Posts by BenWilson
Last ←Newer Page 1 2 3 4 5 Older→ First
-
people do benefit from social interaction with like-minded folks.
I'd be pretty bitter if anyone ever suggested banning that...but the sausages guilt trip, what's that about? Where does the democracy part come in there?
It's cruel - you try explaining to a sweet old lady with a raffle book that winning a case of wine is not going to have a happy ending for anyone involved. You end up wishing they'd just sucker punch you and lift your wallet.
Pushing addictive drugs and gambling for democracy? Next they'll be getting children to do it.
-
A damn sight more healthy and dynamic than the feral rat-bastardry that seems to be part and parcel of state-funding of political parties and political campaigns.
Ah ic. You were being sarcastic.
I was confused because it was actually a tenable position, that all that glorious fund raising isn't particularly relevant to the democratic process. "How generous is your support base?" is an interesting question. But have I ever learned anything about Labour policy by buying a sausage?
One purpose I can see that it serves is to at least give you a relative idea of the demographic of the stauch party support. I did finally make the connection that a blue rinse was a political statement.
-
And bring on state-funding of political parties too -- the more generous the better. You wouldn't believe how many arse-numbingly tedious fundraisers, blue-rinse bats with raffle books and begging letters I've had to put up with over the years. :)
So you're not a fan of DPF's position that those events are a vitally important part of a healthy and dynamic democracy? I thought not getting salmonella from BBQ chicken for $8 a kebab to fund "Kiwi vs Iwi" hoardings was the moral equivalent of putting Key under house arrest! Personally I think fundraisers in our politics are a harmless irrelevance, an enjoyable (for some) once-three-yearly chance to grab your ankles for the party if that's your bag, preaching to the converted, pass the hat around for the Lord kind of thing.
-
But this kind of chest-beating, invective and fact-tweaking is, at least, undignified.
Yes, soon they'll actually join the blogosphere.
-
Meanwhile, somewhere where democracy really is under attack.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/2/story.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=10475755
Just so we remember what it actually looks like. I think these guys actually do have WMDs too.
-
Um, right then. Readers of this Auckland newspaper know not to turn to this organ for balanced, unbiased coverage on this particular topic
It may not be helpful but I think it's true. I like to read the Herald but don't make the mistake of ever thinking it's unbiased.
On this matter it is likely to be totally biased since the law will affect the Herald quite a lot. Fair enough to have bias, there's no law against that.
-
Kowhai, exactly. I guess what I'm saying is that it's really easy to get caught in the trap of thinking the way you did stuff was the best way. I emotionally feel that people miss out on a lot when they don't get what I got, but then I don't know any different either, do I?
I sought a general education mainly on the advice of my parents, and because their arguments seemed cogent. But they grew up in quite a different world, where unemployment was virtually unknown, where the kiwi dollar was worth heaps, where they paid you to go to university, and where nowhere near as many people did so it was a much more valuable thing.
Furthermore, educating yourself, if that is something you are capable of doing, was much harder, the resources were much worse, the options fewer.
Also there was the whole attitude of getting a steady job, which is still of great appeal to many, but people like me actually feel more security in just being highly skilled and bouncing from one job to the next. I've lived the life of corporate climbing, with it's endless promises of promotions and pay rises that always seem to take way longer than they said, and I found it a miserable way to be. I'd much rather just renegotiate the entire terms of my employment any time it's starting to suck.
Hence my self-skepticism. Is general education becoming an anachronism? Is it really something that, as in the past, only the truly wealthy could afford? Are kids smarter than we give them credit for?
-
But as a result of yesterday, I won't get the opportunity to hear all the evidence, and that's a failing of the system.
I'm not sure I agree with this one. Does the public really have the right to know about inadmissible evidence? Part of the reason it's inadmissible was because the collection of it did not satisfy evidence collection standards for the charges these people face. Quite a lot of the point of inadmissible processes is to protect the rights and reputations of the accused.
I also don't buy the 'TSA must be strengthened' outcome. Personally I think this shows how useless anti-Terror legislation really is, how much of a political football that doesn't stand up to serious processes. Terrorism is not well defined because it can't be, for reasons so many people have gone into for so long - if you are serious about it, it casts far too wide a net, right over the security intelligence services provided in most nations. And that actually makes their job of catching terrorists a lot harder. You end up having to describe the actual groups, rather than describing the behaviour, and that makes for fucked laws. Then they just have to be in a new group and they're safe. Or they could be in an old group and do nothing at all and still get busted, or at least heavily persecuted.
We already have laws to deal with everything to do with terrorism. If people do something illegal, whether they fall under the very vague blanket of terrorism or not, then they're a criminal and the police nail them. If they were credibly planning to, they can also be busted, but on a lesser charge. The planning is very hard to prove, and fair enough - plans are nowhere near as bad as actions. The number of people I've spoken to in my life who said they want to kill someone, and told me exactly how they would do it is undefinedly larger than the number of them who have actually killed someone. None of them have, they just talked about it. Talking about it often makes it less likely, because a fucked plan like murder over a personal grievance is more easily seen as a fucked plan when another pair of ears hears it.
