“People simply empty out” • Hacker News Board

Re: “People simply empty out”

#331

Post by PavlovsCat » Fri, Aug 16, 2013, 4:06 PM UTC

Casseres wrote: post #215

PavlovsCat wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poverty_in_the_United_States I still don't see the rosy picture you're painting. edit: Poverty in the US is hovering at the same rate since the 60's from what I can tell, while absolute numbers obviously are rising. So.. what am I missing? Something like People aren't working in factories to put bread on the table, people are working in offices to pay for their next new car or big screen…

I recently spent 2 months in a shipyard. IMO, working in a shipyard is comparable to working in a factory. Yes, a lot of the workers seemed poor, but they were nowhere near living in the same conditions as the poor 50 or 100 years ago. If you keep the definition of poverty a percentage, then by definition you will always have poverty. If you decide if someone is in poverty based off of living conditions, than it's go…

Sure, but people 100 years ago all lived like kings compared to kings 100.000 years ago. Poverty is a relative thing, IMHO.

Yes, a lot of the workers seemed poor, but they were nowhere near living in the same conditions as the poor 50 or 100 years ago.

Were they working for "a big flat screen TV and a new car"?

Re: “People simply empty out”

#332

Post by mkrecny » Fri, Aug 16, 2013, 4:07 PM UTC

king_jester wrote: post #303

mkrecny wrote: post #276

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> So you do agree with physical abuse. According to you, if your partner says something that upsets you, its totally OK to hit them. That is domestic abuse 101. That's absurd. Where did I say "if your partner says something that upsets you, it's totally OK to hit them"? I stated that: a) Bukowski's fiance probably hurt Bukowski (by stating that she cheats on him) more than he did by kicking her. b) It didn't seem lik…

> a) Bukowski's fiance probably hurt Bukowski (by stating that she cheats on him) more than he did by kicking her. Why would that be relevant whatsoever to why someone kicks their partner? You said you don't agree with abuse as a preface and then immediately put physical abuse on the level with having your feelings hurt by something someone said. I don't know if you yourself has been in an abuse relationship or know…

> Why would that be relevant whatsoever to why someone kicks their partner? You said you don't agree with abuse as a preface and then immediately put physical abuse on the level with having your feelings hurt by something someone said.

1. I stated that I don't agree with abuse (physical or emotional).

2. I stated that in this case I thought the emotional abuse Bukowski's fiance inflicted on Bukowski was worse than the physical abuse he inflicted on her. That's my opinion. I think the way that she casually taunted him with her infidelity is _serious_ abuse. The kick is also terribly abusive.

I don't know all the facts, only what I saw in the video. I don't know if Bukowski went on to be a serial abuser or not, but that's not relevant to what happened in the video, which is the subject of this discussion.

You say: "I don't know if you yourself has been in an abuse relationship or know anyone that has been" - the answer is yes. I don't know if you've ever been cheated on by someone you're in love with.

Re: “People simply empty out”

#333

Post by mkrecny » Fri, Aug 16, 2013, 4:13 PM UTC

overgryphon wrote: post #317

madaxe wrote: post #308

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You don't think that screwing around and then rubbing it in your partner's face is abuse?

No, it's not. A partner's monogamy is a gift, not an entitlement.

Whether or not monogamy is a gift or an entitlement depends entirely on your culture / value system. I think that abusing someone's trust is, well, abusive.

Re: “People simply empty out”

#334

Post by reeses » Fri, Aug 16, 2013, 4:18 PM UTC

homosaur wrote: post #265

reeses wrote: post #202

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I like this because Bukowski's first purchases when he "made it" was a BMW and a house in a nice neighborhood. I'd write more but, as you say, we only get one chance at this and we're living in the best time ever.

BMW makes a nice car and there's nothing specifically wrong with buying a nice house, I just mention it as American iconography. Not sure about the cul de sac though.

And it wasn't what we would consider a "nice house" in the present day. It's not on a cul de sac and it's no McMansion, just a house that a guy used to living in boardinghouses, bedsits, and apartments for fifty years would be proud of.

Water view, but it's of the harbor, which is mainly shipping. Kind of like the difference of a bay view from Oakland, CA and the SF Peninsula, Tacoma/West Seattle and Magnolia, or Newark and Manhattan.

Re: “People simply empty out”

#335

Post by sliverstorm » Fri, Aug 16, 2013, 4:32 PM UTC

[deleted] wrote: post #117

sliverstorm wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This meant that you worked only as much was actually needed - i.e. subsistence - and no more. You do know that in agrarian societies this meant 12 hours a day 7 days a week with no holidays ever? And that children worked in the fields instead of going to school? People don't subsistence farm because they don't want anything more than the bare minimum for survival. They subsistence farm because the bare minimum for su…

[deleted]

Even if hunter-gatherer was the peak of humanity, there's way too many of us now. It's not an option for the population at large.

Re: “People simply empty out”

#336

Post by ctdonath » Fri, Aug 16, 2013, 4:32 PM UTC

kphild wrote: post #254

ctdonath wrote: post #169

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Average world per capita income, world GDP divided by population, is US$12,000/yr (PPP accounted for). That counts as the basic poverty line in the USA. The tiny global elite you impugne does not hoard anything relevant. They are just a hose thru which a lot of high velocity money flows, most of their income flowing right back out to others. Without them, the structure for working for that $12,000 average income woul…

And there is zero effort put into figuring out a better system, since those in position of wealth and power don't have an incentive to change what feeds them. With less than 5% people employed in agriculture [1], it must be possible to allocate resources in a way that does not require most people to waste their lives in jobs. The universal basic income, for instance, would achieve that without abolishing capitalism.…

Just 5% of people are employed in agriculture precisely because "those in position of wealth and power" DID allocate resources in a way that does not require most people to waste their lives toiling in fields. Without such high-profit motivation to invest in advanced research & infrastructure projects, we'd still be stuck with most people working in agriculture the hard way.

