BruceVC

Well for me I don't like to ignore anyone because if I blocked everyone who had a different or dissenting view to me I would have very few people to debate with and often the discussions are interesting

I never cease to be amazed by the justification that supporters of Putin go around the Ukraine crisis, your post highlights an aspect of it So now we have a situation in eastern Ukraine where several cities have there government building occupied by well organised and armed Russian speaking militias. This is a situation that no government in the world would accept These are legitimate Ukrainian government buildings outside of Crimea. It is obvious that Russia is fermenting and encouraging insurrection against the Ukrainian government with an end goal to force a federal system of government in parts of Ukraine that is favourable to Russia You are an intelligent person, are you really going to sit there and tell me that you think Russia is not directly involved in this social unrest. And I mean outside of Crimea in other eastern parts of Ukraine They're as involved in this unrest as the EU and US were in the Euromaidan. The west overthrew the legitimately elected government (Yanukovich won his elections fairly) because it said "no" and installed an illegitimate one. European heads of state were parading in the street, supporting insurrection while protesters were burning Kiev. Now that your side has achieved its goals (at the expense of quite a few dead Ukrainians) you want the situation to stabilize and go back to business as usual. Except the Russians can't let that happen and everyone knew they wouldn't. The Russians feel their vital interests are threatened by this. Its a fair concern, the two countries do share a border after all. Is what the Russians are doing okay? No. But its important to note that everything that is happening is a reaction to the US and EU destabilization of the region. You make some good points around the Wests involvement in the overthrow of Yanukovich and the result of that but was the West that directly involved? My understanding is that an EU aligned Ukrainian government replaced Yanukovich. But were there Western soldiers in Kiev and were there Western government's actively controlling the anti-Yanukovich movement ? So in other words Russia's current involvement in Ukraine is much more direct than anything the West did around the removal of Yanukovich. I understand why Russia is doing it but that doesn't make it more right or acceptable

I never cease to be amazed by the justification that supporters of Putin go around the Ukraine crisis, your post highlights an aspect of it So now we have a situation in eastern Ukraine where several cities have there government building occupied by well organised and armed Russian speaking militias. This is a situation that no government in the world would accept These are legitimate Ukrainian government buildings outside of Crimea. It is obvious that Russia is fermenting and encouraging insurrection against the Ukrainian government with an end goal to force a federal system of government in parts of Ukraine that is favourable to Russia You are an intelligent person, are you really going to sit there and tell me that you think Russia is not directly involved in this social unrest. And I mean outside of Crimea in other eastern parts of Ukraine

