Do you think we'll ever see protests and unrest here like in the Ukraine right now ?

Stavros Murphy · 28-02-2014 01:05AM

Aethan Dor wrote: »

That's a no then

It's a solid maybe. At best.

darkpagandeath · 28-02-2014 01:07AM

Lets hire a consultancy company find out ?

Aethan Dor · 28-02-2014 01:07AM

Red Nissan wrote: »

Late with your essay again?

I think the jadedness is a reflection of common essay or thesis titles ~ Boards.ie must have graduated a million BA students by this time.:P

Yeah about 13 years late !

steddyeddy · 28-02-2014 01:08AM

I'll sum it up by using the word spineless.

Aethan Dor · 28-02-2014 01:08AM

darkpagandeath wrote: »

Lets hire a consultancy company find out ?

Red C poll so

Panthro · 28-02-2014 01:11AM

Aethan Dor wrote: »

Are you Eric Cantona ?

What's he, a Communist?
Sounds like a Communist..
"When the seagulls follow the trawler, it's because they think sardines will be thrown into the sea. Thank you very much."

Stavros Murphy · 28-02-2014 01:12AM

steddyeddy wrote: »

I'll sum it up by using the word spineless.

Like a bald hedgehog?

steddyeddy · 28-02-2014 01:15AM

Stavros Murphy wrote: »

Like a bald hedgehog?

Like the "I'll use my voting option to get rid of corruption" people. Spineless. The same people would be against the civil rights marches in America. Just useless people.

Chucken · 28-02-2014 01:15AM

Stavros Murphy wrote: »

Like a bald hedgehog?

Very same.

http://www.eveningnews24.co.uk/polopoly_fs/jb_3_bald_hedgehog_1_907621!image/258916039.jpg_gen/derivatives/landscape_630/258916039.jpg

Stavros Murphy · 28-02-2014 01:17AM

steddyeddy wrote: »

Like the "I'll use my voting option to get rid of corruption" people. Spineless. The same people would be against the civil rights marches in America. Just useless people.

Or in on it? Dum dum dum...

foxy farmer · 28-02-2014 01:33AM

Bring back the Ulster Pride crowd to Dublin and watch it all kick off.

bnt · 28-02-2014 02:14AM

markesmith wrote: »

2. We are largely governed by self-interest, and believe that protest is pointless. In other words, we're fair game for rampant capitalist interests

Corollary to this point: I think there's a tacit admission that there's no "outsider" to blame for the state Ireland is in. The Brits didn't do it, the Americans didn't do it, the European Central Bank didn't do it. Local politicians, generally, aren't enriching themselves at the expense of the public (though I know some have tried).

There was a failure of regulation, but if it's only regulation that would stop you doing something irresponsible - such as taking out a crazy mortgage to buy an overpriced property - what does that say about you? The government didn't tell everyone that they could all be landlords, getting tenants to pay the mortgages for them while they sat back and watched the money roll in from their "property portfolio". If you fell for that pipe-dream, without noticing that you were helping to inflate the bubble, the correct response is not anger at the government but shame at your own greed and stupidity.

darkpagandeath · 28-02-2014 03:09AM

bnt wrote: »

Corollary to this point: I think there's a tacit admission that there's no "outsider" to blame for the state Ireland is in. The Brits didn't do it, the Americans didn't do it, the European Central Bank didn't do it. Local politicians, generally, aren't enriching themselves at the expense of the public (though I know some have tried).

There was a failure of regulation, but if it's only regulation that would stop you doing something irresponsible - such as taking out a crazy mortgage to buy an overpriced property - what does that say about you? The government didn't tell everyone that they could all be landlords, getting tenants to pay the mortgages for them while they sat back and watched the money roll in from their "property portfolio". If you fell for that pipe-dream, without noticing that you were helping to inflate the bubble, the correct response is not anger at the government but shame at your own greed and stupidity.

Poor people were not the ones taking out loans to buy to rent..... Yet the poorest are consistently being hit the hardest every budget. Tbh all buy to rent should be repossessed and no deal done on mortgages they rolled the dice and lost.

chopper6 · 28-02-2014 03:21AM

darkpagandeath wrote: »

Poor people were not the ones taking out loans to buy to rent..... Yet the poorest are consistently being hit the hardest every budget. Tbh all buy to rent should be repossessed and no deal done on mortgages they rolled the dice and lost.

