Then I read this over and NXTGamer, [...]]]>

Samizdata have a post up about how all this bitching about the iPhone 4 is a good thing, as it puts pressure on Apple to fix the little bastards, and compared this to public services and what they do when they cock up. It’s all true, even the comments.

Then I read this over and NXTGamer, and realized just how often this is shown to be true.

Proving once again why they are loved by so many, Valve have unbanned and compensated 12,000 gamers who were incorrectly and unfairly banned for cheating in Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2. Not only removing them from their VACuum (sorry) of despair, Valve have awarded the disgruntled players two copies of Left 4 Dead 2 for their lost hours of shooting people in the face. That’s right, two- one to play and one to gift. Because killing zombies is so much more fun with a friend.

That totals a whopping 24,000 games handed out for the mistake, sure to put a smile on some of the (now un) banned player’s faces. The glitch that caused the mass-bannage was down to a bug in Valve’s VAC anti-cheating system that tricked the system into identifying harmless players as filthy, cheating good-for-nothing fun-fiddlers. Valve originally took no responsibility for the bans, but later realised it was their fault after all after some digging around in the system.

Valve head Gabe Newell sent out a personal message to the affected players, admitting; “This was our mistake, and I apologize for any frustration or angst it may have caused you. We have given you a free copy of Left 4 Dead 2 to give as a gift on Steam, plus a free copy for yourself if you didn’t already own the game.”

Wow. 24,000 copies of Left 4 Dead, given away, to make up for what they admit was their incompetence. But the government can’t even give the smack down to a murderous cop.

There really is this sense of arrogance around public services. It’s because they have no real way of linking the services the provide to how they’re paid for, meaning there’s no sense of  In private, voluntary dealings (or, in our corporatist mess of a mixed economy, those deals which have some semblance of voluntaryism left in them), the only reason deals go ahead is because there’s a mutual benefit; people don’t enter deals unless they feel there’s some upside to doing so (this upside needn’t even be personal profit, despite the cries of the anti-market loonies. Although, there’s nothing wrong with making profits through voluntary dealings), and this means both sides are thankful for the deal.

In comes the government: It’s here, whether you like it or not. You’re paying for it, whether you like it or not. And, if you are to believe what it says, it has to be there, like it or not (it doesn’t). What incentive does it have to keep costs down, when they’re not the ones paying them? None. What reason does it have to keep customer service happy, when it’s a monopoly provider of many of its services? You tell me; if Microsoft became a genuine monopoly tomorrow (helped by the State, as all monopolies are), how much more crap would Windows become? Exactly.

Now, what if Steam and Call of Duty were run by the government, how would the above cock-up play out?

First, there’d be a 3 month waiting list to join a game of Call of  Duty, it’d be incredibly laggy, and noone would be allowed the really cool gun attachments to prevent inequality. Care packages get delivered to the most needy players every 5 seconds, but they’d just waste it all shooting up teammates.  Respawning would take longer than Jesus took (3 days) and every match would be interrupted by health and safety inspectors before every round was fired.

Then, some guy at the Department for Computer Entertainment cocks up and you find yourself banned, as happened to the 12,000 kids above. You’d probably expect to be banned for at least a good few months, before, if you’re lucky, finally being unbanned without as much as an apology, save for some minister giving a half-hearted promise to find the cause of the problem, for which, ultimately, not one bureaucrat will lose his job. Oh, and you’d probably still be listed as “Banned” on some incredibly expensive database somewhere, causing problems later on because no one bothered to update the database. You’re going to be tracked for life, all because you were falsely put on a database for the crime of cheating, which you never committed.

And, this being a “free” government service you’re being fucked over by, any suggestion to improve it by handing it over to Valve would be met with cries of “Neoliberal!” and “You don’t care about the poor, how will they pwn n00bs? You should be grateful for what you get for free!” You’ll be decried as unpatriotic for suggesting that some organization other than a colossal bureaucracy completely unsuited to providing a service should deliver that service. Nevermind that you’re all getting shit services at inflated prices, Call of Duty is a BRITISH INSTITUTION! It’s a Human Right! It solves inequality!