Because human beings do a better job of displaying that they don't let violent media make them violent, while they don't seem to do as well with not taking ideas and imagery and disassociating them. I also feel that violence is better socialized against in other ways. Because you don't understand the terms. Rape culture is NOT "all men are rapists." Rape culture is a term to describe a culture in which prevalent attitudes and practices normalize, excuse, tolerate, and even condone rape. This is from the very first line in the wikipedia article. The second sentence is this: "Examples of behaviors commonly associated with rape culture include victim blaming, sexual objectification, and trivializing rape." For instance, someone suggesting "rape victims should just not make a big deal out of it because it gives power to the rapist" is an example of victim blaming, as well as rape trivialization. IIRC, this is what you actually said to me. It's not up to you, or me, or anyone else to tell someone how they should or should not deal with an assault like that. So yes, I consider a statement like that to be one that contributes to rape culture. No, I do not consider you a rapist. Some extra reading from a place like here. One thing they point out is how rape culture is a culture that feels rape is inevitable. Think about some people getting upset because what a woman was wearing and where she was walking was focused on during a rape, and how she shouldn't be there and certainly not wearing that? How many people go "well yeah, of course she's taking a risk." Soon it becomes her fault that she was raped. As for other examples of rape culture: Look up Stubenville. Some high school boys raped a girl. Adults obstruct justice to protect the boys and the school's football program, and there's a healthy degree of focus on how this is tragic for the boys because they had promising football careers and how they may not even get into college now if a conviction is made. There's another case of Raeteah Parsons from Nova Scotia. Very similar to Stubenville in that boys raped a girl and took videos/photos, and the girl was the one ostracized for it by her peers (she tried NOT coming out with an accusation to start too). She was bullied out of school and harassed by other boys that wanted to have sex with her. The family tried moving, but the bullying eventually caught up with them again thanks to social media... and the girl was driven to suicide. Saratoga High School had a similar thing, which some consider worse than Stubenville, where again guys took advantage of a drunk woman, took dozens of pictures of her being abused, and would share it with the student body. There's an article here in Rolling Stone. Harvard's Crimson posted an editorial from a Havard Student (kudos to the Crimson doing this... I consider that a positive thing). Until 1983, in Canada it wasn't possible for a husband to rape his wife. That doesn't mean that all husbands raped their wife. It did mean that society's codified laws meant that it was not something seen as possible (which is absurd as far as I'm concerned. If a spouse isn't interested in having sex, forcing that spouse, man or woman, same sex or otherwise, it's absolutely rape). That's rape culture. (rectifying this by altering the laws is an example of eroding that culture, which is something that I support) But there's still issues: http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/national/how-canadas-sex-assault-laws-violate-rape-victims/article14705289/?page=all * Most judges now attend courses to become more sensitive, but still hand out sentences, Prof. Boyle of UBC says, that suggest victims invited trouble by how they acted or dressed while out on a date, or with those closest to them. * For example, in October, 2009, the Ontario Court of Appeal imposed a 10-year sentence on a man convicted of assaulting a woman who was working a night shift at a convenience store. The same month, it ruled on a man who had tied his wife to a bed, covered her mouth with duct tape, punched her in the face, cut off her underwear with a knife and threatening to slash her vagina before trying to rape her. Only on appeal was his sentencing increased to 21 months – and even then the sentence was conditional, so the man, by this time out of jail, didn’t have to go back. The man fitting the "typical" image of a rapist: 10 years. The atypical rapist... 21 month conditional sentence. I don't believe this is endemic to only Canada, however. Here's a cartoonist's take on the discussions regarding sexual harassment I was going to go into your misunderstanding of the term patriarchy too, but I've been writing this for a while and have to go soon. I did point out a study in a different thread of the male and female researchers BOTH critiquing an equivalently qualified woman candidate in a study (only the name was changed) more aggressively than a man. There's *some* reason for this type of assessment, and the idea that society (somehow) has us believe that women are less capable at the physical sciences is one possible assessment. This is the idea of "the patriarchy," which is more of a nebulous, abstract concept of institutionalized ways to reinforce a specific set of gender roles. It's important to note that men can be affected by the patriarchy too, in that they are ostracized if not displaying a suitably masculine image. Men are biased against in custody battles. They are biased against in adoption. I don't know this for certain, but I certainly perceive that they are more likely to be ostracized for being homosexual. (despite Volo's declarations, feminism has nothing to do with acting feminine - although feminism is more of an umbrella that has a variety of perspectives now). I find it troubling that you call out someone for "having a different idea of what feminism is than what is actuallly happening" because it doesn't seem like you actually understand the terms being used. But I'm not sure if it's the other people that suffer from cognitive dissonance on this topic. How many people on this forum point out that the extreme people are just that, extreme? How many people on this forum actually espouse those extreme views? Yet in a thread that I was taking part in, not long after I let it be known that I was a feminist, you post some hateful diatribe of what feminism is. I think you're mistaken about what feminism is. I think there may be some bias in your sampling if you think that feminism is as extreme that you think it is. I actually enjoyed reading a comment from a developer on a RPS talk regarding Manveer's talk at GDC. In response to all the people crying out against compromising artistic integrity, he shared how he knows all too well how much that's affected, as character designs he makes are white washed and altered to appeal to specific demographics. Artistic integrity indeed! But fans don't typically see that sort of stuff so it doesn't happen I guess. Perhaps they should stop compromising their artistic vision based on what the marketing department tells them. As a lead on a AAA game (Sudeki) who was forced to make a black character whiter, for “sales in target demographics (Japan)” I can promise you, the words “compromised artistic vision” ring loud and clear across the whole industry. If it’s made for profit, the artistic vision has already been compromised. Fact. (In response to someone asking why designers should compromise their artistic vision to appease sexual minorities). Super Smash Bros had an example of the designer literally NOT doing what was concepted, at all yet this is what was delivered. Artistic integrity! As for bull**** trivialization and fundamental misunderstandings: Magnificently put! I think for a lot of people, it's mere existence comes across as forced. In ME3, Steve made a casual reference to his husband that passed on. My reaction: "WHOA! He's gay!" I make that reaction because, well, it's not something I'm used to see. But I'll remember that... Makes a casual reference to his wife passing on? Do I even blink an eye? (I actually love Shepard's response to that line, given that it unphases Shepard in the slightest). I'll take this as preemptive support of this post. Thanks! Hi Alan, welcome back Yaaaaaaaaaaaay Good to see you posting again, where have you been? I know you said were taking a break but have just been on BSN?

