Yeah, with the exception of all of Europe except for Germany (economy wise).
I wonder how they calculate this data? Health seems pretty difficult, and also the other categories too.
But seriously, whenever I hear the words “tea party” I get sick.
- Another vid of the Occupy Oakland crackdown. It’s kind of hard to see.
[media=vimeo]31187119[/media]
- And this. The “end of the internet” bill. Basically it gives the government the right to regulate social media. Spread it around plz.
"It also includes provisions that would make it a felony to stream unlicensed content – including cover band performances, karaoke videos, video game play-throughs, and more."
http://act.demandprogress.org/sign/pipa_house/
- BP wins approval for new deep-water drilling in the Gulf of Mexico.
And a cartoon for lulz
Democracies are not a nice or acceptable form of government.
bleh semantics. Any other word scares people. I know what you’re saying though, mob rule etc etc.
I edited it, so it’s not encouraging pure democracy (even though even that is better than what we have now.)
Nothing works. People are prone to corruption.
Nothing has worked in the past. All of systems we have are 250 years old or older. We have technology now, and the means for abundance of necessities for everyone, while still preserving the environment. I think we should take a more modern approach =]
points toward Resource Based Economy
well, I knew what you meant. However, the reason why I stated that is because using the word Democracy like its used today by the majority of people only serves to hinder our growth and allow the elite to do things they shouldn’t. And I feel like continous use of that word under that context hurts more than reality.
It has become a loaded word fit for government propaganda. IE
The fight for freedom!!
That statement is so loaded. It automatically associates anybody who says wait up, this isn’t the right answer look like a “terrorist”
You could easily fix that. But it requires a dictator.
what system would yield as much creativity as the current one? From my understanding our economy is based on a goods and services economy. You have what I want and I have what you want. Lets work something out. What could replace our system and yield as much benifits as possible?
As for the pic of the hypothetical situation. It hits hard when he said that no body cared or gave thought about wall street or the rich until the downturn. That it was perfectly acceptable that the rich where generating money from nothing and getting away with the exploitation of others as long as the average American got something about it.
Always knew the only way to fix everything was Dictatorship.
One common form of protest I’ve noticed from OWS is moving money from large banks to smaller credit unions. Now, I’ve exclusively been using a local credit union for all of my banking since I started college 7 years ago, but obviously, this decision was due entirely to convenience. In general, I’ve noticed that a lot of the actions that I do that would be considered commendable are entirely due to convenience or other selfish reasons. Most of the time I give money to charity, it’s because I’m purchasing an item I want and the charity happens to be a bonus for me. I am usually more willing to part with my money for said item because charity is involved, but I’m still mostly in it for me, as even the donation to charity is done mainly because it feels good to do. So my question is, is encouraging people to do the right thing for purely selfish reasons a viable form of social improvement, or is that just using a problem of modern society in a misguided attempt to fix things? Do the means justify the ends, or is doing the right thing for the wrong reasons inherently “the wrong thing”?
Imagine the scientific method applied to the spectrum of the world’s problems. Now obviously in the beginning there will be many solutions to a problem. Let’s say for example personal transportation. Right now we have cars, trucks, that use combustion engines and fossil fuels for energy. We also have some new creative approaches, like hybrid vehicles, electric energy, solar energy. We have trains and buses. We travel on roads and highways. But as you reach a certain point (once you have experimented and developed new creative approaches) you can examine all of the different options you have, and compare them based on certain criteria like safety, efficiency (aerodynamics, sustainability, etc.) and we begin to see that certain forms of transportation are better. You have all of the creativity necessary to solve the problem, and you can express the creativity in a positive and responsible way.
Our economy is based on competition and scarcity. It could be based on cooperation and abundance for everyone. We could eliminate all menial jobs that only exist because of the capitalist system (cashiers, stockers, advertising, banking, accountants, insurance, lobbyists, etc.). Anything having to do with money. Children would grow up in a world where they really could be whatever they want, without sacrificing their future security. Imagine the flourish of architects, engineers, scientists, artists. The system would actually encourage good values instead of greed and self-involvement and apathy like ours does.
Do you think that children would just give up and be failures because they aren’t forced to work to survive, and their basic needs are provided for? No way. Children love to learn, they are learning machines. Humans are naturally curious, the change in behavior occurs because of the psychological effects of the environment which are symptoms of the larger problem which is again the capitalist system. Everything is connected.
I know it’s kind of random and tangental, but long story short, yes creativity will be encouraged through/along with science and technology.
lol. Well I think it depends on the scale of the situation. If it’s a minor thing, like in your case I think it’s good especially if it gives you some form of positive reinforcement for doing something good. Which might lead you to do more good things later on.
On a large scale it might not be good. Because the “right thing” might not be the right thing to begin with. Like for example the US policing the world is definitely made to be seen as the right thing in our own biased media, but in reality violence isn’t the answer. And we are doing it for the wrong reason, which is for the business that is created in the military sector (sorry I forgot the right word), and for the agendas and profits of the corporatocracy. It’s a win-win-win, for them. But it is actually an extravagant lie, that turns into morally wrong actions.
