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COVID-19 Has Blown Away the Myth About 'First' and 'Third' World Competence:
One of the planet's – and Africa's – deepest prejudices is being demolished by the way countries handle COVID-19.
For as long as any of us remember, everyone "knew" that "First World" countries – in effect, Western Europe and North America – were much better at providing their citizens with a good life than the poor and incapable states of the "Third World". "First World" has become shorthand for competence, sophistication and the highest political and economic standards.
[...] So we should have expected the state-of-the-art health systems of the "First World", spurred on by their aware and empowered citizens, to handle COVID-19 with relative ease, leaving the rest of the planet to endure the horror of buckling health systems and mass graves.
We have seen precisely the opposite.
[...] [Britain and the US] have ignored the threat. When they were forced to act, they sent mixed signals to citizens which encouraged many to act in ways which spread the infection. Neither did anything like the testing needed to control the virus. Both failed to equip their hospitals and health workers with the equipment they needed, triggering many avoidable deaths.
The failure was political. The US is the only rich country with no national health system. An attempt by former president Barack Obama to extend affordable care was watered down by right-wing resistance, then further gutted by the current president and his party. Britain's much-loved National Health Service has been weakened by spending cuts. Both governments failed to fight the virus in time because they had other priorities.
And yet, in Britain, the government's popularity ratings are sky high and it is expected to win the next election comfortably. The US president is behind in the polls but the contest is close enough to make his re-election a real possibility. Can there be anything more typically "Third World" than citizens supporting a government whose actions cost thousands of lives?
(Score: 5, Insightful) by linkdude64 on Monday May 18 2020, @10:55AM (29 children)
If I say vanilla ice cream is the best flavor, and I like it much better, but I always choose strawberry - am I a reasonable and trustworthy person?
Self-proclaimed journalists, socialists, and communists: Go live in the places you think are better. Us "reprehensible" capitalists will continue to act cohesively with our stated opinions, and live where we think is best. Please, let your actions speak louder than your words.
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 18 2020, @10:58AM (3 children)
Thanks for the laugh, I was in need of one.
(Score: 2) by linkdude64 on Monday May 18 2020, @12:56PM (2 children)
You're welcome! The only inferred opinion one could reasonably determine from my statement is that I'm currently living in the country which I believe to be the "best." That happens to be the case. Please point out the hypocrisy in any of my stated opinions, unless you're prepared to articulate some other argument that your laughter was a substitute for.
(Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Monday May 18 2020, @01:40PM
He was snickering at your grammar.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 18 2020, @03:30PM
Cohesively, right. Calls to boogaloo [npr.org] are such great signs of cohesiveness.
(Score: 2) by acid andy on Monday May 18 2020, @11:08AM (9 children)
Well some of those Scandinavian social democracies do look very tempting, but I can't really be bothered to learn another language for now.
If a cat has kittens, does a rat have rittens, a bat bittens and a mat mittens?
(Score: 3, Touché) by The Mighty Buzzard on Monday May 18 2020, @11:13AM (3 children)
No worries, if they're really progressive they won't require you to learn the language to emigrate and will happily make all government services available in your native language.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 4, Informative) by coolgopher on Monday May 18 2020, @12:13PM
That would be Sweden, then...
(Score: 4, Touché) by Azuma Hazuki on Monday May 18 2020, @01:28PM
English is widely-spoken in several of them, as well as in Germany. Your ignorance is showing. Shoo that bee out of you bonnet, it's been stinging your last remaining brain cell and making you act the fool. More than usual I mean. Go match wits with a catfish, it's a more even battle...
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 2) by HiThere on Monday May 18 2020, @04:04PM
That's your definition of progressive. There are several. In fact, there doesn't seem to be a consensus as to what "progressive" means.
My meaning says nothing about provision of services to people that both aren't citizens and don't meet your requirements for presence. Unfortunately, legal requirements and actual requirements are very different. When you so structure things that many of your businesses are dependent on those who don't meet your legal requirements, I consider those "illegal" folk to be among those who are entitled to services.
Javascript is what you use to allow unknown third parties to run software you have no idea about on your computer.
(Score: 1) by petecox on Monday May 18 2020, @11:31AM
I've been to Norway; it's friggin' cold.
Besides, I thought Jacinda's Kiwiland was supposed to be the centre-left beacon of coronavirus response?
(Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Monday May 18 2020, @01:46PM (2 children)
They speak English well in all those places.
Know that it is cold and dark for much of the year there. Alcoholism, depression, and suicide are rampant. In history there have been mass migrations from Scandinavia to other parts of the world, but no mass migrations from other parts of the world to Scandinavia. There has been one very recent lesser migration there from two places. Those places are Syria and Somalia. I'll leave that there.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 2) by acid andy on Monday May 18 2020, @01:53PM (1 child)
I consider it a bare minimum consideration to make an effort to learn their first language rather than expect them to always speak to me in mine.
If a cat has kittens, does a rat have rittens, a bat bittens and a mat mittens?
(Score: 4, Interesting) by Phoenix666 on Monday May 18 2020, @02:05PM
That's a good thing. Everyone should learn another language. But not speaking Norwegian is not a real barrier to living in Norway (for example). If you're keen to move to Scandinavia, move now and learn the language there at your leisure. Immersion is the best way to learn, and I believe they even offer free classes to help new immigrants learn their language.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 2) by FatPhil on Monday May 18 2020, @09:36PM
You might complain that it's only "more correct" English, and that doesn't count in the modern day and age. But as someone who learnt to communicate using "correct" English, I much prefer it.
Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people; the smallest discuss themselves
(Score: 5, Interesting) by acid andy on Monday May 18 2020, @11:12AM (13 children)
The harms you reprehensible "capitalists" are doing are unfortunately global. And you the harms spread to other native species that cannot live elsewhere. So we'll continue to complain, loudly, until you change your ways, no matter what part of the planet we, or you, are typing from.
If a cat has kittens, does a rat have rittens, a bat bittens and a mat mittens?
(Score: 2) by acid andy on Monday May 18 2020, @11:14AM
Uhhh...
s/And you the harms spread/And you spread the harms/
If a cat has kittens, does a rat have rittens, a bat bittens and a mat mittens?
(Score: -1, Redundant) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 18 2020, @12:17PM (2 children)
Remind me again which country this virus came from?
(Score: 2) by acid andy on Monday May 18 2020, @01:03PM
One where the profit motive was likely given a higher priority than the well-being of its inhabitants, be they humans or other species. Just like capitalism, then. Let's note that if we believe the figures, they did a more effective job of limiting the spread of the virus within their own country than most other nations.
If a cat has kittens, does a rat have rittens, a bat bittens and a mat mittens?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 18 2020, @02:45PM
It doesn't matter. The next one may very well come from NC [nytimes.com].
It matter more how you deal with (or fail to deal with [google.com])
(Score: 2) by linkdude64 on Monday May 18 2020, @12:52PM (7 children)
Right - the level of poverty for humans globally has gone down dramatically because of capitalism and western medicine, and we all know how merciful nature herself is to pandas and all of the malaria, typhus, and coronavirus victims worldwide.
Nature is a competition for survival, not a socialist/communist utopian pipedream. Capitalism actually helps people survive. Don't believe me? What was the death rate of birthing mothers before capitalist-advanced modern medicine began to intervene? And before you say Coronavirus only spread because of capitalistic technology, consider the mass extinction events that have occurred many times throughout geological history. Plants were responsible for one of the earliest, when they heavily oxygenated and de-carbonized the atmosphere. Do you think plants are reprehensible? Because plants committed a genocidal global extinction in their race to the top. If you have not incorporated scientifically determined genocidal phenomena into your worldview, I wonder if you could be seen as anything other than a hypocrite?
(Score: 2) by acid andy on Monday May 18 2020, @01:10PM (1 child)
FFS. I suppose my comment was a bit unclear. I'm talking about social democracy. Not communism. I don't deny for one minute that there are great benefits to free market capitalism. The issue I have is the level to which it is being deregulated, subsidized and corrupted, and it needs to be supported with welfare and environmental protections which are insufficient and being eroded in the west.
If a cat has kittens, does a rat have rittens, a bat bittens and a mat mittens?
(Score: 5, Insightful) by Azuma Hazuki on Monday May 18 2020, @01:30PM
His MO is to conflate the two. And unless he's very wealthy himself, the term for this is "useful idiot." I've never understood the complete, global nihilism it takes to not only act against your own self-interest but willingly take down others in your position with you. And then they have the fucking balls to blather on about how immoral other economic systems are!
IMO it's a badly- and thinly-disguised case of crab bucket syndrome--ironically, the REAL "politics of envy" (another catchphrase that marks the user as an utter sociopath).
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 4, Insightful) by acid andy on Monday May 18 2020, @01:14PM (3 children)
BTW, when I moved your scare quotes from "reprehensible" to "capitalists" it was quite deliberate. The US and UK have corrupted capitalism to take care of the rich guys and the largest corporations. It's not a free market.
If a cat has kittens, does a rat have rittens, a bat bittens and a mat mittens?
(Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Monday May 18 2020, @01:56PM (2 children)
True capitalism is never achieved in the same way that true communism never is. It's much easier for the powerful to rig the system so they're the only ones to gain. There's always a tension. That said, a free market system, pure or not, is demonstrably better at delivering material wealth to more people than communism is. We're not even sure that social democracy works as well as its proponents insist, because for the past 70 years European social democracies have been essentially subsidized by the United States, which is not a social democracy but has been footing the massive military bills.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 0, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 18 2020, @02:29PM
Yawn, true capitalism has existed but its failures get blamed on others. Typical capitalism gaslighting.
(Score: 2) by Pav on Tuesday May 19 2020, @01:22AM
Wha? A market is neither capitalist or communist... those ideologies only speak to who owns the means of production. Worker owned CoOPs in the USA are by definition communist! A command economy is where most nations go during wartime or some other existential national emergency. The bolsheviks loved that shit, so they kept it... but it's hardly by definition communist. The whole point of not having a democracy, and a government controlled command economy was because the bolsheviks argued Russia wasn't ready for true communism. For sure, the bolsheviks sucked and were utterly authoritarian... but so were all the capitalist dictators (Chiang Ki Shek, Pinochet, Marcos, the Greek military junta etc... etc... etc...), but a significant percentage of the rest of the world look at Americans like they've grown extra eyestalks when they say communism is by definition authoritarian. Most Western Europeans have had communists in power (yes, in coalition, but that's how multi-party systems ie. actually functioning democracies work). They played a part in Israeli politics (at least before the right took over completely). Communism still plays a part in Indian politics etc... etc... Those communists who wanted to avoid having to combat US propaganda in popular culture rebranded themselves "democratic socialists" to avoid the association with bolshevik socialists who were portrayed as the sole representatives of true communism, though to be fair the bolsheviks loved self-assigning themselves that mantle also. The "democratic socialist" rebranding was a mistake in my humble opinion, and it has become wishy washy and these days is even worn by neoliberal state intervention minimalists simply wanting to manage societal decline.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by acid andy on Monday May 18 2020, @01:28PM
I wouldn't say that. I'm not that much of a Luddite.
