is no comparison remotely possible between automotive accidents and terrorism.

How they cannot be compared? The metric here is the rate of death and the probability of incidents. The goal is to reduce suffering in the most impactful way as possible.

Re: Richard Stallman response to Boston Police efforts

#188

Post by wyager »

reader5000 wrote: post #124
temphn wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Surprising to resist one kind of massive state power and then support another. If the US government really didn't want mentally ill people to get guns then the homeless would be off the streets and in prisons or asylums. Instead there was an attempt to criminalize transactions by law abiding people, purely as an expression of media animus against gun owners and with zero concern for false positive rates. As for popul…

I'd bet 90% of gun owners would support virtually anything after being subjected to four months of corporate gun industry propaganda. You know, bullshit like how owning a gun "empowers" you.

Do you think the gun lobby helped to write the second amendment?

I'd also like to point out that the gun industry doesn't really run ads in the same way most industries do. I've never seen a single gun ad outside of a gun magazine.

Re: Richard Stallman response to Boston Police efforts

#189

Post by marknutter »

tkahn6 wrote: post #69
marknutter wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> There is no expectation of danger while spectating at the Boston Marathon. There also is no expectation of getting struck by lightning while spectating at the Boston Marathon, yet that is much more likely to happen than getting hit by a terrorist's bomb.

That is a true statement, but what is your point?

The OP said "It's not every day that people have their legs blown off while enjoying a public social event."

It's an obvious appeal to emotion that doesn't refute the point that terrorist attacks are so infrequent that the average person ought to worry more about, say, slipping and falling in their bath tubs than getting killed by a terrorist.

Re: Richard Stallman response to Boston Police efforts

#190

Post by platz »

zanny wrote: post #164
platz wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not very convinced by by your slippery slope argument with regard to the US, at least in domestic affairs. (foreign is another matter) It's probably not a good idea to mix the emotional with the analytical, but when it happens, the emotional wins; we're human beings. I hate to get moral/philosophical, but utilitarian motives, in the eyes of societal norms, usually is the loosing position. The canonical example of…

Your example is situational, and also doesn't come close to his argument. The super-parent argument is that the loss of life in the immediate is shallow compared to the inevitable loss of life from the loss of liberty and rise of tyrrany in the name of security. If people are on the train, condemning many to die for one is never the right decision. If the train is unmanned (assumed if there is no conductor to manage…

Yes my example was poor; I don't think I got it right, perhaps I forgot the correct form. I guess I just am not sure how this inevitable tyranny manifests in deaths, but I can appreciate the point.
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