tuscl

Bad luck

mark94
Arizona
Friday, October 7, 2022 12:02 AM
“Throughout history,” Robert Heinlein wrote in 1973, “poverty is the normal condition of man.” “Advances which permit this norm to be exceeded—here and there, now and then—are the work of an extremely small minority, frequently despised, often condemned, and almost always opposed by all right-thinking people.” “Whenever this tiny minority is kept from creating, or (as sometimes happens) is driven out of a society, the people then slip back into abject poverty.” “This,” Heinlein added, “is known as ‘bad luck.’” All those “right-thinking people”—the people with the socially certified ideas, the kinder, gentler, mask-wearing, anti-fossil-fuel types—are on the ramparts, proudly toppling the atavistic instruments of their prosperity.

30 comments

  • CJKent_band
    •
    2 years ago
    "All societies are based on rules to protect pregnant women and young children. All else is surplusage, excrescence, adornment, luxury, or folly which can - and must - be dumped in emergency to preserve this prime function. As racial (human race) survival is the only universal morality, no other basic is possible. Attempts to formulate a “perfect society" on any foundation other than "Women and children first!" is not only witless, it is automatically genocidal. Nevertheless, starry-eyed idealists (all of them male) have tried endlessly - and no doubt will keep trying." ~ Robert Anson Heinlein ~ Engineer Lieutenant USN - Novelist ~ Born July 7, 1907 Butler, Missouri, U.S. ~ Died May 8, 1988 Carmel-by-the-Sea, California, U.S.
  • shailynn
    •
    2 years ago
    I’m trying to figure out when I go all in with pocket aces pre flop and lose in poker is it because I am a bad player or just bad luck?
  • PhredJohnson
    •
    2 years ago
    As a long time re-reader of RH work I fully agree. And fuck those who don’t get it.
  • docsavage
    •
    2 years ago
    Heinlein is my favorite science fiction writer. I read a lot of science fiction around 40 years ago but not much since then. I recently looked in the science fiction section at a Barnes & Noble because I was curious which science fiction writers I read a long time ago were still findable in a bookstore. I found Heinlein, Asimov, Bradbury, Clarke, Dick, Wells and Verne.
  • skibum609
    •
    2 years ago
    Shailynn - at the end of the day pocket aces are just a pair and get cracked almost 50% of the time. Interesting thing about getting a lot of bad beats: It means that one is a good player. You're not getting a bad beat if you call an all-in with j/10 off-suit, but the person with pocket queens that you called does. I've stopped playing cash games because it rewards stupid players, similar to re-buy tournaments which do the same thing. Without luck, there is no poker, because the best players would never lose.
  • twentyfive
    •
    2 years ago
    Most folks make their own luck, good and bad, and my own favorite theory about luck, is 99% of luck is being there.
  • satsuma
    •
    2 years ago
    "Attempts to formulate a “perfect society" on any foundation other than "Women and children first!" is not only witless, it is automatically genocidal. Nevertheless, starry-eyed idealists (all of them male) have tried endlessly - and no doubt will keep trying." I don't get it. Who are examples of people (men) who tried to formulate a perfect society that was genocidal? And why are they always male? I am not really familiar with this kind of stuff but sounds interesting.
  • Mate27
    •
    2 years ago
    ^^ have you been introduced to SJG, our resident start a sex cult guy? He’s your first clue there are men out there delusional enough to attempt it, at least on paper. For almost 10 years he’s been telling us about starting is organization, a cover for his sex cult. Yiu choose whether you want to believe in it or not.
  • Tetradon
    •
    2 years ago
    @OP, that reminds me of the saying that hard times breed strong men, strong men breed good times, good times breed weak men, weak men breed hard times. We're somewhere between #3 and #4.
  • Icee Loco (asshole)
    •
    2 years ago
    Poverty is a product of capitalism. It exists coz the rich steal from and exploit workers
  • Icee Loco (asshole)
    •
    2 years ago