The difference is that plants did so via genetic mutations, which are arguably involuntary. When humans do so, it is through conscious choice, with the potential to understand the potential harms they are causing. Surely you can't be condoning the latter?
If a cat has kittens, does a rat have rittens, a bat bittens and a mat mittens?
(Score: 2) by HiThere on Monday May 18 2020, @04:11PM
While true, you need to realize that many of those harms are caused by local capitalists rather that by imported ones. International corporations are usually more facilitators of those harms than actual instigators of them. There are a lot of exceptions, of course. And note that some of the invasive capitalists causing harm call themselves communists...or at least are sponsored by governments that used to call themselves communist, I'm not current with what they currently call themselves.
I think it's clearer if you remove ideology from the argument and say "the powerful tend to take unjust advantage of the weak, to the point of destroying the environment in which they live". That seems to be a true statement...and is true throughout history.
Javascript is what you use to allow unknown third parties to run software you have no idea about on your computer.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 18 2020, @05:15PM
This is a clever argument, in that its incorrectness and unstated assumptions are subtle and hard to spot. It's similar to the "If you're not with us, you're against us" and "if you have nothing to hide, you have nothing to fear" arguments. Let's be explicit about the issues of this argument, though.
1) It ignores the cost of transition. If I inherited tons of vanilla ice cream from my parents and upbringing (I have a job, a family, a home, friends, speak the language, understand the cultural norms, etc), do you expect me to throw them all away (move)? Put another way, I'm sure lots of people here know the advantages of Linux over Windows, PostGRE (or other databases) over Oracle, etc. Why do business continue to buy those inferior technologies?
2) Just because something has always been that way, it doesn't mean it can't be better. "Well, humans have always killed each other, and they always will kill each other. Why bother trying to stop them?" "The US has always had slavery, if you don't like it, move to England who has outlawed it." Etc.
3) It is setting up a strawman. The argument is that single-payer healthcare is better than getting insurance through an employer (which, if you think about it, makes no sense... I'd challenge anybody to justify this in any way besides "it's what we inherited from our forefathers and it's good enough"). If somebody told me they think strawberry ice cream more than vanilla, but they think vanilla is decent and they have a lot of it, I'd be curious why they have so much vanilla ice cream but I wouldn't think they are deceitful.
(Score: 5, Informative) by SomeGuy on Monday May 18 2020, @11:25AM (43 children)
Third World: Any country outside of the United States of America. Except for Canada, which is just a frozen wasteland and not a real country anyway.
(Most in the US actually believe this)
(Score: 3, Informative) by The Mighty Buzzard on Monday May 18 2020, @11:32AM (5 children)
Heh, no. Third-world = Non-NATO, non-Warsaw-Pact nation.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 18 2020, @11:47AM (4 children)
There is no Warsaw-Pact, that was a piece of history, it's gone now.
Are you still fighting the cold war?
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Monday May 18 2020, @11:49AM (2 children)
Irrelevant. That's what first-world, second-world, and third-world mean.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by FatPhil on Monday May 18 2020, @09:46PM (1 child)
That single letter difference is very important. That something may have been codified on paper many many decades ago doesn't mean it's true, or even relevant, today - the world's moved on, at least for most of us.
Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people; the smallest discuss themselves
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Tuesday May 19 2020, @10:55AM
Oh the meaning may be chang-ing but it has not chang-ed beyond including the implied adjective "former".
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 5, Touché) by MostCynical on Monday May 18 2020, @12:51PM
no, this is a war with a cold
"I guess once you start doubting, there's no end to it." -Batou, Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex
(Score: 4, Insightful) by JoeMerchant on Monday May 18 2020, @12:12PM (33 children)
There was a time, not so long ago, where most in the U.S. had never traveled beyond their home state, many never having slept outside their own homes. Still the vast majority have not traveled outside the country, and those who have have mostly restricted themselves to foreign destinations that cater to American tourists.
The grand and unfortunate thing about the ballot box is that there are near zero qualification required for participation in the process. Ignorance is a real problem.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Monday May 18 2020, @12:16PM (22 children)
So? The US is roughly the same size as all of Europe, if only half as crowded. Saying we haven't left our country isn't saying much.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by JoeMerchant on Monday May 18 2020, @12:32PM (21 children)
So, you're saying because we have a bunch of land (about 5% of the planet's land, much of it desert) that staying immersed 100% in our culture (which comprises less than 5% of the total world population) provides sufficient perspective on the world to make decisions about how to interact with other countries?
