Unpopular Opinions.

Medusa22

The Corinthian wrote: »

I'm sure there are exceptions to the rule, especially in countries like Denmark that repealed many medieval laws and later had to reintroduce them (Spain after Franco had a simelar experience), but to suggest, as you did, that these laws are inspired by concerns for animal welfare would be seriously incorrect.

Ok, I agree that the original purpose of the laws was most likely nothing to do with animal welfare, however I think that the purpose of the laws in a modern world is in relation with animal welfare, and like I said, the case of Denmark reflects this.

arayess

I think John Gillian and Brian Meehan didn't get a fair trial.
How the supergrass evidence was allowed is beyond me.

The Corinthian

Medusa22 wrote: »

Ok, I agree that the original purpose of the laws was most likely nothing to do with animal welfare, however I think that the purpose of the laws in a modern world is in relation with animal welfare, and like I said, the case of Denmark reflects this.

Not sure that this is the case though as we are still heavily influenced by taboos that are ingrained - we react almost instinctively against things like bestiality and incest, yet when we are asked why we actually have to think about it first. But in the end, our reaction is not rational, which is why it is almost instinctive.

On the topic of Denmark and animal welfare, an interesting point of note was the rather tragic life of Bodil Joensen, who was the actress in the infamous 'porn video' Animal Farm. While undoubtedly a deeply disturbed individual, it is highly questionable that she was ever party to the abuse of animals.

As for the use of lack of consent as an argument against bestiality, given that we will otherwise happily incarcerate and kill them without consent, it is an utterly laughable rationalization.

OneOfThem

Minderbinder wrote: »

He is not a hero by any stretch of the imagination. His sole purpose was making money. If there was 'a greater good' as you call it, he didn't care about it. But he knew his customers cared about it. He was interested in making money and gaining power and couldn't think of a way to do it legitimately. Lot's of people are campaigning to legalize certain drugs and they are fighting against the bureaucrats the right way, and have succeeded in some cases. Was he ever involved in any campaign to legalize drugs? No, because that would be bad for business.

The silk road didn't stand for anything. The guy marketed it to brainless druggies as a stand against authority and as that message excused their pathetic lifestyles, and implied they were akin to martyrs for this 'cause' they obviously went along with it. He ordered the murders of a number of people. If he is a hero then every drug dealer is a hero.

Your use of language such as "brainless druggies" and "pathetic lifestyles" kind of says it all. What is your evidence for the intellectual capabilities of the users of silk Road and how did you aquire your apparently extensive information on their lifestyles out of curiosity? A man as informed and knowledgeable as yourself wouldn't be making such claims based on next to nothing, so I'm to presume you were a visitor to the site? A man as informed and knowledgeable as yourself wouldn't be attempting to imply something as easily and empirically falsifiable as all recreational drug users are "brainless" and lead pathetic lifestyles. As such, which members on the site, specifically I mean, did you form such a low opinion of due to your interactions with them, and why?

I think the evidence is pretty clear that Ulbricth had long term and quite genuinely held libertarian ideals. He expressed them long before the silk Road came into existence.

Why, in your opinion, all the extensive subterfuge of needless and superfluous libertarian and anti-prohibitionist theory, idealism, discussion and activism? For the sake of the brainless druggies with pathetic lifestyles? They would not want to purchase drugs, if it was absent? The odd thing is other similar sites do not bother with it, and by all accounts do a roaring trade. Seems unnecessary?

The murder for hire charges that were dropped? Why did the state that had physical possession of the SR servers and Ulbricth's unencrypted laptop not attempt to pursue the charges in your opinion seeing as you are so sure Ulbricth was guilty of them? They are quite serious crimes.
What are your thoughts in general on the fundamental principle of legal systems in democratic nations - "innocent until proven guilty"? For or against?

PopePalpatine

Funnily enough, I was reading an /r/askreddit thread about redditors' tales from the dark web, and one of them claimed that Ulbricht was a patsy and that they knew the real mastermind behind the Silk Road.

sbsquarepants

One eyed Jack wrote: »

Slaughtering animals and having sex with animals are two completely different things

Seeing as the argument is for animal welfare - which do you think is more harmful to the animal?

It's just one of these things we all think until we're asked why.

I'm not about to argue the merits of bestiality, I swear I tripped and landed on that sheep, nothing else.:D But the animal welfare argument being espoused here just doesn't hold water in most cases - it's nonsense plain and simple.