Glorify employment? The socioeconomic world is as good as it is because most people are employed, doing something which contributes to maintenance and advancement of society & technology. By glorifying unemployment, you're proposing removing the efforts which maintain our socioeconomic position & direction, soon leaving us with insufficient effort to even maintain a status quo.

"Well, in our country," said Alice, still panting a little, "you'd generally get to somewhere else — if you run very fast for a long time, as we've been doing." "A slow sort of country!" said the Queen. "Now, here, you see, it takes all the running you can do, to keep in the same place. If you want to get somewhere else, you must run at least twice as fast as that!" - Alice In Wonderland

The resources of which you speak are, on the whole, perishable consumables. Remember: any society is 3 food-sparse days from violent breakdown. We have to work hard to keep things as they are, and twice as hard to get to where we want to go. Cutting workforce in half means the remaining workers must work twice as hard just to keep everyone as they are, and four times harder if any real progress is desired. Universal basic income means those not earning it are supported by those who do - reducing the incentive to work at all. You say "*it must be possible to allocate resources..." - it isn't, short of incentivising tremendous work times high risk with expectations of huge payoff.

Re: “People simply empty out”

#337

Post by ctdonath » Fri, Aug 16, 2013, 4:36 PM UTC

scotty79 wrote: post #160

thatswrong0 wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The only reason the vast majority of us have to work to eat is because the vast majority of the proceeds from our labor go to benefit a tiny global elite. Explain how this works logically. Do you honestly believe that if you simply took most of the money from rich people, that you would be able to sustainably feed everyone else? Have you considered all, if any, of the potential consequences of this action? > For qu…

> Define justice. At least a setup where right to live is actual right to live and does not degrade to right to not get killed.

Positive rights vs. negative rights. I reject the notion of "positive rights" on the grounds that forcing other people to do things for you at gunpoint (actual or implied) is morally wrong. I support your right to not get killed; I do not support your "right" to threaten the life of another to compel him to improve your situation.

Re: “People simply empty out”

#338

Post by hudibras » Fri, Aug 16, 2013, 4:36 PM UTC

nilkn wrote: post #286

mattmanser wrote: post #267

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The vast majority of people will get married and have kids and actually want to enjoy life a little bit while working 9-5. They want to stay near their close family & friends, because they love them and want to see them and want their kids to grow up around them. Which means spending X per month on a house. They want to have a car that doesn't embarrass them when they drive into work or round their friends, because o…

> They want to have a car that doesn't embarrass them when they drive into work or round their friends, because owning a BMW has been a secret dream and it's a totally reasonable price, and a smooth ride and great acceleration. This is really pushing it. Anybody buying a BMW on $100k in Silicon Valley while paying SV-level rents is a pretty big over-consumer. If you have a family on top of that, well... you won't be…

> A "six figure salary" today is nothing like what it was when that term was coined.

Exhibit A is whenever a story about public employees makes the front page of HN (for example, the Detroit bankruptcy or the BART strike) and people start freaking out about train operators making $100K: "They don't even have college degrees, for godsakes!"

Re: “People simply empty out”

#339

Post by grey-area » Fri, Aug 16, 2013, 4:40 PM UTC

mrow84 wrote: post #298

grey-area wrote: post #284

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're tilting at windmills. I didn't claim our current system is perfect or uncorrupted (the phrase least worst system clearly points out that our current systems are flawed). I don't think social improvement (however you define that) inevitably leads to some kind of totalitarianism, but I do think people claiming to have all the answers to creating a fairer society have turned out to be tyrannical more often than n…

Sigh. Sorry to be rude, but I'm not sure if you properly read my post - it really wasn't a "diatribe[s] about a shadowy conspiracy of a 1% elite spanning centuries". I wasn't referring to you when I indicated that some conclude that the system is "as good as uncorrupted and can't be improved", nor was I suggesting that you subscribe to "the idea that any kind of social improvement inevitably leads to some kind of tot…

Sigh. Sorry to be rude, but I'm not sure if you properly read my post - it really wasn't a "diatribe[s] about a shadowy conspiracy of a 1% elite spanning centuries".

That referred to the post which started this thread.

In both cases I was speaking about the opinions I encounter in this debate more generally.

Ok, I'm not sure there's much point in debating general opinion; it makes it very confusing if you attempt to debate interlocutors of your own invention.

I'm still wary of the notion that we should pretend that no one has an interest in concentrating power and wealth, and maintain the status quo. My reading of history, and the present, is that people do have such interests

Everyone has this interest, whether they have power and wealth presently or not, and whether they admit it or not, and I don't see it as culpable, merely something to be managed. It can even be healthy in small doses, in encouraging competition rather than resignation. I'm not sure many would claim that all progress comes via capitalism, but recent globalisation has resulted in a shift in wealth to countries which are developing due to trade, and I do find the question of how much regulated capitalism has contributed to global levelling an interesting one.

Re: “People simply empty out”

#340

Post by adestefan » Fri, Aug 16, 2013, 4:46 PM UTC

cgag wrote: post #136

ritchiea wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree that wage slavery exists but let's be serious, slavery in many societies, including the US was a brutal existence that included beatings & intentional separations of families, often even if you as a slave were compliant in the system. If you weren't compliant you were subject to torture and/or a violent death. The cruelty of slavery stretches far beyond the lack of freedom you're describing here.

Call it whatever you want, you're still not free.

The difference is that you have a choice.