Well if that happens they should riot...

Nah,of course they wont.

Give the Irish people broadband and gated apartments and they'll stay there til they rot.

bodhrandude · 28-02-2014 03:36AM

Super-Rush wrote: »

Do you ever think AH will go one month without the same thread being done again?

Yeh! Lets go and riot like mad eejits. :pac:

KyussBishop · 28-02-2014 02:21PM

For people to bother protesting, they first need to know what's actually wrong with how things are run right now, and what the alternatives are.

People generally though, don't give a toss about what is wrong or about the alternatives (or even the fact that what we went through will happen again), so not really anything changing.

bnt wrote: »

Corollary to this point: I think there's a tacit admission that there's no "outsider" to blame for the state Ireland is in. The Brits didn't do it, the Americans didn't do it, the European Central Bank didn't do it. Local politicians, generally, aren't enriching themselves at the expense of the public (though I know some have tried).

There was a failure of regulation, but if it's only regulation that would stop you doing something irresponsible - such as taking out a crazy mortgage to buy an overpriced property - what does that say about you? The government didn't tell everyone that they could all be landlords, getting tenants to pay the mortgages for them while they sat back and watched the money roll in from their "property portfolio". If you fell for that pipe-dream, without noticing that you were helping to inflate the bubble, the correct response is not anger at the government but shame at your own greed and stupidity.

Uh, the banking/financial sector did it.........

They deliberately inflated a massive asset bubble in the housing market, enriching a lot of people working in that industry and developers, and left the rest of the country to deal with the fallout - requiring that we bail them out.

We need to reform the banking/financial sector so this can never happen again, but we haven't done a thing - and because of that, it will happen again.

Every single one of these debates, you have people trying to excuse the banking/financial sector of their responsibility - nobody thinks it's a good idea to make it so that banks/finance should not be allowed to inflate economy-destroying asset bubbles?

Always attempts to pin blame on people who took out loans, not those who gave out the loans - who are not supposed to give out risky loans in the first place.

I am pie · 28-02-2014 02:28PM

Some Irish people have no perspective. By every measure going Ireland is one of the most equal, fair and wealthy places (certainly in the top 30) in the world to live. We don't have poverty, government oppression, widespred lack of freedom of speech.

If we took to the streets at this stage, there would be a collective "meh, first world problems" attitude from the rest of the world.

OK, there are some ideologically motivated people who want to change the system, that's their right but the average man is the street is demonstrably not interested in violence as a political tool right now as it is blatantly not necessary.

darkpagandeath · 28-02-2014 02:40PM

I am pie wrote: »

Some Irish people have no perspective. By every measure going Ireland is one of the most equal, fair and wealthy places (certainly in the top 30) in the world to live. We don't have poverty, government oppression, widespred lack of freedom of speech.

If we took to the streets at this stage, there would be a collective "meh, first world problems" attitude from the rest of the world.

OK, there are some ideologically motivated people who want to change the system, that's their right but the average man is the street is demonstrably not interested in violence as a political tool right now as it is blatantly not necessary.

So why were charity's on the news a couple of days ago saying the government is doing a terrible job in relation to child poverty rates. And I cant believe equal and fair in the same sentence.....

http://www.rte.ie/news/2014/0225/506513-children/

KyussBishop · 28-02-2014 03:32PM

Why on earth should we settle for a corrupt banking/financial system, that rewards reckless speculators/bubble-creators, and piles the cost onto the entire population of the country, just because 'well things are worse in Africa...'.

Fúck that - that's just an argument for defending the power of some people, to exploit everyone else.