I appreciate your idealism, but I do think that dismissing financial transactions of all kinds from an economy is inherently limiting to an extent. As someone who has a couple of friends who want to get into a costuming business, I know that it would be physically impossible for them to distribute every costume that every potential customer would want to them for free. Even if resources were not an issue, time certainly is. How would they be able to determine who gets a product and who doesn’t? This is an issue for anyone who would want to get into quite a few of the artisan fields. Even in modern society, only so many items can be distributed digitally. For those that can’t be, there needs to be some kind of transaction system, and a monetary one is the most efficient. And as long as there is a monetary financial system, people will need personal finances organized, requiring bankers/clerks/accountants/etc.
Artists/designers would share their creations with people freely, and would be distributed through systems that can be created to do so. You don’t need money, it’s just all you have ever known. Imagine how beautiful, art for the sake of art. Fashion for the sake of fashion, not just for profits, but just as a gift from one person to another. Ask any artist, that would be their dream. That all of their necessities would be provided for, and they would have free time to master their craft without worrying about getting enough to eat.
And along with that you can also figure out which materials use the least amount of harmful chemicals, developing new methods and types of ways to color materials. We could create clothing that could be efficiently disposed of, or new types of materials that can last for longer, hell they could even make them flame retardant, or provide ultra violet protection, provide protection from physical abbrasion and yet still be light. It’s really amazing if you think about it.
Just a quick thing. In our current capitalist system you do need money in order to purchase necessities, along with luxuries. But the monetary and barter system was created during a time when resources and necessities were limited and scarce. Now we have the means (or at least the technology and intelligence to develop the means) to provide enough food, clean water, shelter, clean energy along with anything else we might need for everyone. No one needs to be left out, like our capitalist system leaves out and exploits people in “third world” countries.
The issue here is that, unfortunately, physical art is inherently scarce, because an artist can only make so much of it. If two people wanted to receive a specific dress from a designer, but the designer was only capable of making one such dress, how would the designer determine who would receive the dress? If this would be done through a system outside of the designer’s control, how would that system determine who would receive the dress? Would it be on a first-come, first-serve basis? If so, that would exclude one of the two possibly due to factors beyond their control, such as network speeds in online transactions, or one of the two approaching the designer just slightly faster than the other. Would it be through chance? If so, than although that one transaction would indeed be fairly balanced, but if a single citizen had worse luck than others, they would receive significantly fewer non-essential items than others.
Oh you’re not easy are you. Well let’s take a look at our current technology, we have already become advanced enough to be able to connect and communicate (wirelessly even) with people anywhere on the planet or even in space. Now imagine maybe 50-100 years from now, when this type of system would become the preferred and most efficient system of the time, imagine the technology then. It would be much more advanced. So anything could be possible.
Maybe the designer would distribute to certain areas designated to distribute their type of product. Maybe the artist would put certain design ideas up on a website (or the equivalent at that time), and people who like the design or the artist’s style can request their product. And if it is more work than is possible by one artist alone I suppose that could be limiting (but it is still an extravagance to begin with. If it is a need it will be provided for.) But if the artist is good enough, he/she could have apprentice artists creating their designs for them and working for them for tutelage, thus being able to create more of the product. Either way it would be up to the individual artist how many of the product they wish to create personally (giving them freedom). And if the design is good enough or ground breaking, then it could be mass produced at the request of the people, if it is important enough technologically or otherwise.
Actually wait, scratch that. By that time there will be machines being used to do tasks such as production (there are already machines being used today in production that have replaced people and taken their “jobs”). So it won’t have to be determined by the amount of time that the artist has, but by the demand of the people or ultimately by the artists own desire. 
Everything can be solved with a little creativity and using science. Creativity that people seem to be lacking nowadays, since we don’t seem to enjoy thinking outside the box.
Power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely.
This is interesting
The power would be in the collective with everyone cooperating and working towards the same goals (abundance of necessities for everyone, environmental responsibility, and advancement of mankind, to name a few), similar to how the OWS movement is happening. Except that the minds behind it would be much more intelligent on a variety of subjects (not saying that OWS participators aren’t.)
And in regards to the article, OWS has acquired all of that money from the people who support the movement and believe in it. There’s no ulterior motives, they’re working towards exactly what they say they are.
You believe the majority can’t be corrupted or swayed?
Maybe if you look at it in the context of the past, or the present. I encourage you to watch Zeitgeist: Moving Forward, it’s the 3rd movie from TZM. The first part of the film deals a lot with psychology, and these ideas.
You might look at me crazy, but yeah. You would say that power corrupts, and people will have conflict similar to how you would say that if you leave two lions alone together (with not enough food/water for both) they would attack each other. It’s obvious right? But if you put 2 lions together, and give them enough food for both of them then they won’t attack each other. They have no reason to risk their lives or to be violent at all, their needs are taken care of.
Now imagine a similar situation, but with humans. We obviously have a higher mental capacity than lions. So imagine we grow up, and we haven’t been affected negatively, but positively by our surroundings and by our environment. And we are intellectual people (as most people in the future will be as per the current trend of education). Why would we risk our well being, or the well being of our own people if we have all of our base needs provided for, and then some? Can you see where I’m coming from? Instead of being affected negatively, they will gain positive reinforcement from the system, from people they look up to, and they will grow up intelligent and with better values than your average joe from today.
And I encourage you to check out the films (Zeitgeist: Moving Forward, and also Zeitgeist: Addendum), if you want we can discuss any problems you have with things and I’ll do my best to listen and help. When I first heard about it, there was some very intelligent people who helped me with my confusion so I know it helps (but I’m not half as intelligent as them probably lol).
:shake:
Monkeys should not be allowed to carry weapons.