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Nov 2023 Mod notice:


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In line with the general forum rules, 'gravedancing' is prohibited here. If you're celebrating someone's death or hoping that they die, your post will get thumped. This rule applies regardless of what the person you're discussing has said or done.

Edited by Mrph1 on Nov 30th 2023 at 11:03:59 AM

GlennMagusHarvey Since: Jan, 2001
#56551: Jun 16th 2013 at 2:11:22 AM

You can say, 'happy holidays', because yes, there are more than one near the same time.

I like this reasoning.

"It's not a generic holiday. It's plural, holidays, because there are several of them."

Also, "under God" could be taken to mean disfavoring polytheistic religions, for what it's worth.

I take issue with it because it just has nothing to do with the rest of the pledge.

Euodiachloris Since: Oct, 2010
#56552: Jun 16th 2013 at 2:36:34 AM

Sorry, Zendervai... but... it was tax season. And, most Western nations get tax season from the Romans. Although, theirs took a few more months than ours does, they did actually start in spring (the then-start-of-the-year) and usually ended at some time in summer. smile

And, that's expressly not Saturnalia time. wink

Greenmantle V from Greater Wessex, Britannia Since: Feb, 2010 Relationship Status: Hiding
V
#56553: Jun 16th 2013 at 3:22:30 AM

[up] Isn't there a Hindu God/Goddess involved somewhere?

Keep Rolling On
Euodiachloris Since: Oct, 2010
#56554: Jun 16th 2013 at 3:26:12 AM

[up]You mean Devali? That's usually over come Yuletide, though. <confused> I love Devali food, though... when people can agree on the dates to have it on. wink

Zendervai Since: Oct, 2009
#56555: Jun 16th 2013 at 7:52:42 AM

[up][up][up] Yeah. I just mean that the events with the shepherds could have happened at any time during the year.

KnightofNASA Since: Jan, 2013
#56556: Jun 16th 2013 at 8:06:02 AM

Ace of Spades said this is more appropriate here, so...

Looks like Congress is drafting another NASA authorization bill. It feels like Congress is trying to squeeze NASA more. Batting my eyes on the six years term.

RadicalTaoist scratching at .8, just hopin' from the #GUniverse Since: Jan, 2001
Barkey Since: Feb, 2010 Relationship Status: [TOP SECRET]
#56558: Jun 16th 2013 at 10:51:07 AM

^

Noted, since I'm flying into Orlando tomorrow.

Wildcard Since: Jun, 2012
GlennMagusHarvey Since: Jan, 2001
#56560: Jun 16th 2013 at 11:33:32 AM

Wait, it's seriously, literally illegal to serve free food in Orlando?

DrunkGirlfriend from Castle Geekhaven Since: Jan, 2011
#56561: Jun 16th 2013 at 11:47:39 AM

[up] It's probably got something to do with a ban on street food vendors, or serving food without a permit, or something that's really unrelated.

edited 16th Jun '13 11:48:05 AM by DrunkGirlfriend

"I don't know how I do it. I'm like the Mr. Bean of sex." -Drunkscriblerian
Wildcard Since: Jun, 2012
#56562: Jun 16th 2013 at 11:51:10 AM

Oversight leads to a lot of horrible things, like allowing fire departments to burn your house down if you don't pay a fee, and like this.

Belian In honor of my 50lb pup from 42 Since: Jan, 2001
In honor of my 50lb pup
#56563: Jun 16th 2013 at 12:10:50 PM

(Brain instantly jumps to the Colorado fires and how those forests obviously needed a controlled burn years ago. And how the houses in the forest needed to be designed with fires in mind)

...anyone want to take up that tangent? There seems to be enough subjects being discussed here at the moment that I don't think we need to add "responsible preservation techniques" to it.

Yu hav nat sein bod speeling unntil know. (cacke four undersandig tis)the cake is a lie!
NativeJovian Jupiterian Local from Orlando, FL Since: Mar, 2014 Relationship Status: Maxing my social links
Jupiterian Local
#56564: Jun 16th 2013 at 1:00:22 PM

You guys realize that that video is two years old, right? None of them were actually charged with a crime. And DG was right, they reason they were arrested in the first place was for violating an ordinance against feeding people in a public park without a permit — an ordinance passed by the city only after pressure from local citizens, who weren't particularly pleased with the group co-opting part of their park with an unofficial homeless kitchen.

On a more general note, respect to the guys running it for taking a stand and doing what they felt was right despite knowing they were going to be arrested — and then allowing themselves to be arrested without any drama, rather than resisting arrest or doing anything stupid. That's the way to do civil disobedience. On the other hand, the people observing and trying to provoke the cops? They're dicks.

edited 16th Jun '13 1:11:47 PM by NativeJovian

Really from Jupiter, but not an alien.
Wildcard Since: Jun, 2012
#56565: Jun 16th 2013 at 1:15:40 PM

So? It's still messed up that they would arrest people for feeding them just because it was there. Still wrong.