If you really want to bust terrorists doing terrorism, you need to catch them at it. Hard but true. It's hard because it's more dangerous for police, and the targets too. But the alternative is a grave danger to all of society, namely police who violate our rights for our political beliefs all the time. The safer route is exactly what the police have done in this case. Bust them for illegally having the means to commit whatever atrocity they might have done. Take the means away. Give sentences appropriate to that, which are far more minor than terrorist acts and terrorist planning, but are still not insubstantial.
Some of these guys are facing jail. I think that's a pretty stiff penalty for having illegal firearms, since this is an extremely widespread phenomenon. But it sounds like they had a lot of them. That and all the talk of using them is a good enough reason for charges. Let a jury decide how much clemency to give after seeing the facts.
-
3410, no worries. I take your point about life outside, particularly on this lovely day. I have the leisure to work from home and I comment between other diversions or work, whilst sitting at my laptop in the sun (or lounging in the hammock with a cold drink considering points people have made). I tend to forget that others don't have the same leisure. Not upset, just giving you a stir, in response to a stir.
I do talk at length and put words into people's mouths. That's usually when there was an absence of words causing a lack of clarity. I was 'making suggestions' to help me understand what you were saying. It can be annoying I'm sure, but it's how I think. I tell the story I think you're saying, and you can interrupt and dispute something, clarify etc. I'm not trying to give you the shits or even to win the argument, it really is how I get clarity, through clash. I'm well aware a lot of people hate that way of arguing and can take it personally, but such people should steer clear of arguing with me. And it's something I usually only do on blogs or in formal debates, just as I will only physically fight in a formal context, with rules, refs, and all the martial arts honor blah blah. Shake hands after tap out, great fight mate, that kind of thing.
Apologies done. Back to topic.
Regarding the "look it up when you need to" school of thought, I'm not advocating this to the detriment of all other ways of doing it. I'm not advocating it at all. I'm merely commenting that that is the way the world is going. IS going. Not should be. Maybe adults are not seeing this as clearly as kids, who listen bored to a teacher lecturing, look it up and see the teacher is wrong anyway. Or at least that the question is not so simple. Or that there are millions of other ways of looking at the problem. Or that new solutions have come to light, or new evidence. Or a way better way of explaining it than the teacher did.
That's why I don't envy teachers the job of trying to impart 'general knowledge'. They risk just looking antiquated. Even what general knowledge is is changing every day.
General knowledge has its place, sure. But I'm suggesting that it's place is declining. Back in Aristotle's time one man could almost know almost everything about science that was known. Nowadays I couldn't possibly know everything even about my very narrow field of work, one tiny branch of computer programming. But I'm expected to if I'm to be any use to employers. Where does that leave time for me to go getting generally educated?
This is especially poignant to me because the subject I most wanted to pursue at Uni was Philosophy (in which I majored). But I realized very quickly that it was a totally impractical choice, and minored in Computer Science, a subject I enjoyed, but really saw as vocational. This meant I spent 5 years studying before hitting the workforce. In the same time my best mate, and a man of very similar mindset and talent, had worked his way through on-the-job training had earned heaps of money, slept soundly at night without a million assignments and exams hanging over his head, learned waaaay more about computing than I did from all that training, didn't have a great big student loan, and is now a millionaire.
I don't particularly regret it because he was always a man who knew what he wanted, I wasn't. I also valued general education, and still do. But I'm not actually that convinced I got the better deal. I think the jury is out on that one. Did having a wide general education not just make me into someone who thinks they know a lot more than they really do?
He's of the mind of "if I wanted to know I'd look it up". Which he does all the time. And as a result, he knows a great deal about a lot of stuff. It's not 'General'. He couldn't give a flying fuck about Ancient Rome. But on modern issues which I desperately try to link to knowledge of the classics or other even quite recent history, his opinions are usually no more or less well informed than mine.
Even the 'tools of thought' are changing. Most days now when I'm looking for answers to questions, some forum or blog somewhere has everything I need. Not just the answer, but discussion about why it was the wrong question. This was not the case only 10 years ago. In only a few years Wikipedia has become the #1 result for all searchs on general questions. That from freely given anonymous contributions. And yet the academic system seems deeply hostile to it, because they catch it out on some minor point of fact in some highly specialized area. But I've learned a huge array of general things from pottering around on there, and most kids I know have too. This is not bad, this is bloody brilliant.
I guess what I'm saying is that as time passes the old adage "jack of all trades, master of none" seems to become more and more true. There is nothing at all wrong with becoming a master of a narrow domain. It's probably the best way to organize society, the most efficient at least. The cost is that people become less widely educated. It's a totally inevitable process. There are some things that are lamentable about it, sure, but any particular child is not responsible for that, and doesn't see why they should care.
-
Good day, sir.
Yes it is. A good day to cop out. You want to say:
"Look it up when you need to" is an utter cop out. If the education system gets hijacked by that utterly misguided "theory" we're in serious trouble.
in response to a quote from me. Then you want to avoid describing your alternative theory in any depth at all. Yeah, I'm doing all the heavy lifting. Sorry for bothering to engage with your throwaway dismissal, and spoiling your afternoon. If you want a debate, reengage, ask about what you don't understand. If you just want to chuck your 2 cents in, claim to be misinterpreted, and withdraw happily convinced that you're a good listener, fine.
Last ←Newer Page 1 … 998 999 1000 1001 1002 … 1066 Older→ First