Hygro
soundcloud.com/hygro/
So Narz is one of the greatest violators of the environment of our time?
Things are getting better!
- Thread starter Birdjaguar
- Start date
Maybe? I don't know him personally. For all I know he could talk a good game here but in reality be one of those villains from Captain Planet.
Hygro
soundcloud.com/hygro/
You're tripping.
yung.carl.jung
Hey Bird! I'm Morose & Lugubrious
"If you are partaking in something and benefiting from it [...] you lose your right to critisize it". That is exactly what you said. So, following your logic, if you are a famous YouTuber you lose your right to complain about YouTube's policies, same goes for literally any platform where you get paid (or reveice other kinds of benefits).
Ironically enough, this would also mean that if you are a politician in a democracy (partaking in system, benefitting from system, literally) you are not allowed to critisize politics, or democracy. However, someone who did not take part in the elections, according to your quote, keeps his right to complain about said election's results. What a beautiful, twisted world you live in!
Ironically enough, this would also mean that if you are a politician in a democracy (partaking in system, benefitting from system, literally) you are not allowed to critisize politics, or democracy. However, someone who did not take part in the elections, according to your quote, keeps his right to complain about said election's results. What a beautiful, twisted world you live in!
Sure, but you are conveniently leaving out the context in which it was said. You are either doing it out of ignorance or you are doing it deliberately. Given your past interactions with me, I'm going to go with the latter since you have shown that you are more interested in arguing against me as a person rather than arguing against any points I raise.
No they are not. Your statement was general, imprecise and flawed. They are merely calling you out on it. A corrected post keeping your statement in context would be appropriate.
Lexicus
Deity
It's not just about the right to complain. It's about the obligation to move the ball forward, in more than a slacktivist way. The original discussion wasn't about the oppressed fighting the oppression. It is more about the disadvantaged taking advantage of those lower down in order to claw up. We have an obligation to limit the damage that we do downward, with the understanding that there are limits individuals are willing to take. Especially when they are not getting support from peers. I see it often, people are willing to do good things if they notice that people richer than them aren't disproportionately benefiting. When I tell a friend I am worried about global warming, they warned me back that I am just making Al Gore rich. When I tell people that we should donate to alzheimer's research, they complain that big Pharma will get all the profits.
There is no doubt that my cell phone hurt people in the Congo. Asking the moral people to forgo the cell phone basically does nothing. What is more needed is discussion on how to make these life changing tools more useful. Because even if I give up my cell phone, I will not be able to convince anyone else too. Hell, I can barely convince people to donate to charities that I believe cause benefit in an enlightened self-interest way.
There is no doubt that my cell phone hurt people in the Congo. Asking the moral people to forgo the cell phone basically does nothing. What is more needed is discussion on how to make these life changing tools more useful. Because even if I give up my cell phone, I will not be able to convince anyone else too. Hell, I can barely convince people to donate to charities that I believe cause benefit in an enlightened self-interest way.
This is a very popular misconception, an incredible number of charities have very good distribution ratios.. But even then, all you're noticing is waste and so feel ripped off in our charity efforts. People would rather the researcher get $0 rather than $0.20.
Yes, they are. They are taking the statement by itself without considering what was said prior. That is leaving out key context that doesn't make the quoted statement seem so abstract and vague.
I disagree. It's the whole "vote with your wallet" thing. The only language corporations understand is profit and loss. If they are essentially using slave labor to make their product and it still sells well, they are going to interpret that as the consumer giving implicit approval of their business practices. Get a whole bunch of people to stop buying and say "we won't buy until you stop using slave labor" and the hit to the bottom line will force change if it's a big enough hit. We've seen this concept work to a small extent with the microtransaction controversy in the video games industry.
There's also the moral question of "What do you value more?" By buying an iPhone you know is made by slave labor, you are saying that while you may not approve of the use of slave labor, the suffering of those slaves isn't as important to you as making sure your luxury goods are available at an affordable price.
Exactly. The people getting all flustered over me calling out their moral hypocrisy are people who want their cake and eat it too. They want to feel morally superior by criticizing the "evils of this wicked society" without actually having to do anything about it or experience any discomfort to change it. I'm not a religious man by any stretch of the imagination, but I think the whole "let him without sin cast the first stone" thing is applicable to this discussion.
And for clarification: all I really wanted was an admission of that hypocrisy. We are all hypocrites in some way, and there's nothing really wrong with it. What is wrong, in my opinion, is refusing to acknowledge one's own personal hypocrisies. Trust me, once you give up the charade of pretending to have moral consistency (because none of us do), life becomes a lot easier.