If we we're half as concerned about animal welfare as we pretend to be we wouldn't eat the fúcking things, or make them carry us about for fun, or enslave them as beasts of burden, or force them to perform for our entertainment.
You can quite legally shoot certain animals for fun for god sake, or entice them to swallow sharp hooks and drag them about on a string with your mates for a laugh - were is the welfare concern in that?
You can buy poison in the supermarket to rid your house of harmless rodents or your garden of harmless slugs, snails etc. You can quite legally poison whole colonies of ants, or other creepy crawly things just because you don't like the look of them.
If you no longer what your loyal companion spot you can bring him to an animal doctor who for a small fee will inject him with poison to save you the bother of walking him on the wet mornings.....welfare?
Animal welfare is an absolutely false ideal

One eyed Jack

sbsquarepants wrote: »

Seeing as the argument is for animal welfare - which do you think is more harmful to the animal?

It's just one of these things we all think until we're asked why.

I'm not about to argue the merits of bestiality, I swear I tripped and landed on that sheep, nothing else.:D But the animal welfare argument being espoused here just doesn't hold water in most cases - it's nonsense plain and simple.

If we we're half as concerned about animal welfare as we pretend to be we wouldn't eat the fúcking things, or make them carry us about for fun, or enslave them as beasts of burden, or force them to perform for our entertainment.
You can quite legally shoot certain animals for fun for god sake, or entice them to swallow sharp hooks and drag them about on a string with your mates for a laugh - were is the welfare concern in that?
You can buy poison in the supermarket to rid your house of harmless rodents or your garden of harmless slugs, snails etc. You can quite legally poison whole colonies of ants, or other creepy crawly things just because you don't like the look of them.
If you no longer what your loyal companion spot you can bring him to an animal doctor who for a small fee will inject him with poison to save you the bother of walking him on the wet mornings.....welfare?
Animal welfare is an absolutely false ideal

Not at all, I'm well aware of the various standards and so on that I apply to different concepts, and how my standards often don't jig with other people's standards. I eat animals, I don't want to have sex with them. I have sex with humans, I don't want to eat them. They're two completely different arguments, and that's why people arguing that it should be ok for other people to have sex with animals doesn't really work, because they themselves have no real interest in having sex with animals, so I don't have to take their arguments seriously enough to envisage a point in society where the vast majority of it's members want to have sex with animals.

Someone else can worry about stopping me from eating animals, but I've yet to hear a good argument on that score either. Quorn just tastes like sh1t.

Kev W

the_monkey wrote: »

Back to the topic ....


I just don't like The Beatles ... never did .... I think I've met one other person in my life that agrees with me.

Now you have.

jobbridge4life

Kev W wrote: »

Now you have.

And another. I keep expecting them to grow on me and return to them every so often as my musical palette expands but each time I am disappointed to find that nope I still don't get it.

RainyDay

arayess wrote: »

I think John Gillian and Brian Meehan didn't get a fair trial.
How the supergrass evidence was allowed is beyond me.

Do you think they were innocent of the charges?

Milly33

Think some women should be paid to get sterilized same with men.. Some people just should not have kids

Michael D Not Higgins

OneOfThem wrote: »

I think the evidence is pretty clear that Ulbricth had long term and quite genuinely held libertarian ideals. He expressed them long before the silk Road came into existence.

So your basis of him being a hero is because he espoused and preached libertarian ideals as his 'greater good' to use your definition? His preachy bit doesn't justify the Silk Road's primary use as a drug marketplace anymore than a torrent site would be justified if they had a preachy bit about Hollywood/the music industry/etc.

Yours is an unpopular opinion because it doesn't stand up to reason. If he were arrested for his libertarian beliefs or the ideals he was promoting and stood up to them, then you might call him a hero. He wasn't though, so he isn't.

kunst nugget

Milly33 wrote: »

Think some women should be paid to get sterilized same with men.. Some people just should not have kids

I sometimes think if you gave people social housing for not having kids instead of the other way around, there'd be an immeasurable improvement in general terms to society.

jobbridge4life

Michael D Not Higgins wrote: »

So your basis of him being a hero is because he espoused and preached libertarian ideals as his 'greater good' to use your definition? His preachy bit doesn't justify the Silk Road's primary use as a drug marketplace anymore than a torrent site would be justified if they had a preachy bit about Hollywood/the music industry/etc.

Yours is an unpopular opinion because it doesn't stand up to reason. If he were arrested for his libertarian beliefs or the ideals he was promoting and stood up to them, then you might call him a hero. He wasn't though, so he isn't.

Well I'd view him as hero also and I know that countless others do too.