It also costs you all £28 a month in tax, but you don’t notice that part because it’s taken out of your meager pay cheque before you notice you have it, as opposed to a one off £40 from Valve. Everybody knows Valve’s private Call of Duty is better, cheaper, and more fun (with added blood, which the government took out of their version in case if offends hemophiliacs), but that’s a privilege for the rich, you capitalist pig. And don’t you go expecting free Left 4 Dead, be grateful for what you’ve got from the government.

At least our healthcare, roads, and protection services aren’t run like this.

Oh, shi-

I think the biggest mistake in both Islam and Objectivism is perhaps in assigning living heirs after the first teacher died.

-John Ess, a user over at the Mises Inst. Forum.

*You know, the one that is neither a Mosque, nor on Ground Zero.

We here at the Teleguff and Argos is launching a campaign to prevent the prospect that Bradford will soon has its streets filled with radical, mindless, hate filled activists with a message of intolerance .

The Far-left/right/up/down(delete as appropriate) organization, known as “Bradford Together (Except fascists, nationalists, and other types we don’t like)”, a part of [...]]]>

*EDITORIAL*

We here at the Teleguff and Argos is launching a campaign to prevent the prospect that Bradford will soon has its streets filled with radical, mindless, hate filled activists with a message of intolerance .

The Far-left/right/up/down(delete as appropriate) organization, known as “Bradford Together (Except fascists, nationalists, and other types we don’t like)”, a part of Hope Not Hate, unless we’re the ones hating, of will soon be taking to the streets in a planned attempt to get other, just as feeble minded locals to sign their petition prohibiting the right to free expression of people they dislike. We dunno, some Nationalist crazies or summat.

We at the Teleguff and Argos believe that if this petition were to go ahead, it would only damage the civil liberties and stifle political debate in the city and district.

More than in any other city, those of us who lived through the riots of nearly ten years ago know only too well what devastation displays of hatred and intolerance can cause, so that’s why we need to use hatred and intolerance to prevent this showing of hatred and intolerance (which may sound ironic, but not as ironic as a self described anti-fascism organisation using outright fascist tactics. How ironic!)

Hope Not Hate claims to be a “grass roots social movement” which represents, in its words, “every walk of life, every race, every creed and every colour; from the working class to middle England”.

The truth is very different. It is an organisation which thrives on fear, untruths, rumours and hatred and one whose message is divisive to the point where it is dangerous It will argue that its march is to highlight issues relating to anti-fascism but it is impossible to see it as anything other than an attempt to stir up hatred against all political dissenters.

The petition, due to be held during the period known as “Silly Week” will do nothing to help social cohesion and tolerance, largely because the organization behind it are a bunch of low-down, dirty, hate filled, hypocritical, anti-free speech, intolerant jackasses, who wouldn’t understand the concept of civil liberties and freedom of expression if it hit them in the face with a copy of Marx’s Das Capital, and most of them are students who haven’t worked a single day in their lives, so why are we listening to these retarded fucks who can’t string a coherent thought together? Most of them need a bath too, I can smell them from here.

*END*

Do you agree with this bullshit?

a) No- Congrats, You are worthy of life.

b) Yes- I’m sorry, you are a fascist. Kill yourself.

H/T The Racoony one.

It is wrong to say that healthcare is too important to be left to the market. We should realise that healthcare is too important to be left to the state.

Indeed. Same goes for food production too. And clothing production. [...]]]>

Comes from Steve Baker (who is more likely to be the UK’s Ron Paul than, say, Hannan).

It is wrong to say that healthcare is too important to be left to the market. We should realise that healthcare is too important to be left to the state.

Indeed. Same goes for food production too. And clothing production. And dare I say, dispute resolution?

An institution that, allegedly exists for protection of the public is, once again, forgiven for a gross breach of this duty. Unless by “the public”, they mean, as they so often do, “The State”. Yes. That.

Sometimes, wanting to die is perfectly rational. Although suicidal people are often thought of as mentally ill and in need of care for their own sake (which sometimes is perfectly true), there are other times when perfectly sane people simply make [...]]]>

Or: “Die? Pah! That’s the last thing I intend to do.”