I understand the idea of voting with your wallet. But I don't want people to overestimate the effect of a small minority of people foregoing something, when the rest of society doesn't care. The tiny boycott basically does nothing to reverse the overall trend. Look at climate change, for example. We have small minorities of people who choose to drive less, and choose to spend their money improving efficiency even at above cost. And it doesn't change a single trend line. Because nobody else cares. Or look at the idea of vegetarians foregoing meat consumption due to ethical reasons. It has not changed a single trend line. This is true, even though we know that the ethical Optimum is actually much more in their Court than in the mainstream Behavior
I made the wrong choice by using the example of the cell phone, because people too easily think of it as a luxury good. I think of the modern smartphone as one of the most empowering tools available in our society, especially per dollar spent. Yes, it's partially a luxury item. And I have much less tolerance for hypocrisy when it comes to the consumption of unethical luxury goods. The smartphone crosses an interesting divide, you are vastly more powerless to make a difference without a cell phone than if you have one.
I don't really value the social effect of boycotts, but I really do value the personal moral benefit of boycotts. If you think it's wrong, don't do it. Fairly obvious to me. But when it comes to the utility of tools, there's a harder calculus to make. You have to decide if you can affect more change with the tool than by forgoing it. These calculus questions are always hard, I literally have to decide whether to donate to Doctors Without Borders or to Human Rights Watch. A life now, or lives later? There's no easy answer.
But I'm pretty sure that going out for steak with the same money is the wrong answer.
I made the wrong choice by using the example of the cell phone, because people too easily think of it as a luxury good. I think of the modern smartphone as one of the most empowering tools available in our society, especially per dollar spent. Yes, it's partially a luxury item. And I have much less tolerance for hypocrisy when it comes to the consumption of unethical luxury goods. The smartphone crosses an interesting divide, you are vastly more powerless to make a difference without a cell phone than if you have one.
I don't really value the social effect of boycotts, but I really do value the personal moral benefit of boycotts. If you think it's wrong, don't do it. Fairly obvious to me. But when it comes to the utility of tools, there's a harder calculus to make. You have to decide if you can affect more change with the tool than by forgoing it. These calculus questions are always hard, I literally have to decide whether to donate to Doctors Without Borders or to Human Rights Watch. A life now, or lives later? There's no easy answer.
But I'm pretty sure that going out for steak with the same money is the wrong answer.
yung.carl.jung
Hey Bird! I'm Morose & Lugubrious
Not at all, you're just being ridiculous. And no one took your quote out of context. You said that Narz was benefitting from the system (BitCoin) and therefore lost his right to critisize it. That is exactly your line of reasoning and no one misrepresented it. Everyone just chimed in to show you how much of a brainfart that comment was. The democracy analogy was perfect, hence why you chose to ignore it. We all benefit from the system (voting rights, influencing politics with our vote) yet at the same time we have to be its most rigorous critics in order for the system to work.
Which is why I won't begrudge one for claiming they are concerned for the environment even when they still drive a car and use a smartphone.
Most of us do, and one's personal consumption choices don't really change much in the big picture.
It's when that guy goes all "keep your worthless shiny gadgets, I just want the clean air my great-grandfather had!", when it becomes a bit much...
Lexicus
Deity
heh, good point.
I mean, I think you're projecting here mostly but ok
Tu quoque accomplishes nothing btw
Oh, consumption choices matter. It's literally the greatest expression of power we have. It's literally the distinguishing of tools vs luxury and understanding that (at some basic level) some of our choices need to be profit maximizing merely to survive.
Narz
keeping it real
I never said shiny gadgets were worthless, I just said they don't quality of life make. Quality of life depends very strongly on quality of relationships which are showing a downward trend with more and more people answering surveys saying there are 0 people they can count on.
Technology is great for keeping people alive longer. My friendly alcoholic neighbor would certainly be dead in an earlier era (he drinks like 20 beers a day and has a blood transfusion once a month). But using this metric as a way to state everything is better is just pollyanna. Also Pinker is well known to anthologists for disregarding facts and expert opinion in order to sell points/books. He overestimates the amount of violence our ancestors visited on each other and misunderstands the cause of the decline of violence. It has nothing to do with us becoming better people and has more to do with better survalence and rewards for pacifism. In the wild west you could murder people and get away with it. In today's times with dna tests and smart phones it ain't easy (tho you still occasionally catch a guy with his daughter and incest babies locked in the badement
). If a crisis caused gas stations and supermarkets to be barren for a week or more you better believe violence would skyrocket. Principles would go out the window in a jiffy when people actually had to remember the reality of what human survival entails.I'm only holding like .4btc so I do wish yall would get off my bits!
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