PurpleBoxDragon

>That is the main issue. Nothing you can do against individuals that acted legally.

We can punish them for actions deemed wrong even if legal. We do it to the poorest of criminals all the time, through creative legal maneuvers that judges have decided don't violate ex post facto. It is telling that we never do this for white collar crime.

Because that is where people specialize. If we ranked all humans by their programming skill and see which ones choose to become programmers, you'll find it is all around the tip. The average programming skill of the average programmer is far greater than the average programming skill of the average person. This applies to innate talents as well. People go into careers based on what they are good enough at. If you are literally average or below average at your field (compared to all people, not just all people interested in your field), your chance of success is extremely low.

Therefore, if on some metric, you have two groups who are average but one with greater deviation, and then you select among the top 5% of the combined group, you will select more of the group with greater deviation even though the groups are average. You can test this with simulations if you want.

This isn't much of a problem until you apply it to everyday demographics, at which point it can result in uncomfortable conclusions.

What's the possibility that harsh regulators are hired more to create a kind of regulatory capture. The harsher the regulation, the more you need the expert to know how to navigate it, and the less likely competition will be able to navigate the regulation.

I wonder if the contract with the firm is setup so that the information they gather is public, if anyone can find the application in the back of the drawer in the basement if you show up in person and request the form from the admin who is only there 2 hours a week.

They run by lots of little people each working their small part of the picture. This creates a machine that will grind up people and spit them out in ways the little people would never themselves agree to do. If you get the attention of someone who can temporarily halt the entire process you can get humane treatment (such as people who post complaints here or on twitter that gets far more done than any amount of going through customer service), but most people don't have that luxury.

How far will this system support totally amoral actions? One just has to consider cases such as Nestle and their baby formula to see it will allow immoral actions up to and including causing the death of children.

Is Google not a private company that can do what it wants? If they wish to offer a curated list, is that not their choice to make?

In which case they are still equally bad and thus it doesn't matter if they think they are doing it for benevolent reasons.

Do they do this because they want to enforce their own view of utopia onto others? That excuses nothing.

>Of all tyrannies, a tyranny exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It may be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron's cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end, for they do so with the approval of their consciences.

-- C. S. Lewis

I'd say a bigger problem from my perspective is all the non-programmers who get into management and project management roles who never learned these lessons and who refuse to listen to programmers trying to teach them. They'll ignore you, and if you don't 'be a team player' you'll end up replaced by someone who will.

>We would not need affirmative action if every school district in America recieved proper funding to support teachers and enable smaller class sizes, test prep for students to take specialized exams, and after school extracurriculars, both academic and non-academic to prepare them for college.

What counts as proper funding given many school systems get massive amounts of money that is lost to corruption and past debts (which are themselves likely attributed to corruption). And how will money fix the problems of lack of parental involvement and a culture that disparages seeking further education.

If you make money off them but save them more money than you costs, it is still towards their benefit. The only problem occurs when you start working with the hospital to create even more arcane bills that you get into immoral territory.

As long as they aren't a protected class you can do this just fine. If I want to charge football fans twice the price but charge soccer fans half the price, I'm allowed to do that.

>To add to your point, nobody actually trolls in person or in real life because 1) the body language gives them away immediately and 2) they're risking getting punched in the face for their effort.

What do you count as trolling? Purposeful inflamatory remarks? Arguments that aren't honestly believed but are politely used to test the extent of some line of reasoning or the limits of a position?

For example, one common line of reasoning used with drugs and abortion is that it will happen anyways so outlawing it only makes it more dangerous. Now imagine someone taking this same argument and applying it to something like FGM or some other extreme position (though an extreme position that some on the planet do hold, just not likely the one presenting the argument). Would this be trolling, and would it depend upon presentation, in which case would someone with poor presentation presenting an argument they believe in not also be trolling?

The solution needs to be long term viable, which means that voting tax payers have to find the people who receive help sympathetic enough they don't vote to change the system. It's a hard balance to strike.

