In response to recent observations and apparent interest, let's do some discussing! I'll be changing the topic here weekly-ish. If I miss the appointed date, feel free to propose something tasteful and thought provoking. If the previous discussion is ongoing when a new discussion starts, I'll split it off.

Taking proposals for future discussions by PM.

• Topic 1: Zero tolerance laws/policies/whatever, 2/16/10-2/23/10
• Topic 2: Copyright and intellectual property, 2/23-3/2
• Topic 3: Anti-vaccination movement, 3/3-3/10
• Topic 4: Minimum wage, 3/10-3/17
• Topic 5: Geoengineering, 6/25-7/2
• Topic 6: Oil Spills, 7/3-7/9
• Topic 7: The Tea Party, 10/16-10/23
• Topic 8: Pataphysics of gravity, 11/5-11/12
• Topic 10: Ghosts in the machine
• Topic 11: Numerology, 1/11/11-1/18
• Topic 12: Contemporary political discourse, 1/19-1/26
• Topic 13: George Soros, 1/30-2/6 - discussion split to here
• Topic 14: Scale in video games, 2/7-2/14
• Topic 15: Implications of Moore's Law, 2/15-2/22
• Topic 16: Birtherism and politics, 4/28-5/5
• Topic 17: The debt ceiling, 5/11-5/18
• Topic 18: US credit rating downgraded, 8/6-8/13
• Topic 19: NYC shenanigans, 6/18/12-6/25
• Topic 20: Obamacare, 6/28-7/5
• Topic 21: Guest topic - Arguing with portals, 7/15-7/22
• Topic 22: The most important question of all, 8/1-8/8
• Topic 23: Rumble on the Potomac, 8/12-8/19 - discussion split to here
• Topic 24: $1 trillion coin, 1/13/13-1/20/13

Topic 1: Zero tolerance laws/policies/whatever, 2/16-2/23

If you haven't heard of them, they give very specific and often harsh punishments for infractions, designed to reduce the irregularity that can come from people basing punishments on personal judgement. They are popular in the US for school drug and safety rules, and in some states for criminal law, especially for multiple offenses.

I think that they are generally bad, and that the people who put them in place should feel bad, but I think that's mostly due to sloppy/stupid implementation. There is some justification for such policies, as inconsistent application can sometimes be problematic. And of course, we must think of the children.

Get rid of the children and all problems will be solved, the little bastards.

I have to study some more for an exam, but I'll give my two cents right now and expand on it whenever I get back from it [five and a half more hours or so]:

Zero tolerance laws are not necessary to the degree they are currently set, but some kind of law to prevent the children from drinking is necessary. With twenty three or so years since the drinking age was brought up to 21, and the zero tolerance law in effect as it is, teenagers here in the US haven't had the ability to experiment with alcohol in a safe environment. When I say in a safe environment I mean in a place where alcohol is easy to obtain [even for kids].

So to summarize my quick thoughts, I don't approve of the Zero Tolerance laws but believe that the drinking habits/culture of the Americans is so fucked up at this point thanks to the drinking age that some kind of strict rule is still necessary.... even if it isn't preventing anything.

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A Pimp Named Jeezy Creezy: Lasting all the way up to Valentine's.

And the Pimpeth lord sat amidst his real ballin' players, the Apostles, and raisingeth his cup of Cristal as they devoured the grapes and cheese from the finest bitches in town he said

"Sleepery Dee, Sleepery Doo.
Whoever betrays me tonight, I'll mo'fuckin' cap you!"

I laugh about the drinking age in the USA all the time. Not like countries who allow drinking from age 5 become wastelands. Americans just love to spend a load of cash on prevention and laws that will be broken and avoided anyway. I mean, "normal" countries (G8 average) have drinking age set between 16-18. 21 is just a joke, in trying to be somehow better, maybe "cleaner". Truth is, kids will go for alcohol around the age of 15 anyway, and making it illegal and hard to obtain will only make it more "wrong" to do the normal thing. Thus kids end up thinking they are "bad" cause they break one rule, and they start breaking more, if they weren't caught. Not being punished makes them feel like the rules can be broken with no repercussions, while if they are punished you get a really high number of people who need punishment. Honestly, how many Americans tasted alcohol at age 21 for the first time?

Similar applies to many zero tolerance policies.

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This post is intended for information only. Please do not reply to this message as responses cannot be read or acknowledged due to the stupidity of the user.

Little Jim-boy is too cool for school.

If the US truly wants to stop underage drinking, they should take some notes from The Onion

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A Pimp Named Jeezy Creezy: Lasting all the way up to Valentine's.

And the Pimpeth lord sat amidst his real ballin' players, the Apostles, and raisingeth his cup of Cristal as they devoured the grapes and cheese from the finest bitches in town he said

"Sleepery Dee, Sleepery Doo.
Whoever betrays me tonight, I'll mo'fuckin' cap you!"

_________________
This post is intended for information only. Please do not reply to this message as responses cannot be read or acknowledged due to the stupidity of the user.

_________________
This post is intended for information only. Please do not reply to this message as responses cannot be read or acknowledged due to the stupidity of the user.

