BruceVC

Guys I think we need to be honest that this thread is not about how the refugees should be welcomed and how we can all integrate The reason I mention this is because I told a friend who had some questions about the refugees that he should come here for some positive news and he just phoned me to say he is now even more anxious and depressed

Yes I agree, how hard can it be to just find a link? I just want to read it

Yes I can produce links for any debate I have...no issue there

Its Oby, I have to ask for proof

Why thousands? In case of Ukraine EU/US start crying about regime change after 100 corpses on Maidan. Are you sure about that? 100 .....can you produce any links to support this view ?

If the Turkish government decides to use the full might of its military to kill thousands of Turkish citizens who want political change then I will absolutely support the UNSC voting on direct intervention to prevent this

I made a similar point a week ago, I said I don't believe in this notion of good and evil to describe the actions of people as these terms can be very subjective

I must've been asleep when that happened. Link? Meshugger please dont encourage Volos paranoia...of course Obama is not racist and or wants to kill American citizens

Why? Do you know me as someone who jokes ....

I dont disagree with what you saying but what I find interesting is Russia and China also supported the Iranian sanctions....this is what made them so effective. The whole world literally was united on sanctions against Iran Yet Iran is fine with China and Russia but still resents the West

Well its important to remember that Russia is a very relevant member of the global community despite it economic woes, for example it sits on the UNSC and has certain relationships with countries like Iran that are better than a relationship any Western country has with Iran. So the important Iranian negotiations would not have been possible if Russia hadnt also been part of it Also as far as military spending is concerned I don't believe Putin has made any cutbacks so Russia definitely has one of the worlds most well resourced military powers which I'm sure would defeat most countries And his approval rating is very high, higher than most Western leaders ironically because for many Russians Putin is a real hero who is trying to restore Russian pride against the West which is trying to undermine Russia ( of course this is not true, it makes no sense for the West to undermine Russia ) So I would imagine for your average Russian who supports Putin they have convinced themselves that in order for Russia to be restored to former glory they need to accept these sanctions. And as I mentioned Putin is using foreign reserves to sustain the economy and the unemployment rate is only 6 % so all the negative data I mentioned would only really impact them in 2-3 years So its no surprise Iran would publicly align with Russia because the clergy in Iran and the hardliners really despise the West and this dislike is ideological which makes it difficult to change. So any country is better than any Western country for Iran

Volo there are 250 million white people in the USA ....we are just talking about one of them being killed. Stop trying to scare WOD and the other USA members. The Muslim extremist won't kill all the white people in the USA !!!

No but this is actually a good strategy from Microsoft to encourage users to move to Windows 10 but it does get annoying, I'm on Windows 7 for my gaming machine and I'm happy and refuse to upgrade now You can disable the constant updates ..see below for steps Tap on the Windows-key on the keyboard, type programs and features, and hit enter. This opens the list of software installed on the system. Switch to "view installed updates" on the left side of the window. If you are using Windows 7, locate the following updates: 3035583, 2952664, 3021917 If you are using Windows 8, locate the following updates: 3035583, 2976978 Right-click one update after the other and select uninstall from the context menu. Select Restart Later when the prompt appears and remove all updates first from the system. Once done, restart the computer to complete the process.

Okay so the Russian economy is in a much worse situation that you may realize, its really bad. I have been looking for links that will summarize how broken it really is in a way that explains it simply and I think I have found what I need So yes if you just Google something like "strongest GDP countries in the world " the results returned should position Russia as 10 or 11 in the world so your initial response would be " Bruce is talking nonsense ...Russia is fine " But in the example of Russia you cannot look at GDP as an accurate representation of the economic reality, you have to look at a different metric called GDP per Capita. This figure is calculated by taking total GDP and dividing by the number of citizens, this gives you spending power of the average Russian citizen. This metric places Russia at 63/196 countries https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_GDP_%28PPP%29_per_capita http://countryeconomy.com/gdp/russia But thats not there biggest problem, 65 % of the Russian economy was reliant on there export of oil and natural gas. Because Putin,and other oil producers like Nigeria and Venezuela, never imagined a day where the oil price would crash for as long as it has now Putin never diversified the Russian economy. So in other words he always thought selling oil would drive the Russian economy...this is on him Now what makes it even worse is there is a minimum price that any oil producing country needs to sell oil at...for Russia this price is between $90-120 per barrel and the current oil price is $30, so that means its costing Russia to extract oil even though they are selling it http://money.cnn.com/2014/11/24/news/economy/russia-losing-140-billion-oil-sanctions/index.html Now Russia as of 2014 had about $400 Billion dollars in foreign reserves but due to the state of the oil price, the general economy and lack of foreign investment they are spending $140 billion per year to keep there country functional ...and this money comes out of there foreign reserves which means at the current rate of overall economic decline Russia will be bankrupt in 2-3 years https://www.gfmag.com/global-data/country-data/russia-gdp-country-report So how do they fix this? They need the oil price to get back to $100 so they can actually starting making money...but this is unlikey to occur. If the West dropped sanctions they could try generate investment but most countries are reluctant to invest in Russia So I can't see a happy picture for Russia unless the oil price changes In summary Russia is facing major economic turmoil and things are not good at all