OneOfThem

Michael D Not Higgins wrote: »

justify the Silk Road's primary use as a drug marketplace

And here is where you and I would part ways of course. You believe a drug market place such as The Silk Road, would require an external justification. I am an anti-prohibitionist. I believe it is intrinsically justified in and of itself.

Michael D Not Higgins

OneOfThem wrote: »

And here is where you and I would part ways of course. You believe a drug market place such as The Silk Road, would require an external justification. I am an anti-prohibitionist. I believe it is intrinsically justified in and of itself.

Society has determined that for certain drugs the greater good is that they are prohibited due to the damage they cause. While I might not agree with all the illegal drugs being illegal, I agree with the premise that certain drugs should not be attainable.

You describe yourself as an anti-prohibionist but I do not see the 'greater good' justification of such a stance.

Milly33

kunst nugget wrote: »

I sometime think if you gave people social housing for not having kids instead of the other way around, there'd be an immeasurable improvement in general terms to society.

Most defianlty

OneOfThem

Michael D Not Higgins wrote: »

Society has determined that for certain drugs the greater good is that they are prohibited due to the damage they cause. While I might not agree with all the illegal drugs being illegal, I agree with the premise that certain drugs should not be attainable.

You describe yourself as an anti-prohibionist but I do not see the 'greater good' justification of such a stance.

I'm on a phone, and probably meant to be working, but if your genuinely interested, I'll post up my 'greater good justification' of the stance this evening in detail. But if you've read anything in the sphere of anti-prohibitionist thought, you'll probably have heard it all before. It's an argument rooted in a high valuation of individual liberty, an opposition to coercion, and choosing the path of least harm. The usual dealy.

sbsquarepants

One eyed Jack wrote: »

. Quorn just tastes like sh1t.

It's a lousy ride too!:D

foleypio

My unpopular opinion would be that if we werent part of the EU, English speaking with close ties to America & England, economically we would be screwed as a country.

How we conduct business, elect politicians is often backward, corrupt & narrow minded. People like to blame others for their own shortcomings in this country & take as little responsibility as possible. The governments & banks that we've had are a reflection of us, nothing else.

We are where we are by luck, little more.

The Corinthian

foleypio wrote: »

My unpopular opinion would be that if we werent part of the EU, English speaking with close ties to America & England, economically we would be screwed as a country.

That's probably a very popular opinion in Ireland at this stage.

People like to blame others for their own shortcomings in this country & take as little responsibility as possible.

Not a particularly Irish trait, in fairness. Just look at the Greeks.

Magico Gonzalez

jobbridge4life wrote: »

Well I'd view him as hero also and I know that countless others do too.

Heroically contracting hitmen to murder people on his behalf.

Prohibionists are fine with uncontrolled sales of life changing (not in a good way either!) to underage and vulnerable children?

All hail the saint of libertarians.

jobbridge4life

Magico Gonzalez wrote: »

Heroically contracting hitmen to murder people on his behalf.

Prohibionists are fine with uncontrolled sales of life changing (not in a good way either!) to underage and vulnerable children?

All hail the saint of libertarians.

Those charges were dropped. But I guess you know something the prosecution didn't.

We should embrace GMOs.

il gatto

Michael D Not Higgins wrote: »

Regular, yeah. But the chocolate ones are great.

Fox's Classic chocolate. If you can find them, you can thank me later. They're the biscuit Hob-Nobs want to be when they grow up.

Doctor Jimbob

Deleted User wrote: »

We should embrace GMOs.

Not an unpopular opinion to anyone with half a brain, in fairness.

kidneyfan

arayess wrote: »

I think John Gillian and Brian Meehan didn't get a fair trial.
How the supergrass evidence was allowed is beyond me.

Also their inability to get representation from within the state completely disproves the taxi rank claim made by barristers that they can't really choose their clients.

scdublin

Helen from Big Brother is alright.

The_Kew_Tour

Gypies, I dispise them. Now I been around the world, hell I worked in some crap places but met some of best people and everyone has good and bad eggs, but I hate Gypies.

Never met a nice one. They are dishonest, scummy, most disgusting people I have met here and abroad. I have seen them steal from OAP, kick children and women on ground and fool a plenty to get pennies.

Call me what ya like, I detest them.

Into The Blue

The_Kew_Tour wrote: »

Gypies, I dispise them. Now I been around the world, hell I worked in some crap places but met some of best people and everyone has good and bad eggs, but I hate Gypies.

Never met a nice one. They are dishonest, scummy, most disgusting people I have met here and abroad. I have seen them steal from OAP, kick children and women on ground and fool a plenty to get pennies.

Call me what ya like, I detest them.

Traveller's or Roma's?