The Dark Something or other

so would I actually .. but that is very unlikely and would be pretty difficult to pull off I think .. the problem is that they are letting the big nations get away with too much, but if they change that I would think EU is a great idea .. until then though! let's make a united Scandinavia! <{POST_SNAPBACK}> I would love to see a Nordick union of nations, independent of the EU. That would be a dream, to me. The EU is corrupt and a nonsense of statism. Burn it down, I say. :cool:

CONSTITUTIONAL Monarchy, in BRITAIN, works quite well, yes.

I am not interested in a debate or aught, so here is just an expression, in brief, of my politickal views: *Monarchist. Because it works (and is better than the alternatives). *Nationalist. I believe in a world of nation states as the best societal and politickal way. *Quite liberal re: gay rights and suchlike. *Sort of environmentally aware; very much a nature-lover. *A bit conservatives. I believe that the best way forward is to slowly build on the work of one's forebears; dramatick upheavel never results in much of worth. *Generally speaking, less government = better. An "interesting" policy idea of mine is the potential for the death penalty for recidivists of the worst sorts of crime- rape, drug-dealing and murder. (btw, who says organised religion is bound to end in abuse? Surely if you and your fellows believe in the same things, and thus organise yourself , then where is the harm in that? Just because organised religion CAN be corrupted is nto an excuse for no organised religion at all; lots of things CAN be corrupted)

No, communist revolution are supposed to occur spontaneously (as you kind of agree). No communist "revolution" thus far has worked because there has not been a widescale consensus amongst the working class, who have shared a common view of mankind' future. I think what you mean is that there are different stages of human society which must be gone thro first before one reaches communism.. right? Anyway, I dout folks will ever have the rite mindset to make communism a viable option.. and that is no bad thing either!!

I very much follow the train of thought which says the State is teh evil (well, not quite), and should be suspected at all times. Remember, Governments and institutions cannot give one freedom, as one has freedom by virtue of being born human; states can only restrict the freedoms of a man. Now, sometimes this is obviously necessary, but one should never play into the hands of the state and give it more reasons to take your freedom. Any politickal philosophy which requires a strong and centralised state as a fundamental part of it, I am deeply suspicious of. Of course, in TRUE communism the state would "wither away" and not exist at all....except that is never going to happen, because humanbeings all need a state and a cetralised authority. More than that, some people are just more able than others, and will strive to lead, or be better (and quite right). Thus, some people will fall into line, and hose born to lead will, and those not born to lead won't. However, the idea therefore, after accepting that the state is a needed evil, is to make sure it is restricted. "Communist" nations, imo, have failed because a true-communist state cannot exist... and therefore in order to implement these communist reforms there must be a strong cetralised state. Of course, true communism can never come about not until it is the spontaneous will of the people (according to Marx). And therefore, communism will never come about, because people will always see what other people have, or what they themselves could have, and will aim for that, perhaps even "selfishly" so. That is the real world.

You've obviously never lived in a communist society. I'll say this: capitalism is about as far as it gets. The number of people I know from poor- really poor- backgrounds who now are of varying degrees of wealth, influence and suchliek is quite impressive. They got their by their own merits. Yeah, not everyone can get rich, but tough- that is life. However, the amount of genuine social mobility in western capitalistic democracies, compared to any other form of economics or government EVER, is quite impressive.

What about folks who WANT private education? Ya know, the folks wh oactually don't want to get the same Governmentally decided crap spewed at them or their kids, and so decide "Hey, let's do soemthing different". What of those people? Communism, even in its "pure" forms fundamentally contravenes the freewill of people. A lot of these state set up things- and they have to be set up and maintained by a strong state or else they wouldn't work according to their plans- such as healthcare, arguably cause MORE problems for people as they are centrally adminstrated, bureaucratic, wasteful and corrupt. RE: Better education... most Marxists beleive that the "better" schools, the ones that teach you more etc, are the ones that indoctrinate you most into the state....

