If you spend too much time focusing on the way you think things ought to be you become an idealist and naïve. Spend too much time on the way they are and you become trapped in a world that seems unchangeable. Too often I hear statements like “that’s how it is in the real world” or “that’s a fact of life.” Personally, I think nothing is permanent except change. Here are a few thoughts I have about the way things ought to be that I’m offering up to the distinguished devil’s advocates of the SDMB.
The Way Things Are:
Nearly every great society collapsed under the weight of its own decadence, as it grew corrupt and forgetful of its founding values. The American values of justice, equality and opportunity are being replaced with consumption, luxury, and ignorance. No generation epitomizes this more than Gen X and Y, the so-called “fun generations.” Two decades of unprecedented peace and prosperity has sired millions of young adults who crave hedonism and are ill equipped to deal with strife, hardship, and sacrifice.
The Way Things Ought to Be:
The UN is a legislative and judiciary body without an executive branch to enforce its decrees. Much in the way individuals within a nation agree to place restrictions on their rights and obey the laws of a social contract in exchange for security and order, member states of the UN should draft a basic world constitution with provisions for executive powers to place limitations on sovereignty (including superpower nations).
The Middle East is a festering wound inflicted by developed nations that have played a part in the subjugation and murder of millions to protect their access to a finite natural resource. There needs to be acknowledgement of wrong doing by both parties (us for obstructing their self-determination and them for engaging in heinous guerrilla tactics when other proven methods like non-violent protest exist). Diplomatic solutions are always preferable to war.
Israel cannot continue to exist in its present form. Jerusalem (along with other contentious holy sites) should be internationalized and run by an elected council of representatives from the three faiths it is important to. Also, a true Palestinian State must be negotiated within a UN framework (easier said than done, but at the moment all progress in that direction has stalled).
African American’s deserve some form of slave reparations. There hasn’t been significant racial progress since the '64 Civil Rights Act. $50 billion over 5 years in tax breaks and educational and healthcare benefits would be a good start in leveling the playing field.
Capitalism (especially laissez-faire capitalism) is growing outdated and immoral. The pursuit of uninterrupted growth and maximization of profits frequently sweeps questions of ethicality and sustainability under the rug. We should be moving towards a better capitalism-socialism hybrid.
Fossil fuels should only be used for plastics, everything powered by oil should be gradually converted to hydrogen and ethanol and other renewable fuels starting tomorrow. The $100 billion earmarked for Iraq should be used to get the ball rolling; a Manhattan Project to save the world not destroy it.
Mass media places far too much emphasis on encouraging people to buy shit and blindly accept that ‘the system’ is working, and far too little on education and critical thinking.
Politicians spend too much time and energy on elections. The McCain/ Feingold bill has been undermined and loopholed into irrelevancy. The foxes are guarding the henhouse, and the only way to ensure real campaign finance reform is for the public to express it as a prerequisite for their vote. Also, the federal government gave away billions of dollars to the television industry when it distributed TV frequencies. Eminent domain should be utilized to acquire TV time to be freely and equally allotted to candidates.
It’s irrational for any nation interested in the preservation of our species to stockpile weapons of mass destruction. WMD should be permanently outlawed and disposed of in every corner of the globe.
Evolution and creationism should not be placed on equal footing in science classrooms. Religious leaders and parents, not science teachers, should offer creationism as an alternative to evolution if they wish.
Drug use is unavoidable, every society on the planet (with the possible exception of the Mormons and other highly religious groups) has some degree of drug use in its culture. Harsher penalties have done nothing to deter drug related crime, which has steadily increased the past 20 years. Locking up addicts is counterproductive, expensive, and unethical. Treat them.
Marijuana is one of the safest natural drugs in existence, aspirin is more lethal. It should be decriminalized if not legalized within 10 years.
Automatic weapons have no place in any civilian’s hands. Even semi-automatic weapons are questionable. If you’re going to hunt be a damn sportsman about it and use a bolt-action rifle or a bow, if you want protection a 9mm will have to suffice. Also, banning background checks at gun shows is asinine.
Research with tissue from aborted fetuses makes us squeamish but may save and improve lives and should be permitted. Cloning is still not understood well enough to ethically try on humans and should remain illegal for the time being.
