Interesting stuff

They phoned me and were asking how much superannuation I had ? Told them politely to F off

Yesterday was thirty years since 'Point Break' was released. With the anniversary looming, Malcolm Knox wrote this acerbic review for Fairfax a month or so back. It's worth a read.

'The only thing worse than Point Break? Keanu Reeves’ acting in it'

"Point Break is a key cultural reference point for the Zoolander films, created years later by Gen Xers trying to make sense, or comedy, of the youth they had wasted. Americans embarrassed that they couldn’t laugh at their stupidity in films like Point Break and Top Gun found a broad, unambiguous way of doing it through Ben Stiller and Owen Wilson. Once they realised Keanu Reeves was Derek Zoolander, the penny dropped."

God Knox is an earnest kook.

Point Break is hilarious.
It's the sheer cluelessness that makes if so fun to watch.

I found a similar analogue to that particular strain of full-throated American cluelessness the other day listening to a WSL podcast which involved a room-full of WSL employees.

the sheer level of cluelessness was impressive.

If you ever wonder why the WSL gets it so wrong and so perfectly and consistently wrong, then you'll understand why when you hear the employees speak.

I have to admit, I found it captivating.

Nah, I hated it when it came out. It wasn't 'stoopid', as in ironically bad, it was hopelessly, pathetically stupid.

When I watched it again however-many-years later it was only bearable through the darkest of ironic filters. Yeah I could laugh at how bad and clueless it is, but at the end of the film I just felt empty.

EDIT: I also liked the review cos it's not often Knox gets nasty.

Way better than the film...

QT TG scene was gold too.

"It is odd that a nation obsessed with identifying threats has developed such a blind spot to the existential threat posed by the rich getting infinitely richer. Americans stockpile guns to fight off imaginary home invaders, flee to gated exurbs to hide from imaginary street crime, and launch doomed forever wars to battle imaginary foreign terrorists. But 40 years of wage stagnation, rising inequality, and the nightmarish gig-ification of all aspects of economic life are not enough to prompt us to cast a wary glance at an annual confab of all the people responsible for creating the conditions that have made it impossible to work one job and retire with dignity.

"The people who have, in fact, sucked up all of the money that no longer belongs to the mythical American middle class cavort openly in Sun Valley while we fearmonger about antifa breaking the windows of some coffee shop. It is enough to make me think that we are not so skilled at threat assessment, after all.

"There is always next year. In 2022, the billionaires will return to Sun Valley. By then, they will almost certainly be richer, and more powerful, and control an even more grotesque share of the fruits of everyone’s labor. They will have continued to bust unions, consolidate control of industries, and wield disproportionate influence over all of our lives, solely for their own benefit. The case for rounding them up and redistributing their wealth will only have grown more convincing. And fortunately, we know exactly where they all will be."

'What happens at Sun Valley, the secret gathering of unelected billionaire kings?'

We keep going over this again and again.
The government, controlled by corporations, has neutered the unions, brought the press to heel, and established an unquestioned hegemony surrounding consumerism and neoliberalism.
The so-called left took their eye off the ball decades ago, became obsessed with identity politics and completely ignored any talk of class.

As an aside these “secret”gatherings of billionaire kings have been going on in plain sight for decades.
All you need to do is look at St Tropez or Monaco or even the whole of the western Mediterranean in the northern hemisphere summer.
The whole thing is one big deal-making schmoozefest.

A couple of thought provoking articles here re. Sth Africa at the moment. (particularly the first two), the second article has some relevance with Stu's post above at 5.18 Tues 13/7.
Been trying to find out more about the author to get a read on his ties and possible allegiances but couldn't find anything. Just trying to learn a little more about what's going on there and the cause and effect. Thought worth sharing.
https://www.spiked-online.com/author/moses-dube/

stunet wrote:

"It is odd that a nation obsessed with identifying threats has developed such a blind spot to the existential threat posed by the rich getting infinitely richer. Americans stockpile guns to fight off imaginary home invaders, flee to gated exurbs to hide from imaginary street crime, and launch doomed forever wars to battle imaginary foreign terrorists. But 40 years of wage stagnation, rising inequality, and the nightmarish gig-ification of all aspects of economic life are not enough to prompt us to cast a wary glance at an annual confab of all the people responsible for creating the conditions that have made it impossible to work one job and retire with dignity.

