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Are you on Stephen Harper's list of "enemies"?

YmirGF

Bodhisattva in Recovery
I'll admit I know virtually nothing about Canadian politics, but this Harper dude doesn't sound particularly pleasant. He sounds like a bit of a George Bush type. :shrug:
Think of it as being similar to how Republican's often paint Obama. :)
 

Alceste

Vagabond
I'll admit I know virtually nothing about Canadian politics, but this Harper dude doesn't sound particularly pleasant. He sounds like a bit of a George Bush type. :shrug:

Huge George Bush fanboy. He delivered a speech once before he was PM where he called that whole neo-con gang of warmongering thugs a light to guide the world.
 

Dunemeister

Well-Known Member
Monster? Stephen Harper is a monster?

You see, folks, this is how our current PM, and a pretty good one, at that, is viewed by those who are bitterly opposed to his agenda. I think part of this sentiment is the inherent recognition of those who are opposed to him and the Conservatives that they cannot organize a bake sale, let alone, win an election against Harper and crew. Oh, and for the record, I was a life long Liberal supporter before they turned on Jean Cretien and have been lost in the wilderness ever since. Now the Liberals are pinning their hopes on Trudeau Jr. Laughable, really. The hilarious part is that the Liberals will only pick up extra seats from the NDP, who rose in power due to the ineptitude of the Block in Quebec. It's not like they really earned the votes. Malware knows this and that he is skating on thin ice. Meanwhile, Harper just sits there chuckling... watching ...

Oddly, I don't think I would have walked across the street to say hello to Layton. There does seem to be a strange sentiment to make the man a saint however.

You're 9/10ths right. :) He's probably not a monster (rhetorical hyper-flourish). The venom probably does come from the frustration that there are no viable alternatives. But I have to say, Harpo keeps his job not because he's a good PM. He isn't. Rather, he's just very good, as I said, at gaming the system. That, and putting the fear of God into those who might consider supporting other parties. (Ignatieff: Just Visiting was brilliant -- although it was only so because the Libs failed to get ahead of the critique. They should have seen it coming.)
 

Dunemeister

Well-Known Member
Morality-based legislation never works. Making something illegal just because you don't approve of it doesn't stop it from happening and never will. Doesn't even make a dent. Just costs money. Bottomless pits of taxpayer money.

Morality-based legislation is all you can have.
 

Alceste

Vagabond
You're 9/10ths right. :) He's probably not a monster (rhetorical hyper-flourish). The venom probably does come from the frustration that there are no viable alternatives. But I have to say, Harpo keeps his job not because he's a good PM. He isn't. Rather, he's just very good, as I said, at gaming the system. That, and putting the fear of God into those who might consider supporting other parties. (Ignatieff: Just Visiting was brilliant -- although it was only so because the Libs failed to get ahead of the critique. They should have seen it coming.)

The frustration is that Harper has successfully unified the political right wing in Canada, which means that the FOUR popular political parties to the left of centre have to scramble to elect the left-of-centre government a large majority of Canadians obviously want.
 
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YmirGF

Bodhisattva in Recovery
The frustration is that Harper has successfully unified the political right wing in Canada, which means that the FOUR popular political parties to the left of centre have to scramble to elect the left-of-centre government a large majority of Canadians obviously want.
The sad reality though is the demographic that so desperately wants such government does not actually go out an cast their votes. You folks already have the numbers... now if only you could get folks to put down their roach clips and stagger to the polling station.

But, you've already said it somewhere else, Alceste. We live in a very liberal country, by world standards, and the so-called "conservatives" aren't all that conservative.
 

Alceste

Vagabond
The sad reality though is the demographic that so desperately wants such government does not actually go out an cast their votes. You folks already have the numbers... now if only you could get folks to put down their roach clips and stagger to the polling station.

But, you've already said it somewhere else, Alceste. We live in a very liberal country, by world standards, and the so-called "conservatives" aren't all that conservative.

That's true. I'm glad they're not worse, but at the same time I think they're doing a terrible job, especially where the environment is concerned.

We do vote, you know. It's just that some of us vote NDP, some liberal, some Bloc, and some green. Plus it's not easy to defeat candidates who commit election fraud by misdirecting voters via robocall to keep them from the polling station, and who violate campaign spending limits.
 

