http://www.stallman.org/archives/2006-nov-feb.html

Take a look there before you vote. Wow. It takes a special kind of insanity to be that naive and paranoid!

edit: Wait, what the hell happened to the polls? Don't you have to post, then edit to add the poll?

edit 2: Wait again, I found it. :/

I'm Liberal, but not nearly that much.

""Free trade" treaties are inimical to democracy because they transfer power from states to big business."
This quote gets a big :wtc: from me. Last checked, (big) businesses were run by the citizens and NOT the state. Power in the states = not democratic.

And last I checked, big businesses + globilization actually help people. But no, we need to keep American jobs!!!

You have to be crazy to make all those compilers for free!

He doesn't make compilers, he tricks open source geeks into making them for him.

globalization, yes. Big business, hell no.

So...ALL big businesses do not help people? The last 5 ambulances that I saw looked like they had components made from the Ford Motor Company, a big buisness.

I'm all for a free market and big business, but I think there need to be strict laws that force companies to play nice. Because we sure as hell cannot rely on the free market and human nature for that.

He gave a speech at our school last simester... I almost felt bad for him.

We were all there hoping he would talk about the "old days" when he worked on GCC and GDB, but instead he just kept on with his usial talking points such as DRM is evil, that the BSD license is evil, that Linus is evil, Linux is evil, Monolithic Kernels are evil, and that the only thing that is good in the world is the GNU license, and GNU HURD (if it ever works)....

As strange as this may sound, he really needs to loosen up...

Well at least he got one thing right.

Uh, being pro-american jobs doesn't mean you have to agree with the rest of the stuff that crazy **** is saying, Freelancer.

I agree, American jobs are important, but, come on. He's a friggin lunatic.

So, why do you people think he is so insane? I didn't find anything all that ridiculous on that page.

Ya, sorry. I agree with some of things he's saying. The only problem is... I'm a little too old to be an idealist anymore. **** happens so stop whining about things you can't fix. The only thing that matters in life is finding a girl, having lots of intercourse, and making sure you don't die poor. If you're impeded by politics in this quest... kill yourself on tv so you get your 15 minutes.

Aw man, I wanted an Internet test

I consider myself liberal, but not in the political sense because politics suck.

So I have to agree with Schming.

I voted yes, although sometimes I have to shake my head over some stupid things he says.
But mostly I agree with him.

The thing about the current state of big / global business and the "free" market that always suprised me when I looked at it, is how similiar it is to feuadalism:

1. You have a wealth / class status that is passed on within families via inheritence.

2. The majority of land / wealth / resources is owned by that small class (something like 95% of the wealth is possessed by 5% of the people, or something like that. Dont remember the exact statistics).

3. Everyone else works for that class in their factories, shops, or mills, whatever, supporting that class, while recieving their means of living from that same class. (was once food, now is things like automobiles, gasoline, power, and laptop computers, etc. Though we still get our food through big companies like safeway, or (pick your local grocery store, unless its a farmers market), or heck, burger kings, pizza hut, which ever).

The only things really different, are:

1. There is a greater ability to move between classes (though not much if you look at the statistics).

2. In feudal monarchies, the king dictated law *and* owned all the land, whereas in our current society, the wealthy class is now a seperate entity from the government / law making institution.

Or is it...? If you start looking at lobbies and how most politicians come from extremely wealthy families, like our good pal Bushie, it makes you wonder... maybe things aren't as different as we thought? We are still a majority enslaved to a seemingly concrete and inflexible social system, that primarily benifits the few wealthy and powerful.

*Shudder* Crazy to think about? Anyone see something I'm missing?

But, it's not all doom and gloom and hopeless! For years after the America revolution things were genuinely different (as with many revolutions), but now the wealth and power have naturally segregated back into a small minority (as it seems to do continously throughout the course of history). It is just a matter of figureing out how to mix things up again, and distribute the power back amongst the common (hu)man. Any ideas? Short of bloody revolution? Afterall, there might be hope of restoring our democratic system to the ideals of it's youth.

I might sound liberal, but I'm actually extremely conservative. I just don't see a clear distinction anymore between big government and big business. I think the difference is an illusion perpetuated to keep us believing that the democrats and republicans are fighting eachother on everything and cancelling eachother out. One is big government / socialization and the other is small government / big business, and those ideas are diametrically opposed. But they really aren't. What seems to be happening, is big business + big government are working together. As long as they remained directly opposed, the two parties push on each other, and cancel each other out. No harm done. But as the line between big government and big business blurs, more and more, the force of them pushing together will be less and less opposed, and more and more cooperative towards mutual goals. And so the government becomes more business, and the business becomes more government and they both get fat together! And the rest of us... well, you guessed it! We get sat on.

