Armed Polite Society
Main Forums => The Roundtable => Topic started by: roo_ster on September 24, 2009, 11:38:35 AM
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They'll have to pry my soft & fluffy from my cold, dead, butt cheeks.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/09/23/AR2009092304711_pf.html
Environmentalists Seek to Wipe Out Plush Toilet Paper
Soft Toilet Paper's Hard on the Earth, But Will We Sit for the Alternative?
By David A. Fahrenthold
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, September 24, 2009
ELMWOOD PARK, N.J. -- There is a battle for America's behinds.
It is a fight over toilet paper: the kind that is blanket-fluffy and getting fluffier so fast that manufacturers are running out of synonyms for "soft" (Quilted Northern Ultra Plush is the first big brand to go three-ply and three-adjective).
It's a menace, environmental groups say -- and a dark-comedy example of American excess.
The reason, they say, is that plush U.S. toilet paper is usually made by chopping down and grinding up trees that were decades or even a century old. They want Americans, like Europeans, to wipe with tissue made from recycled paper goods.
It has been slow going. Big toilet-paper makers say that they've taken steps to become more Earth-friendly but that their customers still want the soft stuff, so they're still selling it.
This summer, two of the best-known combatants in this fight signed a surprising truce, with a big tissue maker promising to do better. But the larger battle goes on -- the ultimate test of how green Americans will be when nobody's watching.
"At what price softness?" said Tim Spring, chief executive of Marcal Manufacturing, a New Jersey paper maker that is trying to persuade customers to try 100 percent recycled paper. "Should I contribute to clear-cutting and deforestation because the big [marketing] machine has told me that softness is important?"
He added: "You're not giving up the world here."
Toilet paper is far from being the biggest threat to the world's forests: together with facial tissue, it accounts for 5 percent of the U.S. forest-products industry, according to industry figures. Paper and cardboard packaging makes up 26 percent of the industry, although more than half is made from recycled products. Newspapers account for 3 percent.
But environmentalists say 5 percent is still too much.
Felling these trees removes a valuable scrubber of carbon dioxide, they say. If the trees come from "farms" in places such as Brazil, Indonesia or the southeastern United States, natural forests are being displaced. If they come from Canada's forested north -- a major source of imported wood pulp -- ecosystems valuable to bears, caribou and migratory birds are being damaged.
And, activists say, there's just the foolish idea of the thing: old trees cut down for the briefest and most undignified of ends.
"It's like the Hummer product for the paper industry," said Allen Hershkowitz, senior scientist with the Natural Resources Defense Council. "We don't need old-growth forests . . . to wipe our behinds."
The reason for this fight lies in toilet-paper engineering. Each sheet is a web of wood fibers, and fibers from old trees are longer, which produces a smoother and more supple web. Fibers made from recycled paper -- in this case magazines, newspapers or computer printouts -- are shorter. The web often is rougher.
So, when toilet paper is made for the "away from home" market, the no-choice bathrooms in restaurants, offices and schools, manufacturers use recycled fiber about 75 percent of the time.
But for the "at home" market, the paper customers buy for themselves, 5 percent at most is fully recycled. The rest is mostly or totally "virgin" fiber, taken from newly cut trees, according to the market analysis firm RISI Inc.
Big tissue makers say they've tried to make their products as green as possible, including by buying more wood pulp from forest operations certified as sustainable.
But despite environmentalists' concerns, they say customers are unwavering in their desire for the softest paper possible.
"That's a segment [of consumers] that is quite demanding of products that are soft," said James Malone, a spokesman for Georgia-Pacific. Sales figures seem to make that clear: Quilted Northern Ultra Plush, the three-ply stuff, sold 24 million packages in the past year, bringing in more than $144 million, according to the market research firm Information Resources Inc.
Last month, Greenpeace announced an agreement that it said would change this industry from the inside.
The environmental group had spent 4 1/2 years attacking Kimberly-Clark, the makers of Kleenex and Cottonelle toilet paper, for getting wood from old-growth forests in Canada. But the group said it is calling off the "Kleercut" campaign: Kimberly-Clark had agreed to make its practices greener.