If they've proven they can't be trusted to handle giving out loans responsibily, without using their power to inflate huge asset bubbles for their own profit, then some pretty serious reforms are in order, before they dump even more debt onto us again - which will happen again in the future, because nothing has been reformed, and the huge issue of private debt levels is still not resolved (dealing with that, has just be deferred into the future).

bnt · 28-02-2014 06:12PM

So you're basically piling all the blame on to the financial industry, absolving those who took out the mortgages of any blame? Sorry, not buying it. Just because something is being offered, it doesn't mean you have to accept the offer. What I saw during the "boom years" was rampant greed on all "sides":
- on the part of short-sighted bankers and mortgage brokers, raking in fees and interest while boosting their balance sheets and profits, sometimes even selling the mortgage on to investment banks;
- on the part of regulators, who failed to scrutinise who was selling what, to whom. (A friend of mine took out an interest-only mortgage on a flat, and he had to explain it to me before I could be horrified. That kind of mortgage is not something that should be offered to just anyone: it should be backed by solid collateral beyond the subject of the mortgage.)
- on the part of buy-to-let landlords, thinking that renting out is free money with which to pay the mortgage, with the bonus of a nicely profitable asset to sell years later.
- on the part of the financially-illiterate "man in the street", unable to do the simplest of calculations about the real cost of a mortgage, and/or deluding themselves that they would be able to sell for a profit in a few years and keep climbing the "property ladder". Just like everyone else.
- on the part of the media, who fuelled the bubble with their aspirational colour supplement "property ladder" bullshit, telling people to "get in there before it's all gone, because they aren't making any more".

No-one who took part in the boom is blameless, in my opinion. I agree that banks need to be more responsible in how they sell financial products, but - like any products - you are under no obligation to buy them on the word of the seller alone. Regulation should not a substitute for personal responsibility - not unless you think people should never be allowed to take any risks, ever again. Say goodbye to alcohol, ice cream, and cars that do more than 60 mph.

KyussBishop · 28-02-2014 07:17PM

bnt wrote: »

So you're basically piling all the blame on to the financial industry, absolving those who took out the mortgages of any blame? Sorry, not buying it. Just because something is being offered, it doesn't mean you have to accept the offer. What I saw during the "boom years" was rampant greed on all "sides":
- on the part of short-sighted bankers and mortgage brokers, raking in fees and interest while boosting their balance sheets and profits, sometimes even selling the mortgage on to investment banks;
- on the part of regulators, who failed to scrutinise who was selling what, to whom. (A friend of mine took out an interest-only mortgage on a flat, and he had to explain it to me before I could be horrified. That kind of mortgage is not something that should be offered to just anyone: it should be backed by solid collateral beyond the subject of the mortgage.)
- on the part of buy-to-let landlords, thinking that renting out is free money with which to pay the mortgage, with the bonus of a nicely profitable asset to sell years later.
- on the part of the financially-illiterate "man in the street", unable to do the simplest of calculations about the real cost of a mortgage, and/or deluding themselves that they would be able to sell for a profit in a few years and keep climbing the "property ladder". Just like everyone else.
- on the part of the media, who fuelled the bubble with their aspirational colour supplement "property ladder" bullshit, telling people to "get in there before it's all gone, because they aren't making any more".

No-one who took part in the boom is blameless, in my opinion. I agree that banks need to be more responsible in how they sell financial products, but - like any products - you are under no obligation to buy them on the word of the seller alone. Regulation should not a substitute for personal responsibility - not unless you think people should never be allowed to take any risks, ever again. Say goodbye to alcohol, ice cream, and cars that do more than 60 mph.

It's the banks job, not to overextend loans - and when banks fail to act responsibly everything else follows from that.

They are the source of the entire problem: Without the overextension of loans, you don't have a property bubble for the media or government to encourage, for developers to participate in for a quick profit, and you don't have other people greedily getting caught up in it, expecting a return on that which is unsustainable.

Everything starts, with reckless lending - without that you have no bubble, and no crisis. There is also nothing in place, to stop this from happening again - zero reform - and while there is no reform to properly put a stop to reckless lending, it will happen again, because it is so personally profitable for those who perpetrate it.

wendell borton · 28-02-2014 09:07PM

Unlike Ukraine the colonialist planters have their own breakaway state here.

chopper6 · 04-03-2014 12:55AM

bnt wrote: »

- on the part of the financially-illiterate "man in the street", unable to do the simplest of calculations about the real cost of a mortgage, and/or deluding themselves that they would be able to sell for a profit in a few years and keep climbing the "property ladder". Just like everyone else.

This.