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 2, Disagree) by The Mighty Buzzard on Monday May 18 2020, @12:36PM (20 children)
I'm saying that Europeans bragging about being worldly when they've only traveled around Europe is no more impressive than Americans who have never left the US. NYC alone is home to more cultures than all of Europe.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by JoeMerchant on Monday May 18 2020, @01:18PM (10 children)
I can't claim to be a "world traveler" since I've "only" been to Europe, Mexico, and the Caribbean, however... as compared to the U.S., Europe has quite a few more languages, much more "time in place" with buildings and institutions that stretch back 1000+ years, significantly more cultural diversity, and a much greater tendency to travel outside of Europe than most 'muricans travel outside their own tri-state area.
Just the contrast between East and West Germany is more than you're going to see in the U.S. - unless you want to compare a broken down Indian reservation in the middle of nowhere desert to some place like San Francisco, and again, most 'muricans don't actually go to the Rez, or Frisco. First thing that happened when the wall came down, East Germany emptied into the West, and the West took every spare minute touristing in the East - big fuss about the working girls in the East not requiring rubbers, not the kind of thing that gets talked about in Peoria.
Now, if we're going to go around starting wars in Iraq, having naval adventures in the South China Sea, etc. - it would be nice if the people making those decisions knew their ass from a hole in the ground around those parts. When 9-11 happened, I knew the wife of one of the six FBI agents in the whole damn country who could understand any amount of Farsi. My grandfather, born and raised in East Tennessee, knew more Farsi than FBI agent #7 just by virtue of a construction contract he worked in Iraq in the 1950s.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 2) by Pav on Monday May 18 2020, @02:09PM (2 children)
But Farsi isn't spoken much at all in Iraq. The main language is Arabic, with Kurdish being in the same family but not mutually intelligable with Farsi. Farsi speakers have a much better time with Pashto (spoken in Afghanistan)... so did you mean Afghanistan?
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Monday May 18 2020, @02:29PM
Possibly, as I said, I'm an ignorant rube when it comes to that part of the world. I do know that Granddad was there for the fall of Faisal II (which is probably the source of my confusion with the language named Farsi - and do I feel ignorant about that, sure do... but not half as ignorant as most of my countrymen.) Granddad just spoke some of "the local language" whatever it was, didn't share a lot of that detail with me - though I think the concrete plant he worked on may have been near the Iranian border, if that makes a difference. Now, ask any random non-military related US citizen to pick out Iran and Iraq on a globe... I believe you've got a better chance of dying from COVID-19 than you do of them getting that question right on the first try.
And, of course, you're right - the immediate post 9-11 concern was Afghanistan - so Farsi, spoken by over 100 million people (1.4% of World pop), was the language of interest at the time, but of our ~35,000 FBI agents apparently only 6 (0.017%) had any functional ability to help work the intelligence streams. Apparently they had intercepted and interpreted enough chatter to know that something was "going down" on a flight to San Francisco, so that's where they sent him.... oops.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 18 2020, @09:36PM
"But Farsi isn't spoken much at all in Iraq. The main language is Arabic, with Kurdish being in the same family but not mutually intelligable with Farsi. Farsi speakers have a much better time with Pashto (spoken in Afghanistan)... so did you mean Afghanistan?"
I am far from an expert, so take this with a grain of salt. It is possible that some Iraqis in the southeast of the Iraq understand some Farsi because of their religious affiliation with Shia muslims in Iran. Farsi speakers are unlikely to understand Pashto, the main language of Afghanistan. They would probably have an easier time with Dari as the two languages are related. Pashto is a completely different language from Farsi.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Tuesday May 19 2020, @11:19AM (6 children)
No, it doesn't. You can find pretty much every European language being spoken in some neighborhood in NYC alone, as well as dozens more from Africa and Asia (not South America though since they mostly speak Spanish or Portuguese, which are European). Hell, you can find African languages being spoken in Amarillo, Texas right now. I'm not talking "people who know how to speak $blah", I'm saying you will find areas where $blah is the primary means of communication and the residents even speaking English is by no means a guarantee.
See above plus our very own vastly differing cultures.
Dude, you have no idea how wrong you are. The cultural differences between OK and west TN alone are pretty jarring and they're both ostensibly part of The South. Visit Seattle, Atlanta, Amarillo, Miami, and New York. You will never think this again, I promise. And that's completely discounting all the cultural diversity you'll find outside major urban centers.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Tuesday May 19 2020, @01:36PM (5 children)
The NYC area has ~10M population, and sure there are plenty of immigrant communities who have held on to a little bit of their language and culture - particularly in the first generation. Does that mean that the US "has" this culture, or that we've just got a smattering of immigrants here and there who haven't fully assimilated yet? Is NYC the source of these languages and cultures, or just a melting pot? When you get outside those immigrant enclaves, does the rest of the country (or even city) embrace those languages and cultures as their own: something to be cherished and preserved, or fear and shun them as something to be belittled, suppressed, oppressed or deported?
I'll grant: Italian Chinese couples in NYC and their children are a rare, but semi-unique phenomenon to the area, same for Jewish-Cuban in Miami (common enough to have their own label "Jewbans"), but they are hardly the culture of the country, and such melting pot families are hardly unique to the U.S. - a Dutch-German couple bought my house in Miami (briefly, before flipping it for an insane profit and returning to Europe), Switzerland was a melting pot before the Americas were discovered, etc.