I get the feeling this is turning into more of a drinking age discussion than it is a ZT discussion... never the less as is so often pointed out, you can go to war and die for your country before your allow to knock back a cold one.


As far as Zero Tolerance... it's over compensation in a general sense...

Any soldier can get a drink on base regardless of age. Do you want your soldiers fighting for your country drunk?

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victimless crimes unless they are putting people directly into an increased risk of immediate physical harm should at the very least made misdemeanors and not felonies

drunk driving as you notice has plenty of statistical evidence that supports that people who drink and become physically impaired causes problems behind the wheel, no problems with keeping that the way it is, illegal! direct physical harms well documented

posession of most illegal things should be reduced in punishment if not removed entirely.

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Bleedcomics Staff Writer/Editor, , and Keeper of the Jar Brain of Secret President. RIP Ku Ku Ku \(-^.^-)/ U Wuz A REAL N***A!!!!!!!
"We're quite aware of this. BR is no happy rainbow face man. He is simply our neighborhood best fucking poster." ~ Warbear
Puff Most Epic.

I suggest a more modest proposal.

Indeed. I believe Jonathan Swift had the right idea.

But that only applied to the irish.

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CAUTION: Would anyone tell me if I was getting stupider?

Then we can make it less modest.

T_T ^

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A Pimp Named Jeezy Creezy: Lasting all the way up to Valentine's.

And the Pimpeth lord sat amidst his real ballin' players, the Apostles, and raisingeth his cup of Cristal as they devoured the grapes and cheese from the finest bitches in town he said

"Sleepery Dee, Sleepery Doo.
Whoever betrays me tonight, I'll mo'fuckin' cap you!"

Or perhaps we should make it more modest to increase the likelihood of it being accepted.

Going by your logic, it should be legal to carry a bomb on board a plane, and you will only be punished if you detonate it. Possession of illegal things is illegal because they too often end up causing harm. We could discuss why some things are legal and other are not, because that is imho messed up, but the very issue of possession of illegal things is fine as it is.

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This post is intended for information only. Please do not reply to this message as responses cannot be read or acknowledged due to the stupidity of the user.

See the thing about Zero tolerance discussions? They'll eventually move away from the topic at hand and go towards other topics that are derived from it [drinking age, illegal items, etc]

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A Pimp Named Jeezy Creezy: Lasting all the way up to Valentine's.

And the Pimpeth lord sat amidst his real ballin' players, the Apostles, and raisingeth his cup of Cristal as they devoured the grapes and cheese from the finest bitches in town he said

"Sleepery Dee, Sleepery Doo.
Whoever betrays me tonight, I'll mo'fuckin' cap you!"

This is why you ignore those posts and keep your own on topic.

Would you care to elaborate on how a strict rule could be necessary if it doesn't prevent anything?

I've mentioned elsewhere that I think a better scheme than the status quo would be legalization of pretty much everything, but requiring a license to use most things. Within such a scheme, I think that relatively harsh penalties for violations would be appropriate in most cases, e.g. I think that current drunk driving punishments are generally too lenient, but that flexible guidelines would be better than a specific zero-tolerance punishment.

Maybe some people need to stop going to alcohol for all their problems.

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@Val:

I partially agree with your idea about the licenses except that I don't believe [with my limited knowledge on government] that would lead to anything constitutionally correct. I have no data to back my statement at the moment but a good example would be a marijuana user, cocaine user and a regular joe who are applying for a job [alcohol is already accepted as part of the culture so I won't take it into account]. Wouldn't having licenses cause companies to discriminate against those who do drugs?

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A Pimp Named Jeezy Creezy: Lasting all the way up to Valentine's.

And the Pimpeth lord sat amidst his real ballin' players, the Apostles, and raisingeth his cup of Cristal as they devoured the grapes and cheese from the finest bitches in town he said

"Sleepery Dee, Sleepery Doo.
Whoever betrays me tonight, I'll mo'fuckin' cap you!"

did you read my post in its entirety? because you would not be making this assertion if you did. please try again.

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Bleedcomics Staff Writer/Editor, , and Keeper of the Jar Brain of Secret President. RIP Ku Ku Ku \(-^.^-)/ U Wuz A REAL N***A!!!!!!!
"We're quite aware of this. BR is no happy rainbow face man. He is simply our neighborhood best fucking poster." ~ Warbear
Puff Most Epic.

Weekly discussion 2 (2/23-3/2): Copyright and intellectual property

Various laws grant the creator/owner of creative works legal control over what can be done with them to protect their ability to make money from it, thereby encouraging people to do creative stuff that benefits everyone. KEEP THIS PURPOSE IN MIND.

Nowadays, there is conflict between copyright holders of music and many consumers as digital media have made unauthorized sharing easy. Business models probably need to change, but widespread illegal activity is probably not sustainable long-term either, probably triggering a crackdown or legalization. This is a notable part of the controversy about intellectual property, but there are others, like opposition to Google's bid to digitize books and make them available online, so additional related issues are appropriate for discussion.

So then, what is the place of intellectual property in modern society? How should it work in the future?


Also, talking like a pirate is encouraged.