"The people who have, in fact, sucked up all of the money that no longer belongs to the mythical American middle class cavort openly in Sun Valley while we fearmonger about antifa breaking the windows of some coffee shop. It is enough to make me think that we are not so skilled at threat assessment, after all.

"There is always next year. In 2022, the billionaires will return to Sun Valley. By then, they will almost certainly be richer, and more powerful, and control an even more grotesque share of the fruits of everyone’s labor. They will have continued to bust unions, consolidate control of industries, and wield disproportionate influence over all of our lives, solely for their own benefit. The case for rounding them up and redistributing their wealth will only have grown more convincing. And fortunately, we know exactly where they all will be."

'What happens at Sun Valley, the secret gathering of unelected billionaire kings?'

That article was terrible on every level so full of holes.

In what world are home invaders imaginary in the USA?

"According to a United States Department of Justice report:
38% of assaults & 60% of rapes occur during home invasions.
Over 2,000,000 homes will experience a break-in or burglary this year.
There are over 4,500 home burglaries per day in the United States.
The average number of home invasions per year was 1,030,000 between 1994 and 2010."https://www.nationsearch.com/blog/home-invasion-crime-statistics-that-wi...

BTW. As you can see those figures are old, most likely much higher now, i also saw the overall property crimes stats in the USA are much higher at over 7 million incidents a year.

Im glad we dont have the same gun culture here, but the culture of needing a gun in the USA is very real, because guns are so prevalent.

And how on earth is street crime imaginary in the USA?

For a developed country street crime levels are crazy, be it muggings or gang violence etc, im not even going to waste my time googling this, we all know it a very real problem in many countries especial the USA.

And yeah im sure the coffee shop owner who has his windows smashed in some cases on a regular basis by Antifa isn't just calling it no big deal.

But yeah its completely rational to be fearful of the success of others???

What a complete load of garbage...

bluediamond
Causes in chronological order
- Corrupt greedy politicians
- No education of the masses
- Large scale unemployment
- Poverty
- Starvation
Effects
The history of Africa over the last century - take your pick

Some might say another cause was the colonialists but not so much nowadays.

Thanks Gary G. Appreciate that.
It's a proper mess. Trying to learn as much as i can as i go..feel pretty naïve from over here about it all to be honest. Have always had an understanding that it goes so far back that right and wrong, just and unjust are buried deep in a long forgotten history of the nation and land. Always had a fascination with Sth African history, but right now it seems to be as fractured as it ever was. Sad.

Geez Indo, talk about missing the mark. Have a bit of a think about what the article is actually talking about, rather than a knee jerk reaction.

Indo, it's called rhetoric.

Baffling level of miscomprehension. I've got three kids at home under ten that understand the written word better.

JQ wrote:

Geez Indo, talk about missing the mark. Have a bit of a think about what the article is actually talking about, rather than a knee jerk reaction.

I had to double check that I had read the same article.

More cha cha cha from info ....

Argh whatever yeah i skimmed it but it's still just the same old same old Guardian whinge and wankfest article, we are all so hard done by we are so oppressed by capitalism or some BS (same shite people regurgitate here)

Always looking at others that are more successful and blaming them for god knows what, next it will be it's onshore and flat.

But i guess its 2021 everyone wants to be a victim somehow, but not so easy when most of us here are generally middle class white and male.

Reality is we all got lucky and got born in developed democratic countries and capitalism is easily the best system, if you dont like it go move to Cuba or Venezuela for a reality check of how lucky we all are.

You want to be some rich powerful bastard yeah okay its unlikely you will ever be that 1% but if its really what you want, work hard and smart and you have decent shot of having much more money than you need, maybe even some power, personally both don't interest me.

Anyway not only did we get lucky and got born in a developed democratic country, we lucked into a time in history when there is so many positives, long period of peace in the west, economic prosperity, high living standards, longest life expectancy in the history of man kind, half of us dont get even our hand dirty.