Yes Zora I want you to re-engage with me, I have made this point several times. But I dont need to make a post like earlier to Meshugger in order to try to provoke or interest you in debating with me Its makes no sense that you won't debate with me but end of the day as I keep saying I respect a persons right to ignore me or block me. I only want to engage with people who are sincere about having a debate But yes come back to debating with me

Not quite. They want equal opportunity while recognizing equal opportunity isn't going to be achievable just by giving everyone equal opportunity because societal inertia and subconscious biases still exist. Thats a good answer and I can proceed with my next point Would you agree that a SJ objective can be achieved through a system changing but it doens't mean the people who support the system need to agree to it. So for example lets say in Hungary women weren't allowed to go into bars single, due to protests your government passes legislation that allows women to be able to visit bars alone even though some people would still object to this But the outcome in this case is not about everyone agreeing as it was settled through legislation. Would you support this type of SJ result?

If, aside from dramatically underdeveloped reading comprehension skills, the gamer persecution complex that has been, over the decades, steadily fed by the complaints of right-wing moral guardians like Jack Thompson, and a negative bias against anything that has the whiff of social justice to it (causing it to be interpreted in the least charitable light possible), there is no reason for them to feel that way, I hardly see a need to condone it as wrong. Has the article been written in a way that pretty much made it impossible for civil disagreement and mutual respect to dominate the tone of the discussion? Surely. Was it, perhaps, needlessly inflammatory? I can see that. But was it morally wrong? That's an interesting idea, which, I feel, is fundamentally at odds with the dominant perspective of GG that the creation of more content, by itself, can never be morally wrong. I hear you, this is a much better way for me to try to make my point as opposed to that long post as we need to agree on certain stages of the whole GG development in order for me to progress to my final point And funny enough I already share your view on most parts of this topic but I want to share something new with you ...thats what this about for me. Just giving you a different perspective But before I continue do you want to have this debate and I don't mean to sound condescending but maybe you just don't feel like debating this again in which case I wouldn't want to wast either of our time? Go on, share your perspective. Yeah I agree with your rejection and annoyance around this automatic knee-jerk reaction and dismissive nature we see from some people whenever anything they perceive as SJ related is discussed or raised. So sometimes people are more concerned with just undermining the core SJ idea than actually debating if the SJ suggestion makes sense And I'll take it even further, in South Africa there are some white people who claim they are victims of racism because of efforts to address the past and the economic imbalances Apartheid created and trust me when I tell you they aren't really victims of racism So for example an unemployed black person, and understand this person has been unemployed his whole life, will phone in on a radio station and say something like " South Africa belongs to Africans....why can't we get out land back and why dont we have access to our mineral resources" . Because the reality is most of the land in SA is owned either by the government, private companies or white farmers and the mines are owned by large global corporations like Anglo American. So you can understand the frustration from your average unemployed black South African..yet some white people will phone and act very " offended " and say things like " that guy is racist ...how can he say white people don't belong in South Africa " Anyway I think they are over reacting and not understanding where the criticism is coming from But back to our debate, what is your definition of SJ? For me it is about an objective in society where all groups of people are treated equally and allowed equal opportunities to succeed and achieve economic success. You shouldn't marginalize one group at the expense of another but sometimes this may seem to be happening as we address historical injustice ...like affirmative action So whats your definition because this is relevant to GG and what caused it

The last time we debated the Greece austerity crisis I misrepresented my point with you because I didnt understand how you personally feel about what austerity means and how we can measure its success I now think I do have a better understanding around your views on things like the Global economy, Capitalism, the role of Wall Street etc. So lets forget what I said to you in the past as I want to present my argument is a different way but before we engage its important we both understand clearly what the other person actually thinks overall about the Greek austerity measures I will take a guess on what you think and please correct me at the end if necessary You see the Greece crisis as a country being bullied into having to pay back debt that based on the reality of its own economy it is impossible. In other words how can the EU troika give loans to Greece and also force it implement austerity when there are serious structural economic problems in Greece like high unemployment ... in order to pay just the expected initial part on the loans from the EU they need to take more loans so its like a vicious circle,. Greece is expected to pay back this staggering debt yet can't because there economy is under severe pressure You see this as a good example of the greed and indifference of certain countries and this is a display of what is wrong with Capitalism in certain places in the world? If, aside from dramatically underdeveloped reading comprehension skills, the gamer persecution complex that has been, over the decades, steadily fed by the complaints of right-wing moral guardians like Jack Thompson, and a negative bias against anything that has the whiff of social justice to it (causing it to be interpreted in the least charitable light possible), there is no reason for them to feel that way, I hardly see a need to condone it as wrong. Has the article been written in a way that pretty much made it impossible for civil disagreement and mutual respect to dominate the tone of the discussion? Surely. Was it, perhaps, needlessly inflammatory? I can see that. But was it morally wrong? That's an interesting idea, which, I feel, is fundamentally at odds with the dominant perspective of GG that the creation of more content, by itself, can never be morally wrong. I hear you, this is a much better way for me to try to make my point as opposed to that long post as we need to agree on certain stages of the whole GG development in order for me to progress to my final point And funny enough I already share your view on most parts of this topic but I want to share something new with you ...thats what this about for me. Just giving you a different perspective But before I continue do you want to have this debate and I don't mean to sound condescending but maybe you just don't feel like debating this again in which case I wouldn't want to wast either of our time?