By 2011, the company said, 40 percent of the fiber in all its tissue products will come from recycled paper or sustainable forests.
"We could have campaigned forever," said Lindsey Allen, a senior forest campaigner with Greenpeace. But this was enough, she said, because Kimberly-Clark's changes could alter the entire wood-pulp supply chain: "They have a policy that . . . will shift the entire way that tissue companies work."
Still, some environmental activists said that Greenpeace should have pushed for more.
"The problem is not yet getting better," said Chris Henschel, of the Canadian Parks and Wilderness Society, talking about logging in Canada's boreal forests. He said real change will come only when consumers change their habits: "It's unbelievable that this global treasure of Canadian boreal forests is being turned into toilet paper. . . . I think every reasonable person would have trouble understanding how that would be okay."
That part could be difficult, because -- in the U.S. market, at least -- soft is to toilet paper what fat is to bacon, the essence of the appeal.
Earlier this year, Consumer Reports tested toilet paper brands and found that recycled-tissue brands such as Seventh Generation and Marcal's Small Steps weren't unpleasant. But they gave their highest rating to the three-ply Quilted Northern.
"We do believe that you're going to feel a difference," said Bob Markovich, an editor at Consumer Reports.
Marcal, the maker of recycled toilet paper here in New Jersey, is trying to change that with a two-pronged sales pitch. The first is that soft is overrated.
"Strength of toilet paper is more important, for obvious reasons," said Spring, the chief executive, guiding a golf cart among the machinery that whizzes up vast stacks of old paper, whips it into a slurry, and dries it into rolls of toilet paper big enough for King Kong. He said his final product is as strong as any of the big-name brands. "If the paper breaks during your use of toilet paper, obviously, that's very, very important."
The second half of the pitch is that Marcal's toilet paper is almost as soft as the other guy's anyway.
"Handle it like you're going to take care of business," company manager Michael Bonin said, putting this reporter through a blind test of virgin vs. recycled toilet paper. Two rolls were hidden in a cardboard box: the test was to reach in without looking and wad them up, considering the "three aspects of softness," which are surface smoothness, bulky feel and "drapability," or lack of rigidity.
The reporter wadded. The officials waited. The one on the right felt slightly softer.
That was not the answer they wanted: The recycled paper was on the left.
If they ban my soft & fluffy, I'll get some spotted owls to wipe my arse with.
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I say we TP the Greenpeace HQ.... =D
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Why not just switch to spotted owls? =D
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Remember, they want to stop your access to it.
They'll still be the ones "responsible enough" to use the soft tissue. Like they are the only ones "responsible enough" to drive SUVs and fly in bizjets. Or the only ones "responsible enough" to have redwood decks. Kind of like that DEA that was the the only one "professional enough".
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There was a time when you'd only see things like this in places like The Onion, but these environuts are becoming almost a parody of themselves.
"That's a segment [of consumers] that is quite demanding of products that are soft," said James Malone, a spokesman for Georgia-Pacific.
Probably frequency of use has something to do with it, coupled with the increasing popularity of ethnic restaurants with a Third World heritage . . .
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Mark my words, Odin as my witness. If my soft and fluffy toilet paper goes away, I'm gonna start wiping with hippies. On second thought, that wouldn't be very sanitary. I'll go over to the CEO of the tp company, and use his tablecloth, instead.
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I never understood this aspect of the green movement, it isn't like they are chopping down old growth forest to make Redwood TP or something. Most paper products are either from tree-farms or waste products from other lumber operations aren't they?
These people (and PETA) are the liberal equivalent of a conservative survivalist huddled in his basement bomb shelter waiting for his militia buddy's to come over for MRE's and target practice.
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The hippies won't be happy till every last human is dead, only then will we be having a small enough impact on the environment.
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it isn't like they are chopping down old growth forest to make Redwood TP or something.
Well they should! I'd buy that.
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"Save the Trees" makes about as much sense as "Save the Corn" or "Save the Soybeans".
