Unpopular Opinions You Hold

[leicsmac]

7 minutes ago, Izzy Muzzett said:

Well if it’s all about luck, then good luck to the lucky ones I say. 

 

No one ever said life was fair and it’s a fvcked up world we live in for sure. I’ve had loads of ‘bad luck’ in my life health wise, yet I see people abuse their bodies to the max and never get ill. But thems the cards we’re dealt.

 

Maybe the ‘unlucky’ ones in this life get all the luck in the next life - and visa versa. Who knows...

Yup, can't disagree with any of that.

 

Doesn't say "fair" on the box, and a lot of it is out of your hands.

[Izzy]

1 minute ago, leicsmac said:

Yup, can't disagree with any of that.

 

Doesn't say "fair" on the box, and a lot of it is out of your hands.

Do you believe in fate Mac? As in life’s all mapped out and pre determined for us beforehand?

[leicsmac]

6 minutes ago, Izzy Muzzett said:

Do you believe in fate Mac? As in life’s all mapped out and pre determined for us beforehand?

Ooooh, big question.

 

And the answer is hell, no - not because I've got any proof it isn't the case, but simply because I dislike the idea of some cosmic entity being totally in control of my life.

 

IMO it's the decisions of other people, as well as luck (and yes, it could be argued that "luck" is merely part of a greater pattern) have the biggest effect on folks lives, and while that's not exactly palatable either it does mean that humans have at least some free will. But it's slanted - the more power you have, the more control you have and the more decisions you can make.

 

Of course, this is all seriously theoretical opinion and I could be talking utter bollox here, so make of it what you will.

[Rogstanley]

2 hours ago, leicsmac said:

The idea of the "rags-to-riches" dream and that hard work will eventually pay off and make you rich doesn't happen nearly often enough in real life to be held up on a pedestal the way it is, and as such it is damaging.

 

For every one of those stories that come true, there are a hundred thousand stories of those who work just as hard and get zilch as a reward.

 

If hard work is what makes one rich and not working hard is what leads to poverty, then migrant farmworkers would be millionaires and the woman who owns Grumpy Cat would be pulling two jobs just to make ends meet.

Malcolm Gladwell's book Outliers is interesting from this perspective. Gives examples of people being in the right place at the right time, like Bill Gates having been extremely lucky to gain access to a computer at his school, without which he'd have never learned the skills that lead to Microsoft.

 

I agree with you in that hard work is a very weak determinant of high level success. But i think it can make a difference betwen struggling to get by and doing reasonably well for most people lucky enough to live in developed economies and be capable of work.

[RumbleFox]

Inception is overrated.  X

[Innovindil]

2 hours ago, Izzy Muzzett said:

It’s not about working hard anymore, it’s about working smart...

Exactly. I don't get paid for running my arse into the ground, I get paid because I spent 4 years and a lot of money learning how to do it. 

[Buce]

3 hours ago, Izzy Muzzett said:

It’s not about working hard anymore, it’s about working smart...

 

It always was. 

 

Most people are too busy working to earn any real money.  

Edited 17 February 2018 by Buce

[Colourmy]

Working hard and doing what you do well and doing it for a reasonable length of time would normally be enough to earn comfortably I think.

Rags to Riches stories are one-offs, for the most part, someone being in at the start of something that takes hold quickly is more the likelier scenario.

 

Chasing the dream is just a waste of precious, finite time in my opinion. This sums it up perfectly.  If you've never seen the photo 

" Pale Blue Dot", Google it.

 

We succeeded in taking that picture [from deep space], and, if you look at it, you see a dot. That's here. That's home. That's us. On it, everyone you ever heard of, every human being who ever lived, lived out their lives. The aggregate of all our joys and sufferings, thousands of confident religions, ideologies and economic doctrines, every hunter and forager, every hero and coward, every creator and destroyer of civilizations, every king and peasant, every young couple in love, every hopeful child, every mother and father, every inventor and explorer, every teacher of morals, every corrupt politician, every superstar, every supreme leader, every saint and sinner in the history of our species, lived there on a mote of dust, suspended in a sunbeam.

The Earth is a very small stage in a vast cosmic arena. Think of the rivers of blood spilled by all those generals and emperors so that in glory and in triumph they could become the momentary masters of a fraction of a dot. Think of the endless cruelties visited by the inhabitants of one corner of the dot on scarcely distinguishable inhabitants of some other corner of the dot. How frequent their misunderstandings, how eager they are to kill one another, how fervent their hatreds. Our posturings, our imagined self-importance, the delusion that we have some privileged position in the universe, are challenged by this point of pale light.