I know this is no surprise but I agree 100 % with Bryy, there are some topics around social justice that really aren't funny or shouldn't be considered humorous. Jokes about topics like rape and domestic abuse I fail to see how anyone can find them in anyway remotely funny What humour does around these topics is detract from the seriousness of the subject, I'm not saying that just because people laugh at rape jokes that makes then supportive of rape but it doesn't help with the societal problem of addressing the problem at every level

Backhanded compliments aren't really compliments, no matter how true. I hear you but I have also been accused of making " backhanded" comments about people when my intention was to give them a real compliment. The reality is some people have a history and perception around there posting style and most people take time to accept or recognize a change. So sometimes there is nothing malicious or sarcastic about a comment its just that you can't ignore the past behaviour of a member but you want to be supportive of a particular point they have made. I think this is reasonable ? End of the day you can't blame people for having a perception of you if you have done nothing to change that perception

Guys here is a interesting review of this unusual game, if anything it makes me more keen to want to purchase it. So good one Jim Sterling who I normally don't particularly like http://www.escapistmagazine.com/articles/view/editorials/reviews/11243-Betrayer-Review-In-Dying-Color.2

Well if she thinks jokes that are obviously going to offend and hurt peoples feelings are funny then she doesn't deserve to be taken seriously. This is about the perception that you create for yourself Also Bester sorry to say this but I find your comment "She knows what proper humor is and that's a rare quality in a woman" condescending as you seem to be suggesting that unless a women is dismissive of social justice issues in attempt to be funny then she doesn't understand what a sense of humour is

I thought it was a teasing friendly remark; I must work on my PR. Volo, he was paying you a compliment. And you may think " I don't see it as a compliment" but your posting style in the past has made many people not take what you say seriously. So don't get offended when people make supportive comments of your posts, they are not trolling. They are just surprised

By your own account it very nearly turned a legal conflict into one where people got shot. Cow grazing is not worth killing anybody over. There were beatings, taserings, intimidation, questionable arrests, snipers and armed agents around the Bundy Ranch. Then the armed citizens arrive and everyone becomes a little more respectful of each other. And they did it without brandishing those weapons, just making it known they had them. I am surprised by the government reaction to tell the truth. Usually when they are hell bent of seizing your property and freedom no matter the pretext their policy is to shoot everyone in sight indiscriminately. Ruby Ridge comes to mind where the penalty of missing a court date is summary executions of the entire family. Cows are not worth killing for. But defending freedom and property is. And it would be worth dying for if it came to that. Today those folks in Nevada drew a line in the sand and dared the BLM to step over it and God Bless them for doing it. The BLM declined and God bless them for that. But the confrontation is coming at some point. It's been building for years. To quote Thomas Jefferson "The natural progress of things is for liberty to yield and government to gain ground". But not without a fight. GD didn't you predict this ? When we start seeing the Federal government coming to take the homes and farms of good tax paying and god fearing Americans? This could be the beginning of the great and inexorable move by the Federal government to absorb or neutralize anything that doesn't conform to its socialist policies. And I'm worried...you, Steph and Tommy could be next But I think Walsie also has a point, because what could have been the outcome? What if one of the militia's had decided to provoke the Feds, its quite possible. One of the federal authorities gets shot by an extremist in order to deliberately to cause a conflict. There would have been multiple casualties but end of the day the Feds would have won because obviously they have more manpower and access to better weaponry. This happened in South Africa 2 years ago during a violent strike http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marikana_miners%27_strike So having access to all these weapons isn't necessarily a good thing as it can raise the confidence and temperature of a situation