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It will never fly, this country just doesn't produce enough corn cobs.
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There is no oppression.
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This is my favoritist part. :lol:
Toilet paper...together with facial tissue...accounts for 5 percent of the U.S. forest-products industry, according to industry figures. Newspapers account for 3 percent.
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I really hope at least one person they interviewed about this said "I don't give a s#!t." =D
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"Save the Trees" makes about as much sense as "Save the Corn" or "Save the Soybeans".
Environmentalists Seek to Wipe Out Plush Toilet Paper
Soft Toilet Paper's Hard on the Earth, But Will We Sit for the Alternative?
By David A. Fahrenthold
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, September 24, 2009
...Felling these trees removes a valuable scrubber of carbon dioxide, they say. If the trees come from "farms" in places such as Brazil, Indonesia or the southeastern United States, natural forests are being displaced. If they come from Canada's forested north -- a major source of imported wood pulp -- ecosystems valuable to bears, caribou and migratory birds are being damaged
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When it comes to the "southeastern United States" that is especially true. Paper companies in the southeast (and as far west as at least east Texas) have been replanting on tree farms faster than they cut down for at least fifty years now, probably more like 100. The same is true in Maine (and I suspect based on similar economies in much of New Hampshire and Vermont). It is simple economics that neatly planted new growth rows of pulpwood is much more efficiently harvested than old growth wood.
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There was a time when you'd only see things like this in places like The Onion, but these environuts are becoming almost a parody of themselves.
Probably frequency of use has something to do with it, coupled with the increasing popularity of ethnic restaurants with a Third World heritage . . .
How about a (not quite obvious) parody piece encouraging people to use their pets licking them clean as an alternative to toilet paper to pit the PETA wackos against the envirowackos?
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This thread reminds me of the Penn and Teller Bullsh*t episode on recycling. California Hippie Wife who was interviewed said, while holding up a package of toilet paper made from recycled paper (wrapped in plastic :lol:), "This is the toilet paper preferred by trees."
To which Penn replied "That's not true, most trees don't even have asses."
Sorry if my post doesn't add any substance to the topic, but you have to admit that's pure comedy gold! :lol: :lol: :lol:
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How about a (not quite obvious) parody piece encouraging people to use their pets licking them clean as an alternative to toilet paper to pit the PETA wackos against the envirowackos?
You do realize that wiping one's bottom with live ducklings is something that has been brought up in classical literature, right?
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Toilet paper is far from being the biggest threat to the world's forests: together with facial tissue, it accounts for 5 percent of the U.S. forest-products industry,
What percentage of this is accounted for by the wimminfolk?
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After we make the switch it wont be just the libs hearts that are bleeding =D
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What percentage of this is accounted for by the wimminfolk?
:lol: I have a wife and two daughters, and we go through as much TP in a month as I did in a year when I was single.
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You do realize that wiping one's bottom with live ducklings is something that has been brought up in classical literature, right?
Are the live ducklings then just callously disposed of? Or handed over to a motherly Golden Retriever to clean up for re-use in the envirowacko approved manner? (note to self regarding all the past times I have picked up a baby duck and rubbed it's soft feathers against my cheek....DON'T DO ANYMORE!)
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No, the idea is - per Rabelais - that the live ducklings will then go and dunk themselves in water, given they're about as enthused about being covered in crap as you would be, and then, after they're clean, you can re-use them.
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...
When it comes to the "southeastern United States" that is especially true. Paper companies in the southeast (and as far west as at least east Texas) have been replanting on tree farms faster than they cut down for at least fifty years now, probably more like 100. The same is true in Maine (and I suspect based on similar economies in much of New Hampshire and Vermont). It is simple economics that neatly planted new growth rows of pulpwood is much more efficiently harvested than old growth wood.
You can add Blandin Paper in northern MN to that list too. They plant Norway Pines in nice neat rows, clear out about half of them when the trunks are 4-6" in diameter and harvest the rest when they are 8-10", leaving a couple per acre of the biggest trees still standing and start the process all over.