Hialeah in Miami, for instance. But, that's ~300,000 people - maybe 30,000 who don't actually know functional English (though 250,000 will act like they don't while you're on their turf), in a greater Miami area with a population of millions. And local government does cater somewhat to the Spanish speaking community, which really pisses off the majority of the population in Florida. Most of my high school graduating class from the west coast of Florida was flat out openly afraid of the whole Miami area because there were Spanish speaking communities down there, only 2/200 graduates went to the University of Miami - one of roughly 10 "semi-local" universities that roughly 80 of the graduating class dispersed to - and UM was offering easy scholarships that year. Point? The U.S. doesn't embrace or understand its own melting pot communities, the majority of the culture fears them.
Right back at ya. East Germans in 1990 had a totally fucked up concept of money, to their core they just didn't understand what was coming with the West German economy they had been folded into - that's a real cultural difference. I've got some pretty fuckin' weird family back in East Tennessee, and where we owned our land in Central Florida there were "Crackers" across the road - locals who have been on their land since the 1800s, Cracker patois may be English based but it's harder to understand and follow than Anguilla patois, but much less profane. Crackers and Anguillans can speak proper "tourist" English when they want to, they understand more or less how the other people "tick." Crackers shop in WalMart, they're not happy about it, but they do. Get back in the high valleys of Switzerland and try to relate to a goat herder in his hut... that's a cultural difference, Crackers, Anguillans, Chinese restaurant owners in NYC, Irish pub owners anywhere - they're poseurs, assimilated to the local culture and just parading a bit of their family history for the tourists.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Wednesday May 20 2020, @03:03AM (4 children)
Origin is irrelevant. The culture exists where the culture exists.
You misunderstand melting-pot. It does not mean you come here, bring your culture, practice it however you like, and not try or refuse to integrate into the American culture that already exists. It means you come here, bring the bits of your culture that are socially acceptable here, lose the bits that aren't, learn to interact with the rest of society, and expect us to grab anything from your culture we think is awesome. We're welcoming as all hell but the national culture belongs to the citizens not the immigrants.
Heh, I'd relate better to a goat herder in a remote Swiss hut than to someone who chooses to live in NYC or SF.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Wednesday May 20 2020, @03:15AM (3 children)
That would be a perfect description of the Jewish community on Miami Beach.
Not to the (majority of) Mexicans around here and Houston it doesn't mean that.
Except for Trump, and everybody who voted for him.
I dunno man, the one I met was f-in scary - shaking his fist at me and gibbering something that didn't resemble German or Italian (Romansch does resemble German...) I continued to ride my rented bike up the paved road while he retreated into the hut. He got me back, indirectly... after a couple of hours biking and hiking and being out of water, I finally broke down and drank from the snowmelt stream coming down the mountain - hadn't seen a soul or animal in over an hour - 2 minutes later his (I assume his) flock of goats comes wandering over the next peak toward me - I asked them out loud "you wouldn't piss in that stream, would you?" One of them answered me by turning around and unloading a fat stream in my direction.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Wednesday May 20 2020, @03:43AM (2 children)
Which is why folks have issues with them. They'll get there eventually though.
Bitch, please.
See, we would have gotten along great. I'm a big fan of shaking my fist and yelling barely comprehensible local dialect at city boy tourists.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 20 2020, @03:55AM (1 child)
I'm sure he would make allowance for anyone who realized Trump was a mistake. Kinda leaves you standing on the doormat. Maybe if he bought one of your jump to conclusions mats it would help?
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Wednesday May 20 2020, @11:50PM
Yet another tedious ignorance correction: I did not vote for Cheeto Jesus. I just love mocking those who think he's the love child of Hitler and Satan.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by bradley13 on Monday May 18 2020, @02:23PM (1 child)
Spotted the American who has never traveled.
NYC home to lots of cultures? Um...sure, you go right on believing that. First, many of the subcultures in New York are imported from - gee - from Europe. For the rest - guess what, we have immigrants here as well. Anyway, a subculture is a pale shadow of what you get, immersed in the culture in its native country. The Italian quarter in New York (and, yes, I've been there) is most definitely not Italy.
Traveling around Europe is the same as travelling around the US? Minnesota is just as American as California, is just as American as Florida. That's definitely not the case between, say, Norway, Spain and Ukraine.
You need to get out more. But first, you need to lose the attitude - otherwise you'll just be another "ugly American" tourist, wondering why everyone doesn't speak English, take American dollars, and do things the same as you're used to.
Everyone is somebody else's weirdo.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Tuesday May 19 2020, @11:27AM
Yes, and they exist in the US now as well. Melting pot, yo.
Erm... I could go to several European nations, Japan, and most of South America without being anything but the guy with the horrible accent and limited vocabulary, thanks. But why would I want to?
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by gtomorrow on Monday May 18 2020, @03:03PM (4 children)
Mr Buzz, I'm not lookin' for trouble or anything but when you say...
.. you do realize from where most of those cultures came from, at least up until the last 30ish years anyway?
Oh, and while I'm here...I'm not trying to cramp your style and obviously you're free to do as you please, but please stop with your fallacious sig. I can't do anybody potential harm if I wear a mask. And wearing a surgical mask for protection is not the same as carrying firearms for protection. I know you know this. Have a nice day.
(Score: 2) by gtomorrow on Monday May 18 2020, @03:10PM
OOPS! Sorry, bradley13, didn't see you had basically said the same thing (at least partially) while I took my sweet time typing out my reply.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Tuesday May 19 2020, @11:35AM (2 children)
See above about those cultures now existing here as well. Culture is mobile. Has been since it came up out of Africa. And we collect that shit downright eagerly compared to most of the world.
