Subject: Re: source access vs dynamism From: Erik Naggum <erik@naggum.no> Date: 1999/09/21 Newsgroups: comp.lang.lisp Message-ID: <3146893332471700@naggum.no> * Raffael Cavallaro | Your implication is clear; they are foolish for not standing up for | themselves in the first place as _you_ do. I wondered what would make this a true implication. I came to conclude that one would have to dispense with the concept of time, such that I could not look back at things past and wonder why without, at the same time, being with the people who did it at the time and saying they are (present tense) foolish. with a working concept of time in place, most people are able to look back at a time past and wonder why they didn't see things differently. if they dare to examine the causes (which you don't, by the way), they may be able to avoid similar problems in the future. passing judgment on the past with future information, knowledge, insight or wisdom is so moronic that I don't even consider the option that someone is thinking in that mode, but you appear to be lacking a concept of time that would make you see it as just that: moronic. what we see, historically, is that people grudgingly accept some pretty bad conditions, which for some reason continue to appear better than all other conditions, even though they aren't with a more objective point of view, also when considering the transition costs, and then, after a while, when they have realized that a lot of people are just as unhappy as themselves, they object in a way that makes a difference. of course, they also overreact a lot, my guess is to make up for the feeling of shame for not doing anything sooner, but the whole sequence of events suggests that the core problem was not speaking up and letting others know how you feel when and as you felt it. for the above implication to be true, the concepts of cause and effect also need to be dispensed with. my observation is that people who are unhappy with something don't even admit it to _themselves_ unless others validate their feelings. so somebody has to start saying it, for labor unions and all kinds of protest movements to work. to some, this means that people will _start_ to feel unhappy and whoever speaks up is the cause of the unhappiness, implying that people would have been happy with their abysmal working conditions if nobody let them know. this is cleaerly false, but still groups of people need someone to speak up and on their behalf. well, I am that person. I speak up. ironically, stupid people like Raffael Cavallaro object to the part, yet embrace the whole. what's even more ironic is that Raffael also speaks up, and then others too timid or whatever to even think aloud can chime in after someone has "dared" to speak up, usually without a clue and usually unable to voice a reasoned opinion but stay with "yeah, I agree". what bothers me is that those who ignite the masses are so stupid and miss the point so often and so often cause so much pointless destruction in the process. | No matter that you run no risk of being beaten, tortured, or murdered, or | of starving if you express your wants directly to your prospective | employers. no, I don't run that risk, Raffael Cavallaro. I really don't. I'm going to be labeled a racist by you again, but what the heck: this is not the reality of the people I esd talking about. also, you have to be pretty dumb to voice your concerns in such a way as to be beaten, tortured, or murdered. if that's a likely consequence, shut up. however, the reason it so often _becomes_ the likely consequences is that those who protest believe it will be, and then choose a form of protest that only works in an extremely antagonistic way, like riots. "oh, my, you really are upset about the working hours, aren't you? now, let's see what we can do about that, shall we? incidentally, would you be so kind as to burn down as few buildings as possible while we discuss these matters?" is _not_ a likely response to a riot with massive destruction of life and property. the problem is of course that when reason doesn't work, (the threat of) violence may be called for, but the assumption that reason won't work is rampant. the concept that there is a class struggle and that people _can't_ talk across "class lines" is one of the most self-fulfilling there is. it's like certain forms of racism -- the one where you accuse people of being racist because you _prefer_ to think it's because of your skin instead of examining the many much more likely causes. keep it up, and what you experience will be indistinguishable from what you believe. | You deride people who would forfeit their lives and/or their loved ones' | lives if they stood up to their employers, for not being independent | consultants. this is, again, an insane accusation with no possible link to reality. | Your post is offensive. no, it isn't. not to you, nor to anyone else. what's offensive is what your disturbed psyche produces when you see certain words or phrases. | My understanding of it is not faulty, as evinced by the responses of | others, who pointed out, with no little sarcasm, that the reason such | people don't stand up to their employers is that they would become | destitute or dead if they did so. I'm interested in why the same behavioral pattern exists even when the chances of being beaten, tortured, murdered, or becoming destitute are exactly zero. explaining the behavior under such conditions is so trivial that it has no value to discuss it at all. it occurs to me that some people have not gotten their anger out of their system enough to be able to deal with such things rationally, and therefore are concerned _only_ with the impossible situations. not unlike my irritation with people who seem to _value_ ignorance and non-thinking and stupidity. | You deride the opressed just as you deride and abuse posters to | comp.lang.lisp, because you are a verbally abusive, disdainful person. I | believe a very good case can be made that you actively drive people | _away_ from lisp because of the tone of your posts to c.l.l. Though you | have said "lisp is better off without them," I'm sure others believe with | me, that c.l.l might well be better off _with_ them, and without your | abusive posts. so your _real_ reason for posting insane accusations and other drivel was to "prove" how bad I am, is that it? and now that you have figured out that you won't be able to win that way, your real purpose behind all the crap shines through, despite the fact that I have been _responding_ to the biggest asshole on comp.lang.lisp in a really long time, who has not only posted insane accusations, but has shifted his insane accusations around every time they were countered and dismissed. I have strong disdain for cowardice, too, Raffael Cavallaro, and you're the worst kind of coward I have seen in a really long time. if you have been a coward for as long as your expertise in it suggests, it's a pity that you have been beaten up verbally for it much sooner, but, hey, maybe that's it? your defense of cowards everywhere to be sneaky character assassins instead of doing anything useful and constructive takes the shape of accusing others of favoring beating and murdering other cowards, and now you, Raffael Cavallaro, the super-coward, speaksup. hooray! let the masses of cowards be ignited with emotional abandon! a likely conclusion from this debacle is "you can't post to c.l.l without political fanatics with a coward's agenda attacking you for all sorts of irrelevant things." I finally understand why you couldn't confine yourself to Lisp, Raffael, but had to use all sorts of really stupid tricks to attack me. if you had been brave enough to state your actual opinion up front, it would not have made anyone react, so instead of you had to go through all the stupid theatrics that only cowards find necessary. and now I see that all the rabid accusations were only means to this end: to be able to grow big enough in your anger to be able to say what little wimpering whine you had for a real complaint. I pity you, Raffael Cavallaro. I really do. and what I feel for you is not disdain, it's disgust, at such a despicable waste of care and love that brought you into this world and to the point where you could get a Ph.D to sign your pathetic sniveling posts with. #:Erik