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There's a joke in here somewhere about a bear asking a rabbit a certain question... =D
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You can add Blandin Paper in northern MN to that list too. They plant Norway Pines in nice neat rows, clear out about half of them when the trunks are 4-6" in diameter and harvest the rest when they are 8-10", leaving a couple per acre of the biggest trees still standing and start the process all over.
Yeah, I figured it was the case all over the U.S., but didn't want to overextend my veritas[/i/] with too much speculation. Now that you mentioned Minnesota, it spurred my recollection that west Michigan softwood forests are also Pine, all planted in neat rows except for the Christmas tree farms which are neat rows of blue spruce. They probably do more than just "leave a couple per acre"... probably plow, and fertilize the soil, and then plant rows of seedlings. My first guess regarding those couple biggest trees you see left standing is they are left for sentimental value, or are in a spot that is more difficult to harvest (and as such are economically less viable). Wind and bird pooping pine cones is less reliable than planting. The biggest trees being left standing is an argument against their being more valuable to harvest than young trees.
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This is my favoritist part. :lol:
Toilet paper...together with facial tissue...accounts for 5 percent of the U.S. forest-products industry, according to industry figures. Newspapers account for 3 percent.
...at least toilet paper is useful.....and at least crap-free in the beginning.... :lol:
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Yeah, I figured it was the case all over the U.S., but didn't want to overextend my veritas[/i/] with too much speculation. Now that you mentioned Minnesota, it spurred my recollection that west Michigan softwood forests are also Pine, all planted in neat rows except for the Christmas tree farms which are neat rows of blue spruce. They probably do more than just "leave a couple per acre"... probably plow, and fertilize the soil, and then plant rows of seedlings. My first guess regarding those couple biggest trees you see left standing is they are left for sentimental value, or are in a spot that is more difficult to harvest (and as such are economically less viable). Wind and bird pooping pine cones is less reliable than planting. The biggest trees being left standing is an argument against their being more valuable to harvest than young trees.
I was told they leave a few big trees for the shade, because if trees are in the shade, they grow up making nice straight long trunks, but if they are in the sun they grow out making them a PITA to harvest along with a lower yield. Some of those big trees are 3-4 feet in diameter and over a hundred feet high. They also don't leave it to nature to replant, they come in with thousands of 2-3 foot high seedlings.
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I was told they leave a few big trees for the shade, because if trees are in the shade, they grow up making nice straight long trunks, but if they are in the sun they grow out making them a PITA to harvest along with a lower yield. Some of those big trees are 3-4 feet in diameter and over a hundred feet high. They also don't leave it to nature to replant, they come in with thousands of 2-3 foot high seedlings.
Down here, reseeding with helicopters is not unknown.
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I hope they do ban it, and soon. Ban good toilet paper, ban bright light bulbs, confiscate 401ks etc etc. The effing frog needs to get out of the pot.
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Ive gotten booted off of more than one Board for unleashing on the revolution/black helicopter loons....
My fav was always the whats your line in the sand threads.....
Screw the JBTs seizing guns, my line in the sand has been reached,,,
Ban the soft and fluffy bingo tickets and Im voting from the rooftops.....me, the Blaser and the hemmies flapping in the breeze...
Its TP that separates the man from the animals...I'm not using my hand and a bucket of water like I did in wierd asian venues...
On a related note, I stayed in a $400 per night hotel in Tokyo with one of those robotoilets...I literally spent two hours on one, just spritzing myself, and drying and heating and cooling...the best was when I got up and it said in a schoolgirl voice..."domo arigato"
WildpreservingmysigAlaska TM
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If they're so concerned for the trees, why are they trying to smother out plant life by reducing CO2?
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What you all may not know...and I can't confirm this at the moment, is here in Wisconsin, there's a counter-advocacy group calling themselves.....(prepare yourselves)
Wisconsinites for
Intenstinal
Production and
Equality.
Or W.I.P.E
They seem to argue that changing to one-ply only will just make people use more sheets to clean themselves, and I think they're right.