You wear a mask to protect yourself and others? Even if you're not sure if it's actually going to be necessary today? Yeah, you're right, nobody carries a gun with that exact reasoning. Would you like to compare the number of protective uses of firearms to illegally offensive uses? I promise you you'll be disappointed.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by gtomorrow on Tuesday May 19 2020, @01:29PM (1 child)
First point: I don't know if "collect" is the right word in this case. "Collect" as in lint and not as in "baseball cards", maybe. And "eagerly?" If American history has shown us anything, they certainly weren't and aren't "eagerly" welcomed.
Second point: Hey, I tried. If you have the time and inclination, sure, I'd love to see the numbers.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Wednesday May 20 2020, @03:26AM
First point: Dude, we celebrate Cinco de Mayo and Mexico doesn't. We celebrate Oktoberfest and St. Patrick's day. We eat as many tacos as we do hotdogs. We polka your eyes out. We invented the fortune cookie and chop suey. We bring a bunch of slaves over from Africa and a couple hundred years later you can't hardly find music made here that doesn't have strong ancestral influences from the music they brought with them. That shit ain't immediate but it happens as sure as night following day here.
Second point: A CDC (CDC for gun stats? WTF?) report [nap.edu] commissioned by Obama has this to say:
Which puts defensive gun use between ~1.7 and 10 times (Nice variability of data there, guys. Glad to see we're getting our money's worth.) as common as gun crime.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Tuesday May 19 2020, @02:44AM (1 child)
Ooooh, I missed that sig.
Yes, yes indeed: mask wearers are driven primarily by fear, excellent analogy with NRA members.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Tuesday May 19 2020, @11:36AM
I mostly don't bother with either. Both make going to the bank far more exciting though.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 18 2020, @12:19PM (9 children)
So, you want to bring back literacy tests then? Maybe a poll tax? We left that crap behind a long time ago.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Monday May 18 2020, @12:36PM (5 children)
Not literacy tests, and poll taxes are just a crude shortcut to enhance most of the problems we already have, how about general literacy and cultural awareness improvement? Maybe 90 minutes a week of "world travel" education for 4 years of school, consisting of things that actually reach the students like first person travel documentary films?
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 2) by BK on Monday May 18 2020, @01:28PM (4 children)
How does this address your issue of qualification? Are you willing to disenfranchise whoever skips those classes?
The flip side to qualification is that if it's real, some will be disqualified. Aiming for the lofty goal of universal qualification is great, but only if you recognize that there are some who will NEVER get there.
...but you HAVE heard of me.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Monday May 18 2020, @02:10PM (3 children)
No, but considering that we give free child care and food, attendance is pretty good in public school - and I would be willing to withdraw all public funding and tax incentives from any private school that failed to deliver the content.
Of course, and there will always be a slice of society that just doesn't get it, no matter how they've been educated. Would be nice if we were working toward making that slice of ignorance something less than half the pie, instead of consistently growing it like we seem to be.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 2) by BK on Monday May 18 2020, @03:59PM (2 children)
OK then. So no solution.
...but you HAVE heard of me.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Monday May 18 2020, @07:40PM
I believe I proposed education, but given our apparent inability to execute on that goal for the past two centuries... yeah, y'all are screwed after I'm gone.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 18 2020, @10:05PM
"OK then. So no solution."
Surely you can see that making educational content more readily available is better than leaving the population to wallow in ignorance?
(Score: 4, Insightful) by DannyB on Monday May 18 2020, @03:24PM
Maybe not for the voters.
But definitely for the people they vote for.
Who would have ever thought that the US would have an illiterate president.
The lower I set my standards the more accomplishments I have.
(Score: 2) by HiThere on Monday May 18 2020, @04:21PM (1 child)
The problem with literacy tests was that they were applied in a corrupt manner. If you could avoid that, I'd be in favor of them.
There is a real argument that people shouldn't be able to vote on matters they don't understand. The problem is that this allows those who frame the questions to specify that the answers should agree with their biases. This is the reason I usually refuse to reply to polls. The questions are so framed as to ensure a corrupt answer.
This is what makes literacy tests a bad idea. Yes, people should understand the issues before they vote on them, but this is very different from saying they should agree with the creator of the test what those issues are.
Javascript is what you use to allow unknown third parties to run software you have no idea about on your computer.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 18 2020, @10:10PM
"The problem with literacy tests was that they were applied in a corrupt manner. If you could avoid that, I'd be in favor of them."
Hear, hear! Also, it would be great if people were required to take the same test that immigrants take when applying for citizenship.
(Score: 4, Funny) by Phoenix666 on Monday May 18 2020, @01:58PM (1 child)
Canada is a 51st state whose people can't pronounce "about" or "pasta" correctly. Just like Massachusetts.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 2, Funny) by fustakrakich on Monday May 18 2020, @03:46PM
Just like Massachusetts.
I was going to drive my sister to the airport, but I couldn't find my khakis
La politica e i criminali sono la stessa cosa..
(Score: 3, Interesting) by HiThere on Monday May 18 2020, @04:15PM
Have you ever seen one of those "maps of the world" drawn so that part of one city is large, and things get smaller and more distorted as you move beyond the bounds of that part of the city? I've seen maps like that centered on part of New York City, on San Francisco's Haight district, and on the Berkeley Campus of the University of California. They are intended to be humorous, but they display a truth about how people think about things.
