The truth about Guitar Center

[paul999]

Originally Posted by shackman

Brandon:
Don't, my friend, fool yourself into thinking that the capitalist system is fair. It is immoral, amoral and bankrupt of fairness.

If you use the word fair you need to appoint someone a judge to determine what is fair. Are you that judge? Should Hitler be that judge? How about mother Teresa? She wouldn't let you have that new material possession. Is everyone entitled to the same thing? You tell the world how to treat you. If you accept poor wages you suckered yourself. Should the person who sits back and "says how can I legally get a bit more for myself", be penalized by getting the same wage as the person who refuses to stick up for themselves.

MY 2 cents

[garww]

Originally Posted by garageband

Fairness, morality and empathy have been devalued and left behind instead of pseudo-Darwinian values and non-Christian values such as the weak justly deserve what they get, survival of the fittest: the destruction and impoverishment of the rest. It's a curious thing on the American side of the pond that our our society doesn't value society.

Ya, we've become what out parents(puritans and founding fathers) warned us about.

I really don't buy into the capitalist system talk. Sure it's active in our economic system, but I've only met one capitalist even though I was in investment banking for many years.

We're actually a free trade system, bullied about by capitalists. My own pet thought is that you won't have any system if people just do clerking and service jobs(retail work, etc., but that includes teachers and doctors) . You have to have production to support these jobs.

Anti-Trust is a joke and racketeering is the new model.

[shackman]

Originally Posted by paul999

If you use the word fair you need to appoint someone a judge to determine what is fair. Are you that judge? Should Hitler be that judge? How about mother Teresa? She wouldn't let you have that new material possession. Is everyone entitled to the same thing? You tell the world how to treat you. If you accept poor wages you suckered yourself. Should the person who sits back and "says how can I legally get a bit more for myself", be penalized by getting the same wage as the person who refuses to stick up for themselves.

MY 2 cents

Hey Paul - this is an interesting argument.

I question your logic. Is a sense of fairness judgemental?

I am not the judge. I believe society should be. I believe society has failed in that.

I also question your arguments.

Originally Posted by paul999

If you accept poor wages you suckered yourself.

In many, many millions of cases, those low wages are the only wages on offer. What should the suckers do? TURN THEM DOWN? You're suggestion - that they suckered themselves suggests that your attutdue is "let the silly sods rot." That appears to be a common theme in the USA. the "we've got medical insurance, let the poor people die."

Originally Posted by paul999

Should the person who sits back and "says how can I legally get a bit more for myself", be penalized by getting the same wage as the person who refuses to stick up for themselves.

The point here is the "legally". No, that person should absolutely be allowed to do that legally. But isn't there a saying some place about "the law's an ass".

If legally includes standing on other people, paying them unliveable wages - or no wages at all then the law is an ass.

That should not come as a surprise. After all, the legislators appear (I don't know them personally) to be in the pockets of vested interests or in it for personal gain - OR BOTH.

It's THERE - in the legislatures across the globe - that fairness should be judged and implemented. In a community, the strong SUPPORT the weak. They don't stamp all over them in their stampede of greed and self interest.

Garrw.

Maybe my terminology was off center - and I THNINK that I think Free Trade is a good idea. But it is a system bullied and mis-shaped by Capitalists by which I mean - people who see self-interest as more important than community.

Now where's my guitar. I feel like singing a bit of Woody Guthrie.

[garww]

This land is your land,
this land is my land...

From California, to the New York Island..

[jagcmos]

Originally Posted by shackman

I am not the judge. I believe society should be. I believe society has failed in that.

Now where's my guitar. I feel like singing a bit of Woody Guthrie.

This is where Rush Limbaugh has been so successful. Pushing capitalism without empathy.

http://img.freebase.com/api/trans/im...t&maxwidth=510

The words from "This Land Is Your Land"
that I never learned in school:

As I went walking I saw a sign there
And on the sign it said "No Trespassing."
But on the other side it didn't say nothing,
That side was made for you and me.

In the shadow of the steeple I saw my people,
By the relief office I seen my people;
As they stood there hungry, I stood there asking
Is this land made for you and me?

[paul999]

[QUOTE=shackman;145356]

Hey Paul - this is an interesting argument.

I commend your passionate argument and your polite and assertive tact.

I question your logic. Is a sense of fairness judgemental?

I don't think society needs to be fair. I think it needs to balance SOME power and make it possible to reasonably survive for everyone. I believe it needs to be somewhat compassionate and not arbitrary.

We live in a society that makes it easy for people to earn minimum wage 40 hrs. a week for anyone of less then average intelligence in almost any field including music. This, in my opinion, is what society should provide. If you want more you need find a way to have the worth/skill to negotiate it. Society doesn't owe anyone an average wage. You owe yourself more.

I also question your arguments.

In many, many millions of cases, those low wages are the only wages on offer. What should the suckers do? TURN THEM DOWN? You're suggestion - that they suckered themselves suggests that your attutdue is "let the silly sods rot." That appears to be a common theme in the USA. the "we've got medical insurance, let the poor people die."

I'm in Canada I believe in national health care. Your argument that low wages are the only ones that are offered proves my point. Not everybody earns minimum wage so there must be other wages offered. Not everyone who earns more is stepping on someone else to get more than minimum wage. There are plenty of people earning minimum wage stepping on people. From what I have seen successful people do in a situation where they can only get a subsistence income is they get another job, work hard save money and turn that into something.

