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5251

Living Room / Re: Olympic coverage this year SUCKS!

« Last post by Renegade on August 08, 2012, 11:26 PM »

I actually stopped drinking Coke (or any sugary junk for that matter) and no longer eat at McDonalds. And I LOVE the taste of Big Macs... I'm am always soooooo tempted every time I'm near one... As for cars, I have no idea what any of the other sponsors for the Olympics are. Oh, Visa. Yeah... That's one that I can't really get around much. I much prefer to use cash, but my wife likes the paper-trail, and I love my wife more than I hate Visa. (That says a lot.   )

As for their viewpoint, I really have no idea. I think it is almost impossible for any of them to speak out about any of the kinds of things above. What would happen? Well, after the crucifixion... I think things would go downhill just a little bit.

So I doubt that we can actually get what they really think. My bet would be on most being far too scared to say anything. I could be wrong. No idea. Just guessing.

Boycott simply is not practicable on an individual level ... it requires group cooperation, crowd-sourcing, if you will.

Well, yes and no. I know where I spend my money, and if more people did the same, well, there you go. It starts with "me". I kind of see it something like this:

An error does not become truth by reason of multiplied propagation, nor does truth become error because nobody sees it. Truth stands, even if there be no public support. It is self sustained.

https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Ghandi

-Ghandi

But I don't let that distaste detract from the real efforts of the participants.

I can understand the efforts of the participants, but the shadow hanging over them is too much for me. I just can't bring myself to watch any of the Olympics. 

5252

Living Room / Re: Olympic coverage this year SUCKS!

« Last post by Renegade on August 08, 2012, 10:11 PM »

Well-l-l-l,

There's a lot of comment here about the politics/commercialism/restrictions of the Olympic event.  Most of it reasoned.  But there's been little comment about the participants, apart from a few comparisons like unto The Hunger Games.

I watch the Olympics.  I enjoy the Olympics.  There is no more beautiful sight to this old cripple than to watch some young body, male or female, surpass what we consider our physical limitations.  Doesn't matter why they are there, what their reasons might be - they press the borders of human frailty by performing feats heretofore unimagined.  Maybe they want the money from endorsements and merchandising, maybe they have ulterior motives for later activities, maybe it's just plain pride.  These kids - for the most part they are kids - put a lot of blood, sweat, & tears into getting there.  Maybe they're being exploited, but that does not reflect upon their art, their expertise, their ability. 

I cannot imagine anything more beautiful than the floor exercises or the bar exercises.  They demonstrate what the human engine can do, given practice and will and a dream. La misma with the diving and the track events.  Say what you will about the venue, these participants are physical and mental ideals to be lived up to.  (I say mental because, no matter their ability to speak or do mathematics, they had/have the mental ability to continue, to force their body into exertions that the body wanted to deny - if you don't like mental, call it force of will.)  These folk have learned a discipline very few of us will ever know - or have ever known.

Why have they done what they have done?  I neither know nor care their personal reasons.  They are proof positive that the human body can be more than compulsive consumption, more than sex organs and opinions.  And they give us dreams of grandeur that we'll likely never achieve, but at least know to be possible.  They give us dreams.

So, I watch.  Mayhap I cannot create art , but I can damned well appreciate when I see it  .

-barney (August 08, 2012, 09:50 PM)

By no means does that Olympic committed diminish the achievements of the athletes, but I do feel sorry for the athletes. They work so hard, and they're exploited so badly. Then they have the pressures of making certain to never take any cough syrup for a cold/cough, be careful about eating any meat as it could be contaminated with some kind of steroid, etc. etc. Cripes! They practically need to be sequestered from reality.

It's almost as if they're busking on the street with a guitar and open case for handouts. They're certainly not compensated for their participation in a major commercial event. I find the way they are used rather disturbing.

@Renegade: I see what you mean. That is nauseating though. Sort of like you might image a Guardian "journalist's" w#t-dr#am.
Because boycotted, I don't read Olympics commentaries either, so had not seen that sort of drivel.

-IainB (August 08, 2012, 09:54 PM)

I just saw that by accident while reading the news. It's kind of hard to avoid sometimes.

5253

Mini-Reviews by Members / Re: Logitech Wireless Gaming Headset G930 - Mini-Review

« Last post by Renegade on August 08, 2012, 08:45 PM »

Logitech really makes some good stuff. I'm not surprised to hear a glowing review like this.

5254

Living Room / Re: silly humor - post 'em here! [warning some NSFW and adult content]

« Last post by Renegade on August 08, 2012, 07:44 PM »

I meant to say, there is no such thing as a "congress" of baboons.