Unless you are old enough to have been sent to Vietnam, Covid is about the biggest thing we have ever had to go through, but really its more just an inconvenience for most of us, lockdowns and no OS holidays.

Anyway continue your whinging.

Mental

Indo’s on a roll ha ha. Can’t wait to read the next 24hrs of comments

Sorry GF thats it, back to skimming over all the whinge and wank fest BS again.

Ha come on Indo don’t stop now, fire up son.

You had a couple of choices on that one Indo, shame you took the immature route you did. You're more than capable of understanding what the article was about, if you wanted to.

I guess it was more appealing to 'continue your whinging'.

Westofthelake wrote:

JQ wrote:

Geez Indo, talk about missing the mark. Have a bit of a think about what the article is actually talking about, rather than a knee jerk reaction.

I had to double check that I had read the same article.

That makes two of us. Amazing.

More comedy from Indo.
Guffaws of icredulity.

Comedy is in the eye of the beholder, matt. I personally found indo's comments sobering. The anti-(white)America/ pro-(black)Socialist narrative from most contributors on this thread is more of a joke than anything indo says IMO.

Thanks D-Rex

BTW. Notice how everyone was quick to throw out lame smart arse snipes at me, but completely avoided talking about or trying to defend the crappy article.

Noted but not surprised!

"...but completely avoided talking about or trying to defend the crappy article."

Hangabout! It was you who missed the point of it.

Well you could have maybe explained the point i missed.

indo-dreaming wrote:

Well you could have maybe explained the point i missed.

Really? A six paragraph article, very clearly written, and you need the point explained.

@ID,

The author wrote 'imaginary', not to say it doesn't exist point blank, but to make the point that citizens don't know who their would-be assailants are, and that the fear outweighs the reality, while the same citizens know exactly who it is that's causing reduced living standards, and how it's come to be.

Yet you went on a weird stat grab about crime in America like some binary code bot bereft of all nuance.

Inequality isn't just rising, it's accelerating, and it makes me wonder about people who can't see the problem that will pose in the future.

Already select companies, and individuals too, are more powerful than some nation-states, and they're already bending the will of institutions in their favour. I imagine advocates of endless inequality say, 'Well, they're obeying the laws', not realising we've already reached the point where those same people are heavily influencing the laws, as they now wield more power than legislators.

Doesn't take much forward thinking to see where this will end up.

On a global scale and in most countries living standard's are not decreasing though, in most countries living standards have increased more over the last 50 years than any time in the history of man kind, people are generally better off than ever with higher levels of comfort, education, access to medical care, longer life expediency etc (yeah im sure you can find an article that says living standards are dropping based on some technical mumbo jumbo, but it's not reality)

The article makes light of real problems that people face every day while trying to install fear about some imaginary boogie man.

Inequality will always rise, this is completely natural because success is never equal, it can't be equal, but the reality is even those at the bottom are seeing a higher quality of life than previous generations, that's all that matters not that some minority at the top are richer, they will always get richer, it's irrelevant as long as everyone else's life's long term also improve.

Capitalism is the main driver behind this success, it creates innovation and competition that has seen large advances in technology that lift living standards for everyone, it's no coincidence that the most successful developed countries in the world are capitalist based countries generally democratic.

Meanwhile pretty much every true socialist and communist country has failed, the only real exception is China but it has a weird mix of capitalism and communism.

But more and more we hear people going down this path of how bad capitalism is which almost always leads to this marxist/socialist/communist mindset, that we all know from history fails time after time and is responsible for hundred of millions of deaths and much suffering. (have a look what is happening in Cuba right now)

Anyway the article came across to me like some conspiracy theory of all these super rich dudes getting together plotting to take over the world, i thought that stuff was more the realm of the far right?

You've got an astonishing capacity for black and white thinking.

Here's a tip: Just because someone questions laissez faire capitalism doesn't make them a Communist. There are many, many stations between the two. For succesful real world examples look at the Nordic countries and their mix of state-based stability and fairness, and private innovation - Nokia, Ericsson et al.

stunet wrote:

You've got an astonishing capacity for black and white thinking.

