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East Germany balloon escape

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Re: East Germany balloon escape

#261

Post by 372927352929 »

istjohn wrote: post #253
hopelite wrote: post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So turn back the clock to when Hildegard von Bingen was only one of many extremely powerful and influential abbesses that were polymaths and prolific artists and writers and educators of women in Europe? I’ve never understood this mentality that people who read and watched handmaids tale, caused some done kind of weird obsession built on a literal fiction story, a made up story… especially since the reality is not on…

It's laughable to paint Islam as the enemy of Western liberty when it is masked agents of a Christian nationalist regime who are terrorizing the streets of my city and cities across the US.

[flagged]

Re: East Germany balloon escape

#262

Post by immibis »

wolvoleo wrote: post #140
rottencupcakes wrote: post #35

Odd how nobody ever builds a balloon to fly towards the communist utopias.

If I were in the US I would certainly leave to a more socialist country. I could not live there. Even before Trump. However there is a spectrum between it. I don't think either extreme is great, neither American unrestricted capitalism nor full-on communism. A balance of both is needed. I was a lot happier in the 80s when Holland was a lot more socialist. Less things to worry about, a safety net, cheap housing and sc…

What would you call the current surveillance hellscape and inhumane processes in the USA? Is that full-on communism?

Re: East Germany balloon escape

#264

Post by layer8 »

SV_BubbleTime wrote: post #84

> Propane gas tanks became registered products Ha. Someone does a thing and the state moves in to regulate. Same as it ever was, apparently. Item registration… not used to prevent crime, just to make it easier to document after it happens.

The registration serves as a deterrent, and therefore does reduce crime. It wouldn’t have been practical to outright prohibit propane gas.

Re: East Germany balloon escape

#265

Post by vlowrian »

qcnguy wrote: post #251
vlowrian wrote: post #250

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> and they regularly imprison or fine people for anti-left political opinions Do you have any sources to substantiate this claim? In particular, including under which law a prison sentence or fine was imposed for the expression of a constitutionally protected political opinion.

Nice try. The German constitution is a poor document and doesn't protect political opinion, so your "constitutionally protected" political opinion caveat just makes it useless. You'd just defend every example with "our constitution allows that" rather than recognizing that it just means the constitution itself is wrong. Example: the American author CJ Hopkins has been repeatedly prosecuted in Berlin despite being acq…

Any source showing people being imprisoned or fined merely for expressing an anti-left opinion then? Which specific law were they convicted under?

The claim that Germany has "no constitutional protection against double jeopardy" is false. Art. 103(3) of the constitution embodies ne bis in idem. The German criminal procedure allows legal remedies (appeals), including Revision (appeal on points of law), which can be brought by both parties before a judgment becomes final. That’s what happened in this case.

In the CJ Hopkins case, the issue was not "criticizing COVID authoritarianism" as such, but the use of a banned symbol under 86a StGB. One can freely say "the government acted authoritarian during COVID"; that kind of political criticism is protected speech under Art. 5 GG.

> and incorrectly use that as a moral justification.

I’m not interested in moral justifications. Morality is a matter of opinion, and you’re entitled to yours just as I am to mine. The same applies to your view of the German constitution.

However, backing up claims about concrete cases with sources helps me (and others) understand which cases you’re referring to and whether they actually support your argument in a way that lets me learn something new (preferably) or whether we'll simply end up acknowledging that we have different opinions on the matter ;)

Re: East Germany balloon escape

#266

Post by layer8 »

immibis wrote: post #262
wolvoleo wrote: post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If I were in the US I would certainly leave to a more socialist country. I could not live there. Even before Trump. However there is a spectrum between it. I don't think either extreme is great, neither American unrestricted capitalism nor full-on communism. A balance of both is needed. I was a lot happier in the 80s when Holland was a lot more socialist. Less things to worry about, a safety net, cheap housing and sc…

What would you call the current surveillance hellscape and inhumane processes in the USA? Is that full-on communism?

Totalitarianism exists on both sides of the spectrum.

Re: East Germany balloon escape

#268

Post by trelane »

tirant wrote: post #180
elbci wrote: post #155

- What capitalists did in 6 months that communists didn't manage in 50 years? - Make communism look good. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Communist_nostalgia

Communism and socialism have always looked good when compared to the principles of other economic and political doctrines: - No poor people; everyone supported by the State; Everyone works for the common good; shared resources no matter how lucky or unlucky you are… From an intentional and moral perspective, nothing can beat it. However it fails and will always fail because of a couple of important reasons: - it requ…

It necessarily increases the concentration of power in the hands of the few. Some of you may recall a statement about power corrupting, etc.

Just on the face of it: extending the idea of company towns to an entire _nation_ seems bad to me on paper.

Re: East Germany balloon escape

#270

Post by fc417fc802 »

honzabe wrote: post #257
fc417fc802 wrote: post #236

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think there's a misunderstanding here. I'm not arguing in favor of a state run economy or a dictatorship or whatever else it is you seem to have concluded. Flawed though our system may be I don't want to throw the baby out with the bathwater. But all the same it's important to be able to recognize where we could do better. Optimizing for investor return is frequently not synonymous with optimizing for societal well…

No, I understood well. In my country, there is a barrage of Russian propaganda trying to relativize our shitty experience with the communist regime. They keep flooding the zone with claims about democracy being flawed, weak, bureaucratic, meaningless, and decadent. And it is working. People appreciate democracy a lot less than ten or twenty years ago. Sure, there is a time for the self-criticism of the flaws of the W…

> Which is why it bugs me so much when people talk about the flaws of both in one breath as if they were even remotely comparable.

I agree. But it was not my intent to portray them as even remotely similar, hence the misunderstanding.

Reading about things like the balloon escape and what surrounded it gives a very real sense of just how bad things were. So when you see just how much better we have it, the sheer amount of opportunity available to our society in a general sense, it's more than a bit depressing to think that this is how we (collectively) chose to use it so far.

A rough analogy might be, we figure out advanced bioengineering and then the next thing you know we as a society have collectively gone to great lengths to apply it to create the Torment Nexus from the classic sci-fi novel Don't Create The Torment Nexus. Like yeah I think the advanced bioengineering is a fantastic accomplishment. I don't think we should get rid of it. Things were definitely worse before we got that figured out. I don't miss amputations and lobotomies. But is it really necessary to so badly misappropriate the opportunity that it affords us?

Given how different your perspective is from my own I can appreciate that my original short and rather flippant comment failed to convey that particular message.

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