NativeJovian Jupiterian Local from Orlando, FL Since: Mar, 2014 Relationship Status: Maxing my social links
Jupiterian Local
#56567: Jun 16th 2013 at 2:46:21 PM

[up][up]They weren't arresting people for feeding the homeless, they were arresting people for co-opting a public park for private use. Feeding the homeless is certainly a noble endeavor, but you can't just ignore the effect that your activities have one everyone else while you do it.

edited 16th Jun '13 2:46:46 PM by NativeJovian

Really from Jupiter, but not an alien.
Wildcard Since: Jun, 2012
#56568: Jun 16th 2013 at 4:54:00 PM

Yeah and they should have allowed them to rent out part of the park for this.

Barkey Since: Feb, 2010 Relationship Status: [TOP SECRET]
#56569: Jun 16th 2013 at 4:58:18 PM

^

Did they ask the city if they could in the first place?

Wildcard Since: Jun, 2012
#56570: Jun 16th 2013 at 5:06:17 PM

Good question I'll have to look that up, even so arresting the people who went peacefully was too much. Should have just escorted them out.

Barkey Since: Feb, 2010 Relationship Status: [TOP SECRET]
#56571: Jun 16th 2013 at 5:37:59 PM

Yeah, that is rather heavy handed. Though in my experience "It's better to beg forgiveness than ask permission" is almost never the case when it comes to city or county governments.

RadicalTaoist scratching at .8, just hopin' from the #GUniverse Since: Jan, 2001
scratching at .8, just hopin'
#56572: Jun 16th 2013 at 6:01:39 PM

We have another financial collapse to look forward to - the insurance industry is pulling the scam that the finance industry was pulling a few years back.

And part of Louisiana blows up.

Remember the fertilizer plant that blew in West, Texas? Hell, remember the Massey coal mine disaster? Remember how there inevitably was a story about how those places had been freed steadily from the death grip of government regulation by the Invisible Hand of The Profit Motive? Remember how people then wondered how such terrible things could happen to such wonderful people and everybody sent teddy bears and stuff?

For the love of weeping Christ, if you let the members of America's corporate elite go unsupervised and unaccountable, they will kill people, either all at once in cave-ins or big boom-booms, or slowly, a little at a time, by poisoning the air and the water and the food. Thanks to "Bobby" Jindal — and, it must be said, almost everyone of his predecessors in both parties — Louisiana's poorest sections have been turned into an ecological zone of death for almost a century. Now part of it has blown up. And we get the second day stories about how nobody had inspected the joint in 20 years.

Share it so that people can get into this conversation, 'cause we're not the only ones who think like this.
midgetsnowman Since: Jan, 2010
#56573: Jun 16th 2013 at 7:03:08 PM

If not for the cost in Human Lives I'd find it downright comical.

Zendervai Since: Oct, 2009
#56574: Jun 16th 2013 at 7:22:12 PM

Consistent long-term profit should be the priority, especially if short-term profit can result in massive costs down the line. Being rich for five years is great, until you go bankrupt repaying everyone who you hurt or killed with your cost-cutting methods. I honestly don't get why sustainability is apparently such a bad word in the business world.

Linhasxoc Since: Jun, 2009
#56575: Jun 16th 2013 at 7:58:41 PM

I honestly don't get why sustainability is apparently such a bad word in the business world.
I can think of at least two possible factors at work here.

One is the knee-jerk, "those hippies are doing it, therefore it must be bad" reaction. About a month ago I saw a story about how conservatives are less likely to buy CFL bulbs if the packaging plays up the environmental benefits (I think we discussed that story in this thread, actually); a similar thought process may be going on here.

More pressing, though, is the Wall Street profit-now mentality. Everything I have heard about Wall Street investors is that they are viscous sharks that will panic if a company so much as thinks about doing something that hurts its quarterly profits; this is compounded by executives who artificially pump up the stock price to cash in on their stock options.

I actually have a relevant anecdote about that. I just started working for a large, privately-owned software company, but despite being huge, the company doesn't really have a large-company feel. The employees are paid well, the office buildings (and they are all offices; no cubicle farms in sight) each have a unique theme, such as New York City or Dungeons and Dragons, the cafeteria sells restaurant-quality meals for effectively the cost of the ingredients, etc. etc. I say all this because in today's business world, you can't do that as a public company. Investors would question why you're spending all this money on fancy office buildings and employee perks when there's profit to be made for the stockholders. Yet my company's corporate culture is arguably a big part of why it's been so successful, which just brings me back to my point: the Wall Street profit-now culture is antithetical to sustainability.


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