I worked with a bloke who spent 30k on Eircom shares...lost his shirt and then leveraged his house to buy another "property" hoping to recoup his losses with a quick flip.

Now he's stuck with a mortage at aged 65 and he hasnt a prayer of making his money back on the property.

Astounding that a man in his 60's would spunk away his retirement fund on one,much less two "get rich quick" schemes.

KyussBishop · 04-03-2014 01:39AM

chopper6 wrote: »

This.

I worked with a bloke who spent 30k on Eircom shares...lost his shirt and then leveraged his house to buy another "property" hoping to recoup his losses with a quick flip.

Now he's stuck with a mortage at aged 65 and he hasnt a prayer of making his money back on the property.

Astounding that a man in his 60's would spunk away his retirement fund on one,much less two "get rich quick" schemes.

What I wonder there, is how in hell a 60 year old got a full mortgage, for a speculative investment - presumably without any bank-approved exit plan; totally reckless lending.

What's reckless/risky on the part of the homeowner, is reckless/risky on the part of the bank as well, as they are not supposed to lend recklessly like that.

Since the bank is supposed to have people determining how risky these loans are, and thus are supposed to have the expertise to calculate/know this, then if it's so obvious to an outsider that the mans investment was highly risky, then it's almost a certainty that the bank knew.

That's the contradictory thing about these discussions: If people say the guy taking out the loan 'should have known' (i.e. it was obvious), then (given the expertise at hand by the bank) it logically follows that the bank definitely knew - so (if you follow that logic) the bank deliberately made a risky loan.

Yet the narrative is to blame the homeowner, not those deliberately making risky loans.
All the cynicism is placed on the homeowner ("oh it was obvious, they should have known"), and all of the benefit of the doubt gets placed with the banks ("sure how were they supposed to know it was risky, it was an accident") - the narrative is explicitly constructed to excuse the banks.

OttoPilot · 04-03-2014 03:58AM

KyussBishop wrote: »

It's the banks job, not to overextend loans - and when banks fail to act responsibly everything else follows from that.

They are the source of the entire problem: Without the overextension of loans, you don't have a property bubble for the media or government to encourage, for developers to participate in for a quick profit, and you don't have other people greedily getting caught up in it, expecting a return on that which is unsustainable.

Everything starts, with reckless lending - without that you have no bubble, and no crisis. There is also nothing in place, to stop this from happening again - zero reform - and while there is no reform to properly put a stop to reckless lending, it will happen again, because it is so personally profitable for those who perpetrate it.

Who has profited from this mess? You might say high up bankers who got "golden handshakes" but I'm willing to bet they lost a large amount investing their money in bank shares over the years which are now relatively worthless. They did not deliberately cause this mess at all, they simply did it out of incompetence. They chased profits like any business would, don't expect them to self regulate.

Where did the banks get all this money to lend recklessly? From abroad, mostly from fellow EU countries like Germany looking to invest in growing markets. It was a mistake to let their money flood into this country so carelessly which ultimately led to this crisis. We should never have joined the single market, that is what caused our bubble and crash.

djerk · 04-03-2014 06:37AM

"but I'm willing to bet they lost a large amount investing their money in bank shares over the years which are now relatively worthless"

correction.. would have been relatively worthless if we weren't so docile as to bail them out in the first place while we continue to agree to pay taxes without so much as a squeak while all the time reaching our hands through the readied holes in our pockets. we sure can talk the talk however!

the recession, at least in my opinion, was a chance to break away from foreign investment and start anew here. a real opportunity to scrutinize what went wrong and how to turn it around but instead we just sold our souls to europe and allowed our politicians to pillage our resources and our rights.

is it any wonder people are quite literally bailing this country?

either way.. as a society, we've all just jumped back onto the same old hamster wheel and the same sorry tale will continue to repeat itself.

capitalism isnt the problem.. its narcissism.

its time to start putting educated people into elected positions.. isnt anyone bored of the same old rhetoric yet?

http://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/opinion/noam-chomsky-what-id-like-to-see-on-front-pages-of-newspapers-29654898.html

In the United States, one of the main topics of academic political science is the study of attitudes and policy and their correlation. The study of attitudes is reasonably easy in the United States: heavily-polled society, pretty serious and accurate polls, and policy you can see, and you can compare them. And the results are interesting. In the work that's essentially the gold standard in the field, it's concluded that for roughly 70% of the population - the lower 70% on the wealth/income scale - they have no influence on policy whatsoever. They're effectively disenfranchised.