Our planet is a lonely speck in the great enveloping cosmic dark. In our obscurity – in all this vastness – there is no hint that help will come from elsewhere to save us from ourselves. It is up to us. It's been said that astronomy is a humbling, and I might add, a character-building experience. To my mind, there is perhaps no better demonstration of the folly of human conceits than this distant image of our tiny world. To me, it underscores our responsibility to deal more kindly and compassionately with one another and to preserve and cherish that pale blue dot, the only home we've ever known.

— Carl Sagan, speech at Cornell University, October 13, 1994

Edited 17 February 2018 by Colourmy

[Izzy]

2 hours ago, leicsmac said:

Ooooh, big question.

 

And the answer is hell, no - not because I've got any proof it isn't the case, but simply because I dislike the idea of some cosmic entity being totally in control of my life.

 

IMO it's the decisions of other people, as well as luck (and yes, it could be argued that "luck" is merely part of a greater pattern) have the biggest effect on folks lives, and while that's not exactly palatable either it does mean that humans have at least some free will. But it's slanted - the more power you have, the more control you have and the more decisions you can make.

 

Of course, this is all seriously theoretical opinion and I could be talking utter bollox here, so make of it what you will.

Hasn't that always been the case though since the beginning of man kind? There's always been a hierarchy and some people have always had more power than others - I can't see that changing anytime soon...

 

P.S. I really like you as a poster Mac. You're far too clever for me and I don't always agree with you, but I do enjoy reading your take on life and the world we live in 

[FoxesDeb]

Just now, Izzy Muzzett said:

Hasn't that always been the case though since the beginning of man kind? There's always been a hierarchy and some people have always had more power than others - I can't see that changing anytime soon...

 

P.S. I really like you as a poster Mac. You're far too clever for me and I don't always agree with you, but I do enjoy reading your take on life and the world we live in 

I second this. I don't often comment on things you've said, but I love reading what you have to say @leicsmac

[Izzy]

32 minutes ago, Buce said:

 

It always was. 

 

Most people are too busy working to earn any real money.  

I'm sure you've read this mate. Written just for you 

 

[leicsmac]

7 minutes ago, Colourmy said:

Working hard and doing what you do well and doing it for a reasonable length of time would normally be enough to earn comfortably I think.

Rags to Riches stories are one-offs, for the most part, someone being in at the start of something that takes hold quickly is more the likelier scenario.

 

Chasing the dream is just a waste of precious, finite time in my opinion.

Yeah, this is about right. Like Rog said and was said here too, hard work and application can get you a reasonable quality of life in a well-developed country (and there's nothing wrong at all with being comfortable), but if you're going to get to the truly next level you need luck, the right connections, or both - and it doesn't happen often.

 

 

4 minutes ago, Izzy Muzzett said:

Hasn't that always been the case though since the beginning of man kind? There's always been a hierarchy and some people have always had more power than others - I can't see that changing anytime soon...

 

P.S. I really like you as a poster Mac. You're far too clever for me and I don't always agree with you, but I do enjoy reading your take on life and the world we live in 

Yeah, it has. We're hierarchal creatures by nature and I don't see that changing soon either - I just take issue with people filling the airwaves and other peoples heads with this dream that they're just temporarily embarrassed millionaires and they can definitely make a fortune just by working hard; it's a lie and it's cruel to use false hope in that way IMO.

 

Thanks a lot - I enjoy the company on here, being able to challenge views and in return have my own views challenged and think about them critically is an essential part of growth and I'm thankful for the opportunity to do that you and many other posters here offer. No one should live in an echo chamber.

 

2 minutes ago, FoxesDeb said:

I second this. I don't often comment on things you've said, but I love reading what you have to say @leicsmac

Thanks ever so much - as I said above, it's nice to have this platform to talk about stuff.

[Buce]

17 minutes ago, Izzy Muzzett said:

I'm sure you've read this mate. Written just for you 

 

 

 Four hours!!?

 

Do you think I’m a horse or something?

 

 

[leicsmac]

6 hours ago, Colourmy said:

 

We succeeded in taking that picture [from deep space], and, if you look at it, you see a dot. That's here. That's home. That's us. On it, everyone you ever heard of, every human being who ever lived, lived out their lives. The aggregate of all our joys and sufferings, thousands of confident religions, ideologies and economic doctrines, every hunter and forager, every hero and coward, every creator and destroyer of civilizations, every king and peasant, every young couple in love, every hopeful child, every mother and father, every inventor and explorer, every teacher of morals, every corrupt politician, every superstar, every supreme leader, every saint and sinner in the history of our species, lived there on a mote of dust, suspended in a sunbeam.