    And quoting heinlein. You might as well quote an rand 🤡🤡🤡
  • Tetradon
    •
    2 years ago
    ^ That's only why capitalism has been around a few centuries and poverty has been around since the dawn of time.
  • Icee Loco (asshole)
    •
    2 years ago
    Lack of technology isn't poverty. You can't say Neanderthals we're poor for not having a consumer society. Poverty is endemic of capitalism. Forcing people off common land and into wage servitude for an exploiting class
  • skibum609
    •
    2 years ago
    Socialism = fascist poverty. Socialism = All people are created equal, but some people are more equal than others..... Bernie Sanders - kapos - Bigot - Moron
  • Tetradon
    •
    2 years ago
    Incorrect. Poverty is a lack of the basic necessities of life. Capitalism brought billions out of poverty.
  • chiefwiggum
    •
    2 years ago
    ^^THIS. Also, sorry, I had to chime in: AA loses heads up about 15% of the time (that's another player shoving 27o on up) regardless of number of people at table. Vs another solid hand like KK, QQ, AK+, I think it goes to about 20%
  • skibum609
    •
    2 years ago
    I would like to point out that while it is true that pocket aces loses 15% of the time, that statistic applies solely to heads up play and not to 3-10 players at table. The overall rate of all pocket aces winning/losing is 50/50
  • Mate27
    •
    2 years ago
    Pre flop All in? Only when head to head.
  • Icee Loco (asshole)
    •
    2 years ago
    Socialism saved capitalism...without socialist measures like labor laws unions welfare programs.... We'd be worse off than medieval peasants
  • Tetradon
    •
    2 years ago
    ^ Without socialism, 75+ million more people in China, Russia, and Cambodia among others would be alive.
  • Icee Loco (asshole)
    •
    2 years ago
    Thats bs... Without capitalism 100 million Indians 50 million Africans and 35 million native Americans wouldn't have died. Does Pinochet give you a bigger hard on than thatcher? You're a poster child for a self hating minority
  • Tetradon
    •
    2 years ago
    ^ Got a source for those numbers? Or is data white male patriarchal oppression? You can look up the deaths caused by Mao, Stalin, Pol Pot in five seconds. Capitalism brought billions out of extreme poverty. Given you this Internet and this phone from which you trash it. But yes, it creates inequality. Because we aren't equal. You're a loser, locked out of its benefits, because of your own lack of brains and initiative. And losers gonna lose.
  • CJKent_band
    •
    2 years ago
    Political systems that favor the wealthy may not have the interests of the working poor at heart. @Tetradon “Poverty is a lack of the basic necessities of life. Capitalism brought billions INTO poverty.” You are welcome.
  • Tetradon
    •
    2 years ago
    Capitalism made poverty _not_ the norm in the world. Deng's embrace of the free market, after Maoism, brought a billion out of poverty in China alone. Socialism is the creed of envious losers.
  • Icee Loco (asshole)
    •
    2 years ago
    Tetradon be like " were better off than medieval peasants coz we own more shit than them"
  • Tetradon
    •
    2 years ago
    ^ Loser talk. There's that matter of "food insecurity" which was the norm before capitalism and the exception now.
  • Icee Loco (asshole)
    •
    2 years ago
    You're lost but keepbsucking masta whites dick
  • Tetradon
    •
    2 years ago
    ^ When you know the facts are arrayed against you, deflect with name calling. It _might_ fool someone. Lulz.
  • CJKent_band
    •
    2 years ago
    "When the debate is lost, slander becomes the tool of the loser” ~ Socrates
  • CJKent_band
    •
    2 years ago
    The undeniable reality is that: Most of our past and current “western” Economic Systems create Poverty, Greed, Violence, Disease, and Environmental Destruction "There is enough in the world for everyone's need, but not enough for everyone's greed." ~ Frank Buchman aka (Franklin Nathaniel Daniel Buchman) ~ Decorated by the French and German governments for his contributions to Franco-German reconciliation after World War II. ~ Born June 4, 1878 Pennsburg, Pennsylvania ~ Died August 7, 1961 Freudenstadt, West Germany
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