As you move up the wealth/income ladder, you get a little bit more influence on policy. When you get to the top, which is maybe a tenth of one percent, people essentially get what they want, i.e. they determine the policy. So the proper term for that is not democracy; it's plutocracy.

Inquiries of this kind turn out to be dangerous stuff because they can tell people too much about the nature of the society in which they live. So fortunately, Congress has banned funding for them, so we won't have to worry about them in the future.

These characteristics of RECD show up all the time. So the major domestic issue in the United States for the public is jobs. Polls show that very clearly. For the very wealthy and the financial institutions, the major issue is the deficit. Well, what about policy? There's now a sequester in the United States, a sharp cutback in funds. Is that because of jobs or is it because of the deficit? Well, the deficit.

Europe, incidentally, is much worse - so outlandish that even The Wall Street Journal has been appalled by the disappearance of democracy in Europe. A couple of weeks ago it had an article which concluded that "the French, the Spanish, the Irish, the Dutch, Portuguese, Greeks, Slovenians, Slovakians and Cypriots have to varying degrees voted against the currency bloc's economic model since the crisis began three years ago. Yet economic policies have changed little in response to one electoral defeat after another. The left has replaced the right; the right has ousted the left.

Even the centre-right trounced Communists (in Cyprus) - but the economic policies have essentially remained the same: governments will continue to cut spending and raise taxes." It doesn't matter what people think and "national governments must follow macro-economic directives set by the European Commission". Elections are close to meaningless, very much as in Third World countries that are ruled by the international financial institutions. That's what Europe has chosen to become. It doesn't have to.

KyussBishop · 04-03-2014 01:37PM

OttoPilot wrote: »

Who has profited from this mess? You might say high up bankers who got "golden handshakes" but I'm willing to bet they lost a large amount investing their money in bank shares over the years which are now relatively worthless. They did not deliberately cause this mess at all, they simply did it out of incompetence. They chased profits like any business would, don't expect them to self regulate.

Where did the banks get all this money to lend recklessly? From abroad, mostly from fellow EU countries like Germany looking to invest in growing markets. It was a mistake to let their money flood into this country so carelessly which ultimately led to this crisis. We should never have joined the single market, that is what caused our bubble and crash.

All of the people working in banks/finance/property-development (particularly those higher up, in a position of control and thus in a position to seek more rewards) who got paid their salaries + bonuses; particularly since raises in their salary and bonuses they got, were in many cases based on short-term profits based upon actions which guaranteed long-term destruction.

You give banks benefit of the doubt "it was just incompetence", yet you hear people speaking of people who took out a mortgage, like they should have predicted the crisis coming - yet it's the banks who are the ones who are supposed to have the expertise for predicting risk and market conditions like this, not homeowners.

Chasing profits is not incompatible with the banks knowing this would lead to a bust:
The people who run banks, don't have to care about the long-term sustainability of the bank, because they can rack-up massive short-term profits in the bank (that are unsustainable in the long run), in order to get increased salary/bonuses as reward for the short-term profits.

I'd agree though, that we shouldn't have joined the Euro, though the boom was more caused by lack of regulations over loans, than the single currency.

--Kaiser-- · 04-03-2014 02:12PM

How do stupid do you have to be to believe that there is any resemblance between our situation and that of Ukraine?

Zeebs · 04-03-2014 02:23PM

LOL do yo think the Irish public are even capable of such a protest? The eastern europeans are tough mother****ers and stand up for themselves, if the gardai did one baton charge most of the Irish protestors would go home. If they had to sleep on the streets for more than 2 nights, most of the Irish protestors would go home. If there were snipers shooting at Irish protestors I doubt there would even be one Irish protestor standing on the street.

Remember Occupy Dame Street when most of the tents were found to be empty (protestors heading home for a shower and some supper) and after one night of bad rain most of them packed up and left!

Holsten · 04-03-2014 02:23PM

Not a chance in hell.

Do you think we'll ever see protests and unrest here like in the Ukraine right now ?

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