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No

9 (37.5%)

Yes

15 (62.5%)

Total Members Voted: 23

[Evil Knievel]

I have now read all the thread in a single go.

1. It is surprising that the latest TTIP protests have not been mentioned yet.

And I don't get it that while I find discussion and scepticism about everywhere in my environment (I literally don't know anybody saying anything positive about the agreement), the internet seems almost untouched, as is the mass media. The news line was worth about 2 sentences: "XXX number of protestants in Berlin, largest rally since the Iraq war protests, and here some superficially blunt arguments for TTIP and some equally stupid fears against. In Ankara ..."

Granted, I don't think the real arguments for TTIP are good for mass media - I doubt that TTIP is for the masses.

Spoiler: a bit of a rant (click to show/hide)

I followed it a bit on reddit - very weird disinformation going on there, lots of repetition of lines, e.g., "can't critisize something that's not finished/secretly discussed/to complicated for our simple minds" - of course we can and we should, "negociations must be held secret" - yeah sure, democracy was never really intended, "nothing is secret, all is on the internets" - what? the stuff posted on the EU website is about as informative as a mcdonalds commercial.

It would be interesting to know who sends people to these secret meetings and pays how much for it, and how much money is sunk into drafting documents etc.. I would think that all these costs are high enough so that the thing in the end will really unlikely fail, regardless of how much people don't like it.

2. Monsanto etc.:
- Of course Monsanto is evil, as any corporation is evil. How could they not be? Their goal is to make as much money as they possibly can, at the lowest cost to themselves (disregarding costs caused other than to themselves, of course).

Spoiler: more rant (click to show/hide)

What do you think happens to Monsanto if they tried to act like benevolent actors? What do you think shareholders would say to the CEOs responsible for such a change? Yes, they would kick them out and find more ruthless executives. Monsanto just has worse PR than e.g. Google, who (yes they are legally persons, aren't they?) is certainly equally evil, as is any other company above a certain scale (yes, VW too, and H&M and Coca Cola). The only way is to regulate them fiercely, by hopefully not yet bought governments.

- The science and development costs ARE being payed for largely by the government, at least all the basic research is.

Spoiler: yet another rant (click to show/hide)

Only if there are enough results from state-funded science, which can with a large enough probability lead to the profitable products, the investment will be made. The state funds the research for the most part, the companies produce and market. And then, they use IP to monopolize their products. Which, let me guess, will be a central part of the TTIP (at least it seems to be part of TPP already).

[martinuzz]

I think TTIP is an affront to the concept of a constitutional state. It places the right to private property above every and all constitutions, regardless of said constitutions' democratic legitimacy, by creating a tribunal that can verdict and fine states, without regard to constitutional laws, and as cherry on top, their sessions are classified secret.

Voting in favour of TTIP is basically saying that you are in favour of an olicharchy with corporate boards, without any form of transparency or control, instead of a constitutinal state with parliaments and the right of public information.

Since the US has always been very keen on preserving democracy, they should really arrest anyone who thought up and or promotes TTIP, and put them in Guantanomo bay on charges of terrorist activities aimed at undermining the state.

[Sheb]

The benefits of TTIP are also pretty limited in scope anyway.

[Nick K]

2. Monsanto etc.:
- Of course Monsanto is evil, as any corporation is evil. How could they not be? Their goal is to make as much money as they possibly can, at the lowest cost to themselves (disregarding costs caused other than to themselves, of course). [spoiler=more rant]What do you think happens to Monsanto if they tried to act like benevolent actors? What do you think shareholders would say to the CEOs responsible for such a change? Yes, they would kick them out and find more ruthless executives. Monsanto just has worse PR than e.g. Google, who (yes they are legally persons, aren't they?) is certainly equally evil, as is any other company above a certain scale (yes, VW too, and H&M and Coca Cola). The only way is to regulate them fiercely, by hopefully not yet bought governments.