That would be very cool, there are so many good suggestions that have been mentioned in this thread and others. I would like to see access or interaction to a D&D type Underdark realm and meeting races that dwell in those realms. Maybe parts of the dungeon are occupied by these races a living level of the dungeon, the entire level is a sentient creature either summoned by Old Nua or created by him through some arcane experiment

The only thing you've 'proved' is how ignorant and full of yourself you are. Yet again. You are quite good at offering us all proof of this quite often. Oh, and congrats again on being a subject of your government, thinking it is your government who provides the quality of life to the folks under it's rule. You are such a good serf. Such a good subject. Your superior comrades, king, or queen are no doubt happy to have you as such a loyal subordinate. Really, if you think there's a scale that can quantify what is the best culture you're either naive, ignorant, full of yourself, stupid, some combination of, or all of the above. Here's probably the best scale I can think of out there in regards to what is the best nation to live in: The suicide rate by nation. As obviously if it's such a great place to live for everyone, no one would kill themselves. In no way would I say that even the above is any kind of great indicator of what is the best culture. Though it's certainly more relevant I'd say that the links you provided. And in regards to those links. By one of them I live in the #1 culture, and while there are few other places on earth I'd consider living in, I wouldn't say my culture's way is the best way (especially in 2014 USA). Of the supposed top ten nations on that list, exactly half of them I would move the hell out of as fast as possible as their governments are way too fascist or communist for me. Of your other list, the top 4, absolutely no way would I want to live there, for the same reason. Sweden? Australia? Nice places to visit sure, great people, I have friends in both places.. but their laws and government are way too oppressive, corrupt, and inept. Unless of course you are a happy good loyal subordinate serf who bathes in socialism and the 'glory' (*cough* *choke* *gag**vomit*) of their queen. Seriously. What's good for one person is not good for another. One man's trash is another man's treasure. #@*( anyone who would forcibly impose their way of life on anyone else, especially if they do it under the false auspices of 'we're doing it for your own good'. There's a special place in hell reserved for such folks. Morning Vals How are you doing today ? So despite the fact that I can give another 6 or 7 links that discuss various indexes that represent what countries have the best quality of life you think the best way to measure this should be based on how few people commit suicide Seriously dude you make me laugh....try to listen to what you are saying. Suicide is normally caused by depression, depression is a chemical imbalance and your quality of life for a depressed person can make no difference around a decision to end there life And yes I believe in governments and paying taxes. I believe governments have a responsibility to provide certain basic services and we need to support them by not breaking the law and paying your rates and taxes. So if this makes me a serf then I guess I am one. But I don't mind being a serf because I think I live a really good lifestyle

I had never heard of them before, they look cute. I wonder if they can be eaten and what they taste like?

Either you haven't had enough sex in your life or you've got some kind of creepy synesthesia if you think the offal of human groinal regions and sweat smells like spring flowers. The potential joke based on the fact that flowers are fundamentally sexual organs is lost when you've actually been in a room reeking of human copulation. Do you spend loads of time in rooms that reek of human copulation...you seem quite knowledgeable

Its funny but I never saw his posts like that. I thought he was always logical and reasonable with his comments. He also made some of the most informed and convincing points around issues of social justice. So I miss his input

When did anyone say that Western culture is perfect and doesn't need to improve on any aspect of its culture? I said that governments in Western countries give there citizens the best quality of life and I proved it by posting several links. I made this point because I wanted to settle the debate " what makes Western society better than say Russian or other societies". If you have another way of measuring happiness levels across countries please post it. But I refuse to say, just because its politically correct, that the quality of life in places like Russia or China for the average citizen is the same as most Western countries. This may sound arrogant but its not intended to be, its just the reality of governments in the modern world and how they manage there countries Also the issue with RT is that it is an international news channel. Its suppose to present the news to world and not just there local population. That's why the objectivity is important

I miss him as well, he said he was taking a break from the Obsidian forums

OK, what was in the past that's better than Western civilization? Also if the indexes are flawed because they are based on Western qualities of a good life then maybe you can share what other variables are important. The links I posted discuss scores like purchasing power, safety, healthcare and pollution levels. And I'm sure those are universal values that every culture and country aspires to?