They want us to have the liberty of using one, two, three, or four-ply paper to err...wipe.
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Ive gotten booted off of more than one Board for unleashing on the revolution/black helicopter loons....
Sigh. They're dark green. Not black. Welcome to my world. Try explaining IR properties of aviation paint to tin foil nutjobs.
I hope they do ban it, and soon. Ban good toilet paper, ban bright light bulbs, confiscate 401ks etc etc. The effing frog needs to get out of the pot.
We both know most people would give up all of those and not even think twice.
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See, the only way to be *really* environmentally friendly is to reuse the stuff. Which my family does. Well, when we have a kiddo in diapers anyway. In for a penny, in for a pound, and why should I spent money on TP when I'm washing diapers every other day anyway.
I would like to point out however, that I refuse to recycle anything that I am not going to get the immediate benefit of recycling. It's about the cash, not the pseudo-environmentalist policy crap.
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Sigh. They're dark green. Not black. Welcome to my world. Try explaining IR properties of aviation paint to tin foil nutjobs.
Let it go, man. :lol:
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Sigh. They're dark green. Not black.
They spray paint 'em black after they your factory to give you "plausible deniability." Either that or your one of "Them".
[adds another layer of tinfoil, causing my spine to compress from all the weight.....]
=D
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A friend on mine refers to his dark green Saturn's color as "black helicopter green."
The man is *seriously* invested in tinfoil, btw.
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If they really cared, they would volunteer to recycle the used cushy TP.
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You can tell the ones that don't wear their tin foil. The mind control rays make 'em think black is green!
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Mark my words, Odin as my witness. If my soft and fluffy toilet paper goes away, I'm gonna start wiping with hippies. On second thought, that wouldn't be very sanitary. I'll go over to the CEO of the tp company, and use his tablecloth, instead.
I was thinking hippie dreadlocks myself, but then I said. "Self, the object is to get cleaner, not dirtier." So, I switched to the ultra-soft environmentally friendly alternative. Baby seal fur.
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I wish them people worried about trees would fight the giant piles of paper in my maibox. Useless advertising for crap I will never buy...
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Sigh. They're dark green. Not black. Welcome to my world. Try explaining IR properties of aviation paint to tin foil nutjobs.
We both know most people would give up all of those and not even think twice.
I've been wondering about it, actually. I'm starting to think removing creature comforts is about the only thing that actually would get people to care. Let's ban beer and cigarettes and "unhealthy" food too. Have temperature police making sure you aren't wastefully keeping your house over 45* in the winter. Maybe people would care then. Maybe.
No, I'm being more misanthropic than usual now. People are stupid, apathetic, and don't really care about freedom but they can be driven to do the right thing eventually.
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No, people wouldn't.
Because they won't ban cigarettes overnight.
THey'll whittle away at the percentage of smokers in society with taxes and regulations and propaganda - today, only about 21% of adult Americans smoke. In 1949, the number was 44%.
Nobody will be willing to stand up and oppose cigarette excise taxes and regulations as a violation of rights and liberties. By the 2010 election, the percentage of smokers in society is expected (by the NIH) to hit 15-19%. Unless a massive shift in the political landscape occurs, smoking will eventually decrease to the point where banning tobacco will become feasible. Only when it has decreased until smokers have become politically irrelevant will they ban tobacco.
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Hence my wishing they'd ban it nao. That was actually kinda the point I was making.
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People believe themselves generally free because most of the things they personally want to do, or are used to doing in their personal life, are either legal or restricted in ways they find tolerable. That other people - who want to do things they don't particularly want to do - are restrained is of very little relevance to them - so as far as they are concerned, they already live in a semi-libertarian society.
The fact that other people are being trampled upon - and that they themselves would have far more options and wealth if they were free - is of very little relevance to most people.
After all, we're not being oppressed, are we?
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No, people wouldn't.
Because they won't ban cigarettes overnight.
THey'll whittle away at the percentage of smokers in society with taxes and regulations and propaganda - today, only about 21% of adult Americans smoke. In 1949, the number was 44%.