Here's a tip: Just because someone questions laissez faire capitalism doesn't make them a Communist. There are many, many stations between the two. For succesful real world examples look at the Nordic countries and their mix of state-based stability and fairness, and private innovation - Nokia, Ericsson et al.

Ha ha i will take that as compliment.

Those countries are still capitalist countries with free markets, im sure they have super super rich people too.

"...higher quality of life than previous generations.."
plenty of data that states the opposite to that indo for the newer / younger generations.
for the 1st time in a long time these generations will be worse off then their parents.

the rich get richer the poor get the picture...........

https://www.forbes.com/billionaires/

These graphs and this discussion all relate to people. Humans. Put up the graphs on capitalism's impact on the rest of the animal kingdom, and the environment. Unless growth is sustainable it should be illegal.

indo-dreaming wrote:

stunet wrote:

You've got an astonishing capacity for black and white thinking.

Here's a tip: Just because someone questions laissez faire capitalism doesn't make them a Communist. There are many, many stations between the two. For succesful real world examples look at the Nordic countries and their mix of state-based stability and fairness, and private innovation - Nokia, Ericsson et al.

Ha ha i will take that as compliment. Those countries are still capitalist countries with free markets, im sure they have super super rich people too.

Try not taking it as a compliment.

Try and see how those high-taxing Nordic countries differ from ours, and how those states don't leave citizens to fend for themselves against predatory capitalism, how the state protects the Commons, and also how the state retains primacy over corporations - which despite the kind of scaremongering you hear from biz councils don't flee from those countries.

It's capitalism, but not like ours.

Go on, try and apply some nuance.

Yes adam, great idea. Socialism certainly does promote both animal and environmental welfare, just look at the paradises which are North Korea and China. Not just make it illegal, let's put anyone who advocates unsustainable growth in jail.

You know the funny thing about those that are for increased levels of socialist type policy.

They are almost always the same people that always whinge about the government no matter who is in power, yet they want the government to have more control over things?

Go figure.

Anyway i think Australia has pretty much the perfect balance, i know its not a very popular opinion or even that cool, but im happy with the country i live in.

My biggest concern is more around social issues and influence of the far left in these areas.

bonza wrote:

"...higher quality of life than previous generations.."
plenty of data that states the opposite to that indo for the newer / younger generations.
for the 1st time in a long time these generations will be worse off then their parents.

Housing is really the only area, but thats a housing thread discussion,

indo-dreaming wrote:

They are almost always the same people that always whinge about the government no matter who is in power, yet they want the government to have more control over things?

Last quote of the day, promise.

Our political institution should run on protagonism. That's what politics is - mock combat. Advancing ideas by adversarial argument. Prosecuting them in the court of public opinion.

Complacency or cosying up to one side is the perversion.

bonza wrote:

"...higher quality of life than previous generations.."
plenty of data that states the opposite to that indo for the newer / younger generations.
for the 1st time in a long time these generations will be worse off then their parents.

That's the de-industrialisation and attempted replacement with a services economy, bonza. If you want to be first world you have to value-add.

Trying to stay out of these kind of threads, but I really can't see a happy future for ZA. Can anyone offer an alternative to continued looting by their ruling party?

velocityjohnno wrote:

Trying to stay out of these kind of threads, but I really can't see a happy future for ZA. Can anyone offer an alternative to continued looting by their ruling party?

The JobKeeper allowance?

This guy dropped his CEO salary from 1.2 million to 70k and restructured things to make his employees starting wage 70k.

https://m.facebook.com/DanPriceSeattle

I think looting by the opposition is the most likely future outcome.

It's good to see Stu getting into the economics of the inequality, too: this goes back to the kind of stuff I studied at uni. Everyone has been blindsided, as AndyM pointed out, by the identity politics which is an economic own-goal. Or missed penalty, to be topical. And it's also good to see Indo pointing out the benefits of the current system - and they are there for workers/businesses in the favoured sectors at any one time.