Ah.. more of your Your ignorance rises to a special level BruceVC. I'll give you this, of all the people I've ever run across on a forum anywhere, your indignant armor to reality is the thickest. In media you'd be akin to Piers Morgan, hubris, haughty holier than thou attitude, and all. Pretty much no matter what anyone ever writes your viewpoint is near impervious. And to address your first quotebox above, you really just show how much you let other people do your thinking for you. I'll leave the 9/11 issue at this for you as it's a good litmus test in regards to actual knowledge of the event. Until you (or anyone else who swallows whole and faithful the official conspiracy theory on 9/11) can write at least a couple of paragraphs about the significance of Building Seven during that event, citing actual facts about it, and why it is significant on the number of levels that it is, especially in relation to the official narrative, you truly have not done your homework and allowed others to do your thinking for you. Its funny you mention Piers Morgan, I really admire him and loved his show. He was shutdown by the right wing and the NRA in the USA, a pity because he made loads of sense. But to be fair to America you can't have an outsider lecturing morality and whats socially acceptable. So his time was limited, I realize that now And Vals remember, I won't give up on you..I'll keep trying to get you to see the reality of how the world really operates

I agree, Fox and RT are on the same level IMO. And its a very low level for the objectivity of news

How did I know Sarex was going to agree to that You and I have had this discussion before and we both know we won't convince each other, so this is a good case of a " Lets agree to disagree"

You've raised some good points but I think you are misunderstanding and misrepresenting what feminism means. I am feminist and all it means is that you believe that women have equal rights to men and I am opposed to cases where those rights aren't equal. Some of the examples you gave have more to do with the objectification of women or sexual inappropriate comments Feminism doesn't mean you hate men or think men are rapists. If that has been your experience you weren't dealing with feminists but people who clearly were discriminating against men.

Well I'm working now at a customer and we have an issue with Firewall ports that aren't open. So we may have to reschedule the work for later in the week, oh well these things happen

So this is really the problem as you see it Volo? Men are stereotyped in games and there are games that are designed only for women and this is sexist?

And it's really rather tiresome seeing Mor reflexively press the 'must be Russian' button whenever someone disagrees with him. Even asterisking oby ain't Russian. As for bias western media are as bad as RT, they're just (somewhat) better at hiding it and use more subtle techniques like false balance (interview Tartars on a 1:1 basis with others to provide 'balance', even if they're 1/8 of the population, cherry pick to get psychotic sounding interviewees with opposing views), acritical restating of governmentally supplied 'facts' (Iraq can hit London in 45 minutes; John Kerry says there's no real separatism in Crimea so there isn't whatever prior referendum and actions show), allowing the presentation of poorly researched facts (Tartars were a majority prior to Stalin's deportation, still occasionally stated as fact; transparent ballot boxes = travesty, despite them being used in France and India and shown on the same news sources without comment) and just plain selective reporting and weasel words (our side= activists; their side = separatists/ rioters; we intervene, Putin invades; we have governments, they have regimes etc etc). The last especially is straight from 1984, might as well actually be saying Putin regime doubleplusungood, our government doubleplusgood. Most westerners think our media is better due to simple confirmation bias- they say what people want to hear, confirm our obvious superiority and hence are, obviously, correct. But five minutes research shows what a load of slanted garbage we're actually being presented with. And if I can do that for free they, with all their resources, should be able to do it on a professional level, but they don't. They're capable of it, they just don't want to. You can't seriously believe that RT and other Western news channels portray the news in the same way? But I want to discuss a more interesting point. What's wrong with thinking that Western culture is superior? Lets not use the word superior, it sounds arrogant. Lets say that Western culture gives its citizens the highest quality of life. http://www.numbeo.com/quality-of-life/rankings_by_country.jsp http://www.businessinsider.com/top-countries-on-oecd-better-life-index-2013-5?op=1 Do you dispute these links? The Cold War is over, Western ideology has won. Lets not ignore the fact that despite some of the issues in Western culture we offer our citizens the best and most favourable options for a happy and prosperous lifestyle