[AshleyO]

Originally Posted by x-deviant-x

LOL = this coming from a douche that can’t give a [...] ended in tyranny or oppression, but thinks it’s the best way for mankind to continue, and I’m the one dealing with hypotheticals? ROFLMAO

Stop being a jerk and just watch The Take and come back and tell us that any amount of socialism is flawed. The fact that you actually think capitalism is a final solution, that it's the best that we can ever do, is patently totalitarian. You toe the line of nihilism and fascism.

Over 99% of all employing organizations in the US are small businesses.
Maybe you need to wipe the Marxist bullshit out of your eyes and read that again.

It was 85% and now it's 99%. Deviant; cite your sources. These numbers you're throwing at us are important and exceptional. So the burden of proof is on you.

OVER 99% OF ALL EMPLOYING ORGANIZATIONS IN THE US ARE SMALL BUSINESSES.

Again, cite your sources. Exceptional claims demand exceptional evidence.

Small businesses are the largest employer in the country representing 53% of US workers

Cite your source.

The 30 million small businesses in the USA account for 64% of net new jobs (jobs created minus jobs lost).

Cite your source.

70% of jobs created in the last decade were by small business.

The proportion of Americans employed by small business versus large business has[...]some small businesses become large businesses and just over half of small businesses survive more than 5 years.

If you're going to try to lecture us on the virtue of the petty fascist that are small businesses, then please cite your sources. This is almost annoying, Deviant. Do you not realize that throwing statistics around like this is hearsay? Do you not realize why peer review is important? Besides, even if you could empirically prove that small business is the backbone of the US, exactly what are you trying to prove in the end? What is your end game? Right now, you're spouting useless information.

The median household income in the US as of 2008 is $52,029.

Yes. For example, when you average school grades, your median score IS your score. So let's say you get straight As on 2 classes out of say... 10. You get 3 Bs and then the rest are F- grades. What would your GPA actually look like? It would look like you were actually a C student when in reality, the majority of your grades are actually failures. Think of this like the difference between rich and poor.

SOURCE:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/US_economy#Employment
http://www.sba.gov/sites/default/files/sbfaq.pdf

Finally. But I still don't know what your thesis is.

I own my own business in entertainment media. I’m an artist, as I’ve told you before. A business that I’ve spent the past 10 years building on my own, with my own money, labor and sweat. I quit working for “the man” over 5 years ago. I still live on ramen when I need to and I still work odd jobs when money is tight - jobs that have nothing to do with my career. I do whatever it takes to survive.

With a country as capable as the United States, it's laughable that we consider ourselves survivalists or that we'd have to resort to survival tactics in the most richest and opulent country in the world. That's some serious weirdness, dude.

I’ve never had to rely on the government for assistance. If it means not eating for a week, so be it.

Why is this condition EVER okay? Though I seriously doubt you had to do that. When I was in the military, I ran out of money one week. I had to live on water, a shot of espresso, and the free donuts and coffee that I got to eat once a day. I was proud like you. I didn't ask any of my shipmates for help. I LIVED ON DOUGHNUTS, Deviant. I don't feel morally justified, I feel as if I unduly suffered for no reason and I actually ATE food a little bit, even though it was once a day. You know NOTHING of starvation. Anyone that actually experienced it would understand that you wouldn't want that kind of thing to exist for ANYONE AT ALL.

I did, reluctantly, apply for food stamps once about 4 years ago and was issued a card, but never used it because it was an issue of contingency with my ex, who somehow felt belittled for needing it. So to make him happy I cut the card in half. Of course that still didn’t make him happy.

So instead of getting help, you opted out to make things worse. How calvinistic of you.

What I have is mine. It’s not much but I’ve earned it, I share it with whom I choose to share it with and no one else. I don’t live on credit. I own my own vehicle outright. When I can’t afford gas in my truck, I just don’t go anywhere until I can afford it. I don’t come from any sort of privilege. My family has always been military.