The Earth is a very small stage in a vast cosmic arena. Think of the rivers of blood spilled by all those generals and emperors so that in glory and in triumph they could become the momentary masters of a fraction of a dot. Think of the endless cruelties visited by the inhabitants of one corner of the dot on scarcely distinguishable inhabitants of some other corner of the dot. How frequent their misunderstandings, how eager they are to kill one another, how fervent their hatreds. Our posturings, our imagined self-importance, the delusion that we have some privileged position in the universe, are challenged by this point of pale light.

Our planet is a lonely speck in the great enveloping cosmic dark. In our obscurity – in all this vastness – there is no hint that help will come from elsewhere to save us from ourselves. It is up to us. It's been said that astronomy is a humbling, and I might add, a character-building experience. To my mind, there is perhaps no better demonstration of the folly of human conceits than this distant image of our tiny world. To me, it underscores our responsibility to deal more kindly and compassionately with one another and to preserve and cherish that pale blue dot, the only home we've ever known.

— Carl Sagan, speech at Cornell University, October 13, 1994

4

I truly, honestly wish more people had this perspective.

[woollett the bullet]

That I am a quite decent  and likeable bloke and really useful , both at work and around the house

[woollett the bullet]

17 hours ago, Izzy Muzzett said:

It’s not about working hard anymore, it’s about working smart...

Bang on Muzz , willing horses will always be flogged the most - always have always will.

[ozleicester]

18 hours ago, Izzy Muzzett said:

It’s not about working hard anymore, it’s about working smart...

 

18 hours ago, leicsmac said:

The idea of the "rags-to-riches" dream and that hard work will eventually pay off and make you rich doesn't happen nearly often enough in real life to be held up on a pedestal the way it is, and as such it is damaging.

 

For every one of those stories that come true, there are a hundred thousand stories of those who work just as hard and get zilch as a reward.

 

If hard work is what makes one rich and not working hard is what leads to poverty, then migrant farmworkers would be millionaires and the woman who owns Grumpy Cat would be pulling two jobs just to make ends meet.

[Guest]

People don't earn what they deserve. Some people are lucky to have certain skills or abilities others don't have, some are lucky to have the looks or the intelligence or the smarts others don't have and some happen to be in the right place at the right time and others don't.

 

I really wish that everyone was paid the same wage per hour whatever work they do, which is why I'm all for UBI and would prefer it went a step further. It wouldn't stop people from wanting to be doctors or footballers, it would give respect to cleaners and shelf stackers.

 

If not how can we oppose DNA modification, where parents can superhumanise their kids to give them the same chances as everyone else? It may also dehumanise them and make them all similar but at least getting low pay because your dumb would be a thing of the past.

 

 

[Colourmy]

1 hour ago, FIF said:

People don't earn what they deserve. Some people are lucky to have certain skills or abilities others don't have, some are lucky to have the looks or the intelligence or the smarts others don't have and some happen to be in the right place at the right time and others don't.

 

I really wish that everyone was paid the same wage per hour whatever work they do, which is why I'm all for UBI and would prefer it went a step further. It wouldn't stop people from wanting to be doctors or footballers, it would give respect to cleaners and shelf stackers.

 

If not how can we oppose DNA modification, where parents can superhumanise their kids to give them the same chances as everyone else? It may also dehumanise them and make them all similar but at least getting low pay because your dumb would be a thing of the past.

 

 

How could that work though? So many, many things wrong with that notion.

Why would you put 5-10 years of hard graft in to become a neurosurgeon, to only get the same as a cleaner, who just walked into the office and said I want a job?

Socialism doesn't work, history proves that.

[lifted*fox]

If the money is the same I am NEVER choosing to work 12 hour shifts with people's lives in my hands over putting loaves of bread neatly on the shelf in Waitrose.

 

There will be a few determined souls out there who'd do it anyway but they would be the exception. 

 

[Wymsey]

1 hour ago, lifted*fox said:

If the money is the same I am NEVER choosing to work 12 hour shifts with people's lives in my hands over putting loaves of bread neatly on the shelf in Waitrose.

 

There will be a few determined souls out there who'd do it anyway but they would be the exception. 

 

You're being shelfist/stackist imo.

[Sampson]

It's not just the modern Socialist states of the 20th century which didn't work, ideas of mass wealth redistribution, wage fixing and stuff like price fixing and price controls have been around since Roman times and the likes of Tiberius Gracchus etc. and it never works.