Javascript is what you use to allow unknown third parties to run software you have no idea about on your computer.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 18 2020, @11:59AM (3 children)
Not sure I get who/what caused 'thousands of lives'?
Bear in mind, that at least in Canada (where I live), the narrative has NEVER EVER been to stop people from getting the virus. Nope! Never.
The only narrative has been to *slow* transmission, so that the hospitals would not be overwhelmed. Thus, giving those that get very sick, the best outcome. In other words, *everyone will get this virus*, and this has always been the known outcome stated by the governments in my country.
This thing is here for *years*, staying at home won't help you, unless you intend to become a hermit forever.
So... unless hospitals have been overwhelmed in the UK, for example... with people needing treatment being turned away, then.. well, no one died that wouldn't have, regardless!
Where I live, hospitals have *not* been overwhelmed. At all. Is that different in the US/UK? Have those needing treatment been turned away?
NOTE: I'm not saying response was "as it should". Mayhap, mistakes were made, maybe some, maybe a lot! But the idea that people have needlessly died is absurd, unless there wasn't (for example) a ventilator available when needed, or a bed...
(Score: 2, Insightful) by The Mighty Buzzard on Monday May 18 2020, @12:06PM (1 child)
There were a very few, geographically isolated instances early on of not having enough ventilators (whose efficacy beyond an oxygen tube is still unclear) and PPE to go around early on. This has since been resolved. Nobody was turned away for what treatment could be provided and I'm unaware of anywhere actually running out of beds, only screaming that they might soon. Oh, and "do I have it" tests that people keep somehow mistakenly thinking will make a difference in if they die or not.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 18 2020, @02:31PM
Hey Buzzy, you in here being stupid?
Sweet! You're my rock bro!
(Score: 2) by FatPhil on Tuesday May 19 2020, @03:06PM
https://covid19.healthdata.org/canada claims that country-wide, ICU beds have been at least 100% oversubscribed recently.
I don't trust their predictions for shit (honestly, they can be pure garbage that can vary by an order of mangitude day to day), but the raw numbers they have seem to agree with other sources. Perhaps you have some sources that could either confirm or refute the above?
Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people; the smallest discuss themselves
(Score: 3, Interesting) by JoeMerchant on Monday May 18 2020, @12:08PM (4 children)
My concept of "typically third world" is not where citizens support the government but rather where governmental power flows from the barrel of a gun, foreign aid is intercepted and hoarded by the ruling elite, and the people of a country are a resource to be exploited, or meaninglessly slaughtered, or simply ignored.
The U.S. and Britain (and much of Europe) seem to be in various stages of post-imperialist decline, where the citizens are delusional about their country's actual power and wealth and somehow expect things to go well for them just because they are British, American, or whatever.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 2) by PiMuNu on Monday May 18 2020, @01:45PM (3 children)
> are delusional about their country's actual power and wealth
Woah there cowboy! US and Europe are not doing badly when it comes to power and wealth. In this case, the delusion aint so stupid.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_GDP_(nominal) [wikipedia.org]
United States 21,439,453
European Union 18,705,132
China 14,140,163
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_GDP_(PPP) [wikipedia.org]
China 27,804,953
United States 20,289,987
European Union 18,377,114
(I wonder if SN/html does tabs?)
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Monday May 18 2020, @02:14PM (2 children)
Being on top of the dung heap doesn't make it any less of a dung heap.
We've got power yes we do, we've got wealth, yes we do, we're also a tiny minority of the world's population and strutting around like everybody is going to just fall in line because we say so... historically that tends to burn out after 50-200 years even when you hold the superior weapons technology.
And, all that wealth that "we've got" doesn't seem to translate into much meaningful for the masses, except a carrot to dangle in front of them and tease them that they could have more of it if they'd just abuse the foreigners some more.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 2) by PiMuNu on Monday May 18 2020, @04:28PM (1 child)
> historically that tends to burn out after 50-200 years
I take your point, and realise that e.g. French cooked for abouit 100 years 1660 to 1760 (or so), Brits took up the baton 1760 to 1910 (or so), US (1910 - 2010?).
As counter examples
* The (Eastern) Roman empire arguably kept on right up until early 20th century, though it changed name, culture, language, religion, through Byzantine, to Ottoman empire. Probably one could say that from 1800 or so it was a spent force. But there was a continual military power centred on Istanbul for around 2000 years.
* The Chinese empire kept going and is still going, relatively without interruption, since roughly 0 AD.
In terms of the long term, it seems likely that Europe and America will continue to hold significant power for the next couple of millennia, in some form or another - though they may have to share with China.
> tiny minority of the world's population
Just to be clear:
Europe is about 400 million
US about 300 million
That's about 10 % of the world population. I don't think one can class that as a "tiny minority". I guess the content of your comment was that we are likely to have "10%" of the power (whatever that means) in the future - and I guess that is a fair comment.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Monday May 18 2020, @07:48PM
Your counterexamples significantly "reinvented" themselves somewhat frequently with transformations more drastic than the US civil war - China a couple of times in the last century. They also tended to geographically bound themselves and mostly stay out of far flung endeavors.
IMO, China is ramping up to attempt global domination - Chinese style, one little bit of expansion at a time.