-Curt (August 08, 2012, 03:22 PM)

But it's still funny!

5255

Living Room / Re: Robert Downey Jr credits BK saving his life...

« Last post by Renegade on August 08, 2012, 07:43 PM »

 

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Living Room / Re: It's Official: Many DC'ers Are Psychopaths~! :P

« Last post by Renegade on August 08, 2012, 07:39 PM »

And I'm also getting real tired of all the psychological bullying going around these days.

-superboyac (August 08, 2012, 11:27 AM)

That's pretty much where I was coming from earlier. It started out as a means to help people, but now it's mostly just weaponized nonsense. Sure there are still some of the low level touchy feely I'm ok you're ok types. But the bulk of the psychology effort seems to go into screwing the shit out of the populace by conning them into believing some mindblowingly ridiculous spin-doctored bullshit. Like we're really supposed to feel sorry for the oil (oops) "energy" companies because they're having such a tough time making ends meet while they try so gash darn hard to make the world a better place for everybody... Seriously??? [comment omitted to avoid burning a hole in the fabric of the internet]

Either that or they're trying to "fix" things that are just not repairable. Some fruitcake standing over a pile of corpses with a can of whipped cream, a sparkler, and a spoon does not need counseling.

-Stoic Joker (August 08, 2012, 07:02 PM)

+1

Couldn't agree more.

Psychology signals were used as weapon in society for centuries. These days it is heavily used in corporate places and social interaction to bully people.

-mahesh2k (August 08, 2012, 07:34 PM)

+1 again.


And you see articles like this EVERY DAY in the news. Maybe not as blatant, but they're always there. Usually softer and in higher numbers.

Tell a lie enough times and it becomes truth. 

I love the analogy "weaponized", because that's so completely bang on.

5257

Living Room / Re: Olympic coverage this year SUCKS!

« Last post by Renegade on August 08, 2012, 07:34 PM »

Something has always seemed "off", in an H. P. Lovecraft sense of the word...

-Renegade (August 05, 2012, 11:23 PM)

This is the kind of stuff that I mean when I say "off"...

Not really nice reading for people that love the Olympics...

Utopian? Yeah. That always works out well... Who else had Utopian dreams? Stalin - bodycount 60+ million, Mao Tse Tung - bodycount 70+ million, etc. etc.

Collective? Yeah. Right. Ummm... Borg anyone? Socialism? Communism? Those always work out well. See above.

Dream? Yeah. Exactly my point -- the dream is completely Chthonic. See above.

The rest of the article is a circle-jerk.

5258

Developer's Corner / Re: There's Apple in my Microsoft

« Last post by Renegade on August 08, 2012, 11:47 AM »

Yep. Very familiar. All the mobile platforms do this - force you to get an account... You register your applications in the online UI, blah blah blah. It's a way to keep track of you. Their excuse is "security". Yeah. Right.

It's all about developer lock-in. (If you could peer over my shoulder, you'd see internal documents going over exactly these kinds of things.) And they have oh so many ways to get that done...

5259

Living Room / Re: silly humor - post 'em here! [warning some NSFW and adult content]

« Last post by Renegade on August 08, 2012, 08:49 AM »

5260

Living Room / Re: DOTCOM saga - updates

« Last post by Renegade on August 08, 2012, 08:26 AM »

Today: VIDEO: What really happened in the Dotcom raid?
I recommend you watch it all - and Campbell's commentary. Very interesting.

-IainB (August 08, 2012, 06:20 AM)

Watched. Saddened. That's pretty shameful.

I just saw another short news video with Mike Adams interviewing Michael Schmidt in Ontario, Canada. While Schmidt is a farmer, you still hear all the same kinds of tactics.

Whether it's "piracy" or "milk" or "pigs" or "rain", we see all the same things --- armed troops attacking unarmed civilians, stealing their property, and throwing them in prison.

This isn't about "law and order". This is about destroying and controlling people.

All of these kinds of cases are sickening.

5261

Living Room / Re: silly humor - post 'em here! [warning some NSFW and adult content]

« Last post by Renegade on August 08, 2012, 08:14 AM »

Wrong or not, it's still funny!

5262

Living Room / Re: It's Official: Many DC'ers Are Psychopaths~! :P

« Last post by Renegade on August 08, 2012, 07:28 AM »

Right, let's make everybody feel guilty about not signing up to be monitored by the CIA.

The only thing this proves is that psychology is BS.

-Stoic Joker (August 08, 2012, 06:57 AM)

Well, now that you bring it up...