Dunemeister

Well-Known Member
Lol, what? Very few social mammals enjoy seeing others in their social group suffer. Our capacity for empathy makes it uncomfortable for us.

It may well be true that empathy can make the suffering of others uncomfortable for us. But that hardly seems relevant to my question. Of course we may feel uncomfortable. But why care about the suffering of others or our own discomfort at someone else's suffering? Why should what makes certain people feel icky determine what becomes law?

What I'm pointing out is that caring about harm is a moral question. Whenever you impose legislation on something, you are declaring certain activities "good" or "bad", that is, you are making an evaluative judgment. When crafting legislation based on a harm-reduction strategy, you are making a moral pronouncement about harm reduction, evaluating it as morally superior (although other terms may be used, such as "effective", "compassionate", "consistent with what we know from science", or whatever).
 

Alceste

Vagabond
It may well be true that empathy can make the suffering of others uncomfortable for us. But that hardly seems relevant to my question. Of course we may feel uncomfortable. But why care about the suffering of others or our own discomfort at someone else's suffering? Why should what makes certain people feel icky determine what becomes law?

What I'm pointing out is that caring about harm is a moral question. Whenever you impose legislation on something, you are declaring certain activities "good" or "bad", that is, you are making an evaluative judgment. When crafting legislation based on a harm-reduction strategy, you are making a moral pronouncement about harm reduction, evaluating it as morally superior (although other terms may be used, such as "effective", "compassionate", "consistent with what we know from science", or whatever).

Morality is not required for us to conclude we don't want to feel bad. Nothing wants to feel bad. Many social mammals have an innate sense of justice and they dislike being treated unfairly, or seeing others treated unfairly.
 

bookwormlady

Owned by 2 cats
Morality is not required for us to conclude we don't want to feel bad. Nothing wants to feel bad. Many social mammals have an innate sense of justice and they dislike being treated unfairly, or seeing others treated unfairly.

Agreed. As a non-theist, I've seriously thought about the entire concept of morality. After all, what defines 'good' and 'bad'? Hypothetically, if there isn't some universal law-giver or some absolute definition of good and bad, then good and bad/right and wrong simply come to mean "what's good/right for me/what's bad/wrong for me". And everyone seems to disagree on these definitions. That's why laws vary from state to state, and country to country. Even those who believe that there's some absolute, objective morality out there disagree on what it is, and who and what determines it.

For those reasons, harm-based legislation makes much more sense to me, personally. We can determine the things that are likely to cause the most and least harm, pain, etc. We understand, as you mentioned, that most people (and other creatures) do not like unfairness, pain, and general harm. We often feel a sense of innate compassion for others and ourselves. I can see legislation based on the principals of avoiding harm working, I think.
 

Dunemeister

Well-Known Member
Morality is not required for us to conclude we don't want to feel bad. Nothing wants to feel bad. Many social mammals have an innate sense of justice and they dislike being treated unfairly, or seeing others treated unfairly.

Wait, what? An innate sense of what? Don't like others being treated how?
 

YmirGF

Bodhisattva in Recovery
You can read. When you give one monkey a banana and the other monkey a rock, all the monkeys get agitated. That's injustice in a nutshell.
Now, now, Alceste, there is no reason to refer to Liberals and those on the Left fringe as being monkeys. Have some compassion for pity's sake. Then again, the other monkeys could throw their rocks and steal the banana in the confusion that ensued.

Besides, the down side to this fuzzy-wuzzy approach is enacting legislation that is caring and sensitive but eventually has unforeseen negative consequences. What then?
 

Alceste

Vagabond
Now, now, Alceste, there is no reason to refer to Liberals and those on the Left fringe as being monkeys. Have some compassion for pity's sake. Then again, the other monkeys could throw their rocks and steal the banana in the confusion that ensued.

Besides, the down side to this fuzzy-wuzzy approach is enacting legislation that is caring and sensitive but eventually has unforeseen negative consequences. What then?

Give me an example.
 

YmirGF

Bodhisattva in Recovery
Give me an example.
I don't have one, Alceste, but hypothetically it could happen. Here I'm thinking of software written for one intention only to be maliciously hijacked by folks who get it to do something that was not envisioned by the writers.
 
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