Sometimes, wanting to die is perfectly rational. Although suicidal people are often thought of as mentally ill and in need of care for their own sake (which sometimes is perfectly true), there are other times when perfectly sane people simply make the value judgement that living isn’t worth it any longer. Like this guy.

I once heard on the TV (I think it was that Big Questions thing on a Sunday) a woman arguing against legal support for people like him on the grounds that people who wanted to end their lives were mentally unsound. Her support for the fact that they were mentally unsound was that they wanted to end their lives. Apart from the obvious circular logic here, it’s quite clearly nonsense.  In this case, for instance, the poor soul has Locked in syndrom, which is a:

• Condition in which patient is mute and totally paralysed, except for eye movements, but remains conscious.
• Usually results from massive haemorrhage or other damage, affecting upper part of brain stem, which destroys almost all motor function, but leaves the higher mental functions intact

A person in Tony’s condition is quite clearly not mentally unsound. He’s merely suffering greatly. In fact, he doesn’t really have much of a life at all. Given that it’s impossible to really comprehend his situation, especially the part that means there’s no cure or chance of reversing his state, I really don’t think there’s anyone out there who can possibly judge whether or not he should or should not go on living, apart from himself. There’s simply no way any other person can make such a judgement for a sane, free thinking person.

Tony’s no doubt in a good position if he would like to end his life or keep on killing, but the law, as it often does, is standing in the way of his freedom. Although English law does accept the idea that a person may legally take his own life (s1), the same piece of statute makes it unlawful to assist a suicide (s2).Which all makes sense until you come across a person like Tony who lacks the ability to end his own life.

Now, wouldn’t you all agree that it makes sense that if a person has a right to do something, then it follows they have a right to do it alongside, or with the aid of, other, voluntary parties? Hell, that is, after all, the basis of all trade and social interaction. It pretty obviously follows that if you can’t kill yourself, but you want to, then you should have the damn right to get some help from a voluntary party to help you off yourself.

So why, oh, Christ, why does The State believe that it- a totally disinterested body with absolutely no experience in any particular individual’s situation- get the idea that it has a better idea of how to handle such a decision than that very individual? Answer: It doesn’t. It can only resort to emotional arguments, based on religion, or maybe some counter intuitive claim to utilitarianism, or indeed, as it often does, in claiming to defend one’s right to life.

But the right to one’s life necessarily includes the right to end it, just as the right to free speech includes the right to shut up (which some people could really do with invoking more often). Politicos may sit in their offices under the impression they’re empathic, caring, and all pro-life, but forcing those who, rationally, do not wish to live is actually a breach of their right to own their own lives. Self-ownership means just that. And who would deny you have a right to destroy one’s property if one wishes to?

From a legal point of view, despite recent calls to clarify the law, it’s still all a bit muddy. At the moment, although aiding and abetting another person’s suicide is still illegal, there are guidelines that need to be considered before prosecution goes ahead. For obvious reasons, they focus on the terminally ill, and those unable to kill themselves (after all, a non disabled person determined to end it would do it himself), but as the law is still not entirely crystal clear in this field (if it can ever be), it still means that the relatives of those in severe situations like Tony, the people who are most likely to pull the plug, metaphorically or literally, need to live not only under the massive pain of their loved one’s situation, but also about their own legal situation too. When you could spend years, or even your life in prison for what could be the most caring thing you will ever do, you’re not going to be at the top of your game.

At this point, I wanted to make a brief point about jury nullification in such cases, (Look up Kay Gilderdale, although as her daughter was not in a state to personally make any death wish known, it’s a bit different), although I got a bit distracted with the concept and now plan to do a bigger blogpost on the concept in general, but in cases of voluntary assisted suicide, I honestly can’t see why a perverse verdict in favour of a defendant could possibly be seen as unjust.

TL;DR version: People have a right to their own lives, and sometimes, for whatever reason, people have good reason to want it to end sooner than it otherwise would, and neither the law nor bureaucrats have either right or reason to interfere. It is, after all, the most important and personal of all personal decisions.

I’ve emboldened a few key parts.