That should not come as a surprise. After all, the legislators appear (I don't know them personally) to be in the pockets of vested interests or in it for personal gain - OR BOTH.

Where is your proof of this on such a wide scale. Do you seriously think GC has this kind of pull. How many legislators has GC bribed. I highly, highly doubt it.

It's THERE - in the legislatures across the globe - that fairness should be judged and implemented. In a community, the strong SUPPORT the weak. They don't stamp all over them in their stampede of greed and self interest.

In Canada the more money you earn the more you pay in taxes. The more you earn the more you have the opportunity you to earn money from your money. This seems like a reasonable reward for working hard. Rich people are just people. They aren't mean. When people see wealth they rarely see the work that went into it.

Cheers

[garww]

In Chicago, those nice people were Pullman, Palmer, Swift and Armour. Got the government to build Fort Sheridan for protection : ) Capone was not so far removed. Sure there are plenty of great prosperous people, but there are many who have ethical and moral issues. Beyond that, going public makes business' slaves to earning reports. The stock market djia the US really had no business going above 6000. So, big block traders are then trading in speculation rather than worth. Peoples pensions and retirement accounts have vanished. That took a lot of hard work.

[shackman]

Very coherent: You are obviously comfortable with what exists, and that's fine - for you. I'm hugely uncomfortable with what is, and for me, it is centred on a lack of fairness.

Originally Posted by paul999

I don't think society needs to be fair."

So we'll always differ.

Originally Posted by paul999

We live in a society that makes it easy for people to earn minimum wage 40 hrs. a week for anyone of less then average intelligence in almost any field including music.

I understand what you're syaing there, though I hope it's not quite so bald as your words suggest. And there's a tone I heartily dislike because your sentence suggests it is people with "less than average intelligence" who get minimum wage.
My wife is a highly intelligent woman. She gets minimum wage in part-time work. Why? Because she is also the 24/7 365 days a year carer to someone who is disabled. That's unpaid work supported by a government benefit which works out at 0.539513 CAD an hour (just used one of those conversion tools to get the number of CAD).
But that's our life story.

Originally Posted by paul999

Society doesn't owe anyone an average wage.

Does it owe anyone anything or is it ok to do away with welfare and - from the comfort of our self-centred lives - watch the unemployed, the disabled, the mentally ill, the old rot. I'M NOT being judgemental. There are people, millions, who think that's the way to go. You are NOT one of them

because:

Originally Posted by paul999

I believe in national health care.

So I think we have a tiny slice of common ground and not much else, and that's fine too.

You DID misinterpret (perhaps my statement was ambiguous) one thing I said.

I do NOT mean nor believe that "low wages are the only ones that are offered".

I mean that for some people that's all they can get hold of because there ARE NOT jobs in their location which offer more; or because they ARE of lower than average intelligence; or because they are disabled; or because they have a criminal record; or because the list is almost infinite.

Originally Posted by paul999

Not everybody earns minimum wage so there must be other wages offered.

NOT EVERYWHERE. NOT FOR EVERYONE.

Originally Posted by paul999

Where is your proof of this on such a wide scale.

Don't need proof because I qualified my words with the word "APPEARS". That is MY perception. It may be wrong. Where's your proof that I am?

Originally Posted by paul999

Do you seriously think GC has this kind of pull. How many legislators has GC bribed.

No I don't. They ride on the back of the legislation as you or I would. So good people in good companies (from what our friend said to start this rolling, I doubt GC area good company) work within the law and - in my view) the law's an ass.

Paul, I'm not just saying this. In my siuation living in rurla northern England with little chance to get out of the place to debate, meeting someone with a brain and an intellect and a capacity to debate is FANTASTIC.

NOTHING I have said hear is directed personally at you. Good politicians - in my view - can be the best of freidns and yet at opposite ends of the spectrum politically. I HAVE met some of those when I worked as a journalist and I can tell you it is true.

Your final comment is the one which really hurts me - not personally - but politically.

Here's how I see it (I'll roll round to your point in a mo).
The banking crisis, the recession, the mass unemployment, the loss of homes, the human cost of the crash all came about because people in high rise blocks in the City of London, in New York, in ???Toronto, in Tokyo were making money from money. Not working to produce anything (wealth???); not benefitting anyone but themselves.

And we are the suckers who pay for it, and the suckers you mentioned who don't help themselves are left on minimum wage or nothing.

Originally Posted by paul999

The more you earn the more you have the opportunity you to earn money from your money. This seems like a reasonable reward for working hard.

At what cost?

Cheers

PS. I haven't read back through this, so excuse typos and irrantional arguments. It's where I sit.

[P.P.T.]

We don't live in a capitalist system. It is more corporatism. And gov't regulation and lack of propper regulation make it possible.
Both political parties are part of this system, so. no mater who you vote for it will be "the new boss same as the old boss."

And Guitar center is the demon at the center of the entire system.

Dude, get another job.

[paul999]

[QUOTE=shackman;145444]

I understand what you're syaing there, though I hope it's not quite so bald as your words suggest. And there's a tone I heartily dislike because your sentence suggests it is people with "less than average intelligence" who get minimum wage.

To clarify that isn't what I meant. What I meant was that minimum wage is easy enough to achieve. Lots of higher intelligence people earn minimum wage. Not everyone puts the same importance on earning money that you or I do.