 

Whether you like it or not, people only live once and most people won't waste their while life (and they're perfectly right not to) training extra for something if there's no monetary gain at the end of it. People wouldn't put all that extra work into becoming specialised in particular fields if specialised jobs weren't more valued to the market place than unskilled or unspecialised jobs which millions of people in this country can do. No way in hell I'd put in the extra hours to become a doctor or architect when I could the same or even a decent amount less at a supermarket as said above, life is far too short for that.

 

It's shitty, of course it is, those unspecialised people don't work any less hard and specialised people often dedicate their life to something only for it to become obsolete by technology, but that's just part of life I'm afraid, it's much better than the alternative. At least we benefit as a society from brain surgeons and pilots and town planners and technological innovators this way.

Edited 18 February 2018 by Sampson

[Rogstanley]

1 hour ago, Sampson said:

It's not just the modern Socialist states of the 20th century which didn't work, ideas of mass wealth redistribution, wage fixing and stuff like price fixing and price controls have been around since Roman times and the likes of Tiberius Gracchus etc. and it never works.

 

Whether you like it or not, people only live once and most people won't waste their while life (and they're perfectly right not to) training extra for something if there's no monetary gain at the end of it. People wouldn't put all that extra work into becoming specialised in particular fields if specialised jobs weren't more valued to the market place than unskilled or unspecialised jobs which millions of people in this country can do. No way in hell I'd put in the extra hours to become a doctor or architect when I could the same or even a decent amount less at a supermarket as said above, life is far too short for that.

 

It's shitty, of course it is, those unspecialised people don't work any less hard and specialised people often dedicate their life to something only for it to become obsolete by technology, but that's just part of life I'm afraid, it's much better than the alternative. At least we benefit as a society from brain surgeons and pilots and town planners and technological innovators this way.

Socialism isn’t successful when assessed against capitalist criteria in the same way darts players wouldn’t be very successful if assessed against the criteria of a professional footballer. You’re comparing apples with oranges. Not that I’m in favour of socialism - I’m not - but when you judge everything from the perspective of a capitalist then of course capitalism is going to look like the best system.

Edited 18 February 2018 by Rogstanley

[Sampson]

23 minutes ago, Rogstanley said:

Socialism isn’t successful when assessed against capitalist criteria in the same way darts players wouldn’t be very successful if assessed against the criteria of a professional footballer. You’re comparing apples with oranges. Not that I’m in favour of socialism - I’m not - but when you view everything from the perspective of a capitalist then of course capitalism is going to look like the best system.

Socialism is never successful in the realm of giving the majority of people better and freer lives which I would think would be the main goal of any political ideology not just a Capitalist one. Because prioritising individual liberty has shown it *can* provide these things when done right in a way prioritising collectivism has shown it does not, because most people recognise their own mortality and the fleeting nature of life so want to have the liberty to choose how to live their life rather than bring told they have to certain things or make certain decisions because the state or a syndicate or a collective decides that was better for the collective even when all individuals are different and have their own unique goals etc. and Socialism and collectivism cannot take those into account and always sucks the freedom for individuality out of the individual.

 

It's why the Berlin Wall came down - because people saw the choice and freedom to be an individual on the other side of it and rose up against it, because life is too short to have it dictated by the decisions of others be it the state or some democratic syndicate or what have you - I don't see what's specifically Capitalist about wanting individual liberty as an ultimate life goal. It's just that historically Capitalism has shown to be the best promoter for individual liberty while still helping people's lives generally get better over the long-term, despite all its flaws and downturns.

Edited 18 February 2018 by Sampson

[Rogstanley]

6 minutes ago, Sampson said:

Socialism is never successful in the realm of giving the majority of people better and freer lives which I would think would be the main goal of any political ideology not just a Capitalist one. Because prioritising individual liberty has shown it can provide these things when done right in a way prioritising collectivism has shown it does not, because most people recognise their own mortality and the fleeting nature of life so want to have the liberty to choose how to live their life rather than bring told they have to certain things or make certain decisions because the state or a syndicate or a collective decides that was better for the collective even when all individuals are different and have their own unique goals etc. and Socialism and collectivism cannot take those into account and always sucks the freedom for individuality out of the individual.

 

It's why the Berlin Wall came down - because people saw the choice and freedom to be an individual on the other side of it and rose up against it, because life is too short to have it dictated by the decisions of others be it the state or some democratic syndicate or what have you - I don't see what's specifically Capitalist about wanting individual liberty as an ultimate life goal.

You could argue that people in capitalist systems only have an illusion of freedom.

 

Certainly your average slave wasn’t free in any way. The fact that today’s low wage workers have more freedom than a slave is not thanks to capitalism.