“Free Market Capitalism” is an Oxymoron

It’s pretty much standard for the chattering classes — both [...]]]>

I repost this post by Kevin Carson, in full, something I’m not in the habit of doing, but will make an exception here purely because it’s one of the best things I’ve ever seen on C4SS.

I’ve emboldened a few key parts.

“Free Market Capitalism” is an Oxymoron

It’s pretty much standard for the chattering classes — both liberal and conservative — to refer to something called “our free market system,” also known as “free market capitalism.”  To the extent that the right-wingers at Fox and CNBC or on the editorial page of the Wall Street Journal advocate some purer form of “free markets” in contrast to the existing economy, what they mean is essentially the present model of corporate capitalism without the regulatory or welfare state.

But the form taken by the existing capitalist system that we live under owes precious little to free markets.  From its beginnings in the late Middle Ages, it has been shaped by massive and ceaseless intervention and enforcement of privilege — much of it breathtakingly brutal — by the state. To adapt a phrase from Orwell, the past has been a boot stamping on a human face.

The state played a central role in creating the defining characteristic of capitalism as we know it:  the wage system.  Had free markets been allowed to develop peacefully, with the peasant majorities remaining in control of their land and with free access to the means of subsistence, labor markets would likely have taken a much different form.  Employers would have had to compete with the possibility of self-employment, available to the vast majority of the population.  But thanks to Enclosures and similar land expropriations over a period of several centuries, the majority of the population was turned into a landless proletariat totally dependant on wage labor for its subsistence.

As if this weren’t enough, the British state imposed totalitarian social controls on the working class in the early days of the Industrial Revolution to reduce the bargaining power of labor.  The Laws of Settlement, for example, acted as a sort of internal passport system, forbidding workers to leave their parish of birth in search of better terms of employment without permission.  The Poor Law authorities then came to the rescue of employers in the underpopulated industrial North, by auctioning off laborers — cheaply — from the parish workhouses of London.

Over a period of several centuries the European powers brought most of the Earth under their subjection and imposed similar land expropriations and social controls on the peoples of the Third World, and looted the mineral resources and raw materials of most of the world.

A wide range of thinkers, from the free market anarchist Lysander Spooner to the Marxist Immanuel Wallerstein, have pointed out historic capitalism’s continuities with feudalism.  Capitalism, as a historic system of political economy, was really just an outgrowth of feudalism with markets grafted in and allowed to operate in the interstices to a limited extent.

The state also played a central role in the rise of corporate capitalism from the late 19th century on.  The railroad land grants created a single national market in the U.S., externalizing the costs of long-distance distribution on the taxpayer, and led to industrial firms and markets far larger than would otherwise have existed.  Patent law and assorted regulations passed during the Progressive Era served to cartelize markets under the control of a handful of oligopoly firms.

In the twentieth century, the state played a growing role in absorbing the surplus output of overbuilt industry or guaranteeing an overseas market for it.  The leading industrial sectors were state creations:  the automobile-highway complex, civil aviation, the miliitary-industrial complex and outgrowths like miniaturized electronics and industrial automation.

The neoliberal economy of the past twenty years is overwhelmingly dependent on the draconian enforcement of “intellectual property” law. The dominant sectors in the corporate global economy — software, entertainment, biotech, pharma, agribusiness, electronics — are all almost entirely dependent for their profits either on “intellectual property” or direct subsidies from the state.  The central function of the U.S. national security state since WWII has been to make the world safe for corporate power through the overthrow of unfriendly governments.

Both the statist right and the statist left, for their own reasons, equate the “free market” to corporate capitalism, and promote the myth that corporate capitalism as we know it is what would naturally have emerged from a free market absent state intervention to prevent it.  The statist right want to defend the legitimacy of big business, and the statist left want to make you think you need them to defend you against big business.

But the exact opposite is true.  Big business has been a creature of the state from the beginning.  And genuinely free markets would operate as dynamite at the foundations of corporate power.

And that’s exactly what those of us on the free market left want to do.

Reposted thanks to the wonders of the Creative Commons license. BTW, you did know that everything I post is under a Creative Commons 3.0 license, right?

I will let her set the terms, the medicine, and what have you.

I’ll record/film/photograph everything and put it on youtube/whatever.

Let’s see how this goes.