Bitcoin Forum

Probably a recurring topic, but since I "accidentally" started such a discussion and people wanted to reply (and also because I have throwing away a long answer ^^), I am opening a thread here, I believe it is the best location.

Original discussion: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=583449.msg8597628#msg8597628

It is self-moderated. My thread, my rules.

• Life is full of things that you did not decide (like being born human). Better to light up a candle than to curse the darkness. Although this is not perfect (perfect would be close to international water or better yet outer space), you can move to another legislation and change your citizenship.
• A contract should require two things: that you understand it and that you accept it (which in turns implies that you can refuse it). I accept the social contract for the most part and you seem not to. This doesn't make it less legible (even though the fact that you cannot practically refuse it is annoying, to say the least). I consider you are confusing "I refuse" and "Everyone shall refuse" (Russel's teapot here). When you say that "taxation is not a necessity", you are expressing your own belief, not an immutable truth (immutable truth are the province of hypothetico-deductive systems like maths and chess).
• I'm not a fan on using big words for the sake of it. Look at real slavery and the true horror it generates. Same goes for "kidnapping" and "guns".
• Let's talk business. Offer and demand: there is a demand for taxation. Economy of scale: good luck making large structure work without spreading the cost and the maintenance - consider fixing just the part of the road you are actually walking on. Before the advent of state-owned schools, which part of the population was litterate (reminder: freedom starts when you can question what you are being told, and litteracy is a great way to do it)?

A bit off-topic but since you are pursuing a non sequitur fallacy regarding belief: the Catholic Church (despite all the atrocities it perpetrated) did a fine job (till year 1000) in perpetuating a semblance of civilisation in Western Europe after the fall of the Roman Empire. And I'm saying this as an agnostic.

I have a pretty consequentialist vision of things. If mankind constantly balances between individualism and collectivism, between liberalism and interventionnism, betwee, private interest and public interest), I believe (yes, believe, please let me sacrifice someone on an altar) this is because it is the best reflection of his aspirations as a species. Human is social animal at heart. It is a monkey (living in tribe-sized community in the jungle), not a lion (strong enough to live by its own) and not an ant neither (completely devoid of individuality).

Both ardent individualists and ardent collectivists are extremists in my book. It's all about the balance. Of course, where to place the balance is a hard question, probably without definitive answer as long as the human brain will be what it is.

So if social contract implies censorship of bitcoin and hard informatics regulation, repression and spying of the citizen (like in "Thieves emporium", seriously read this book ;) ) to be sure nobody use it illegally is ok ?

So maybe you can help me understand something. Why are lefties involved in a movement whos purpose, not by any mans imposition, but by its own nature, is to create a free market. I mean I welcome you guys. I welcome everyone. But i just dont understand why you guys would want to be involved in this. Wouldn't you rather support the money that the state uses to fund its self? You talk about how much you love government schools. You know those are mostly paid for by stealing the purchasing power of the money that they force everyone to use right? Why dont you use that money if you love government run schools so much. Now just to be clear, its not rhetorical, i dont want you to use that money, i personally want you to use crypto, its just a legit question that sounds rhetorical even though it isn't.

Capitalist anarchist, libertarian and minarchist have a clear moral border between what is legit for a government to do and what is bad. Leftist don't have this, everything is good if it serve the "public interest" (something that don't even exist...), so nothing prevent them to push to radical collectivism like in Cuba.

You are trying to bring the debate on something else than the initial discussion. It was about "Are taxes inherently evil?" not about crypto in particular.

Nope, i want to debate on the "social contract" theory cause you justify taxes with it. So if this theory is false somewhere you lose your argument.

Being born human is not a result of force of coercion and can therefore not be compared to being born property.
Oh, tell that to the people born in Syria, North Korea or any other horror state how they should just move. How about the Palestinians? The Jews in Germany.

So easy to sit in an comparative Ivory Tower.