It must be stopped! Or, feel free to poke holes in my argument and tell me how I'm totally wrong! That would be much appreciated.

-- Kiramin

Yeah, well said Kiramin.

You only have a two percent chance of changing social classes within your entire lifetime. Which means that approximately 99% of the upper class simply inherited their wealth. Politically things really are no different today than they have ever been, we just have other ideological apparatus' aside from the church.

We also have more people working under slave labor conditions in the US than we ever did at the peak of slavery. Mostly illegal immigrants, and the pay they receive is either equal to or less than the food and shelter that slaves would have received.

I have got to see the methodology behind this one.

Thanks, Zojo!

I will now show that thanks by being stickler for statstical wording!
"You only have a two percent chance of changing social classes within your entire lifetime."

Nope. Shouldn't that be:
"Only 2 in 100 citizens of the United States change social classes in their lifetime."

Chance can dictate statistics, but statistics never dictate chance. There are many factors involved (luck possibly being one of them), but that is such an individual matter. So I would say "You can do anything you set your mind too. Break out of your social bonds and change your status! You could be one of those 2 in a hundred." That attitude right there will up your "chances" of changing status significantly.

It is really easy to look at statistics and "normalize" everyone by saying: "X in 100 to Y, therefore you have an X% chance to Y." Not the case. Who knows what factors go into determining each individual's opportunities for social/economic advancement. It's not the same conditions for everyone.

Sorry. It's a pet-peve of mine. You probably didn't mean it that way. You are using common statistical language. I just happen to have an issue with that in general because of it's false implications.

(Okay, shoot me now.)

For example, check this out:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BE8b02EdZvw

Well said, Kiramin.

Whoa. I remember seeing this a year or so ago. I can't believe he actually pulled it off.

That is AWESOME!

True, so the illusion rests on the fact that most people are arrogant enough to believe that they are somehow better than the other 98% of the population. It's a delusion.

I'm not liberal, I'm socialist.

Zojo, its not about "better."

I'm making no judgements about superiority. When I'm talking about individuals and different factors, I'm not talking bilogical intelligence or anything like that. I don't think that biology has hardly anything to do with intelligence anyway. In general, I'm not talking about anything that implies "worth" of a person one way or another. Worth of a person isn't something that is judged by physical factors!

Human worth is inherient to all human beings. I think that all people are created equal (in the spiritual sense), but that we are all in different environmental circumstance that may help or hinder our various goals in life. Someone who is born with a serious mental illness is not inferior to someone who isn't, but they will sure have a harder time accomplishing certain goals, and this would definitely apply to social class changes.

And my comment about attitude is also not about believing you are superior, it is along the vien of having a positive attitude, and believing that anything is possible. You can't say that doesn't help people achieve goals.

Nobody's perfect.

I don't actually believe any of that.I am just trying to illustrate that the system we have in place rests on the mythical idea that the hard working are rewarded.

Oh! Yeah, totally.

Whaaaaat? So you mean to say that in the last 142 years we've actually become MORE of a slave nation than back in 1865?

"Mythical idea that the hard working are rewarded"? You will be rewarded if you work hard, as long as you are smart enough to work hard for the right people.

What Kiramin failed to mention in his rant is that in the feudal system there isn't a middle class. Oh snap!

Now, this statistic of only 2% changing their class depends entirely on where you draw the line between the classes. The vast majority is middle class, and most social climbing happens within that class - going from lower middle class to upper middle class. Does this statistic take that into account? I doubt it. Does it even account for downward moves? I doubt that even more.

Yet the biggest difference between America and the feudal system is that you can change class at all. In the feudal system, it's not 2% that change class, it's 0%. You're either born upper class, or you're not upper class. Thank God we live in a country that gives you the opportunity to fight your way to the top.

The real moral of this thread is unrelated. It is a public poll : Go look at the list of people who say they are as liberal as Richard Stallman, and tell me if any of the names there are in any way surprising.

I think that quote was probably a bit misleading. It says "more people" not a higher percentage. Since there are so many more people now then there were during the slavery period, thats not very surprising.



Good point. And how you divide the classes totally makes a difference. I wasn't really considering it in terms of lower, middle, and upper class. This is how I was making the division: average citizen vs. someone in a position to execute direct financial/political influence as an individual.

In the middle ages I suppose it was more like
99.9% of the people were at level 0-10, and 0.1% (or less) of people were at the 90-100 range. And now there is more of a scattering from 0-70ish. With the highest numbers clustering at the lower end, and then spilling all the way up the spectrum towards the high end. That being the middle class.