Fuck you, the military has AWESOME benefits. You're a military brat. Even if your folks were enlisted, you got some SICK ASS benefits provided by tax payer money. The military is NOT privatized. You have undermined your entire argument now, military brat.

They own their own houses and land, which they purchased themselves, with money they earned.

From a socialist construct like the military, they earned their wages. You have NO credit to your argument anymore.

I don’t own a house yet. I rent, because I haven’t decided where I want to live and don’t want to be strapped into a mortgage in an area I don’t want to stay in.

This I can understand to a degree.

In 37 years I've never once met a single one I could trust - and fuck knows i've tried - so yeah, I do, but that really has nothing to do with any of this.

37 and nothing to show for it except some kind of... Calvinistic moral justification. How brave.

More leftist bullshit. Welfare makes up 12% of US budget.
SOURCE: http://www.usgovernmentdebt.us/piechart_2012_US_fed

This is REALLY interesting, isn't it? 10% unemployed and 12% welfare. So... if you wanted to be a dick about it, 2% are actually abusing welfare while the rest actually need it. If you want to be catastrophic about it, 12% of Americans are on welfare and 10% are unemployed but not using welfare because stupid shits like you would make them feel less of a person for getting any kind of help. So which is is? 2% fraud or 22% total unemployment in the USA? Is that even remotely acceptable?

Welfare is paid for by tax dollars. Welfare recipients do not pay taxes. So your bullshit side-stepping does not answer the question. When everyone is on welfare who pays the check?

The rich do. However, if you're trying to be that catastrophic, welfare wouldn't really be the problem. You're afraid of a totally lazy culture, which simply does not exist and if it did, it would die... very quickly. Humanity simply doesn't just lay down and die that easily.

You all want some ideological, utopian society where everyone helps everyone and shares everything with everyone, while they come and go as they please and do whatever they want to do, and somehow all the work that is required for a society to sustain itself just "magically" happens, because people "love each other", and you're telling me I should wake up?

No. We're not utopians. I'll be the first to admit that there IS and will be and very much those that deserve to be dealt with by purges in the face of a total populist movement. It's not to say that a populist movement should be violent, it's to say that it's a tactic that we would reluctantly use because SOME people can't be convinced. There are SEVERAL leftists who would disagree with me when I say that in the event of egalitarianism, violence and killing DOES have its place in our arsenal for change.

Those Occupy r.ape tents are great examples of just how much socialists love each other.

Where did you get that information? That is patently ludicrous. It's almost offensive that you demand socialist to be PERFECT while you're allowed to be absolutely horrible because it's easier for you to believe in human hatred while disregarding altruism or even rational self interested altruism.

It’s never going to happen in the US. You can keep on fantasizing about your Marxist wet dream all you like,IT WILL NOT HAPPEN HERE.

Sadly, I agree with you. I will contest that OWS doesn't want real functional and cultural change, they want softer bonds.

Unless you can dream up some kind of way to take the property from the estimated 53 million Americans who own guns in this country. And those are just the ones who are documented. So if you’re brave enough to accomplish that, then maybe you have a shot. The UN isn’t going to do it. Obama isn’t going to do it. Not without a civil war.

If I should be so bold, you seem to think civil war is something that will never happen again. I'd stress that it probably will someday and it WILL be between the classes. And when it does, it'll be owners vs. those who do not. If there was a new civil war in America, the government will not be a target. It will be the very capitalist culture which dominates it.

You think a bunch of hippies in times square can? Lol. Right.

No. I don't think a bunch of hippies in Zucotti park will actually change America in any reasonable way. America isn't prone to radical change for the most part.

I mean, let's be real here. In the event of something so catastrophic as Civil War 2, what exactly would you be defending, Deviant? Barring freedom (that's a nebulous word that's pretty much lost all meaning as well as the word for peace), what exactly is it that you actually think you'd be defending?