Yes and no. The idea of capitalism is that the best way to help society is to be personally selfish - by working for your own interests, you create wealth and employment which incidentally benefits others as well. It was called 'trickledown' by Thatcher and Reagan, but it's not a new idea. The kind of charity we see in rich countries is not inspired by neo-liberal capitalism, but another source such as religion, tradition or a sense of social justice. Socialists would say that this just another way for the elites to shore up their position - you can't be 'rich' unless there are poor people to look down on as you 'give generously'. <{POST_SNAPBACK}> Trickle down.... Thatcher.. blah. Communism didn't work FOR A REASON. End of debate. :cool:

WRONG. You ASSERT it is a system based on greed, but you talk nonsense. Where is your proof? Oftimes when folks are in need, they help each other out IN A CAPITALISTIC SYSTEM. Private charity tends to flourish, as opposed to under communist ideology, where it likely never would.

Pretty much sums it all up. :shades: Capitalism does not exclude charitableness. In fact, quite arguably, it encourages it.

Probably not, no. But then communism is a pretty bad idea anyway.

I wasn't referring to you with that comment, I was talking generally. But I have mentioend you as you are relevant i nthe context of the conversation.

erm, no need to get so defensive. My tone was friendly and unjudgemental. I'm not judging anyone, I am just making the statement that diet drinks are one of my peevs, as people who drink them usually don't need to- if you drink a lot of diet drinks, it makes no difference (inasmuch as the "diet" drinks will put you on weight), and if you don't drink a lot of fizzies, then whether they are diet-drinking or not when you drink em makes little difference. Unless you physically aren't allowed sugar because of some medical condition. Nothing more, nothing less was I saying. To be honest tho' and I hope you don't take this the wrong way, but I find people complaining about people always "hollering" at them, are usually the most causing such holler themselves. Or to quote a tory politician, "Racism is often in the minds of people who use that word".

lol, probably, but given your name is JellyBelly, then who are you to judge? [EDIT] Altho' it kinda proves my point made at LadyCrimson- diet fizzy drinks are for people who like to think they are on a diet/are healthy. If you were healthy you wouldn't drink fizzy at all, or hardly ever (and if you drink it hardly ever, then it doesn't matter if you have non-diet fizzy because it is drunk so infrquently as to not affect your health anyway)

1. Yes. One. And it starred him. It was in the 60s, if I recall rightly. 2. Tell us about that, haven't heard of it.

"Paint an Ugly Picture" by The Smiths.

Diamond, look it up(zorz) :shades: :D

Funny thing is, barring a few cruddy visual effects, the Twilight Zone is IMMENSLEY watchable even to-day. Pretty impressive stuff. Also, Shatner is a wasted actor- watch some of his early stuff, and he had potential. Oh well, he's richer now and more important because of Star Trek (and subsequent milking of Trek) than he ever would have been otherwise. Interesting factoid: Shatner starred in the ONLY film ever shot in Esperanto. Interesting stuff it was too.

My bad. It's the terminology that'll screw one up, like if someone says gimme two nickels, some people would prolly be like huh? The thai language doesn't "change" verbs to refer to different tenses, ie. in english the present tense for go is go, past is went, I dunno, I don't remember all those grammatical terms. Anyway, point is, verbs in thai don't change. Also, there's (IIRC) 44 consonants and 36 or 33 vowels. There's also no spaces between words, and there's no periods to mark the end of a sentence. <{POST_SNAPBACK}> What a sh*t language erm, 3.5" floppies ain't really 3.5"?

Darth: *spurt*

Twilight Zone. The original one, not one of those sh*tty colour remakes. The X-Files was also good.

Thou art a wimpzorz. -Shakespeare, Henry IV, 1 ii

IWD failed because it took the fun out of hack and slash games (Diablo was a good hack 'n' slash), yet it took the fun out of RPing too (BG was a good RP game). It was, like, not frantic and mad enough to be a good hacker, and ws too plotless to be a good RP game. A waste, I have to say. A shame, cos a lot of the more technical side of it, the voiceovers etc was rather good.

Here's a question: what the HELL is the point of "diet" fizzy drinks? If you were on a diet, you wouldn't drink coke or dr. Pepper etc at all, for eff sake!!! All it is is people fooling themselves into thinking they are being healthy. Like chav-mums when they buy their kid chocolate fudge yoghurt. "Will, it MAST be good for'im, coz iss liiiiike yoguht innit".