It's not that psychology is BS; it's more that it is being abused towards a collectivist agenda. This is just a hit-piece on people that don't want to go on Facebook to make them look like anti-social deviants. I would not be surprised if some people actually sign up for Facebook because of it, thinking something like, "Oh my, I'd better do what everyone else is doing. Don't want to rock the boat..."

It's the same collectivist garbage that's being pushed in K-12 education, where you have "participation awards" and "standardized tests".



If you look into it, you'll vomit. It really gets far, far worse. Test questions about committing crimes in a group, with the correct answer being to go along with the group... Yeah. Seriously.

As for the CIA...

5263

Living Room / Re: silly humor - post 'em here! [warning some NSFW and adult content]

« Last post by Renegade on August 08, 2012, 06:46 AM »

I hate Martians! They're all bigots and racists!

In other news...

5264

Living Room / Re: Windows 8 Metro has gone ...

« Last post by Renegade on August 08, 2012, 06:43 AM »

aCertainCompany patented rectangles and the colour white, so I think we better all take a look at our display pics, or hire a good lawyer.

-Fred Nerd (August 08, 2012, 05:26 AM)

Truth be told, I don't really know you well enough to know whether you are joking or not, because things really are that utterly nutty... 

5265

Living Room / Re: DOTCOM saga - updates

« Last post by Renegade on August 08, 2012, 05:13 AM »

I won't be the only voting Kiwi who is looking on with keen interest to see how ethically and legitimately this case has been handled. We already have the judiciary coming out with the documented and stunning judgement that the raid was illegal (QED), and it appears that the US side of things was illegal too (QED).

-IainB (August 08, 2012, 04:32 AM)

Unfortunately today, it seems that in matters of law enforcement and legislation, the words "ethical" and "legitimate" simply no longer apply.

Like seriously. It is virtually impossible to go a single day without hearing about some kind of government or law enforcement violation of some law or basic human right -- from some supposedly "free" country, e.g. UK, US, Canada, NZ, Oz, EU, etc. etc.

This case really has a huge impact worldwide though. It's not just a NZ/US issue. Because if the thugs in jackboots will kick in a Kiwi's teeth, they'll kick in a Canuck's teeth faster. (We're a bit closer after all.) I hope that this case gets more attention. It certainly deserves it. But, probably some pop singer will die of a drug overdose, or get charged with something, and that will be all you hear about until the next episode of "Jersey Shore" or some other vapid reality show. Sigh...

I hope my faith in the judiciary and in the professionalism of the NZ Police/SS will not be shaken any more by unfolding events than it already has been by this business. There is nothing like a Second Amendment in NZ, and none of us want to wake up one morning to find ourselves in the reality of living in a police state run by thugs.

-IainB (August 08, 2012, 04:32 AM)

When I first got to Australia, an Australian friend told me that there is no such thing as free speech here. I just about pooped myself. I looked it up. He's right. You pretty much have zero rights here. I was shocked.

No idea what it's like in NZ though... I hope it's a better situation than here.

5266

Living Room / Re: Curiosity Mars rover - live feed from NASA

« Last post by Renegade on August 08, 2012, 03:03 AM »

I got trapped for an hour reading Dork Tower after seeing the devastating new comic.
http://www.dorktower...08/DorkTower1098.gif

-TaoPhoenix (August 08, 2012, 02:24 AM)

That's the only one I've read, but it is a very good commentary!

5267

Living Room / Re: Apple's Marketing Mindset

« Last post by Renegade on August 08, 2012, 01:57 AM »

Kind of OT, but...

Meh, I wouldn't take the UN's Universal Declaration of Human Rights as worth much or put much faith in it. In it they directly say that you have no rights if they don't want you to have any rights. i.e. "None of it applies to you."

Think I'm kidding? Article 29, section 3:

http://www.un.org/en...udhr/index.shtml#a29

(3) These rights and freedoms may in no case be exercised contrary to the purposes and principles of the United Nations.

Now, given that the UN has an affiliated publisher that was originally named "Lucifer Publishing", ahem... Seriously? Yes. Seriously.

There are comments on the World Wide Web claiming that the Lucis Trust was once called the Lucifer Trust. Such was never the case. However, for a brief period of two or three years in the early 1920’s, when Alice and Foster Bailey were beginning to publish the books published under her name, they named their fledgling publishing company “Lucifer Publishing Company”. By 1925 the name was changed to Lucis Publishing Company and has remained so ever since.Both “Lucifer” and “Lucis” come from the same word root, lucis being the Latin generative case meaning of light. The Baileys' reasons for choosing the original name are not known to us, but we can only surmise that they, like the great teacher H.P. Blavatsky, for whom they had enormous respect, sought to elicit a deeper understanding of the sacrifice made by Lucifer. Alice and Foster Bailey were serious students and teachers of Theosophy, a spiritual tradition which views Lucifer as one of the solar Angels, those advanced Beings Who Theosophy says descended (thus “the fall”) from Venus to our planet eons ago to bring the principle of mind to what was then animal-man. In the theosophical perspective, the descent of these solar Angels was not a fall into sin or disgrace but rather an act of great sacrifice, as is suggested in the name “Lucifer” which means light-bearer.

