Subject: Re: Engineering Envy [was: Re: CL and UML] From: Erik Naggum <erik@naggum.net> Date: Mon, 16 Jul 2001 16:08:26 GMT Newsgroups: comp.lang.lisp Message-ID: <3204288502691393@naggum.net> * "Biep @ http://www.biep.org/" <reply-via@my-web-site.com> > Yes, these people sign contracts, but what does a stupid piece of paper > mean to them? The fact that we in the West get all worked up over > contracts and signatures doesn't mean that it has any significance in > their culture - if your patron asks you do do something, including > signing a paper, of course you do it. Well, if nothing else, this certainly explains why they do not eveolve reasonable economies or legal systems and why the whole continent reeks of corruption. It is so tremendously sad to see what a bad culture can do to good people and how much it can keep them back. Stamping out bad cultures should have been one of the United Nations' primary missions. But, tragically, it cannot be. We show "respect" for people by trying to pretend that we think they know what they are doing, if they are harming themselves in the name of some "culture". People in our own culture who "invented" the same insanity would be put in jail or in hospital, but, instead of telling people to snap out of it, we "respect" other cultures through a process of extremely demeaning and denigratory "we do not think you could do any better, so it is OK for you to do those insane things". The only _real_ evidence of a lack of belief in cultural or racial superiority is in the ability to get angry at people who do stupid and harmful things, regardless of which culture they (seem to) come from. If you actually think someone who does something stupid and harmful must be protected from criticism because of his culture or his skin pigmentation, you are a racist. Otherwise, what is so different about some stupid culture who gets everyone supposedly screwed by "globalization" and a gang of idiot youths who take psychoactive drugs that seriously damage their brains? Both are _cultures_ and they should be left alone, right? > Nestle steps into THEIR culture; why should they have an obligation to > know about Nestle's culture? Yeah, right. And when people from the same culture come to the "West", their "culture" must be protected from "Western influence". So either way, Western culture should not influence these poor hapless bastards and it is all our fault that they get screwed over because they are stupid. Put their retarded cultures in a museum and give the people who obviously suffer from them a _real_ chance, dammit. The problem is not so-called exploitation, it is that their cultures are unable to withstand attempts to _be_ exploited, both on the societal and the personal level, and those attempts will _always_ occur. Please recall that the evil white dudes who "enslaved" all those Africans never actually trapped or caught _any_ of them themselves -- why bother when they could just purchase them from the tribes that more than willingly enslaved members of other tribes, because slavery had certainly been the accepted policy among themselves in those _bad_ cultures for many millennia. We white guys may not have the _right_ answer, but we most certainly do have a _better_ answer than crappy cultures like that. (That we in fact embraced slavery of our own people and other tribes not _that_ many years earlier is no more than evidence that we also were once pretty crappy, but at least we figured it out in time. However, today we are dead set on _inventing_ the slave, instead -- through machines, computers, and robots. The idea of having someone to command that will do any damn idiotic task you give it has not exactly died. In fact, many managers still believe in slavery, a stupid cultural thing that led to such disasters as labor unions and communism, neither of which would have happened if the people in power had had any brains at all. But brains may not be enough: ask any graduate student about his professor's personal beliefs on slavery.) Regardless of how one views _any_ culture, everyone has an obligation to himself, and a duty to those who might pick up the pieces afterwards, to figure out as best he can what he is getting himself into. Failure to do so cannot be explained by blaming a retarded culture that has failed to develop the concept of planning. Some stupid mistakes people make cause death. This is a fact of life. It is true whether it involves reckless disregard for personal safety around fire, guns, or electricity, or abandoning your livelihood for somebody else's promises, "patron" or not. Stupid cultures who believe in patrons die. Smart people in those cultures get out before it is too late. I for one welcome anyone who has the guts and brains to escape from such a retarded culture. (But I am also inclined to send those back who bring their culture with them and demand protection from the realities of what they have chosen.) I do not believ that the "victims" of "globalization" are victims. I believe they are trying to enforce their crappy cultures on "us" much more than "we" are trying to impose ours on them. Those who favor those cultures and still live in the "West" could just move to their favorite cultures and live there instead of trying to get anyone to adopt the backward, retarded cultures that are so easily "victimized". > Oh, and some people there lisp.. :-) I appreciate that the "gratuitous Lisp relevance" idea has caught on. #:Erik -- Travel is a meat thing.