I understand what you're saying, but I don't think we should assume that small companies are "good" compared to big ones. My experience is that smaller companies are often more willing to violate government regulations by doing illegal things such as paying desperate workers below minimum wage.
A big company would find it hard to get away with that sort of thing - they have enough staff that someone would be bound to go to the press or the authorities. A little shop with just a few employees often can and there are plenty of small-scale "entrepreneurs" who'll do things like that without even thinking, as long as they think it'll give them a competitive edge.

[da_nang]

Ingrid Lomfors, Swedish historian who has mainly researched Jewish history, Sweden's refugee policy and the Holocaust, has announced the initiation of the genocide of the Swedish people with the blessing of the leftist government.

#sverigetillsammans #IngridQuisling #svensktfolkmord

[SirQuiamus]

Aren't you glad you're not living in Sweden, then? Finland will remain a safe haven for Swedish Culture, don't you worry.

Also, waiting for the inevitable "SWEDEN YES" kekposts...

EDIT: I watched the entire video but couldn't find a single implicit or explicit exhortation to genocide. Could it be that they've already edited out the scandalous bits and replaced them with trite cookie-cutter multi-kulti blather? Very fishy, I say.

[scriver]

So apparently no culture of any kind exist anywhere, and neither does peoples. Good to know!

[SirQuiamus]

That's what everyone in cultural studies has been saying since the eighties.

[scriver]

Yup! That's why all laws look the same everywhere, people act the same everywhere, think the same things everywhere. We're all just really one person!

[SirQuiamus]

[soap-post]Swede-laws, Finn-jails, Syrian health-meat-vegan falafel and Kibbutzim, Universal non-toxic-glycene-free Merkels and Kraut, All-One! We're ALL-ONE! All-one or NONE! Exceptions eternally? NONE![/soap-post]

EDIT:
...
In all seriousness... no. Cultural studies can get pretty barmy sometimes, but I don't think anyone over there has ever suggested that things and people are exactly the same everywhere, because they fucking well aren't, and that's a fact. However, quite a few totally sane people have argued time and time again that this 'thing' called "Culture" is not actually a tangible thing (in the same way as rye bread, vodka, and falafel are tangible things) and that, I think, is a perfectly uncontroversial idea.

[TD1]

Yup! That's why all laws look the same everywhere, people act the same everywhere, think the same things everywhere. We're all just really one person!

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

A Display of Mackerel
BY MARK DOTY
         
       
They lie in parallel rows,
on ice, head to tail,
each a foot of luminosity

barred with black bands,
which divide the scales’
radiant sections

like seams of lead
in a Tiffany window.
Iridescent, watery

prismatics: think abalone,
the wildly rainbowed
mirror of a soapbubble sphere,

think sun on gasoline.
Splendor, and splendor,
and not a one in any way

distinguished from the other
—nothing about them
of individuality. Instead

they’re all exact expressions
of the one soul,
each a perfect fulfilment

of heaven’s template,
mackerel essence. As if,
after a lifetime arriving

at this enameling, the jeweler’s
made uncountable examples,
each as intricate

in its oily fabulation
as the one before
Suppose we could iridesce,

like these, and lose ourselves
entirely in the universe
of shimmer—would you want

to be yourself only,
unduplicatable, doomed
to be lost? They’d prefer,

plainly, to be flashing participants,
multitudinous. Even now
they seem to be bolting

forward, heedless of stasis.
They don’t care they’re dead
and nearly frozen,

just as, presumably,
they didn’t care that they were living:
all, all for all,

the rainbowed school
and its acres of brilliant classrooms,
in which no verb is singular,

or every one is. How happy they seem,
even on ice, to be together, selfless,
which is the price of gleaming.