Nobody will be willing to stand up and oppose cigarette excise taxes and regulations as a violation of rights and liberties. By the 2010 election, the percentage of smokers in society is expected (by the NIH) to hit 15-19%. Unless a massive shift in the political landscape occurs, smoking will eventually decrease to the point where banning tobacco will become feasible. Only when it has decreased until smokers have become politically irrelevant will they ban tobacco.
Good analysis, I get Balog's point though. It's why I think every man, woman, and child of every color and religion should be issued an AR-15 here in America. Make it as commonplace, accepted, and expected as possible. I rarely ever smoke, but despise the anti-smoke nazis.
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Micro, I once again find myself wondering why you are so antagonistically agreeing with me. You keep "refuting" my argument, by making the same damned point I am. Are you even reading what I'm writing?
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Micro, I once again find myself wondering why you are so antagonistically agreeing with me. You keep "refuting" my argument, by making the same damned point I am. Are you even reading what I'm writing?
What I'm getting it is that the time to become outraged, to 'revolt', to do all of those things you're talking about, has not merely 'come', it has not merely 'passed', it has probably passed YEARS ago. We are supposed to be outraged now. We were supposed to be outraged yesterday.
Modern society as it stands today has been shaped, to a vast extent, by dead guys like Thorstein Weblein, and Maynard Keynes, and Lester Ward. They have created ideas that had later led other people - like Brandeis, and Holmes, and FDR, and Ben-Gurion, and legions of others, not just in America, but throughout Western Civilization to create social and cultural institutions which are incredibly, mindblowingly, Cthulhuistically evil, and they are already here. And even though these guys are dead, they are still in charge, far more in charge than people like you and me, even though they're dead and we're alive, and that outrages me as a person to a deep visceral level.
What gets me, really, that you seem to share my evaluation of the basic facts of this, but you don't seem to share my emotional evaluation about it.
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What gets me, really, that you seem to share my evaluation of the basic facts of this, but you don't seem to share my emotional evaluation about it.
/facepalm
I'm discussing ways to get people outraged, dude. I agree wes. civ. has gone to a bad place, but what counts isn't how I feel. It's how the majority of people who vote feel. And massive emotional responses to things that are beyond my control are not healthy. Just because I'm not frothing at the mouth on teh intarwebz doesn't mean I'm happy about it. But frothing at the mouth attracts other mouth frothers. And yes yes yes I know your feelings about suits, wookiee vs 3 piece. We disagree on tactics, ok? No need to attack me when we agree alright? I like arguing on the internet as much as the next guy, but it gets annoying to have to fight the people who agree with you.
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I'm not trying to argue with you. I'm trying to explain myself. I'm sorry if it seems I am arguing with you.
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I'm not trying to argue with you. I'm trying to explain myself. I'm sorry if it seems I am arguing with you.
Believe me Micro, we all know how you feel. =D
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They spray paint 'em black after they your factory to give you "plausible deniability." Either that or your one of "Them".
[adds another layer of tinfoil, causing my spine to compress from all the weight.....]
=D
SPRAY PAINT? One does not SPRAY PAINT over hideously expensive aviation paint! And why would we need plausible deniability? Ain't you ever heard of 'product placement'? Most companies would spend major bucks to have their product in the title of a major movie (Black Hawk Down) or prominently featured in a huge blockbuster (Our lovely and affordable MH-53 Pave Low model with the optional "Shapeshifting Giant Alien Robot"â„¢ kit installed wiped out an entire FOB in the beginning of Transformers).
You can tell the ones that don't wear their tin foil. The mind control rays make 'em think black is green!
grumble, grumble, grumble...
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SPRAY PAINT? One does not SPRAY PAINT over hideously expensive aviation paint! And why would we need plausible deniability?
Ease up, RD....we all know that the "evil black helicopters" aren't really black...they just have that custom paint job that shifts color as one's perspective changes....from black to dark green to invisible to cloud-colored.... :cool: