a quick glance at the headlines (no matter where you get your news) alludes to the possibility, of likelihood of a massive global uprising, of the proletariat I guess you could say.

*OR liklihood

Remember one time when the Dow was at 8500, you said that if we didn't see a stock market crash you'd eat your words - you'd print out that threat and eat it?

Did you ever do that?

You see fear and doom and chaos and corruption everywhere you look. I think you might be paranoid

and by threat I meant thread

Global social unrest - yes
Massive global uprising of the proletariat - no

hahaha phil. make him put it on youtube.

Global social unrest - yes
Massive global uprising of the proletariat - no

different words to say the same thing.

Link me to the thread, I'd me more than happy to keep my word.
I must say though I dont have either a printer or a camcorder so I'm not sure how I'd prove it to you. But I'm open to suggestions.
I think the stock market did crash, but if not one person here agrees with that in some way, then... well....
I'm a man of my word

"I must say though I dont have either a printer or a camcorder so I'm not sure how I'd prove it to you. But I'm open to suggestions. "

Perhaps you'll just have to go on a world tour and do it in front of every forum member...

http://www.webdiplomacy.net/forum.php?threadID=316003#322874

Most people are too lazy to rise up against their oppressors. As long as some politicians promises change and more hand-outs are on the way, the apathy will remain. Plus, you know, between reality TV and Facebook most people don't even know what the hell is going on in the world, let alone have an intelligent opinion on anything...

you might be able to argue that going down to 8500 was a crash ... but you said it was going to crash AFTER we were talking about the fact that it had already fallen to 8500 implying that you thought it was going to go much lower

I think Sicarius is right. There will be a great deal of instability over the next few years.

What we really need to worry about is when China's demographics catch up with it in the 2020s. At least Japan got rich before it got old, China will get old before it gets rich. Instead of Japan's perpetual doldrums, China's economy could fall much faster and harder. That would be a catastrophe and lead to literally a billion people economically ruined and angry. Can you imagine the consequences of widespread unrest or civil war in today's (or tomorrow's) China? Would the CPC do something crazy like violently seize Taiwan or enforce their ridiculous claim to the whole South China Sea to unite the public? Would the apparently super nationalistic Chinese people overthrow the Communists if they didn't? Even without a serious conflict, how would the future world order respond to any kind of a political-economic hiccup in China, let alone a barf like hte one which is possible?

There are no answers to hypotheticals like this, but we can be certain that we're entering a dangerous and unpredictable time in history. If America did one thing during its hegemony since World War II it was making clear what the broad rules were and keeping things relatively predictable. We very easily might not have that any longer, and when the next huge world crisis comes we'll miss it.

I'm just saying, I think it's extremely likely that social unrest is coming in a big way. You dont need anyone to tell you that, just look out the window. I'm not saying we're heralding in an age of reasoning when the oppressed masses overthrow the dominator! lol
but people are pissed. really really pissed. everywhere. What part of the world isnt going to shit right now? this is a pretty eclectic forum, someone should be able to answer that. It doesnt take a social revolution for people getting screwed to get angry enough to do something about it.

look around


As far as eating 8 pages of forum thread, dont you think that drop in the market was a symptom of a much larger economic collapse. or if not collapse, sharp decline which continues?

well, I'd let you get away with just eating "Your words" if it were an actual bet. I'd be fine with you just printing out your single post where you said it would crash, and if it doesn't you'd eat your words. Hell, you can even use a really tiny font, so that it wouldn't take up more than about an inch square on paper.

But that's why I clarified about the stock market crash specifically, and that it was already at 8500. But the bigger point I was making was about your paranoia. Except now Invictus agrees with you (?!? WHAT?? first time for everything, I guess), so I might have to take your claim more seriously

How do you define "social unrest"?

The UN and the IMF (distastful as they are) agree with me too.

I dont know, how do you define it?

rebellion , disobedience, indiscipline, insubordination, insurgency, insurrection, lack of discipline, overthrow, overturn, sedition, strike, subversion, upheaval, uprising, commotion, defiance, disloyalty, insurrection, mutiny, resistance, revolt, revolution, riot, sedition, subversion?

I'm sure there will be unrest, but no organised or widespread uprisings. krellin is right, people are too stupid to care. And Australia survived pretty well, so nothing will happen here.

I'm not sure how you define it, but under mild definitions it is already occurring.

Under what appears to be your extreme definition, I would say it is unlikely though not impossible.

Apathy is a powerful force, one which is likely to continue to be a factor, and more so as time goes on I expect. What, in the end, will get the people up off their asses? Very little I expect, even a tax hike wouldn't do that.

I wouldn't worry about it. You know what they say. There's no unrest for the wicked.
(Sorry. I'll be going now.)

But I dont have an extreme definition. It IS happening right now. and what signs are there that things wont continue to "go downhill" and become what you would say is 'extreme' social unrest

Its not like this is one of my wacky ideas no one can relate to. look on the news. look down your street

Sicarius is right.

I must copy/paste something now:

The entire Federal Reserve Bank System is a giant "Ponzi": or pyramid scheme.