[scriver]

[soap-post]Swede-laws, Finn-jails, Syrian health-meat-vegan falafel and Kibbutzim, Universal non-toxic-glycene-free Merkels and Kraut, All-One! We're ALL-ONE! All-one or NONE! Exceptions eternally? NONE![/soap-post]

EDIT:
...
In all seriousness... no. Cultural studies can get pretty barmy sometimes, but I don't think anyone over there has ever suggested that things and people are exactly the same everywhere, because they fucking well aren't, and that's a fact. However, quite a few totally sane people have argued time and time again that this 'thing' called "Culture" is not actually a tangible thing (in the same way as rye bread, vodka, and falafel are tangible things) and that, I think, is a perfectly uncontroversial idea.

Of course it's not a tangible idea. "Society" and "family" are not tangible ideas either. That doesn't mean they don't exist.

And that is not what she was saying, by the way. She was saying that because of historical foreign influences and because people have immigrated to Sweden throughout history there is no such thing as Swedish culture. Which is just ridiculous. Imagine somebody saying that because of those reasons there is not such thing as, say, Malinese or Thai culture.

[SirQuiamus]

She was saying that because of historical foreign influences and because people have immigrated to Sweden throughout history there is no such thing as Swedish culture. Which is just ridiculous.

Look, it's just some stock piece of rhetoric she learned back in the swingin' pos'structuralis' 80s, and people like her have been constantly giving similar speeches by rote ever since: "There is no such thing as X," with such things as Nature, Humanity, Reason, Truth, and Reality routinely playing the role of X in that formula. If you look through the fustian, she isn't saying that you, as a Swedish person, do not "have" any culture of your own, because that would indeed be rock-eatingly stupid and delusional. From cultural studies' point of view, it's not bloody possible for a human being to not have a culture, because pretty much everything that human beings do and think is culture by definition, no two ways about it. But then again, it's perfectly reasonable to wonder why some things are included in the category of "Swedish" or "Finnish" culture while others are left out for no apparent reason...

The point is that national cultures that are presumed to be monolithic and unchanging in lay discussions are anything but for people who actually study them: It's just a simple fact that cultures change, and if you're a multi-kulti-hugs-and-kisses progressive, of course you're going to draw on facts of cultural history to argue for pluralism and diversity. Because you realize that your culture was never all that un-diverse to begin with...

EDIT: I think I'll make a dedicated thread for worthy discussion of this worthy topic...

[GoblinCookie]

Look, it's just some stock piece of rhetoric she learned back in the swingin' pos'structuralis' 80s, and people like her have been constantly giving similar speeches by rote ever since: "There is no such thing as X," with such things as Nature, Humanity, Reason, Truth, and Reality routinely playing the role of X in that formula. If you look through the fustian, she isn't saying that you, as a Swedish person, do not "have" any culture of your own, because that would indeed be rock-eatingly stupid and delusional. From cultural studies' point of view, it's not bloody possible for a human being to not have a culture, because pretty much everything that human beings do and think is culture by definition, no two ways about it. But then again, it's perfectly reasonable to wonder why some things are included in the category of "Swedish" or "Finnish" culture while others are left out for no apparent reason...

The point is that national cultures that are presumed to be monolithic and unchanging in lay discussions are anything but for people who actually study them: It's just a simple fact that cultures change, and if you're a multi-kulti-hugs-and-kisses progressive, of course you're going to draw on facts of cultural history to argue for pluralism and diversity. Because you realize that your culture was never all that un-diverse to begin with...

EDIT: I think I'll make a dedicated thread for worthy discussion of this worthy topic...

This is basically Buddhism.  The self does not remain consistant over time hence the self does not exist.  The main difference is when we talk about the self most people know what we mean, when we talk about culture nobody knows what we are exactly talking about.

[GoblinCookie]

A Dutch investigation has found that the missile that shot down flight MH17 seemed to have come from rebel controlled parts of Ukraine and was an SAM missile, probably to very few peoples surprise.

Just the closest thread I could find, since the older 'whole of Europe' thread and the Russian politics thread are both dead.

Yes, we know the rebels shot down a civilian airliner by accident.  The significance of this is?