The horrors of prison is very real. You keep talking like these things are not real because they aren't happening to you at this very second.
Are you honestly saying that people are not being kidnapped and put in the rape camps known as prison for defying the state by asserting their own rights to property and body?

How does going to prison for defying an arbitrary law differ from a mafia kidnapping from defying their law? They both come from the same logic. That might makes right.


There is also a demand for child porn and slavery. It doens't matter if there is a demand for things that are immoral. It does not make them any more moral.
Of course there is a demand for free money by the people who benefit from getting them, and the power they bring.

You are free to sign any contract you want. Where do I confuse this?

The fact that you can't refuse it says it's not a real contract, but a form of slavery.

First, I would welcome a state to convert its currency into a cryptocurrency. Cryptodollars? Why not!
Second, my vision of interventionnism (or leftism, if you prefer) is: a safety net for everyone at a cost of a contribution. A finely-tuned redistribution that doesn't prevent people to reach a high level of wealth, but prevent people to fall below the poverty level.
I believe in offer and demand (and not only for economy, also in biology or psychology, hence religions). But I also believe in safety net. I completely accept this is a Judeo-Christian thing at heart (caritas, justice) and I won't say it is rational (although there is some rationality in defending it, watch Nick Hanauer (http://www.ted.com/talks/nick_hanauer_beware_fellow_plutocrats_the_pitchforks_are_coming/) and Richard Wilkinson (https://www.ted.com/talks/richard_wilkinson)). It is my ideal of life, that people who fall won't die.

Na. Some capitalist anarchists like myself are consiquentialists. In theory we would be willing to support taxation if it lead to the right consequences. Some people would argue that we are not libertarians, but I think we are.

What will make people richer is an increase in productivity per capita, but the state prevent that by his interventionism in economy. No need for coercion.

You are free to offer any social safety net you wish. Why do you feel the need to force people into it by the threat of violence to gain their possessions to redistribute?

No anarchist wants to stop you from setting up a working safety net that you may opt in to. The very idea that you would need force to do this seems to imply that you think it's a failed idea, because people can't voluntarily do it.

OK so I don't believe (or, say otherwise, "my own perception of the social contract is") that Bitcoin shall be censored, nor shall people be spied upon (they can accept to be monitored, but only under full consent).

Does it make you better understand my point?
By the way, discovered minarchism some months ago and I have some sympathy to it.
I may contemplate reading Thieves emporium, but I have very little patience for extremists of any kind - I'm not saying that Thieves Emporium is extremist, I did not even read a review of it yet)

So you are not against the principle of taxation, you are against the actual implementation, am I right?
(like CryptoNote is great, but the Bytecoin implementation is not)

That all sounds great. I think it would be wonderful if societies had a safety net for those who, through no fault of their own, fall through the cracks. It happens. Sometimes people who don't deserve it at all get delt a bad hand. I totally support your right to do your part to provide such a safety net. I would never dream of trying to stop you from doing that. And i certainly would never dream of using violence against you to stop you from doing that. The question is, if i preferred not to fund the net would you extend the same respect to me that i extended to you by not using violence to try to prevent you from funding it, and not use violence against me to try to force me to fund it? (I would if it were empirically demonstrated to be truly effective and well tuned like you say, but lets say i wouldn’t just for the sake of the argument).

Then you might as well start support child rape, if that somehow was to lead to the "right consequences"?

I'm not saying you do that, but if you start your argument from consequence, I don't see how you can be against anything.

I understand your point, i wanted you to answer this. So in my own perception of the social contract public school is not something i agree with. How do we decide without a moral way to reflect about the place of government ?

And Thieves Emporium is a fiction about a failed USA that turned to a police state. You follow a young mother who try to survive in an agorist economy that take place in the deep web. It's not a philosophy book, more a book about how the western world can turn.

A lot of people don't want to be productive. They have another vision of life. They want to live a simple life with their family, go fishing on a Saturday and have money to buy a gift for their son's birthday. What do you answer? That is it the governement's fault if they can't?

I consider that major companies are not encouraging the free markets, this is bad for their business - when are atop, you want to stay atop, oftentimes by any means necessary. How do you see anti-trust regulation? For or against the free market?

The idea that you can have a legal entity that is other then the persons who commit the deeds is laughable at best. Of course companies are against the free market, they are a product of the state and benefit from state protection and can use its law to drive out competition.

If people don't want to be productive they don't have to. A lot of people could live very simple lives if it weren't for inflation, taxation, debt and the constant need to grow the GDP to satisfy your debtors.

I totally do. If a metior were coming towards the planet and were about to wipe out all life on the planet and some aliens stopped by and said "well save your planet from destruction but only if you allow someone to rape a child". Heck yes i would support child rape. Consequences matter man. Notice this is not at all the same thing as just saying child rape is fine. Obviously its a terrible thing. I have my moral objections to it and i do have a sense or morality and i do think that morality matters. But so do consiquences.

Now obviously thats an extreme example but its an important analogy. A less ridiculous form of the same argument is that if the outcome of abolishing the state were to actually create what statists mean when they use the word anarchy, than i would not be in favor of that simply because taxation is theft and theft is immoral. I would rather live with a little bit of immoral theft by the government than mad max thunderdome. Of course lefties are wrong and that would not be the consequences of abolishing government. Thank god. I know what choice i would make if forced to, but i sure am glad i dont have to make that choice.

For first, I am not sure I understood your sentence, so please correct me if I am wrong.
If you don't want to fund the net, no problem. You're out of the equation. You don't want to participate, then if you fall down, I won't help you, I let you die in the street if that happens (it would require people to know what to answer to their son asking 'dad, why he is dying and no one does a thing?' but that should be easy).
That's a contract, you refused it (because you gambled you would not need it of for whatever reason). No problem here. So, yes, I would respect and respectfully let you die :)

I have to say I have a problem with "society should protect people even against themselves" ( common interventionists trope). I consider society should protect people against lack of sufficient information to make an informed decision. But once it is done, its everyone's business.

1.Be productive don't mean work 12h a day, it mean produce more added value in one hour of work. Productivity gain happen cause of creative destruction, and everyone become more productive. A low skill worker is more productive in a mainly automated industry than in some farm in Africa.

2.Anti trust law are a government solution to a government problem: market rigidity cause of regulation.

Na than you arnt a leftie in my opinion. We just got all confused with our words. I totally support your position. Though i will say what you described can hardly be called a government ;)

Strawman fallacy bordering on Godwin point.

I'm not a fan on using big words for the sake of it. Look at real slavery and the true horror it generates. Same goes for "kidnapping" and "guns".[/quote]

So is the horror of living under the bridge because you are pennyless after you boss fired you and you can't get an new job.
Let's face it: we won't have a productive conversation that way. I'm talking about avoiding hyperbole (slavery for citizenship) and you reply by engaging in a slippery rope that avoids talking about the real thing (here, abuse of hyperbole).

Ditto (I hesitate between loaded question and strawman, through).

OK, I quit. It seems that you main argumentation is about invoking various avatars of Godwin. I will continue this conversation with Anon136 until you revert to a more contructive argumentation.

You are not, I was just making a point. Sorry if it was unclear.

I must admit you argumentation is interesting here - a contract that you can't refuse is not really a contract, it is closer to slavery. But your use of hyperbole still annoys me. Slavery is in my view to strong of a word, even if the idea is similar.

See my answer to Anon136. Safety net like an insurance, maybe opt-out instead of opt-in (children and insufficiently informed people). Now that I think about it, it is close to the Theory X and Theory Y (X=people are stupid, we shall protect them against themselves; Y=people can be empowered)

So, my vision of interventionnism is more like an opt-out insurance.

Invalid argument, people are richer in a free market economy cause they are more productive and productivity increase faster. Sorry but economic theory and reality prove this everyday.

'

How so?
You talk about how the social contract/goverment is valid because you can move from it. I point out to real examples where this isn't true.
If we were talking about a specific government in a specific place in time that you like, please state so and we may continue the discussion there.


This argument does not hold water. The boss have no moral obligation to let you work for him. If you he does, you should immediate hire me and pay me a wage, right?

He does nothing wrong by not having you as a worker, no more than you do something wrong by not hiring me.


The question might be loaded, because you claim I hyperbole because I show real world examples where this is actually true.


No, I just point out where your argument goes if it you stretch it. Can we agree that an argument to be valid, it must not self contradict in any situation?

My position is that of a moral one. You say that there is an demand for taxation and use the idea that somehow a demand for something is an argument for it. I merely point out that if you take that argument and apply it to another situation such as child porn, it doesn't hold, therefor it can never hold that demand for something makes it right.

I do not find this hyperbole at all, its much closer to what is actually going on. I don't know what the opposite to hyperbole (hypobole?) is, but I find that this is what most people engage in when it comes do these matters. They call theft taxation and they call torture enhanced interrogation techniques. Not because of the act itself, but because who does it.

If you were to describe the situation in neutral terms, such that you didn't know what the parties involved people are much more inclined to use the words I do.

"Person A uses force to take money from person B. Person B has worked for the money. What do you call person A?"

Anyone would call him a thief, yet they call him the taxman when he's sent from the government.

This is tricky because we are talking about children, who don't have the right tool for free-thiking (this is scientifically proven, even anticipating doesn't happen before age seven, the part of the brain devoted to this being underdeveloped).

I would tentatively say that children should be taught to exercice their critical thinking. There is a need in society to learn a corpus of value and references that tie people together. The schoolyard is a great place for this (and courses too, but different ones). I don't believe in homeschooling but since it illegal in my country, I can't talk about it, I have no experience, even second-hand, about it.

I did not know agorism. I quite like the idea.

Sorry, I do not understand. Could you reformulate?

So we agree on this one. I was not sure at first, but that may be because of the state of politics in France (the rightists are pro-corporations, so it mixes things).

I honestly don't know about this one, neither on one side or another. As a general rule, I am suspicious against any magical formula, whoever announces it - a someone say "listen to the one who is looking for truth, be ware of the one who found it".

1.Sorry, children was not the point but just an example. So if my own perception of the social contract don't include drug prohibition ?

I don't know if you support drug prohibition, it's just an example. I want to ask you "how to decide without a moral border what to include in the social contract ?".

2.Sure, you are in bitcoin  :D

And please, don't lose time explaining what the fuck is France, this government is a so big pile of shit (but Sarkozy was same).  ;D

Can you elaborate on this?

Sorry, I do not understand. Could you reformulate?[/quote]

A company (corporation) is a legal entity in itself that might be punished.
For example, a bank can accused and found guilty of laundering money. But a bank can't do anything, only people can, so its actually people who laundered the money, but the guilt is put on the bank and the bank is ordered to pay money instead of the people who commit the crime.

But the bank is just a fictional construct, how can something fictional do anything? It cant. It's just another government sanctioned way to reduce risk for the powerful.


Many rightist confuse free markets with corporations.



That's very true! :)

I am not convinced. Take infrastructures. I requires a long-term vision to put them in place and I can't believe a free market would create them. It would create a road and plumbery for this very building and the next one and it would be done in a ad'hoc way, resulting in a lot of incompatibilities and kludges and thus loss of efficiency. Central planning has its merit. Would TCP/IP exist if it was not a central planning? We would a bunch of proprietary protocols (because it is more profitable for its creator) and we all know what is means. Not a lot of persons are ready to voluntarily lose (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=582080.msg6366134#msg6366134) for the greater good.

Free market is an economy where there is very much concurrence cause there is no (minimal, just one simple tax without exemption) market distortion caused by the government. So a trust/monopoly can't stay long cause somebody will find a way to compete with the company or find a disruptive solution that kill his market.

Government intervention in the market create rigidity and distortion, big corporation can deal with them cause they have lobbyist, lot of lawyer and have a bureaucratic organization. Small can't and are killed/never created.

Some market distortion/rigidity:
 
-intellectual property
-taxes on product (don't include value added tax if it's the same rate for everything, but there is other problem with the VAT)
-different corporate taxes rate
-regulation, any kind
-investment restriction
-protectionism
-legal monopoly
-capital control
-...

You are "normalising the exceptionnal", taking an extreme example as if it was the common state of affair.

Let's talk about, say, Norway. This is fairly democratic and peaceful country that none of us  know well (if I choose US, I would be at a disadvantage and you would if I chose France).


My position is the same as Anon136, it does hold - under certain condition. But I am an utilitarist, this probably explains that.

Total giving to charitable organizations was $335.17 billion in 2013 and growing.

http://www.charitynavigator.org/index.cfm?bay=content.view&cpid=42

It's just that people want to give in way that makes them feel good about themselves and their deed.

ALSA told Fortune it recorded donations worth $10.1 million on Wednesday alone.
http://fortune.com/2014/08/22/ice-bucket-challenge-als-charity/

I disagree. This is the normal state of affairs for a VERY large proportion of the human race.



I know Norway quite well as I have visited yearly all my life and live close do it. I'm Swedish

1.Heavily capitalistic company (Those who need billion in investment) have long term (decades) plan, like mining company. Did you know that American railway company (in the time of the "wild west") was the biggest capitalization of American exchange ? Free market can build very big infrastructure.

2.It would improve the way we build road cause there will be concurrence and different price, we don't need first class road everywhere but company need them to move their product.

3.If government don't decide what is the language everyone will speak a different language and nobody will understand each other ? No, free market can do standardization where we need it. Did you know that big hardware company meet to decide what is HDMI, USB, WIFI, ect ?

4.In army yes, everywhere no.

Please tell me if somewhere my English is very bad  ;)

euphemism

"Person A uses force to take money from person B. Person B has worked for the money. What do you call person A?"

Anyone would call him a thief, yet they call him the taxman when he's sent from the government.
[/quote]Person a uses force => not a thief. Maybe an extorsionnist :)
What you sentence implies is that Person B doesn't want to give money. My point is that an awful lot of poor souls (me included) wants to give money. The fact that you don't want (and a lot of people neither) doesn't suffice to call it a bad thing (but the fact that you have no choice does).

ill give you a free lesson.

Thx, wtf i have write  :-[

And in government owned school, government can decide that English is not a priority and you must learn it by yourself (i started two year ago)...

Hey i dont even speak a second language. So dont feel bad.

I'd say we decide depending of the answer to this question: does the action (drug use) by design hurt s someone else? If yes, then the social contract shall prohibit it (except if every member of the social contract is fine with being hurt).
I said "by design". Alcohol doesn't hurt other by design (only indirectly), most hard drugs neither. Cigarette does (in public places)
Then there is the grey area of drunk parents molesting their child because of alcohol. The child is rarely in position to freely decide for himself. Same thing for a pregant women taking hard drugs.

2.Sure, you are in bitcoin  :D

I must admit we got a particularly bad one this time. And it seems we could get an even worse one next time (the racist party won the latest city elections).

I feel bad as many French, we have more difficulty to learn English cause many law prevent anything in English to come here to protect French...

Alright, you got me there. Haha


If person B wants to give the money then it's not a tax, it's a donation. You may more may not agree with the tax, but it does not matter, because you have to pay it anyway.No anarchist ever had an argument with someone giving away their money, you know this.

The very fact that it involves force is what makes it a bad things. You could just as easily have a tax on peoples bodies (in fact, they were quite common, where noblemen had rights to brides). It's the same difference as between sex and rape.

If you agree with one, it's no moral reason why you shouldn't agree with the other as they imply the same thing. That people have no right to their own body and property.

A company (corporation) is a legal entity in itself that might be punished.
For example, a bank can accused and found guilty of laundering money. But a bank can't do anything, only people can, so its actually people who laundered the money, but the guilt is put on the bank and the bank is ordered to pay money instead of the people who commit the crime.