The average citizen may have more luxuries than in the middle ages, but they still fall into the category of not being able to execute direct finanical/political influence as an individual. Only as a member of a larger group through elections and demonstrations, etc.

So, I was never trying to say we are in the exact same possition as the middle ages, since:

1. We do have more social and legal freedoms.
2. We do have the ability to move between classes (less distinct class boundries).
3. We do have more luxuries than the average citizen of the middle ages.
4. We do have the ability to peacefully demonstrate and lobby for social change.

All very good things!
My only point was in looking at the similarities that remain. One such being:

- We are still a majority in a social system in which we have a very limited ability, as individuals, to execute change. And a product of that system is a few wealthy and powerful have a exhorbinantly greater ability to influence political change, and partake of the economy's luxuries and resources. (You forced me to refine and clarify my point, thanks).

It doesn't seem to me like there are porportionally less economically and politically powerful individuals in today's society as there was nobility in the middle ages. Admitidy, we have more ability to execute change than our serf counterparts, and our "nobility" has less, but there is still a massive gap. I wasn't trying to deminish the awesomeness of the improvements we have seen, only to show how much further we have to go to reach the ideals of freedom and control of one's own destiny with a long term, sustainable government system.

Ideally (and I'm talking IDEALS!), we would have one *political* class. That doesn't mean everyone would have the same wealth (economic class), or the governement would control it through limiting our freedoms and rights of ownership (socialism). Just that being wealthy and successful shouldn't enable you to unduely influence the direction of government. Because human nature being what it is, greed will always push the powerful to influence the system in order to keep them in power and help them become more powerful, at the inevitable expense of others.

Why should the individual have the power to enact change? The problem isn't that people want this power and can't reach it, it's that anyone has it at all. Democracy is not about individuals, it's about communities.

But, direct democracy does not work with a population of 300 million. The answer isn't to ***** about rich people, it's to educate the lower classes so that they can make an informed vote on the issues that effect them.

There is also a very real limit on how much you can equalize things. If everyone had exactly the same, as in Socialism, the sad truth is that everyone would be poor. Imagine you have a guy who has 300 million dollars. He's a lot richer than most 'rich people'. Let's distribute his wealth evenly over all Americans. We all get one dollar. ONE. Whoop-dee-doo!

The upper class serves two important purposes in our society. First, they are the goal. Everyone wants to be rich, and many are willing to work very hard to get their. Their hard work is what keep's our country going. Second, they invest their money. The more money they invest, the more businesses expand. The more they expand, the more people they employ. The more money they pay their employees. The more money the lower classes have, the more they buy. The more the companies make. The more the rich people who run the companies make. The more they invest. Etc.

Something else you probably didn't know: A scientific poll found that American's that describe themselves as 'conservative' also gave the most money to charities. People describing themselves as 'liberal' gave the least. Americans also gave more than any other country. So if you want to talk about your ideals, get your buddies to put their wallets where their mouths are.

You also can't compare us to serfs. We are not the equivalent to serfs. Illegal immigrants and the inner city poor are serfs. The middle class is something else entirely which has no equivalent from that time period. Perhaps the merchant class during the renaissance - ah, but feudalism was already dead by then, wasn't it?

BTW, the very fact that you acknowledge that social mobility is possible makes you less liberal than Richard Stallman. A pity you can't change your vote.

It was divided into at least 5 different classes and it did take into account downward movement. I'll try to see if I can find the statistic online, an old teacher of mine cited it once in class.

I don't know I think its still surprising because thats all within the united states. I'm sure in conjunction with the ridiculous amount of imports coming from sweatshop labor in central america and south east asia the percentage is higher.

Has anyone read about Stallman's way of "living light". Some may think it crazy, but you have to admire a man who is that dedicated (or fanatical) to his principles.

[edit]Here's a blurb about it from Wikipedia, for the lazy:

Some day in the future, some kid will crack open a history book---or perhaps plug an electrode into his brain---and think it was the most comical thing for the people of the past to declare arbitrary, imaginary lines splitting the world up into 150 different territories. I'd love to just see the look on his face that day.

He'll wonder what the point of patriotism was. Patriotism is the assertion that the portion of humanity contained within your imaginary lines is better than the rest of humanity. Kind of douche-ish, huh?

Teehee I'm not agreeing with Kiramin on every point, but his/her style of reasoning [that is, reasoning itself] is absolutely delightful.

I enjoyed reading this discussion so far.

I think more of you should sit down and force yourself to read Jean-Jacques Rousseau's The Social Contract and JS Mill On Liberty and it would make the debate sooooo much more interesting and less ignorant.

Either that or the world will be populated with cockroaches and single cell orgainsims due to the pride that comes with patriotism.

One way or another, your point is well seen.