The Glade 4.0

+1



If Wal-Mart "eats the loss," what do they do?

They write it off.

Which means taxes not paid.

Which means reduced revenues (albeit marginal to the scope of government), with static operations costs.

Which means the tax payers (now or in the future through interest on debt) bear the loss.

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“The duty of a patriot is to protect his country from its government.” - Thomas Paine

And, to be honest, if my bank sent me a letter or something that said, go ahead and charge whatever you want on your card, and it won't be counted against you, I probably would go buy stuff. Cause, hey. They told me I could.

But that is most definitely *not* what happened in this event.

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Holy shitsnacks!

This has taken me a long time to properly think of the way to word this. The fact that you assume that people would do it proves that you have exactly zero empathic link with the class of people who works for a living and does their best to pay for what they have. Moreso... this speaks volumes to how much of a part of the problem you actually are. You are a part of the cancer that is destroying this country. The sense of **** entitlement you continuously espouse and say "well it is better than letting it getting to looting and rioting to just take these things anyway!" is astounding.

You are a very silly person and I shall no longer consider your contributions to any thread in hellfire more than the ramblings of a paste eater or paint huffer.

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Darksiege
Traveller, Calé, Whisperer
Lead me not into temptation; for I know a shortcut

I can't be the only one who's reminded of this:

I dont see how it's much different. The system was down. If Wal-Mart said, "OK, we'll let you take it, but if the system comes back up and you don't have the credit then we expect you to come back and pay." Then it would be theft. Wal-Mart didn't say that. They let people walk out with stuff with no obligation and no reasonable expectation of being compensated. The fact is if I walk into a store, grab something, and say to the owner, "Hey I'm gonna walk out with this, you have a problem with that?" And he says, "No problem, go ahead." It isn't stealing.

But you know, if I'm wrong, it will be proven pretty easily. They have a paper trail showing exactly what was taken and who took it, security camera footage, and about a billion witnesses. Let's see if anyone gets prosecuted.

I work for a living too, but thanks for the stereotype.

You take objection to "well it is better than looting and rioting"? Well, isn't it? You would prefer looting and rioting? Also if we are paying them off to avoid violence, then entitlement doesn't have a lot to do with it.

The fact is, there are people who, for whatever reason, can not support themselves. These people exist and we have to deal with it. You can't wish them away, and it's been shown that there simply aren't enough jobs for them even if they did magically develop a work ethic. Also, unlike your fantasy world, they're not going to quietly go die in a corner if you take away their food/shelter entitlements. So the way I see it, we have three options:

- Welfare
- Prison, which would cost far more than welfare does.
- Bullets

I'm a cancer? I'm not the one whose view on this issue can be effectively summed up by, "Then they had better die, and decrease the surplus population."

Yeah except for the fact that in what DS was actually responding to, you were talking about how you think everyone would just go "steal" a new car if they could get away with it. Way to move the goalposts there, champ.

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"Hysterical children shrieking about right-wing anything need to go sit in the corner and be quiet while the adults are talking."

This right the **** here!

X,

I know you work for a living. I never said you abused the system. But you are part of a system which is okay with taking away from me and the people who bust our asses to get where we are.

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Darksiege
Traveller, Calé, Whisperer
Lead me not into temptation; for I know a shortcut

I responded the way I did because I think it's not that particular position that offends people, its my general liberal stance and my stance on those on public assistance. This is such an issue because everyone here already thinks the EBT cards themselves are a form of theft, and as such abuse of the system is an even worse form of theft, even if it clearly isn't. Where are the prosecutions? There's no lack of evidence or public outrage. The "theft" by those on assistance is then used to demonize them as a group, even though the vast majority of those not on assistance would act the same way in a similar situation. This is just like when welfare people get demonized for not wanting to take 80+ hour/week farm jobs and called useless and lazy despite the fact that probably 80% of the US population would chose welfare over said jobs.

As for my "cynicism", well I've posted cynical stuff before and gotten referred to as the scum of the universe for two pages straight. When other people post the exact same position it doesn't happen to them. Let's see if I have to wait years to get vindicated this time.

I think you're making two errors there, Xeq. The first is that there's no need for the ironic quotes. It was literal theft (by fraud), at least for those who knew what was going on. The second is that you're assuming people with different socio-economic backgrounds, and thus very different cultural contexts for what kind of behavior is acceptable, would view the situation in the same way. That's generally not the case. However, that's not to say that just because most working class and middle class people probably wouldn't commit EBT or credit card fraud they wouldn't commit other unethical and/or illegal acts that are more common and accepted among their peers. For instance, there are a lot of working class and middle class conservatives who disdain welfare yet happily accept Medicare and Social Security benefits far above what they paid in, who apply for federally-subsidized student loans for themselves or their kids, and who don't hesitate to sign-up for unemployment whenever they get laid off or have a seasonal shut-down of their jobs in the winter months. They see no problem with any of that because their social/cultural context doesn't lead them to view those things as in any way equivalent to welfare, even though they're also mostly funded by other people's taxes. More directly on point, we know there are plenty of people on this very board who've stolen many thousands of dollars worth of music, movies, software, etc. via torrents, because among young, tech-savvy people, that's considered relatively normal and virtually harmless if not outright justified. Even those here who personally don't do that are more than happy to associate and be friends with those who do. Similarly, there are lots of people here who would strongly object to knowingly purchasing stolen property but who use drugs or have good friends who use drugs and yet feel zero moral responsibility for the crime and violence-ridden supply chain through which they were obtained.

Now, having said all of that, one person's hypocrisy doesn't justify or excuse another person's wrongdoing. It's fine to note that lots of middle class people commit unethical acts all the time, but that doesn't mean we have to give the people in that article a pass for what they did.

*ETA: On a re-read, it sounds a bit like I'm saying accepting student loans, Medicare, UI, etc. are unethical acts equivalent to EBT fraud. To clarify, that isn't what I mean. I'm saying those things are equivalent to welfare, which many conservatives consider to be unethical.


Heh. Yeah, I still chuckle when I think about that one. Probably the best example of blatant inconsistency in Glade history.

I actually do not mind the programs. I have issues with the government running them. Take less from my tax and give me the option to have portion of my check given to the EBT people charity.. and I would choose to do it. I would likely even choose to have the same amount the government would normally take to do it too.

of course I know people who use the EBT program, and bust their asses to make ends meet and just need a little help.

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Darksiege
Traveller, Calé, Whisperer
Lead me not into temptation; for I know a shortcut

Maybe that had to do with the fact that your cynicism in that case was also factually abusrd. There's also the fact that in that case, Arahain said he WOULD intervene and why, and re-directed the discussion onto his position. Not ever discussion on similar topics will take the same eventual route. I would also question the similarity between a school bullying scenariop where the severity may not be totally clear, and a child being raped by an adult which is pretty much totally clear.

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"Hysterical children shrieking about right-wing anything need to go sit in the corner and be quiet while the adults are talking."

*twitch*