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Cards Against Humanity Redistributes Your Wealth

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Re: Cards Against Humanity Redistributes Your Wealth

#121

Post by FLGMwt »

lobotryas wrote: post #97
FLGMwt wrote: post #31

Oh hey, on top of the prevalent skepticism and detractions in the current discussion, I'll just throw out that, on its own, this is objectively a Good Thing. I won't dismiss the fact that this is good PR for CAH, but it is still morally-motivated positive impact for some fixed number of people. A company took some profit they had and exceptionally distributed to some of their less fortunate customers. Don't immediate…

>objectively a Good Thing Could you please defend this assertion? They themselves admit that their redistribution method is flawed (see the FAQ). I see this as an empty publicity stunt and something that doesn't help in the least.

Happy to!

First, I chose the word "objectively" in the sense that win/wins are still possible in consumeristic markets. I think most businesses would have taken a flexible $100k USD and spent it on marketing or expansion or something. The fact that this was distributed freely to people who self-identified as having use of it is good.

Second, flawed/unfair/biased/imperfect does not mean that something can't have net gains. Just because a company recognizes and discloses their faults, that shouldn't dismiss them from credibility. I'd rather a service that promises 99.5% availability than no service at all (or worse, a service that doesn't disclose their reliability).

Third, I think that the public, publicized, monetary actions of a trendy business have an additional non-material benefit. On top of any fiscal commentary about this bit, CAH is quite popular, and they have enough financial leeway to make a statement. This statements is "we are a business. we have knowledge that some of our customers have a greater need than others. we are making a decision to help those people with greater need".

Their statement is no more prescriptive than that. But damn if it doesn't make me question every other wildly profitable business, including the corp I work for.

Re: Cards Against Humanity Redistributes Your Wealth

#122

Post by chefandy »

Helloworldboy wrote: post #27
chefandy wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Personally, I got bored with making sour grapes comments on the internet in like 1995. To each their own.

Yeah, all those dreams I've had of creating a boring card games shattered. You've really cut me to the core.

What?

Re: Cards Against Humanity Redistributes Your Wealth

#123

Post by harryh »

alexasmyths wrote: post #119
harryh wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The fact is that most Americans pay virtually no federal income tax, This is not really true. Especially when you also look at payroll taxes which are, for all intents and purposes, income taxes. When I...made the median income level for the state I was living in at the time, I still paid no tax (outside of SALT) and got a return larger than what I paid in. This is highly unlikely to be true. I'm sure you remember it…

Only about 1/2 of Americans at any given time work (very roughly - think kids, elderly etc.) so most Americans don't pay tax is technically kind of correct, but not very meaningful at all in any discussion.

Lots of people that aren't working do pay taxes though. Social Security benefits, for example, are taxable in a lot of cases.

Re: Cards Against Humanity Redistributes Your Wealth

#124

Post by ridgeguy »

throwawaycloud wrote: post #76
fjsolwmv wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are you sure they are cancer symptoms? Seems you be dead by now if you and them untreated for so long.

Nope, I have no idea what the blood is from. I can't afford to see a doctor. :) TMI below, so stop reading. Before I switched diets a month ago, I had blood about 80% of the time. It's ... Mixed in, and dark, as opposed to bright red and on the surface. Meaning whatever it is, it's deep inside my intestinal tract. Since a month ago I've seen it only once. I'm holding out hope it's just a stomach ulcer or some weird t…

Not an expert, and my apologies if you already know the following.

On costs: have you investigated going to an emergency room to be seen for blood in stool? Under Federal law, you have the right to screening, emergency care, and transfer to appropriate followup facilities regardless of ability to pay. It's possible you could at least get a diagnosis at an ER, and perhaps a full colonoscopy as part of that.

On needles: I don't have fear of needles, so I have no 'been there, done that' recommendations. However, there are effective oral anxiolytics that would probably reduce your anxiety enough to get past needle insertion. These might be combined with oral sedatives as well.

On the actual colonoscopy: I've had three. They've all been completely routine and painless. The first time, my doc asked me if I wanted to stay awake and follow the colono-tour on a video monitor, which I did. It was fascinating. For the others, I decided I'd seen it before and chose to not be a tourist, so I was sedated (Versed, I think).

My brother had intestinal cancer. He had a short bowel resection over 40 years ago and he's been fine since. No colostomy bag, no hassles, just 4 more decades of good life. Good outcomes do happen.

I hope you can get care very soon. Best of luck.

Re: Cards Against Humanity Redistributes Your Wealth

#125

Post by FLGMwt »

bluthru wrote: post #102

Much better than digging a hole in the ground or buying up property along the border.

I'll agree on the hole-in-the-ground schtick which I guess I attribute to a social experiment.

As far as the border property, I wish more people of consequential power/capital would follow their lead and buy up border property. The wall is preposterous and any form of resistance is credible in my eyes.

Re: Cards Against Humanity Redistributes Your Wealth

#126

Post by FLGMwt »

n0her0 wrote: post #30

They took the money and put it where it seemed like it would have the biggest impact. The people who paid $15 should all be very happy to have been a part of this. For many, especially those with little income and high economic insecurity, holidays are very tough and actually result in working few days having less money at a time of greater need. To those seeking to criticize, it was not meant to be a perfect example…

> it was not meant as a perfect example of anything

+1 this

I feel like we tend to demonize incremental progress in favor of easy criticism.

Let's maybe ask: "Is this a Good Thing? Is it better than nothing? Is it better than than yesterday's suggestion?"

If you answer no to any of those, shut the fuck up with your criticism and start working on the next iteration.

Re: Cards Against Humanity Redistributes Your Wealth

#128

Post by jnbiche »

bobcostas55 wrote: post #54

Literally every single poor person pictured is obese. That baby is almost certainly going to be overweight in a few years. I'm amazed this isn't a bigger issue politically. Nutrition is a huge driver of health inequality. In 50 years the obesity rate has quadrupled. A return to the eating habits of the 1960s is perhaps the greatest possible welfare achievement right now (in the US), with impact far larger than univer…

To fix poverty among the poor, you'll have to do a whole lot more than just convince them to eat healthy:

1) Healthy food where I live is much more expensive than unhealthy food. I get that in SF and NYC, it's possible to buy such food at Asian grocers for a reasonable cost, but not everyone is fortunate enough to have an Asian grocer on their corner. So they'll need more money.

2) On a related note, many poor neighborhoods don't even have a grocery store within walking distance, and many poor Americans own no car.

3) Unless somehow the food is pre-cooked (unlikely), they'll need the time to prepare it. Many poor people work 2 jobs, and I know of some single mothers working 2 FT minimum-wage jobs. These are investment banker hours. They don't have time to cook.

4) Many poor people also don't have working stoves/ranges, just microwaves or hot plates. It's much harder to cook healthy food in microwaves, although it can be done.

5) The also need to learn how to cook new healthy foods, which isn't always easy.

6) Finally, and this is a big one, but it's very stressful to live life as a poor American. Many people both rich and poor stress eat, so that is another factor here.

Anyway, not sure what you're suggesting, but if it's just that someone needs to tell those poor people to eat better, it's not always so easy. But I do agree with you it would be great if it were possible to work on some of the challenges above. 3)

Re: Cards Against Humanity Redistributes Your Wealth

#129

Post by harryh »

jnbiche wrote: post #128
bobcostas55 wrote: post #54

Literally every single poor person pictured is obese. That baby is almost certainly going to be overweight in a few years. I'm amazed this isn't a bigger issue politically. Nutrition is a huge driver of health inequality. In 50 years the obesity rate has quadrupled. A return to the eating habits of the 1960s is perhaps the greatest possible welfare achievement right now (in the US), with impact far larger than univer…

To fix poverty among the poor, you'll have to do a whole lot more than just convince them to eat healthy: 1) Healthy food where I live is much more expensive than unhealthy food. I get that in SF and NYC, it's possible to buy such food at Asian grocers for a reasonable cost, but not everyone is fortunate enough to have an Asian grocer on their corner. So they'll need more money. 2) On a related note, many poor neighb…

Re #4:

96.6% of US households below the poverty level have a working stove.

https://www.cnsnews.com/news/article/terence-p-jeffrey/censu...

Re: Cards Against Humanity Redistributes Your Wealth

#130

Post by paulv »

jquery wrote: post #44
FLGMwt wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

$15 is a roughly a single meal. Are we suggesting that $15 spent towards entertainment is exceptional or excessive for anyone below middle-class, ? If that's true, than surely we're worse off than we're all aware of.

If $1000 is life changing money for you, you have no business spending $15 on a lottery ticket, unless you are terrible at managing money, which might have something more to do with their situation more than living in the richest nation on Earth.

Poor people are allowed to have fun, too.

They "Deserve To Taste Something Other Than Shame", by Ijeoma Oluo: https://theestablishment.co/poor-people-deserve-to-taste-som...

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