Weren't you and KP meant to have a debate about this? If by debate you mean Bruce telling me I'm wrong without being able to make an argument on how austerity is beneficial, then I suppose we've had it. No we haven't had it yet as you well know. And I did excuse myself and apologize as I going out drinking And of course I will provide all the valid links to support my arguments, everything I say and believe on these forums I can support with data Of course you can still decide Greece is somehow the victim here and thats fine, I can't force you to agree with me

To be fair, looking at the current state of gaming, it often seems like the devs themselves know the least how to make their games Spoken like a true **** alum when I made that long post about GG and why I am now opposed to anti-GG I mentioned to you that many people who supported GG honestly felt that for months they as white males were being criticized and vilified for things they had control over Now you and I had no issues with the Alexander article but the truth is many other people really felt she was attacking them on a personal level. And she was, if you just take what Oerwinde posted above he summarizes my point In the greater scheme of SJ and true equality if people like us didn't feel we were being discriminated against is irrelevant but if large numbers of white, male gamers did feel this then we need to condone this as its wrong? Because SJ cannot be about only showing concern for bigotry against minorities or " non-white " people? I hope this makes sense?

Good to know ...good to know I consider myself a progressive white liberal in discussions in South Africa

Oh, I know the name, I was with my family at the pier just days before she was shot. However I'm much quicker to blame a terrible mental health care system than our porous border. This wasn't a criminal mastermind, he was a crazy person who didn't get the help he needed in either country. He always was deported, multiple times, so it would seem that the INS was actually doing their job in this case. That aside, my comment on diversity was actually about Bill Gates, capacity, and the refugee situation. Which has little to do with illegal immigration. Also, I think it is fair to point out that you live in a wide open space and I live in a community of field workers with questionable immigration status. I've helped our babysitter get citizenship, for goodness sake. They aren't all criminals, anymore than we all are criminals. I'm not suggesting they all are. Or even most. But it is undeniable that by allowing in people who are not criminals we are bringing in many who are. But I was taking issue with your notion that people who are opposed to simply allowing illegals to walk in were so positioned out of some fear of diversity. While I'm certain that is true for some lets not kid ourselves that there isn't some real concerns for the safety of the people already living here from the ones who had no problem breaking one law to come and have no problems breaking others while here. Of course what do I know. Where I live diversity means a fox squirrel and a gray squirrel living in the same tree. You funny Do you know the difference between a fox squirrel and gray squirrel ? Have you ever eaten squirrel, I was watching one episode of Bizarre Foods America and Andrew Zimmerman eats squirrel in West Virginia. I love that show, its legitimate and I always think what he eats always looks so yummy. I am a very experimental eater and basically eat everything and all parts of an animal but I won't eat insects. But check these slide out http://www.travelchannel.com/shows/bizarre-foods/photos/bizarre-foods-america-west-virginia-pictures

A very good question considering the billions of dollars involved It would vary from person to person but I imagine Bill Gates would be quite hands-on and at least be aware of the types of sectors they donate to. So yes he would be aware of donations to the energy sector which as I explained can be perfectly reasonable

You know, the Oligarchs who meet in a smoky back room who actually control everything and everyone. Read all about them here: http://www.realworldorder.net/ Do you realize there are people who really believe this

It's not just the prison system Could've solved world hunger with all that money. Seeing how many fingers he has in many pots Mr. Gates has probably done more damage than Trump. Okay now I see your point, you are highlighting the supposed contradictions when Bills Gates says he cares about climate change yet he donates millions to various energy companies Yes that is a debatable point and I can understand the question but in future please just tell me directly this is what you are getting at because I thought you were dismissing there donations in places like Africa and only focusing on what they gave to institutions like the prison system. And I enjoy debates with you but I would prefer we just debate what you are really asking and not what I think you mean..so it other words I sometimes misunderstand you So for me I have no issues with donations to energy companies from people because all energy companies also invest and have policies around renewable energy and cleaner energy ...so how do we know that Gates actually didn't donate to those companies for exactly the reason that he supports there renewable energy initiatives? I get your point but it doesn't mean Gates is a hypocrite or necessarily inconsistent in his views