Chess is not a crime!

Damn!  I was going to say that ...  :-)

kind of strange to think about this happening now and then think back to G.I. Bill times after WWII. whole surburban towns constructed by the government specifically for veterans. it's actually the bill that is largely responsible for the rapid expansion of the suburbs after the war. Levittown, most famous example of the american suburb, was funded through the G.I. bill. 

whole economy is a parasite really when you think about it. it's all based on fossil fuels, non renewable resource. it's seemingly something alien that has been grafted onto the world, currently acting as a cancer of sorts. problem isn't totally capitalism or market/competition driven economy either. there are ways to re-direct capitalism in ways that don't go against the grain ecologically speaking. more people should read the book natural capitalism. it's a good place to start the conversation.

That's exactly why revolutions are violent! The haves do not let go of what they claim is theirs, that easily!

That, and a truly bizarre money system that allows banks to create money effectively out of thin air as and when they see fit. It's not sustainable, and I suspect many of us (maybe not me) will live to see the unpalatable proof of this fact.

Thanks for the book pointer, btw - looks interesting!

A book I would recommend is Tim Jackson's Prosperity without Growth: Economics for a Finite Planet.

Of course you would, it's only human nature. However, if I wasn't that rich I would consider it only right and fair if wealth were distributed at least a little more equitably. It does not seem right to me that 300 people have the same wealth as 3 billion people, or that a CEO should earn 380 times what the average employee in the company earns.

"It is easier to justify your own way life (miserable or not) than to change your way. I meant that we cannot wait until the rich will have an 'illunination'. Force is needed."

Tyranny against the "rich" is still tyranny.

Yes , the most appalling aspect of revolutions is not what the new rulers did to the old ones or vice versa, but what both did to the ordinary people who belonged to either of the sides!

So they are homeless. Give them a home and a food ration. Anybody who wants to complain about them not working for it or burdening the tax payer can stick it.

It would take less than 5 percent of the population to produce all of the food, fiber and energy that the world needs. Someone who sells insurance or works a lunch counter is no less a parasite than these homeless. They are unnecessary. They contribute no more to the well being of civilization than the homeless chess players and maybe less.

Cram the taxes. Taxes are used to misappropriate other people's property for the purpose of paying the pigs to brutalize you, the army to shoot you or the bankers to impoverish you. What would happen if the US defaulted on the National Debt? China wouldn't sell us any more goods. I guess we would have to do without all the particle board junk or (gulp) start making it all here again.

Take the 5 percent who mean something and pay them very well so they will want to keep doing it. The rest of us can loaf and play chess in the streets for free.

I sit on a man's back, choking him and making him carry me, and yet assure myself and others that I am very sorry for him and wish to ease his lot by all possible means - except by getting off his back.

Leo Tolstoy

“The happy man only feels at ease because the unhappy bear their burden in silence. Without this silence, happiness would be impossible.”

― Anton Chekhov

These guys knew what they were talking about. Chekhov was a Russian doctor, who saw how the majority was getting used as almost slaves for the supposed elect few.

Alain de Botton in his books points out that  democracies usually function as meritocracies. That is power is given to those who deserve it, or who have merit. This logic is sensible in one way, but its implacations are dangerous. Since it can be argued, that those who reach the top, deserve to reach to top, and those who journey downwards, deserves to be where they belong. Your situation suddenly becomes a just desert.

This ties in neatly with social darwinism: the strong succeed, the weak fail. Although as a theory, it no longer has any validation, it seems to have a place in peoples minds.

The weird thing is that the rich few don't see how they have benifited from the good works of the general population. Their thinking is that they acquired the wealth themselves, that they made it on their own, and not for once realising those who have done so many things to make their efforts possible. The doctors who sacrifice their own years so that they can take care of them, the teachers who patiently teach them, the garbage man who takes away their trash, the officers who risk their lives to protect them. They feed on the good of others, but won't let others eat at their table.

If playing chess is a crime, let me be guilty!

On the scientific issues, there is also a (free to download) classic : http://www.withouthotair.com/download.html

certianly chess is not a crime

Wow, that's generous of them. I actually bought the 2008/9 paper edition of the book and hadn't noticed that it was freely downloadable. A really good book, with excellent diagrams.

Well , I started reading it; quite thought provoking!

That being said, did you know in Islam, there are groups of people who believe that playing chess is a sin? Held equally bad as playing luck games, or gambling.

Yes, and yet, we call it ''civilization"!!

        Some people might suggest that there is evidence that the more social workers you have, the more social problems you have.

<RG1951> Right!

In Israel "social" workers team up with psychs, and one of their principal crimes is taking children away from their parents, with no justification. The parents then often find it impossible to get their children back. This is a phenomenon, largely, of the last decade, and it enjoys the support of the "family" courts. 

Some people might suggest that both this post and the one it quotes had better come up with a reference if the posters want to avoid dogmatic name-calling.