Making the news today....

[Vespasian]

1 minute ago, Mesterh said:

Well then, are you a non smoker  teetotaler?

 

 

Smoker givin up in a day or so...   don't drink for the most part..  hangovers ain't my thing...

 

And yes both are drugs..   but both ain't hard drugs... thats somethin in it?.   

 

and theres a difference between drink an hard drugs..  one is a solitary experience one a social experience..    If I had to choose between the two it would be alcohol..  

[Ratman]

I thought the assumption was that drugs lead to mental illness..  isn't that the assumption?.
 
I was on the other hand was suggesting the opposite, that mental illness leads to drug abuse...   in a round about way..   
 
and if I'm not mistaken I was also suggesting that people who might be subject to those types of illnesses be forewarned in the classroom..  teach them that they are particularly vulnerable to the dangers of drug abuse and thus direct them away from drug use early in life...    
 
Teachers know who these types are..  its a well known fact teachers can spot those who they know will end up in prison in later life, its not a stretch to see they can see the mentally unstable..
 
Its not like its likely to stop substance abuse in general, but at least it might save some from themselves in later life..  
 
And its a better strategy  than doing nothing and waiting on events..  don't you think?...
 

Uncontrollable mental illness CAN and does promote drug use was the original mention.
You said classroom teaching could stop drug use, then you back peddled saying they needed to be of mental fortitude to stop it happening.
Now your implying the opposite again? “In a round about way!” as you put it!
How do teachers know who “these TYPES are”? (Your a prick for trying to categorise the unfortunate!)
And as for “waiting on events”...... thats another point, how can you spot what is going to happen, you cant!
You’ve just talked yourself in to a circle of muttered bollocks!!! Are you on drugs? Do you want me to get the doctor...... i mean teacher??!!!

I’m done for tonight Vesp, you’ve wiped me out with all your spatterings of excrement, i’m off to clean my full body suit off, you’ve completely covered me from head to toe tonight!
Soon be 4am get up for me, night night ya [emoji931] end!

[Vespasian]

3 minutes ago, Ratman said:

Uncontrollable mental illness CAN and does promote drug use was the original mention.
You said classroom teaching could stop drug use, then you back peddled saying they needed to be of mental fortitude to stop it happening.
Now your implying the opposite again? “In a round about way!” as you put it!
How do teachers know who “these TYPES are”? (Your a prick for trying to categorise the unfortunate!)
And as for “waiting on events”...... thats another point, how can you spot what is going to happen, you cant!
You’ve just talked yourself in to a circle of muttered bollocks!!! Are you on drugs? Do you want me to get the doctor...... i mean teacher??!!!

I’m done for tonight Vesp, you’ve wiped me out with all your spatterings of excrement, i’m off to clean my full body suit off, you’ve completely covered me from head to toe tonight!
Soon be 4am get up for me, night night ya end!

Hahahaha

 

I bet you missed me didn't you ratman when I was banned for a time...   see your gettin back into the swing of things...  

 

is this you...

 

 

[Ratman]

Hahahaha
 
I bet you missed me didn't you ratman when I was banned for a time...   see your gettin back into the swing of things...  
 
is this you...
 
 

Yeah thats me [emoji106]

[Vespasian]

3 minutes ago, Chessa said:

A little more... (I'm not tired yet)...

Quote from the above book again: "Lloyd Pendleton, the director of Utah's Homeless Task Force, had his lightbulb moment in the early 2000's. Homelessness in the state was out of control, with thousands oaf people sleeping under bridges, in parks, and on the streets of Utah's cities. Police and social services had their hands full... in 2005, Utah launched its war on homelessness... The goal? To get all the state's homeless off the streets. The strategy? Free apartments. Pendleton started with the seventeen most abject street sleepers he could find. Two years later, after they all had a place to live, he progressively expanded the program. Criminal records, hopeless addictions, towering debts, - none of it mattered. In Utah, having a roof over your head became a right." 

I'm all for this sort of thing, though I wouldn't want to go so far as a right..  a partnership, you get a roof over your head, you act as a good citizen..   

 

Universal income as well, give everyone a fixed income, money earned afterwards is a bonus...

 

prison reform as well, instead of what we have today. we have spartan accommodation without heating..   no telly no nothing..  just hard graft and physical punishments..  birch whip or cane..

 

beat em down and keep em down..  you play nice in society or you go down hard in prison..

 

 

[the village idiot]

13 minutes ago, Chessa said:

A little more... (I'm not tired yet)...

Quote from the above book again: "Lloyd Pendleton, the director of Utah's Homeless Task Force, had his lightbulb moment in the early 2000's. Homelessness in the state was out of control, with thousands oaf people sleeping under bridges, in parks, and on the streets of Utah's cities. Police and social services had their hands full... in 2005, Utah launched its war on homelessness... The goal? To get all the state's homeless off the streets. The strategy? Free apartments. Pendleton started with the seventeen most abject street sleepers he could find. Two years later, after they all had a place to live, he progressively expanded the program. Criminal records, hopeless addictions, towering debts, - none of it mattered. In Utah, having a roof over your head became a right." 

