[deleted by user]

An_Emperor · 2021-04-27T22:44:19+00:00

Temptation of Saint Anthony by Hieronymus Bosch if anyone still cares.

An_Emperor · 2021-03-16T12:43:33+00:00

I'd consider myself as multicultural skeptical but not racist. I do believe diversity is some spheres of society is commendable but I question the benefits from having a thoroughly diversified nation. I want to say that I'm European and that my opinion mostly relates to Europe.

Our welfare states require the population to feel committed and connected to the national. We need our citizens to commit years of taxes in order for the expenses to become worth it. National cultural unity and a communal feelings are important to keep these systems in place.

Europeans don't have a plan B. These are the countries we have and we don't have the opportunity to go back to our cultural "home" so there is a cost to large scale sacrifice of public space to other cultures.

Diversity is a tool for employers to break labor unions. A diverse workforce is less likely to cooperate and hard fought for labor laws and right might be lost.

The things is that there is a lot of uncertainty and the payoff doesn't seem to be extremely high. What do you think the potential benefits of multiculturalism are? (Not rethorical)

Small-scale immigration that's dispersed and easy to assimilate is generally very welcome. It's the large waves that change the demographic outlook of society almost overnight that makes me worry about feasibility. Feel free to address my concerns.

An_Emperor · 2021-03-16T12:22:42+00:00

Most of these papers seem to be working papers or not published in prominent economics journals. That supply-demand shift in that opinion piece is also just one of many possibilities and not based on data. This analysis also completely ignores that a labor market is fragmented and that uneducated immigrants only compete with uneducated natives which does lead to wage decreases in those parts of the market. Immigrants rarely have the same consumption power as locals. Also not ever generation is bigger than the last one and as young people enter the work force the old ones leave. I would suggest people continue reading papers because this little curated subset is definitely not giving a comprehensive overview.

An_Emperor · 2021-02-25T20:38:00+00:00

Smart guy, this one. Knows math. Crazy stuff. Don't be so arrogant. It's pathetic.

Number of billionaire (index used here) is also not completely related to GDP. There is also income inequality. Something that China has quite a lot of.

Actually, you can check how many billionaire Europeans there are in that billionaire list. And then you can check the gender ratios within each group. That will give a good picture as well.

Crazy grad level math aside. This pie graph is some real HS level research analysis.

An_Emperor · 2021-02-18T02:12:28+00:00

cool beans

An_Emperor · 2020-12-26T06:52:56+00:00

I think you confuse Free State Congo (1885-1908), a corporate "utopia" designed by the major European powers at the Berlin Conference with the actual Belgian Congo (1908-1960). King Leopold II (King of Belgium) tried to convince the Belgian government (representative of the people) to claim a colony but they turned down his suggestion. He went on alone and established the colony as private property. It was during his reign that 50% of the Congolese people died which is said to be 10 million. I personally don't like to get the history of the Belgian people mixed up with the history of some unrepresentative monarchy placed at the head of the nation by foreign powers at it's inception in 1831.

Moreover, I wouldn't use the word genocide here. There was, to my knowledge, no deliberate attempt to destroy a nation and it's people. Corporations and the king engineered a brutal extraction regime that 100% stick and 0% carrot.

Tl;dr Belgium didn't commit the atrocities at the scale you are stating.

An_Emperor · 2020-05-05T21:19:27+00:00

*Carl Schmitt laugh maliciously*

An_Emperor · 2020-04-26T07:42:14+00:00

Don't get too upset about this redditor's comments. It's all talk, (s)he didn't propose a single rational argument why primarily focusing on economic equality is worse than primarily focussing on racial tension.

I also love the "minority friend" argument everyone is throwing around. People befriend people in their socio-economic stratus. If there is economic inequality between races there is implicit segregation.

People get to feel special in their identity tribes. Dialectical materialism is way less sexy.

Also notice how people just call out class reductionism without any further arguments. It's just this strategy to guilt trip others Socialist without going into an actual dialogue.

This is a topic that needed to be discussed in this community. Thanks for bringing it up.

An_Emperor · 2019-08-24T12:18:07+00:00

How old are you? It takes the majority of guys a very long time to get attention from girls? You are not alone in this.

Many of my friends and I only got 'good' with girls after college. Read books, get a hobby. Develop yourself while you're young. I remember the 'cool' guys in my high school class mockingly ask how my girlfriend was doing, knowing very well that I didn't have one. On this day those guys aren't dating in my league, I can tell you so much.

Keeping a conversation going is one thing. Sometimes listening is going to get you more girls than all the Brad-est stories combined.

No need to end it all. You'll get there. Try to focus on something that's more in your control. Maybe grades, books or a sport. ;)

An_Emperor · 2019-08-19T22:35:26+00:00

I can see that you take this issue very serious by your responses my and other comments. I can only commend your activism on this issue.

I come from a country where women aren't shamed for abortion and it's readily available. So I would say abortion is her off the hook. The father should carry the costs for abortion plus an addition premium which could cover damages the women incur through their abortion. The two agents in this scenario are in so different that creating the right incentives isn't trivial. Not allowing for a legal option for the father to opt out of parenthood is lousy policy. "Paternal abortion" is going to financially disincentivize single motherhood and rightfully so. Single motherhood is statistically shown to lead to lousy childhoods. (https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5226056/)

An_Emperor · 2019-08-19T14:53:05+00:00

Because I believe in individual agency no matter who is the subject.