The state of education in America is embarrassing and time and time again serious funding for education is shot down in congress in favor of things more important than our future leaders, like remote control planes that can fire missiles. More testing alone won’t solve the problem. For starters base pay should be one and half times what it currently is, which would improve the prestige of the job and attract more applicants.
Well, thats quite a list! My critiques would be (corresponding to your list):
The UN is a bloated and corrupt bureaucracy. If not eliminate it, we should dramatically change it, in size and scope. I for one am incredibly opposed to my country surrending a shred of sovereignty to a multinational body.
Eeek! Israel! The topic of doom!
See #2.
. I own(ed) no slaves, and no person alive in America was a slave (in America, at least.) Collective punishment for what people did several generations ago hardly seems to be the balm that soothes racial problems.
We are, much to my chagrin, already a socialist-capitalist hybrid. What would you change? My list of things to change would be rather long, but if need be, I can type it up
When ‘The Market’ is ready for such a change, it will happen. As things stand, the benifits of fossil fuels outweigh the costs. At some point, this will change, and so will the energy industry. (The parts of it that wish to stay profitable, that is!)
Yep. No argument here. But would you ‘force’ (by means of laws) mass media to change?
I agree that we need massive electoral reform; I disagree that the public interest is served by forcing the televison industry to give candidates free airtime. Who decides which candidate qualifies? Who foots the bill?
If automagically every nation in the world agreed and disposed of WMD, I may agree. But just how are we to verify the North Korea’s and Pakistan’s of the world have complied?
This should be a local decision. If a particular community wants equal time, then hey, let them teach their kids the way they want.
I agree that our drug laws are assinine; But I do not agree that society should bear the responsibility of ‘treating’ addicts.
Come on now, aspirin is more lethal then The Demon Leaf?
You can have my firearms when you pry them out of my…you know the rest. I see few types of law as assinine as gun control laws. I oppose virtually all gun control laws. This is one of the few (if not only) issues that I have zero tolerance on.
With you on that.
Money is not the problem. Per-student spending has been steadily rising in most (including urban) areas. Education has been politicized; Get the politicians (and unions) out of education, and lo! I bet we can graduate literate kids once again.
Are we allowed to ask for cites for your thoughts? Because I disagree swith this entire statement. Neither generation has had enough an impact on American society for them to “epitomize” anything. And last time I checked, the White House wasn’t being overun by younguns. Methinks your finger of blame is misdirected.
Also, when has the US been better when it comes to justice, equality, and opportunity? IMHO, it seems like there has been significant progress in these areas, not regression.
Well, that point of view is way too simplistic because it avoids the many ways in which markets fail. To name just two examples:
(1) Lack of information: Consumers probably end up choosing cheaper things that will cost them more in the long run due to being less energy efficient.
(2) Lack of full accounting of costs in the product (“externalities”): Fossil fuel production and use involves various costs (such as air pollution, global warming, the need to exercise military might in the Persian Gulf) that are not internalized in the cost of the product, i.e., they are externalized. The actual price of a good with externalized costs is less than it should be (i.e., the efficient price) according to market theory.
If people want to understand market economies as a science rather than just as a religion, it behooves them to understand the ways in which markets fail and not just the ways in which they ideally work!
Gen X and Y haven’t invaded politics to any great degree yet, but they will. And their influence on popular culture and the media is already felt to a great extent. I’m not blaming them for anything, I’m pointing to them as examples of a decadent (and flawed) culture.
I can’t find a cite online, but there is a piece by historical patriot Dr. Joseph Warren (1741-1775) a titled “An Oration.” In the document Warren makes the case that the colonies defeated the vastly more powerful British in the Revolutionary War because like many great societies before it the UK had been corrupted by its wealth and success. He goes on to say that America should be wary of its love of free commerce, as it will lead us down the same path.