The NATO partners are holding around 10% of world population, and a great deal more of the economic and military power at the moment. Wouldn't be surprising at all if they continue to steadily dwindle on the world stage over the coming decades. I just hope the USA doesn't do something immature and self destructive on the way down, at least not more immature and self destructive than we have been recently.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 5, Informative) by PiMuNu on Monday May 18 2020, @12:09PM
Ahem:
Senegal - 2.9 % aged 65+
India - 5.4 % aged 65+
UK - 18.0 % aged 65+
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographics_of_Senegal [wikipedia.org]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demography_of_the_United_Kingdom [wikipedia.org]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographics_of_India [wikipedia.org]
(Score: 2) by progo on Monday May 18 2020, @12:51PM (3 children)
IMO feeling that Trump winning against the democratic party's candidate is merely a "real possibility" seems out of touch with reality. I'd list my evidence here, but it's not worth it to get into a US-politics bar-fight in a forum like this.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 18 2020, @02:04PM (1 child)
I'm not sure what you're saying here. Are you saying that, in your opinion, Trump's reelection is almost a given, or are you saying that he has no chance in hell ?
(Score: 2) by deimtee on Tuesday May 19 2020, @12:31PM
The only chance of Trump not winning is if either Biden or Trump drops dead before early October.
If the democrats had put up a decent candidate it would have been a reasonable fight, and difficult to pick the winner. But they didn't. They put up Sleepy Creepy Joe, who is very obviously showing age-related mental decline. For some reason the democrats would rather lose to Trump than pick a candidate who could win.
Their base will convince themselves that no reasonable person could vote for Trump, no matter how bad the alternative, and will once again be appalled on election night. Cue up some more youtube videos of crying leftists, and The Young Turks being "Shocked! Shocked I tell you! How Could America Let This Happen?"
If you cough while drinking cheap red wine it really cleans out your sinuses.
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Monday May 18 2020, @03:27PM
If Trump is re-elected, I won't be shocked. Not even surprised.
The first year of Trump made everyone numb to any further lowering of the bar.
I would have thought that by this point people would regret having voted for Trump. Reading this board just makes me realize otherwise.
The lower I set my standards the more accomplishments I have.
(Score: 2, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 18 2020, @01:55PM (4 children)
Somebody tell those Third Worlders their countries are better than the First World. They keep emigrating to my country. Why do they do this if their country is better? Has nobody told them? WHY DO THEY KEEP COMING?
(Score: 1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 18 2020, @02:14PM (1 child)
They are just moving to where all their stuff that has been stolen and plundered for centuries is located.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 18 2020, @05:00PM
Troll, hey ? The truth hurts, snowflakes ?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 18 2020, @03:05PM (1 child)
Among others, to help you picking the fruits and keeping your cities as decently clean as possible, you stupid lazy bum.
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Monday May 18 2020, @03:28PM
It's more general than picking fruits.
You hire immigrants to do a job that no American would ever do.
That's why all of Trump's wives are immigrants.
The lower I set my standards the more accomplishments I have.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 18 2020, @01:56PM (7 children)
This article was written by a brainwashed left wing nutcase. The problem(s), and the stated causes of the problem(s) have absolutely nothing to do with one another. I guess I would expect as much from an article written in such a way that Britain's GOVERNMENT is expected to win the next election. The GOVERNMENT? What? Do they swap out their entire government system? "In the 2020 elections, Technocracy is expected to in in a landslide over the Republic". Additionally, the author FAILS to understand that the United States is governed BY the people, FOR the people. It's not the "government" leadership that cost thousands of lives. It's the author of this article. Anyone who believes this crap and is in the United States is quite frankly, a sheep and doesn't take personal responsibility for their well being and of others - blaming someone else entirely for problems instead of helping to fix it themselves. Wasting time writing garbage instead of making masks or working so they can donate money to help out. You want more garbage from me? Continue to write more garbage. Maybe I'll leave eventually like I did slashdot.
(Score: 2, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 18 2020, @02:12PM (1 child)
When someone here posts a rant about someone they accuse of being a "brainwashed left wing nutcase", reading of few lines of said rant almost invariably reveal them to be "right wing nutcases". Note that I'm not saying all right-wingers are nutcases, but this one clearly is. And a poorly educated one at that.
Oh sweet sweet irony.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 18 2020, @03:07PM
But they are, even if you refrain of saying it. (grin)
(Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Monday May 18 2020, @02:15PM (4 children)
Stories are submitted by the community. If you want better stories, submit better stories. This is the HTML I use for my submissions:
<p><a href=""></a>:</p>
<p><blockquote></blockquote></p>
<p></p>
Fill in the blanks.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Monday May 18 2020, @03:33PM (3 children)
For me:
<b><a href="">(headline goes hear)</a><b>
<blockquote>
(story goes hear)
</blockquote>
(snarky comment goes hear)
The lower I set my standards the more accomplishments I have.
(Score: 2) by maxwell demon on Monday May 18 2020, @05:19PM (2 children)
I see, you do audio submissions. ;-)
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
(Score: 3, Touché) by DannyB on Monday May 18 2020, @06:31PM (1 child)
The subject line is about wrighting an article.
The lower I set my standards the more accomplishments I have.
(Score: 2) by deimtee on Tuesday May 19 2020, @12:35PM
That's never going to fly.
If you cough while drinking cheap red wine it really cleans out your sinuses.