And:

https://en.wikipedia...org/wiki/Lucis_Trust

The Lucis Trust has consultative status (roster level) with the United Nations Economic and Social Council.

 

Nope. Totally un-make-up-able.

What was that phrase? Oh yeah... "HAIL SATAN!"

Now, look back at:

(3) These rights and freedoms may in no case be exercised contrary to the purposes and principles of the United Nations.

D'ya think that the "purposes and principles" are really sort of, like, maybe, "on the level"? Or might they be, oh, perhaps, just maybe, Luciferian? Or "Satanic" if you want another word for it?

I'm like totally convinced that Satan is like all really totally for peace, love, grooviness, unicorns, rainbows, cute puppies and all that stuff. Really.

5268

Living Room / Re: It's Official: Many DC'ers Are Psychopaths~! :P

« Last post by Renegade on August 08, 2012, 12:58 AM »

I bet they also both didn't have ebola. Does that mean that everyone who doesn't have ebola is a psychopath?

-Deozaan (August 08, 2012, 12:42 AM)

Oh God! I'd better make a trip to Uganda quick so that I don't end up running around in a mindless killing spree~!

(Yeah - This stuff is just way too funny! Complete, total, off-the-brink insanity.)

5269

Living Room / It's Official: Many DC'ers Are Psychopaths~! :P

« Last post by Renegade on August 07, 2012, 11:52 PM »

Well, seems like the jury is in. And I'm sorry to inform you that many of our fellow DC'ers are indeed psychopaths~!

It came as a shock to me too. Who would have thought?

http://www.huffingto..._hp_ref=social-media

If you're not on Facebook yet, or if you're considering ditching your profile, you've got a new pressure to consider: You might be labeled a psycho.

In a Tuesday article, the Daily Mail asked the question "Is not joining Facebook a sign you're a psychopath?" The Mail points to an observation made by German-language Der Tagesspiegel, that mass murderers Anders Breivik in Norway and James Holmes in Aurora, Colo. both didn't have Facebook profiles.

http://www.dailymail...-say-suspicious.html

The German magazine Der Taggspiegel went so far as to point out that accused theater shooter James Holmes and Norwegian mass murder Anders Behring Breivik have common ground in their lack of Facebook profiles.

On a more tangible level, Forbes.com reports that human resources departments across the country are becoming more wary of young job candidates who don't use the site.

Just when you think you kind of know some people. Sheesh!

Raise your hand if you are a closet mass-murderer!

5270

Living Room / Re: Pepper Spray Cop Interactive

« Last post by Renegade on August 07, 2012, 11:03 PM »

The internal affairs process that looked at Lt. John Pike's decision to douse student protesters found he acted reasonably.

-IainB (August 07, 2012, 09:20 AM)

From the second video posted here:

http://www.activistp...e-for-rainy-day.html

Out of over 10,000 complaints against police, only 19 had any kind of action taken. A badge is an excuse to do anything you want now. It's shameful.

Reasonable? Just what would be "unreasonable"? Napalm?

Keep in mind that "pepper spray" isn't pepper. It's a chemical weapon. Most often there is no pepper in it. i.e. Using chemical weapons on people is "OK".

This is a very, very dark path that we're racing down.

5271

Living Room / Re: silly humor - post 'em here! [warning some NSFW and adult content]

« Last post by Renegade on August 07, 2012, 09:54 PM »

5272

Living Room / Re: silly humor - post 'em here! [warning some NSFW and adult content]

« Last post by Renegade on August 07, 2012, 09:05 PM »

5273

Living Room / Re: Curiosity Mars rover - live feed from NASA

« Last post by Renegade on August 07, 2012, 08:58 PM »

@Renegade: ^ So? Your point is?

-IainB (August 07, 2012, 08:36 PM)

Always look on the bright side of life! De do, de do, de do de do de do!

5274

Living Room / Re: Curiosity Mars rover - live feed from NASA

« Last post by Renegade on August 07, 2012, 02:06 PM »

5275

Living Room / Re: Curiosity Mars rover - live feed from NASA

« Last post by Renegade on August 07, 2012, 01:17 PM »