This nation fought a war with England to free itself from the predatory banking practices of the Bank of England, enforced on the colonies by King George III's Currency Act, which mandated the use of British Pounds for all commerce. But pounds were only available as loans from the Bank of England, at interest. It took only a few years for this scheme to reduce the formerly prosperous and productive colonies down to the poverty and unemployment typical of London at the same time period.

While the state-run schools teach that the revolution was about the Stamp act and the Tea tax, it was the rage created by the enforced impoverishment of the Currency Act which fueled the revolution. Following the American Revolution, the Founding Fathers reverted back to the system which had worked so well before the Currency Act. Government issued the public currency and spent it into circulation where it was used by the public free of interest. Then the money was taxed back into the governments hands, then to be re-spent back into circulation. This is a system which has worked very well for the civil population throughout history and which for the obvious reasons, bankers loathe to the point of starting wars to prevent it!

The US has been cursed with three private central banks issuing the public currency at interest and all three brought this nation to the edge of ruin. The mechanism is simple. Because all currency is the product of a loan, the moment that first bill goes into circulation, more money is owed to the Federal Reserve banking system than is actually in existence, and the population is trapped; sold into debt-slavery by their own government, as happened to us all in 1913.

The system perpetuates only so long as an ever-larger group of new borrowers can be found to create new money to pay the interest on the old money. That is what makes it a pyramid. That is why the government and media always talk about the "growth" of the economy. "Growth" may sound like a good thing to the unenlightened, but in a debt-based economy, "growth" means "deeper in debt. And because it is a pyramid, if the economy does not grow, that is, if more new debt cannot be created to service the interest on the old debt, the pyramid collapses, which is what is happening now.

The Federal Reserve System is designed to suck the real wealth out of the nation and put it in the pockets of the bankers, and now that they have succeeded, the system is breaking down, too cash-poor to operate efficiently, just as it did in the colonies in the early 1770s. The system is broken because the bankers have all the wealth, and absent a new source of wealth to pay the bankers' interest charges and fees, the system is locking up.

Of course, it is all paper debts and make-believe obligations. The money owed to the bankers by the government never existed in the first place. It's just part fo the scam by which the bankers enslave the world, which is the real essence of banking; to hold nations and people perpetually in debt-servitude or indentured service, with the government bribed to not take action to ameliorate the situation!"


A collapse is inevitable...it is happening now. Brace yourselves.

I'm really not an "I told you so" kind of person.

but for real y'all should plant some gardens. If I'm right you'll get to feed your family. if I'm wrong you have a hobby garden. OH NO a HOBBY GARDEN!!!!!

Can I have my landscapers plant and manage the garden?

doubtful.
what would you do for them? I doubt you'll be able to give them money. I'm sure they'll be much more concerned about their family.

I'm not convinced a currency without interest would work. There would be no incentive to grow.

Interest is a way for the banks and government to control spending. If there wasn't any then what's to stop people from borrowing loads of money from the bank, and putting it under the bed for 20 years?

What would determine when the government should print more money? If there was no interest, whenever they print more money, it depreciates all existing currency, so if there was no interest, the value of money can only go down with inflation, but no counteracting force of interest to make money grow.

Interest is like resistance in an electrical circuit. It is necessary to prevent a meltdown of the system. Perhaps the economy worked without it back when there was 1 bank and the bank could evaluated each and every one of the candidates asking for a loan. But these days, would you expect the government to just go out handing no interest loans to everyone? What incentive would they have in doing so?

Would the no interest loans apply for international loans?

"I dont know, how do you define it?

rebellion , disobedience, indiscipline, insubordination, insurgency, insurrection, lack of discipline, overthrow, overturn, sedition, strike, subversion, upheaval, uprising, commotion, defiance, disloyalty, insurrection, mutiny, resistance, revolt, revolution, riot, sedition, subversion?"

One of the great comforts of my life comes in the form of a cuneiform tablet that an archaelogist found near Kuwait City around about 1993 or so, with the flood of archaelogy performed in the area after Kuwait became definitively pro-western thanks to Saddam's invasion. It was dated to around about 3,000 BCE, right around the time the First Dynasty was emerging in Egypt, and when translated, said something to the effect that...

"Surely, the end of times is near. Every day children now disrespect their elders. Fewer people can afford goods. People are now inattentive to the ceremonies pleasing to the gods. Such great wickedness floods the land that surely the gods will end the world soon."

Why does this tablet comfort me? Because I can easily imagine the inscriber of this tablet dashing off an exhaustive letter to the editor of his local newspaper if he was alive today saying more or less the exact same message. I know this tablet inscriber. He is functionally identical in worldview, to my Uncle Dave. It seems as if he shares a weltanschaaung with Sicarius as well.

Or, to put it another way, social unrest always threatens the globe. It has since the days of Pharaohs of Egypt and the Lugals of Sumeria. It will threaten the Mars when the Martian Federation economy has a recession, and all the nano-assembly jobs are being off-planeted to Titan or Ganymede.