Just a quick comment on your education section. Why do you start off assuming that education is controlled by the Federal Gov’t? It’s not, and shouldn’t be. I’m not sure of the %, but I believe Fed $$ going to education are a relatively small % of what is spent. I believe that you must drive control even more to the local level to make improvements. Parents need to be involved, and the further control is taken away (geographically as well as administratively), the less the can participate. Forget Washington-- let’s get them out of even the small % they’re involved now, and give control back to local communities. I have no problem with states setting stds, but let local school districts experiment with different strategies to found out which ones work best.
Simply paying teachers more isn’t going to make them better teachers. Let the local communities decide what is best for their kids. When teacher shortages arise, then the parents are smart enough to figure out that they’ll need to shell out more money to attract teachers for thei children.
A higher base pay for teachers (mandated and subsidized by the federal government) would increase the prestige of the profession, and draw more applicants and more applicants from better educational backgrounds themselves.
As for letting the local levels fully control education, I see two problems. One, this leads to further inequality of education, as rich areas with high property values get rich high schools and poor areas get over crowded classrooms without enough textbooks. And two, are you satisfied with the status quo in education? Because that’s what you’re advocating.
I disagree here. This would be assuming that the evolution theory is correct and the creationism theory isn’t, or it would at least seem that way. The two theories should be taught equally, because the truth is they’re probably both equally wrong, but at least the government isn’t showing a bias.
Science is based on empirical observation, as is evolution. Religion is based on faith, as is creationism. Hence my feeling that each should be taught in its domain of practice. A science teacher is no more prepared to teach about Adam’s rib, than a priest is about Darwin’s Finch.
Evolution is both a fact and a theory; creationism* is neither. “Theory” does not mean “guess”; it means “well-supported explanatory framework”, and theories should most definitely be taught in science classes. “Evolution” can mean both a “theory of evolution”–Darwin’s “theory of evolution by natural selection”, or the “modern synthesis” evolutionary theory, which incorporates Darwin’s ideas with findings made and ideas developed since his time–and the established fact that all existing species have evolved from earlier species, including that humans have evolved from non-humans. This established fact is one of the things theories of evolution seek to explain. Other established facts are that the planet Earth is billions of years old, which various scientific theories of the origin of Earth and the Solar System take into account.
*“Creationism” in the sense of the belief that God created existing species (or “kinds”, whatever those are) of life separately, especially if this belief is combined with a belief–contrary to the facts–that the Solar System and Universe are of recent origin. “Creationism” in the sense of the belief that there is a God who created the Universe should not be taught in science classes either, and I don’t personally accept that belief, but it isn’t contrary to the known facts of the way creationism[sup]1[/sup] is.
I find it hard to listen to an argument for more gun control from someone that obviously does not know the first thing about guns. You state first that semi-automatic weapons are “questionable” and then go on to say that the only guns that you would allow for protection are like the 9mm. The 9mm is almost always a semi-automatic handgun.
Giving $50 B to African Americans so they can buy 40s and chicken wings will not help a single person. What will help African Americans is to invest a little time and effort into their communities and find role models for their youth other than gangster rappers and illiterate basketball players. Why don’t we also give reparations to the Irish, Chineese, Italians, Poles, Greeks, Jews, and other groups who came to this country with nothing and also faced prejudice?
Hydrogen is not an energy source. Energy is required to release the H from H2O.
Do you think that there is enough arible land in the USA to grow enough corn to power every ethanol car?
Isn’t it wonderful how the racists expose themselves in such a bold way? Why don’t we replace the proposal for reparations with a proposal to end prejudice and racial ignorance?
Gjorp, the theory of evolution is a scientific one. Creationism is a religious one. Keeping the two out of the same classroom doesn’t say anything about which one is right or wrong. It’s simply keeping subjects in their appropriate disciplines.
This is hilarious in its blatant anti-PC premise and provides a refreshing counterpoint to the sanctimony of the OP.
As for the 15 original points, I like the scientific/technological ones and some aspects of the drug-legalization ones (though aspirin is deadlier than marijuana?? Cite, puh-leeze, and you’ll have to take into account fatal accidents caused by drivers and machine operators who’ve smoked a few), all the political/economic ones are Grade-A hooey.
Oh, I’m sorry! I mistook your praise of black Americans for condescension and bigotry. Maybe if I put down the 40 and chicken wings, I’d be able to comprehend better. My bad.
