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[hector13]

I’m also sure you could’ve done it without the nativist patriotism, but eh, I’m more bothered that it appears you’re ignoring your country’s history there.

 

To be fair, he is British.

I don’ geddit.

[Maximum Spin]

It's worth noting that this wasn't intended as an insult; in any case, as I said, the American definition of "liberal" is consistent with its original meaning.

[smjjames]

I’m also sure you could’ve done it without the nativist patriotism, but eh, I’m more bothered that it appears you’re ignoring your country’s history there.

 

To be fair, he is British.

I don’ geddit.

It was a joke about Europeans because Europe (and others) complain about the US showing off nationalism and patriotism.

[redwallzyl]

The split definitely arises from the American definition of "liberal", though. The Clinton definition seems to have arisen from people being unaware of the European definition when they heard the word "neoliberal".

(removed)

Insults? Really?

Americans use the word to mean social liberalism and social democracy generally. The rest of the world uses it to mean economic liberalism, laissez faire classical liberalism exc.

Neoliberalism does in fact have a definition at least in my academic discipline of anthropology. You can look that up if you want and there are endless papers on it.

[Frumple]

There totes is, but the general use is scattered further than the results of a week long street orgy.

(removed)

Except when it doesn't, of course. Which is often. Or when people disagree as to what the original meaning was. Also fairly common. Or when it's basically just a generic swear word, c.f. most right wing media better than half the time.

Cus 'murrica actually has a fair bit to do with that, though. A lot of our schools kinda' blow in particular when it comes to stuff like history and social sciences, and the more nativist political corner has persistently tried to fuck the systems related to that into a deeper hole. So a chunk of the fuzziness has been due long running attempts to wreck the things that make terms like that stay particularly consistent in meaning, because bloody somehow that's "real american" or whatever works as an appropriate designator depending on the specific group doing the sabotage.

[smjjames]

I take Neoliberalism to generally mean the globalist liberal policies since the Clinton administration. Obviously the globalist policies started before that, but it’s connected with the Clinton admin onward.

[Akura]

Wasnt the ‘if you didn’t pay the fire department or whoever, they wouldn’t put out your burning house’ an actual thing back in the 19th century or something? It had a heck of a lot more to do with corruption and capitalism than anarcho-whatever.

There was a fairly recent case where a town only had privatized fire service. One guy who didn't pay, his house caught fire. The... I don't really want to call them "firefighters" here, showed up, but refused to do anything, even when the homeowner tried to pay for service on the spot. They did put out the fire at the house next door(who had paid for the service) when the fire spread there, but refused to touch the other house. It burned to the ground, and killed the family pets.

Here's the story. Huh, 2013. That's more recent than I thought.

[Rolan7]

I mean, they were people who professionally fight fires, AKA for money
It's real easy to judge them instead of the person who demanded a free service.

[bloop_bleep]

Wasnt the ‘if you didn’t pay the fire department or whoever, they wouldn’t put out your burning house’ an actual thing back in the 19th century or something? It had a heck of a lot more to do with corruption and capitalism than anarcho-whatever.

There was a fairly recent case where a town only had privatized fire service. One guy who didn't pay, his house caught fire. The... I don't really want to call them "firefighters" here, showed up, but refused to do anything, even when the homeowner tried to pay for service on the spot. They did put out the fire at the house next door(who had paid for the service) when the fire spread there, but refused to touch the other house. It burned to the ground, and killed the family pets.

Here's the story. Huh, 2013. That's more recent than I thought.

That is total fucking bullshit. (In the way that it is horrifying, not that it is untrue.) The mayor didn't even apologize, and they arrested the son on assault charges when he went to the fire department to demand that the fire be put out. Did anything come of it or do the firefighters still ignore people who don't pay the fee?

Ninja-edit:

I mean, they were people who professionally fight fires, AKA for money
It's real easy to judge them instead of the person who demanded a free service.

It's one thing to with-hold a house-keeping service if a small fee isn't paid. It's another thing to endanger peoples' lives and property because of it. He even offered to pay the fee up-front, but they still refused.

[dragdeler]

-snip-

[MetalSlimeHunt]

Re: Firefighters

That's what happens when a place in society is withheld on monetization. Every aspect of civilization can be corrupted in this way, with higher or lower bounds of resistance based on the stakes. AAA game companies are without shame while private hospital staff tend to be more resistant, and such.

Would the firefighters have allowed people to burn to death instead of pets? Hard to say, but it's not a gamble you'd want to take.

[Maximum Spin]

That's what happens when a place in society is withheld on monetization.

That's so shallow though. Money is just a system we've developed for expressing value. If you do more for other people, other people are willing to do more for you; this is a human universal, money only serves as a convenient medium of exchange.

[Rolan7]

Ninja-edit:

I mean, they were people who professionally fight fires, AKA for money
It's real easy to judge them instead of the person who demanded a free service.

It's one thing to with-hold a house-keeping service if a small fee isn't paid. It's another thing to endanger peoples' lives and property because of it. He even offered to pay the fee up-front, but they still refused.

They showed up and kept the fire from spreading, and I'm pretty sure they made sure he was safe.
Sure he offered to pay the fee - that's literally the same as trying to buy insurance on the property once the fire started.

I find it particularly telling how you claim they "endangered" anyone, when they literally did the opposite, for free.

[Rolan7]

Though I should clarify, my takeaway is that fire service shouldn't be privatized.  It should be offered by the government, and everyone should have to pay whether they want to or not.

It's not the firefighters' fault, is all.

[MetalSlimeHunt]

That's what happens when a place in society is withheld on monetization.

That's so shallow though. Money is just a system we've developed for expressing value. If you do more for other people, other people are willing to do more for you; this is a human universal, money only serves as a convenient medium of exchange.

Money at this point is detached from value due to muh fiat currency, it's more an expression of authority. Nations with authority have confidence in their national banks, nations without don't have such confidence and their money is worthless as a consequence.

More importantly is the relationship here between a social position and the exchange of a particular fee of money. Firefighting is in economic terms a non-exclusive public good, you don't cease to have firefighting coverage because other people do have it (indeed, just the opposite since fire fucks the NAP and can't be stopped by lawyers).

Making people pay a specific fee for individual firefighting coverage is to exchange firefighting into the category of a club good, still non-exclusive but now private. You get automatic firefighting coverage within city bounds (can't have any political doners losing their houses because they forgot to pay a dumb fee), but the poors outside? Eh, let em in the door if they can pay the piper.

It is this imbalance that is the corrupting influence. It encourages people to take massive unnecessary risks even if they do know how it works, and for most it's a confidence destroying technicality in what is generally seen as one of the big three public services (security from other humans, security from disease, and security from disaster). It is no surprise that the son attacked the fire chief, his outrage was at nothing less than a violation of the most basic form of social contract.

Powerful people who think they can violate the social contract never seem to understand that they're fucking themselves just as hard - they're depriving the people in society a reason to continue cooperating with any aspect of the social contract. It may seem small, but it is an expression of a larger trend, of a system gaming disease that seeks to maximize benefits for social "providers" while providing as little as possible...and trends like that can and have brought down empires.