But the bank is just a fictional construct, how can something fictional do anything? It cant. It's just another government sanctioned way to reduce risk for the powerful.[/quote]Oh, I understand. Yes, this is quite an issue.
Oh, so this is not only in France. I think this is something like "money=company=rich=ennemy of the people"

Wow i knew your government was crazy but that's a special kind of crazy. Next they will be forbidding you to interbreed with people with the wrong skin color. Gotta preserve that french heritage. :D

1.Drug is like firearm, using them don't allow to hurt people, no food regulation don't mean sell poisoned food is legal.

2.Yes, I plan to leave this country in few years. but i need more valuable working experience and a good plan.

We agree here to.
Fundamentally, I believe that man is tribal creature (see our ape origine). I doesn't scale beyond the tribal level (200 persons).

So come paying me a visit at Malla, one day, this ain't far :)

I'd love to! If you can stand my hyperbole ;)

We can't see movie not translated in French, media have a number of French subsided "art" to diffuse, my government plan to prevent netflix from coming here. English class is with funny teacher to do nothing or speak about American history in French. Even in Paris nothing is write in English in the street...

And the more funny is the government funded agency that translate "e mail" to "courriel" or "hash tag" to "mot dièse" even if nobody use their fucking word.

And your far leftist or rightist say that English language is some imperialist conspiracy...

OK for the first three. On that one, I'd say a project is not a democracy. Look at Monero. Benevolent dictator model does works.

Now I agree the benevolent part is hard to maintain :)

Every action carry a risk, and there is no fair way to asset it. You can easily die from just walking and falling.
Carrying a disease carries a risk, so if you use risk as legal standard you should punish people who have the flu, or young girls who cut their arms. Cutting your arms is probably more dangerous than taking any street drug.

But lets asses your argument here. Yes, a drunk parent could hurt someone, but so could an angry person. So if it's the risk increase, I'd say the average angry person is more of a risk than the angry drunk person. So, still, if you use risk assessment as basis for your law you should make anger illegal

It's an opt in project. Just like any free project you can choose to participate or not. That's the opposite of a dictator.

This is an urban legend (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Droit_du_seigneur) (Braveheart perpetuated it).

As a transhumanist, I strongly agree.

I'm leaving it in 15 days. And I should be packing stuff instead of posting on Bitcointalk :)

that is fascinating. i had no idea about any of this. thanks for teaching me a little bit about your culture.

It's not my culture it's the absurdity of my government... People here do pretty the same thing than in any western country, but there is people who know what the world is and people who never go outside France and trust government and media bullshit that "France have the better "social model" of the world, we need to protect it against ultra-libertarianism...".

Subsidised art is one of the reason why the artistic culture in France is particularly vivid (especially cinema). We all know that art doesn't make you a linving (unless once you're dead... humm). Sure, they're many abuses but on this one, I won't follow you.
As for the English teacher, it really depends on the teacher. I've had great and not so great teacher.
And I find it completely normal that things are not written in English in Paris (btw, this is "written", not "write"). Highly touristic place have double or even quadruple translation, mostly like everywhere else in the non-English-speaking world.
Yeah, Académie française is an old lady that should take care of something else than trying to be young. Or it does, trying better.

For Jungian and Anon136: French-bashing is a pretty popular sport in France. Frenchmen (and Frenchwoman) are known to complaint a lot. Foreign citizens established in France often say "stop complaining, you don't know how lucky you are"./me doesn't like French self-bashing.
 (I did not intend to have it red, I forgot about this formatting option).

So, if people don't own their bodies. Who does?
Do you also, following that train of logic, also think that they don't their actions and therefor can not be held responsible for it?

How do you know that this is the reasons? Subsidized culture is commonplace in many countries.

What you aresaying is that the french art culture produce things that are such in the nature that no one willingly pays for them and they have to be payed for by extracting money elsewhere and be made to please the bureaucrats who hand out the money.

