@Koder Well you have to understand itâs rather strange when an account is newly with a single comment to it. But I digress because nothing can be proven and pursuing that further is just asking for a pissing match. As for the rest of itâŚ
First of all, the two-party system is a symptom of the first-past-the-post voting system. I tend to get annoyed by people who feel superior to both sides by just denouncing them and choosing not to participate. Weâll have to change our entire voting system to fix this issue, but until then the two-party system will stand.
While Iâd love to fix it, itâs just there right now, and I get a bit annoyed with people when they seem to feel superior for not voting for either of them. Thatâs part of the reason Trump won IMHO - I was a Bernie supporter all the way, but once he lost the Bernie people shouldâve lined-up behind Hillary just to ensure Trumpâs defeat at least, but many refused. I know thatâs quite a controversial opinion, but Iâd have preferred a Democratically-run government over this Republican-run bullcrap overall. Hilllary wasnât my favorite, but I thought she was at least leagues better than Trump and I personally didnât really give much of a crap about Benghazi and âBUT HER E-MAILS!â
Again, that last paragraph is probably my most controversial of opinions, but I stand by it. I didnât like Hillary, but I knew that faced with Trump, it was no time for in-fighting. But it happened anyway.
I think what youâre saying is that technological advances are more important than political ones, but I dare to disagree with you there. While technological advancements are just as important, if we continue to lose battle after battle in the political playing field, that will eventually catch up to the technical advancements and could even lead to companies like Purism being infiltrated or even shut-down. Thus political victories are just as important as technological advancements.
I am concerned for the future of the country. âVoting with moneyâ is a big problem more than a solution - corporations are not people and money shouldnât be speech. If thatâs the way the country works then the only opinions that matter anymore will be the opinions of the rich and large corporations. Because they have all the money, and having all the money means having all the speech in that case.
In a system like that, you end-up with a government that literally doesnât give a crap what itâs people think.
Statistically proven that our government give a damn anymore. They just laugh at us as they lie to the population and then go do whatever they want - doublespeak left and right. Nobody knows whatâs true anymore, everyone just points at each other screaming âFAKE NEWSâ, so now people are just believing whatever theyâre biased or inclined to believe in - basically, believing in whatever they want to believe, not whatâs supported by evidence, because now evidence can be faked and nobody is an authority on anything anymore apparently.
But yeah, if money is speech then weâre screwed, because the top class of people can easily overcome the entire rest of the population of the country using what is just chump-change to them.
To be honest, this is my ultimate fear in regards to the internet-related stuff.
I get what youâre trying to say, and I agree - the two party system sucks as well as many of the things you listed there. It would be better to get rid of those things in one sweeping blow of course. But I feel that that is unrealistic. Yes in an ideal world Net Neutrality wouldnât be needed, but it is not an ideal world. In an ideal world we wouldnât need laws against theft and murder either⌠but such an ideal world will likely never exist. We need laws to protect the people and probably always will.
Ultimately, I just donât see why youâd be applauding for the removal of a law that was doing good for us. All it did was regulate ISPs and ensure they couldnât just do whatever they wanted without oversight. The better thing to do wouldâve been to declare them a utility really, but only the most âextreme leftâ (extreme left for the US, maybe) people like Bernie would even talk about doing such a thing.
Without NN, ISPs are unregulated and without oversight. Theyâll be doing whatever they want now. Selling your history, throttling your connections, blocking your access to websites - all of that is legal and there are no laws against it. They may even start blocking VPNs at some point. Itâs a scary thought.
Of course âsupporting ethical companies and boycotting unethical onesâ is still something good to do and important, but that alone isnât enough to stop whatâs happening. Plus with how big some companies are getting, itâs becoming impossible to boycott some of them anymore without seriously putting yourself at major disadvantages. You need the government to break-up monopolies and the likes of course, for this very reason. I think companies in the US are realizing that they can do just about whatever they want to people and people will continue buying their crap anyway. So few people pay attention, so few people care. So few people in my age group even bother to vote and theyâre part of the problem, itâs frustrating truly. Apathy will be the end of us, eventually itâll reach critical mass and be too late to do anything to stop it anymore.
I agree with some points but disagree with others. I definitely donât agree with getting rid of Net Neutrality, and the reasoning you proposed just feel like Libertarian talking points to me. While I agree with them to an extent, I donât think theyâre enough on their own.
Anyway, thatâs about all I got to say. From here I just agree to disagree because while I do like some healthy debate, carrying on an argument beyond a certain point starts to get awkward and redundant and you just start to repeat yourselves at each other. All in all I share your opinions, but think that fighting politically is just as important as supporting ethical companies.
@MrFriday Generally agree with what youâve said. When everythingâs run by money, everyone becomes a number and all ethics go out the window. I certainly donât believe in full-on socialism, but our healthcare system is disgusting and the stock market just corrupts companies and turns them from nice private corporations with standards and ethics into machines that puts money before everything. I feel like our problem is that weâre a money-worpshipping culture, in a way. When money comes before all else, you eventually end up in a dystopia run by oligarchs.
I think Net Neutrality couldâve had a better name, really. Think that alone made some people dislike it. Itâs honestly pathetic how just a name can affect peopleâs perception of something - many Americans were asked if they supported âObamacareâ and were vehemently against it, and then the same people were asked if they support the âAffordable Care Actâ and they were all for it then (if you donât know, Obamacare is just a slang name for the ACA). Just goes to show that the majority of people have no idea what theyâre talking about and are just picking sides. I think that in truth theyâre just siding with whatever side their peers and family sides with, and pretending to be passionate and informed about politics when theyâre truly not.
And yeah, lots of people basically just hate the government being involved in anything. Some people want there to be no EPA and reject that manmade climate-change exists even though. Iâm pretty much convinced that despite the mountains of evidence that proves global warming, nothing will ever happen on a global scale to reverse it until it starts to affect peopleâs daily lives. I still hear people say stupid things like âOMG itâs so cold today, so much for global warming amirite??â
Thereâs plenty of people who simply wonât believe anything until their biased media company of choice say so (this is true of both Conservatives and Liberals, but Fox News is certainly the first thing that comes to mind), and even then some of them would continue to reject it. And theyâll always just attack you ad-hominem too - such as how many times Iâve had to refute the âWell Al Gore uses loads of electricity for his fancy shmancy house!â argument, which is irrelevant but even if it was, itâs real fake news. (Yes his house uses more than the average Americanâs home, but so does pretty much anyone with a sizeable house and I donât like the logical fallacy that anyone that cares about the environment has to âprove themselves by living like Tarzan or theyâre hypocrites!â)
We live in a world where thereâs still crazy people that downplay the Holocaust. I just canât believe weâve still made so little progress by 2017.
I donât think the government should have itâs nose in everything, no. But I donât think thereâs really no good reason to think that NN is bad, or that laws prohibiting ISPs from collecting and selling your history are bad, or that laws that prevented dumping coal mining waste into rivers and streams was bad, or that laws that required airlines to disclose baggage fees were bad, or that laws prevented poisoning the ecosystem with lead were bad.
Yeah I just get tired of arguing at some point. Speaking of which, think Iâve typed-up enough, just had a burst of energy and figured Iâd vent a little.
Peace.