 

"The program was a resounding success. While in neighbouring Wyoming the number of people living on the streets soared by 213%, Utah saw a 74% decline in chronic homelessness. And all this in an ultraconservative state. The Tea Party has had a big following in Utah for years and Lloyd Pendleton isn't exactly a lefty. 'I grew up on a ranch, where you learned to work hard' he remembers. 'I used to tell the homeless to get a job, because that's all I thought they needed'."

 

"The former executive changed his tune when he heard the full financial story at a conference. Giving away free housing, it turned out, was actually a windfall for the state budget. State economists calculated that a drifter living on the street cost the government $16,670 a year (for social services, police, courts, etc). An apartment plus professional counselling, by contrast, cost a modest $11,000."

 

"The numbers are clear. Today, Utah is on course to eliminate chronic homelessness entirely, making it the first state in the US to successfully address this problem. All while saving a fortune".

 

(This has really blown me away, actually).

 

Interesting stuff.

 

I think we grossly underestimate the pivotal role that luck plays in all our lives. 

 

There is a lot of talk of 'bad choices' but it is not at all clear that we understand the mechanics of choices, and as far as I can see there is certainly no evidence of free will being involved.

 

Give some people some 'no strings attached' good luck and the results can be dramatic.

[WesD]

4 hours ago, Mick Dempsey said:

Wes, go to page 1071 and read Timon’s post, that’s exactly what was happening.

Just read, Yep agree, last sentence more so than other parts! Self satisfied should be replaced with ignorance of how to help. 

 

Begs the question though, how do we help? We don’t see what charities do only the girl outside of Sainsbury’s???

 

That Q ain’t aimed at you btw @Mick Dempseybut open to all.  

[difflock]

Chessa, 

I am reasonably certain, that that book you quote, was written to support a particular point of view, in that it, or at least the parts you choose to quote, absolutly fails, or refuse to mention the backsliders, the absolute neerdowells, that simply must exist in any given society.

Also the $11000.00 per year accomodation (Utah example) cost has to be falsely low. i.e. it may reflect the bare rental cost but zero maintenance nor utilities.

Ditto for the African example, though oddly, since most Africans know what actual true poverty is, they might actually better realize the value of the cash hand-out.

As before my opinions are based on my local observations, which definitively reveal that some families from solid family backgrounds will work their way down, some are genuine alcoholics/addicts, some simply feckless with money and some gifted individuals from plainer/rougher backgrounds will refuse to better themselves, and some indeed progress.

Regardless of the "free money" so blythly disembursed. (that someone had worked hard to earn)

While most in the community knuckle down and survive, which is not easy for them, but they make themselves do it.

There are no easy "one size fits all" answers.

And any easy-money solution will attract criminals and con-persons(i.e. the Grenfell fire) , such is life.

But to deny these facts is not a little disingenuous

P.S.

I am aware that "shit happens", however most such shit is caused by poor life choices,(or indeed others poor life choices) some/most(and I worked with quite a few examples) refuse to accept that their poor choices were in any way to blame, ergo their lives will not improve.

And they continue to blame Society instead.

Perhaps that is the basis for the expression "charity begins at home".

P.P.S

Our son works in a Post Office, involved in handing out benefit payments, staggering sums of "free money" are already being disembursed, to individuals, on a weekly basis.

Never mind the equally staggering sums(but always sub £800.00, in each individual transaction) being MoneyGrammed back to Romania

 

Marcus

Edited December 31, 2018 by difflock

[eggsarascal]

23 hours ago, kevinjohnsonmbe said:

Which bit Mr P?

 

The fake news figures or the duty placed upon all at sea (under international maritime law - UNCLOS) where it is safe to do so, to assist those in distress (imminent peril) where imminent peril is described under the SOLAS convention. 

 

Bit of a shambles really where well intentioned international conventions are being exploited by those that purposefully, intentionally and often criminally set out to exploit that which was never envisioned as being applied in such a manner so as to short circuit normal immigration processes. 

 

The answer - pick em up and set em back from whence they came. Maybe then the message will get out and the ‘victims’ will stop giving their money to organised crime and international terrorists....

 

 

 

I keep reading this pick em up and set them back to France, why don't we do this, is there an agreement in place to stop us?

[kevinjohnsonmbe]

11 hours ago, Chessa said:

But it gets even stranger. In Liberia, an experiment was conducted to see what would happen if you gave $200 to the shiftiest of the poor. Alcoholics, addicts, and petty criminals were rounded up from the slums. Three years later, what had they spent their money on? Food, clothing, medicine and small businesses. 'If these men didn't throw away free money' one of the researchers wondered, 'who would'."...

There was a much more scientifically reputable social experiment directed by John Landis in early 1980's Philadelphia, USA where the contrasting effects of nature v nurture were explored by fundamentally altering the social circumstances of 2 wholly unrelated individuals living in the recessionary circumstances of post 1970's Federal fiscal incompetence and the after effects Reaganism.

 

Not a new experiment however, the above is often considered a modern representation of the much earlier (100 years earlier) work of Mark Twain - funny old world where fact becomes stranger than fiction!