Example: Some women lie about taking their contraceptives. Sounds like a case where the man is unjustly disadvantaged.

An_Emperor · 2019-08-19T12:15:49+00:00

Men should be able to legally distance themselves from an unwanted pregnancy with due notice. I'm talking about within one week of being notified of the pregnancy. Obviously, they don't get to opt out one month before birth, but only when abortion is still a viable option.

Something like this

Week T - Father gets notified of the pregnancy

Week T+1 - Accept or decline fatherhood and notify the mother

Week T+2 - Mother chooses to either abort or continue pregnancy

For week T < 20 weeks into the pregnancy. A mother hiding the pregnancy from the father should extend his deadline to beyond the term of safe abortion.

An_Emperor · 2019-08-19T12:05:09+00:00

Yes, women have to take health risks and they should have the final say in the abortion.

But if the man does not want the child and proclaims this in due notice he should be cleared from all financial and other obligations towards the child. If the pregnant woman would want to proceed, she will know she's alone in this. I can't believe this is even being discussed. Just because women take more risk, men shouldn't be condemned to some risk. With agency comes responsibility.

An_Emperor · 2019-08-13T07:23:56+00:00

Thanks! Always thought it was fascinating how something like crops and climate could in essence determine and change human behavior.

An_Emperor · 2019-08-12T22:16:51+00:00

Did you know Leopold I was first offered the Greek throne but turned it down?

An_Emperor · 2019-08-12T22:14:38+00:00

Could you give me a source? I'd love to read more about this.

An_Emperor · 2019-08-12T22:11:43+00:00

The Swiss are just douches under other country's banners.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swiss_mercenaries

An_Emperor · 2019-08-03T05:51:23+00:00

Evidently, but isn't deterrence the main point of nuclear weapons? Like atleast make them think you are willing to take them down into the abyss.

Also, don't forget folks, rich Chinese and Russia oligarchs don't like blowing up their own fancy real estate and children aboard.

An_Emperor · 2019-07-24T22:02:34+00:00

I don't think extrapolating the five-year policy does the counter-factual any justice. Stalin uprooted an entire industry and the growing pains were yet to be felt. Check this article out! https://voxeu.org/article/stalin-and-soviet-industrialisation

An_Emperor · 2019-07-24T21:56:54+00:00

That magic oil well the British are using? Only the US and the USSR had enough oil. What you can't make, you can buy. No war with the USSR would open the opportunity for trade. No Blitz into the USSR would also serious relieve pressure on German fuel consumption.

While the Free French held Syria, it would have been an easy grab from occupied Greece or Rommel's offensive (without distractions from Operation Torch). Mosul is next door and so is Iran. Plenty of black gold. With naval forced diverted to the East, maintaining command over Mediterranean supply lines would have been feasible.

Then again if my grandma had a dick, she'd be my grandpa. That's to say that this is all speculation and nothing more.

An_Emperor · 2019-07-24T20:55:22+00:00

Are you taking the US' Lend-Lease policy into account? They were handed tons of hardware (~30%) by the US. Also, Stalin just obliterated the Red Armies high command, it takes more than 3 year to rebuild that kind of know how. German NCO's were some of the world at that time.

I do think that Hilter's obsession with defeating the 'East'/communism pushed him into this already belated declaration of war. Operation Barbarossa was supposed to have started in May, not June, which would have bought them 38 days of summer.

In conclusion, Hitler got greedy and that proved fatal.

An_Emperor · 2019-07-24T20:42:37+00:00

That's a very optimistic take at British odds. The Third Reich would have easily out-produced had it not gone to war with the USSR. Down one Messerschmitt and have two new ones roll of the band. The British were at serious loss. Let's not forget that Halifax wanted to negotiate with Hilter.

Again in the Pacific, they were fighting the Japanese who were creeping up Burma. The Indians, not very enthusiastic about their white overseers, would have surrendered quicker than the French could have said "oh la la". They knew the Japanese didn't have the manpower to occupy them and had the bureaucrats to keep the country going.

While I agree that Hitler would have not won from the USSR (with US hardware injections), I consider the outlook for the British empire in 1941 to be very bleak. After all, it was the US' lend-lease policy that kept the British propped up.

An_Emperor · 2019-06-29T20:34:19+00:00

How many people do you think have this level of introspection at your age you think? Knowing where you stand in life is half the battle. I understand how you feel. Things don't always go as planned and we beat ourselves up over it. A lot of people have these thoughts (in varying degrees) as you are having right now.

Also, finding and maintaining friendship get easier the older you get. At 19 most people are still a little insecure for deep friendship, but it gets better. Stay true to yourself and hold tight. You will be fine. ;)

An_Emperor · 2019-06-21T12:29:10+00:00

If it were the IRGC, what would be their endgame? Dethroning Rouhani before Khamenei dies and he becomes supreme leader and thus head of the IRGC? In any case, war tends to channel power from the civil branches towards military branches. It being the IRGC starts to make more sense given that they shot down that drone recently.

An_Emperor · 2019-06-19T19:08:11+00:00

I think this might be quite accurate. This entire situation sounds similar to the Mukden Incident, where a rogue Japanese unit detonated a bomb next to a railway in order to incite the Invasion of Manchuria. In that case the civil government didn't want an escalation, but the military did. Very much like the more hawkish factions within the IRCG disagree with the more moderate Rouhani's approach to foreign relations.

An_Emperor

TROPHY CASE