61–70 of 83 posts
>Not only do these tactics not accomplish anything in reality, they also distract people from making a real effort to change the world. You might say the same thing about a massive street protest. Those people are just standing in the street shouting, they're not physically acting to solve their complaints! And yet, from civil rights to overturning dictatorships, peaceful public protests have proven unsurpassed for e…
Wow. Glass houses much? A whole post of nothing but "You're all wasting your time and not accomplishing anything." In order to not be just 100% hypocritical he would need to offer some actual solutions.
You don't need to know how to cure cancer to know that poking me in the eye won't cure cancer. You don't always need the right answer to recognize a wrong answer.
He's not being helpful, he's just being a douche.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
To avoid becoming part of the problem myself, here's my suggestion: Find one Member of Congress who's been vocally supportive of these programs, and run them out of their job. Throw down a challenge -- "we're coming for Representative X" -- then form a PAC (or piggyback on the PAC of a supportive org, like EFF or the ACLU) dedicated specifically to turning that person out of office, raise money, and use it to nail th…
Someone like Dianne Feinstein, California Senator, who has emerged as vocal defender of the spying programs? http://articles.latimes.com/2014/jan/18/nation/la-na-adv-fei... http://www.feinstein.senate.gov/public/index.cfm/contact
EDIT: And yes, I did call.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
You don't need to know how to cure cancer to know that poking me in the eye won't cure cancer. You don't always need the right answer to recognize a wrong answer.
I didn't ask for the right answer. I said how about any kind of suggestion. He's not being helpful, he's just being a douche.
What? If the suggestion isn't a good one, it's worse than no suggestion at all, which at least won't mislead people into spending resources. Saying "I don't know the answer" is better than pretending you know the answer, if you don't.
OK, so what do you propose we do instead? crickets
To avoid becoming part of the problem myself, here's my suggestion: Find one Member of Congress who's been vocally supportive of these programs, and run them out of their job. Throw down a challenge -- "we're coming for Representative X" -- then form a PAC (or piggyback on the PAC of a supportive org, like EFF or the ACLU) dedicated specifically to turning that person out of office, raise money, and use it to nail th…
Source: a couple long-time political operatives teaching a weekend seminar I attended a couple years ago.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
You don't need to know how to cure cancer to know that poking me in the eye won't cure cancer. You don't always need the right answer to recognize a wrong answer.
I didn't ask for the right answer. I said how about any kind of suggestion. He's not being helpful, he's just being a douche.
Sometimes the best (only) suggestion a person can give is to suggest that what you are doing is not going to work.
>Not only do these tactics not accomplish anything in reality, they also distract people from making a real effort to change the world. You might say the same thing about a massive street protest. Those people are just standing in the street shouting, they're not physically acting to solve their complaints! And yet, from civil rights to overturning dictatorships, peaceful public protests have proven unsurpassed for e…
While I do see the parallel you are pointing out, I think "I care so much that I spent 5 seconds to type in my email address!" and "I care so much that I gave up a whole day of my life" might be a case of a quantitative differences large enough to be qualitative.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salt_March
If you dont want to do nothing, it's your right to do so.. but keep your cynical pessimism to yourself, by doing that, you will give a real contribution to the world.