Of course, the same people get very powerful and can influence the popular opinion that this is the "good art".

This of course also has the side effect of driving out competition from the market. If one type of art gets the money, this is where people flock instead of reinventing themselves to compete for the market share.


It's not just the french who suffer from this, let me tell you how bad it is in Sweden ;)

1.Do we need to subside art ? Good for the libertarian vs interventionism debate  ;) But you know, art subside are a way politician give billion per year to their friend and often to produce movie nobody watch...

2.I go in an average countryside public school and English class was just fun time... It's not a secret French have a very bad level in English and most children go to public school...

3.You find normal it's forbidden by law ? Like movie ? And the anti-netflix crusade ?

4.This shit should be closed, language is a bottom up process... another libertarian debate  ;)

I must have expressed myself badly. I strongly agree with you. My body is mine, not some god or whatever.

Ah, good! I thought you disagreed with me.

No. I would find it normal OTOH, that it is mandatory to have a French version and probably also that the French version is prominent.
Now that I think about it, French airports have huge ads in English.

No debate here, you're preaching the choir :)
Although I must say I also am a proponent of the linguistic relativity (better known as the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis) and a proponent of diversity.

Well, this is actually pretty widespread out of US and not France-specific at all. US citizen Andrew Tannenbaum (Minix, the inspiration for Linux) said this when he announced that he is behind electoral-vote.com: "I live abroad and you don't have a clue how bad a reputation the US in the world." (I could not google the exact quote).

Just found this :)
http://anarcho-transhumanism.net/what-is-anarcho-transhumanism/

1.Why have a mandatory French version ? Translation cost money, it reduce the amount of movie French can see. So you don't want Netflix or French TV purpose English movies ?

2.I'm an language utilitarianist, i admire what the north Europe country do to teach English very young to their children so they are fine with the modern world.

This is what really attracts me to anarchism (although I feel that label may be more a burden. The idea that you don't need to bring in violence where it's unwarranted doesn't need a big name like that). You do not need to subscribe to any ideology or ideas other than that you own your own body (and by extension have right over what that body create). To me, it doesn't matter if you want to work in a commune or top-down big corp.

All ideas are free to flourish or fail on their own merits and people will subscribe to what suits them best.

Mostly, it's an unintentional consequence of being a small country. For example, with such a small market, we couldn't afford to put voice actors on every movie. Instead they were released with subtitles. This proved a great learning experience because you hear the actors and read what they say at the same time.

Getting to interact with a foreign language in a positive and voluntary is how you learn a new language, not by forcing the kids to sit in front of a white board for hours trying to bend grammar. So I wouldn't credit the school system much for this.

I'm baffled you even ask, this is France. We can be proud of our history and our language, And don't tell me if would not negatively impact the French language. Your question is a loaded question. I don't know the story about Netflix, but this is France, you speak French. Of course you should be encouraged to know a second language (EU policy is three languages per European citizen).

This reminds me of the famous picture of a pupil asking his teacher "why is it bad to kill people?" and the teacher being unable to answer. I am in the same position there.

I agree with this but they still have their own language first and foremost.

Language is symbol, (sumbolon, "what which unites", opposed diabolon what which divides - and now this explains a lot of things about the Devil in the Bible). A nation (different from "a country") is united by something that transcend petty opposition. A language is such a thing.

1.I know, being a small country with a language that nobody will ever learn if you don't torture him help a lot. And in your country people don't fear the world and want to learn what happen everywhere more than here i think.

2.But in your country this is not forbidden by law, so i still blame my government  :D

3.Sure, was so happy to learn English (it's not finish yet), but i started late and i would prefer have more serious English class here like in everywhere else in Europe. English is 2 hours a week from 14 to 18 then one hour a week. Here school program are build by a central authority and they apply in every public school. I have hear you have more education freedom than us.

1.Yes, this is France, the country that created human right (and then they inspired the US constitution amendment), was one of the more libertarian country before WW1, was a great empire and one of the most competitive country of the world for a long time but now people fear so much the future... I'm proud of the history of France but the actual trend is very bad, we go to an Argentina scenario.

