Ignore the "patch" thread

[Ataros]

It feels so good to blame and punish others for your own decisions like upgrading a PC, purchasing CloD or downloading spyware from internet. Blaming others implies that they are bad guys but I am a much better guy compared to them. This is why it feels so good. E.g. dictators like Stalin or Hitler usually blamed and executed their generals for their own mistakes.

It is much more painful to take responsibility for a mistake and admit to yourself: "I can not pay attention when needed. I can not control my anxiety. I can not clearly think when excited. I need someone else like forum members or admins to tell me what to do because I can not make responsible decisions myself. I am not a grown up man yet."

No one can "get" you to purchase a game, upgrade a PC or download a file from internet. It is always you who make a bad decision unless you have a gun pointed at your head when you make it. Children do not make their own decisions of cause as adults make them for them. Then most of children grow up and learn to take responsibility.

[irR4tiOn4L]

Originally Posted by Ataros

It feels so good to blame and punish others for your own decisions like upgrading a PC, purchasing CloD or downloading spyware from internet. Blaming others implies that they are bad guys but I am a much better guy compared to them. This is why it feels so good. E.g. dictators like Stalin or Hitler usually blamed and executed their generals for their own mistakes.

It is much more painful to take responsibility for a mistake and admit to yourself: "I can not pay attention when needed. I can not control my anxiety. I can not clearly think when excited. I need someone else like forum members or admins to tell me what to do because I can not make responsible decisions myself. I am not a grown up man yet."

No one can "get" you to purchase a game, upgrade a PC or download a file from internet. It is always you who make a bad decision unless you have a gun pointed at your head when you make it. Children do not make their own decisions of cause as adults make them for them. Then most of children grow up and learn to take responsibility.

I'm sorry, but while I believe that at an individual level people should indeed look long and hard at their actions and do everything they can to prevent mistakes, I also think that no one should act with malice and ill intent toward others and I don't subscribe to the kind of philosophy which tends to minimise the actions of others.

Yeah, it might sound nice to talk about liberty and agency (ignoring doubts about free will and determinism) and pretend you are an island impervious to all assault but in practice this ignores malice and ill intent on the part of others and actually CREATES SPACE for those misbehaviours.

It is both desirable in a practical sense and right that people should challenge the actions of others when malice or ill intent is suspected. It is what prevents and discourages those behaviours (alongside personal philosophies) and allows us to work toward a better world. There's nothing childish about that.

If anything is childish, it is trivialising and infantilising Hitler and Stalin. Those men did not commit the crimes that they did because they blamed others. They did so first because of profound personal corruption of their humanity and human values, and second because of certain truths about high public office that we do not like to admit (history does not always allow for being nice) and because of world views that they didn't create and we are embarressed to admit were held more widely (racism, geopolitics, our appetite for world domination).

If there's something to take out of the recurrence of war with WWII, it is not that the failure of individual men to take responsibility for their actions brings the world to calamity - it is that the failure of the collective to hold itself to account for its thoughts and actions spawns such men.

Let me ask you a question. If war is so unequivocally terrible, if it is only the deranged like Hitler and Stalin who desire it, then why are we sitting here replaying it? Part of holding yourself to account is holding yourself to account for a failure to challenge the actions of others.

I think this forum is undoubtedly part of that 'better world' if I may say so, now that the more immature elements are starting to diminish...

[kendo65]

Originally Posted by Ataros

It feels so good to blame and punish others for your own decisions like upgrading a PC, purchasing CloD or downloading spyware from internet. Blaming others implies that they are bad guys but I am a much better guy compared to them. This is why it feels so good. E.g. dictators like Stalin or Hitler usually blamed and executed their generals for their own mistakes.

It is much more painful to take responsibility for a mistake and admit to yourself: "I can not pay attention when needed. I can not control my anxiety. I can not clearly think when excited. I need someone else like forum members or admins to tell me what to do because I can not make responsible decisions myself. I am not a grown up man yet."

No one can "get" you to purchase a game, upgrade a PC or download a file from internet. It is always you who make a bad decision unless you have a gun pointed at your head when you make it. Children do not make their own decisions of cause as adults make them for them. Then most of children grow up and learn to take responsibility.

I once heard an interview with a burglar in which he rejected all responsibility for his actions because his victim had inadvertently left a window open. In the burglar's mind this absolved him of any blame - after all if the victim did not want to be burgled why did he leave a window open?

Your argument strikes me as uncomfortably similar - and equally wrong.

[irR4tiOn4L]

Originally Posted by kendo65

I once heard an interview with a burglar in which he rejected all responsibility for his actions because his victim had inadvertently left a window open. In the burglar's mind this absolved him of any blame - after all if the victim did not want to be burgled why did he leave a window open?

Your argument strikes me as uncomfortably similar - and equally wrong.

Lol still doing well if the burglar isn't falling under a stack of newspapers and suing for negligence

irR4tiOn4L said:

>>So what would be your opinion on judging deception without the full information? <<

I would say we should all love eachother and be grateful that we have two pillars of the community acting in guardian-like fashion, in Wolf Rider and Bongo.

It would not do to have people randomly jumping to any conclusion that suits them, and I am sure those two fine gentleman would not lower themselves, having spotless records as they do.

(I wonder whether you have read any of my earlier posts perhaps? They may be older and mis-guided, but they have a certain charm for a young naif)

irR4tiOn4L said:

>>Ultimately your overly positive endorsement says only one thing, and that is that you believe Wolf Riders judgment of deception in this case is better than mine.<<

Perhaps 'overly positive endorsement' is the right form of words....


>>What you avoid addressing by that, of course, is how you can possibly know that. And since, of course, you cannot know it, you are merely saying that Wolf Rider's opinion matches your own and avoiding any talk of justification.<<

Absolutely. Wolf Rider is an absolute pillar of the community. Above reproach. I would trust his judgement with my life, and that of my daughter's 4 year-old puppy (that came from an orphanage for one-eyed dogs)

>>If you are going to imply you know better than I do whether pencon is lying, you might as well say so and say why. said<<

Because Wolf Rider - and Bongodriver - are almost always right, and their posts have seldom been found to contain anything but the most carefully thought-out and morally just position.

[bongodriver]

@Fallstaff,

Hi mate, you have no idea how happy I am that you have turned the corner and realised my true intentions, it's nice to know that theres hope for me and you to be best buddies from now on, perhaps we can get together for some beers.....

it would break my heart to think that you might just be cruelly playing with my emotions though, but you and others have made me realise that is probably just the cynical side of me you have highlighted so well.

[irR4tiOn4L]

Shall I invite Pencon and Foobar for the round of drinks? Making up and all that.

[bongodriver]

Originally Posted by irR4tiOn4L

Shall I invite Pencon and Foobar for the round of drinks?

Why not, I'm really starting to feel the love now.