Should the same be done with time based fines (prison sentences)?

Even if it was free, the ability of the non nobles to provide for themselves as they don't have a family to live off of is something they really should take into account when pursuing a degree. And one can always earn two degrees in 4 years, one for the aristocratic pursuits, one so that retirement is possible.

I'm a Caucasian American whose family has no records of where we came from, not even where in the US my ancestors lived before they moved to the farm in middle of no where. My parents grew up on farms where the food they grew was the food they ate, and while my own childhood wasn't improvised (probably upper working class, if that's a thing), a lot of OP's post resonates with me.

For example the following feels like it was describing my own childhood.

>Beating your kids is not the right way to raise them. Yelling louder is not the way to win an argument. Hiding your faults hurts your family more than it helps.

So we need regulations that prevent physical harm from businesses?

I feel like the safer bet is that future elections will be decided in much the same way as current elections are, by weaponized money. How many people would make great candidates that we never hear about because they don't have the money and realize the futility of even trying?

Would the same apply to laws against assault/battery? If not, why shouldn't they?

If I think something deserving of compassion, then it is something I cannot kill simply for the sake of my palate.

I think that once you get enough of an outside view of any given society, we see the seams fall apart all over the place. Social norms are extremely inconsistent.

Wouldn't numerous apes that operate in groups that seem like simple societies, some of which have been seen passing down traditions like very simple tool use, make the list?

Look at the comment chain with the quote

>You build a form that allows ads to be submitted. It refuses to allow certain illicit keywords. People resubmit a few times until they get the form to accept the ad.

to see where the claim is being made that the company was helping to craft ads to avoid detection.

If prisoners are slaves, then it isn't that far a leap to the concept of wage slavery or being enslaved to nature. But please note that I am not the first post in this thread to use a definition that disagrees from the one you are suggesting.

>Your redefinition of slavery is significantly broader than the accepted definition of it.

Please note this is not my redefinition of slavery as I was largely using the definition many other posts here assume, but only pointing out that it isn't limited just to hard labor on the enslaver's behalf.

If you think this definition of slavery is wrong, then this would apply to numerous other posts here and the core take away would be that prisoners aren't slaves. At which point we can just pick a different word or create a new word and continue to the point.

So, if you have an issue with the word slave, then I'll define a new word to capture what people in other posts are complaining about, praves (yes, just combining prisoners and slaves into as single word). Now, I repeat my point using praves instead of slaves.

So what about cases where the penalty is a fine instead of (or in addition to) prison time? If I get a ticket, I have to pay. For the majority of people, that money comes through doing work of some form, which I'm now being required to do or else face possible prison time.

Is it immoral by default, or due to implementation?

For example, consider a prison which forces (which I'll define as however the prisons currently gets inmates to work the jobs) it's inmates to attend classes to learn job skills and avoid behaviors that landed them in prison. Would this not also be a form of slavery given they are forced to attend? Slavery isn't defined by the slave doing something useful to the owner. A slave is still a slave even if they are doing nothing or if they are being commanded to improve themselves. And in this case I wouldn't see it as immoral.

What about if the slaves are equally forced to clean up the class once done (think stereotypical Japanese school where the kids do much of the cleaning). This could potentially be saving money for the prison by reducing the number of janitors needed, but I don't see it as any more immoral that I see the kids cleaning the classroom as a form of child labor.

In a general sense, imprisoning is a subset of enslavement, though one we generally see as just as long as the laws and legal system which lead to imprisonment is seen as just. In the US in particular, we see some cases as just and some cases as unjust.

But if they did the opposite, and just not posted any add that they flagged as inappropriate, then the ones posting the add could keep testing and figure out what sort of add gets past, and thus Backpage would be blamed for helping the traffickers posting the add figure out how to avoid detection.

So if they strip out the words and post it anyways, it isn't doing enough, but if it just doesn't allow it to be posted, then it is a tool that allows traffickers to groom their adds?