There isn't "good language", the good language is the language people want to speak.

2.Netflix story was pretty priceless, netflix don't want to subside French movie so ISP won't include the netflix service and only people who can build an HTPC will use netflix.

We have subtitles too. For a large amount of movies, you can choose between dubbed (with original voice off, not like in Spain) or subtitled - French subtitles or original language subtitles. I prefer original language subtitles and I agree this is a great experience both for enjoying the movie and for learning the language.

Please stop bashing. I've been in several European countries, I talked with people routinely working in English with non natives. And I can tell you this: we are pretty well positionned when it comes to speak English.

But a Frenchman who doesn't complain is not really a Frenchman :) "Les Français sont râleurs". Even the American say that we are "judgemental" (always eager to complain).

Nope ! And i'm proud to be critical toward my government  ;)

Ranked 35th out of 60 in this year's EF EPI, France’s English proficiency skills are declining, according to data gathered on over 150,000 French adults between 2007 and 2012. France is one of only eight countries whose proficiency scores have dropped by more than two points, although in absolute terms the decline is slight. What makes the situation more remarkable is that most of Europe has either improved or already demonstrates consistently high English proficiency. France currently has the weakest English skills in Europe.

http://www.ef.edu/epi/spotlight/france/ (http://www.ef.edu/epi/spotlight/france/)

This has probably changed around the world now, but I think we got the head start when this was the norm for every movie. I doubt there were movies in the French cinema 30 years undubbed right?

Thanks, I learnt something.

No idea, would be worth investigating.

Just a sidenote, not the main topic of this thread, but this:


There is actually a very big benefit from the fact that a company is a separate legal entity. For example, this means that the shareholders of the company aren't personally responsible a loan their company takes. If the company cannot pay back the loan, it will go bankrupt, but the shareholders don't have to personally pay it.

Now, of course some will abuse the system (e.g. take loans which they do not intend to repay). This is a risk the lender takes, and will adjust the interest rate of the loan to reflect this risk.

As long as the majority of people act honorably, the system is beneficial. Why? It allows people to take more risk, so it is easier to start a new company, to try out different ideas. Thus we have more startups and enterpreneurs. A lot of ideas (=companies) fail even if risk-taking is encouraged. You can't often know in advance if an idea is good or not.

When people do criminal things, of course those people need to be personally responsible for that, and not the company. But that is a separate issue.

It's ok to intervene sometimes, because in such a system humans search 100%profit.

So 90% profit is ok ? How do we count that ? no sense.

What is "sometimes", and what is wrong in searching 100% profit ?
What is wrong with wanting to eat all the pie that I backed ?

I am French and libertarian, our government is so bad that it convinced me about the danger of putting too much power into their hands.
I became libertarian, when I finally understood why I did not like neither, green, left, right, middle, and I could finally put a name on what I despise about all of them : Statism and that there is no other alternatives available.

I don't consider any subsidies legitimate, and there is no compromise to be made.
I do not blame the businessman, nor the miserable that profit from it, since, from a libertarian perspective, they are right to act in their own self interest.

But the people who protests to get subsidies and government intervention are the one guilty of putting the gun on my head. They are the real parasites.
In France labor unions can only exist by the subsidies they are granted after a successful strike, in other words they get subsidies to plead for more interventionism. They are the parasite's puppeteer.
And then I must smile when I pay my taxes to finance what I despise ?

The only solution I found is to take more free time so I don't earn too much and don't have to pay too much for the repairs of the holes made in the Titanic.

I am not proud of my country, worse, I am ashamed of it, and won't fight for it.
No need to tell me I can go elsewhere if I'm not happy, I know and I will.

If you are mounted on on the dollar (or on the BTC) and you are well off, you'll hate any interventionism.
If you are born in a shit tier hellhole in an objective dead end, you would miss an state that covered basic needs.
It depends on your point of view.