[jmjhb]

Originally Posted by buddyholly

Are you so disillusioned that you think a handful of rioting youths is a revolution?

It was hardly a handful.

[StevoTG]

Figured some people here might find this to be interesting

[rocketassist]

When Thatcher dies they'll be out into the streets again for a BBQ and a piss up.

[buddyholly]

Originally Posted by rocketassist

When Thatcher dies they'll be out into the streets again for a BBQ and a piss up.

With their fiddles no doubt.

[abraxas21]

Originally Posted by Topspindoctor

Theft is theft. Whether it's someone stealing a few tomatoes from the local vegemarket or someone stealing half a dozen iPhone 4's from Dick Smith. Doesn't make it right. Just because the person who stole "less", but happened to get caught, doesn't mean we should stop punishing thieves.

Also, will you ever stop bitching? The rich are rich because they got off their ass and worked. I accept that I will never be rich because I am content to sit on my ass, recieve average salary and half ass my way through life and I accept it. People like you are self entitled and think "the rich are bringing them down" because you are a lazy piece of crap. Stop blaming everyone else and look at yourself.

do you really believe all the crap you write?

[Topspindoctor]

Originally Posted by abraxas21

do you really believe all the crap you write?

Yes, I do. Quite frankly I am tired of your self-pity and the attitude that the world owes you something.

[abraxas21]

this thread has made my day btw

seingeist, buddyholly and topspindctor --a fundamentalist Christian, a northern irish right-wing loyalist and a xenophobic bogan-- all uniting their forces in their political clowning. mother england would be proud

[Getta]

don't tar all Brits, Aussies, Yanks (and Canucks?) with the same brush

[abraxas21]

i know but deep down in my mind i cant help to blame england for their former colonies. i just can't help it...

[Seingeist]

Originally Posted by Getta

don't tar all Brits, Aussies, Yanks (and Canucks?) with the same brush

That would require at least some minute capacity to draw distinctions in one's thinking.

It is unfair of you to ask of abraxas that of which he is woefully incapable.

[tripwires]

Originally Posted by buddyholly

A few days ago you were berating me for commenting on a Canadian case where an Afghan man and his son drowned the three girls in the family along with his other wife. (The girls liked nice clothes and talked to boys at school.) You said the press should not report this stuff, for some reason that escapes me other than that you must favour press censorship, so we would all end up reading Granma.

Given that English justice sets the standard for the world, I would think you would favour ignoring this small anomaly in favour of concentrating on the big picture.

Apart from that, if I were to clutter the forum by starting a thread over every little thing I found worthy of criticism in the non-Western world, I would rightly be called a huge mug clown. Why don't you stick to important stuff, like dwarf tossing?

I used to think this was true until I read this article and was alarmed by how familiar the whole situation is. Familiar, that is, because it reminded me of my country's deeply flawed criminal justice system. I must say that I'm quite disappointed in how the English courts have handled these rioting cases.

Originally Posted by GOAT = Fed

I think the system is giving her a punishment for all the other people that were not caught which I think is wrong. One thing this harsh punishment might accomplish though is that it will deter people from stealing and they'll think twice before looting.

Sorry, I completely disagree with you. I've heard this deterrence BS from my country's judges throughout my years in law school and in my one year in private practice and it's the biggest load of crap that the establishment can ever say to justify overly harsh sentences in complex situations. The most extreme example which unfortunately happens on a regular basis in my country is imposing the death penalty on drug traffickers and saying that it will deter future drug traffickers from doing the same. If it's really that effective a deterrent sentence, why is it that my country is about to hang another drug trafficker from Malaysia, if he's not already been hanged?

Of course, a harsh penalty is justified in some cases; I'm sure that a lot of the hooligans in the English riots deserve whatever punishment that befalls them, if they happen to be caught. But I just don't see how any of the cases mentioned in the article deserve the punishment that has been meted out. This girl that stole the shoes for example - she sounds like a stupid kid to me. But does she deserve 10 freaking months in prison? Hell no. The whole point of a criminal justice system that purportedly values the principle of innocent until proven guilty is to protect the individual from unduly harsh punishment, among other things. The problem with deterrent sentences is that they fail to distinguish the deserving cases from the undeserving ones, and in the process, might not actually serve the ends of justice.

Anyway, I'm not attacking you; I just feel really strongly about this. I guess I've seen enough BS done to people who don't deserve it over here and I honestly always thought that it's only stupid conservative Asian countries that pull this kind of crap. So yeah, I'm quite disappointed to read this article; seems like the English courts aren't immune to knee-jerk reactions.

[tripwires]

Originally Posted by abraxas21

i know but deep down in my mind i cant help to blame england for their former colonies. i just can't help it...

I should probably despise the English but omg, I love the English accent. (Not that there's actually such a thing but let's not bother too much with the specifics, ok?) I love English novelists like Julian Barnes. I love London.

[buddyholly]

Originally Posted by abraxas21

i know but deep down in my mind i cant help to blame england for their former colonies. i just can't help it...

Thank you for that vote of solidarity with the USA.

[Lopez]

Originally Posted by star

2. Rich people are usually rich because they inherited wealth from their relatives. That is the most usual way people have acquired wealth. There are some rich people who have worked themselves up from nothing, but they are the minority of wealthy people. There are, of course, others like Mitt Romney and Donald Trump who inherited wealth and then increased their wealth through their own efforts. Let us not delude ourselves that wealthy people have all worked hard for their wealth.

There is a lot inherited wealth sure but some people are able to make their own fortune.

What's paradoxical mostly about high taxation policies that they actually make it more difficult to get rich by any other means than inheriting. With moderate taxation, even middle income families can create quite the nest egg by smart investing.

What I require from a society is that everyone is given the same chance, i.e. access too free, quality education, healthcare etc. After that, working should be encouraged by as low tax rates as possible.

Low taxation also brings a lot of jobs to the economy because it increases GDP and investments.

[Henry Chinaski]

Originally Posted by abraxas21

this thread has made my day btw

seingeist, buddyholly and topspindctor --a fundamentalist Christian, a northern irish right-wing loyalist and a xenophobic bogan-- all uniting their forces in their political clowning. mother england would be proud

too big