I see two problems with your response.

One, I stated "one of the major problems with capitalism;" I was not defining all capitalism. Capitalism is not a black-and-white subject. There is good capitalism, where businesses take care of their employees and try to do good by the public with their goods and services. And there is bad capitalism, where the corporations appear to have little empathy for their employees and the public. Some capitalism is known as predatory capitalism; for instance, some investors buy out a company with the main goal of taking the pensions and retirement accounts that the workers had built up, often over decades, for their retirement, so they are left with nothing whatsoever. This is legal (for some unknown reason), but seems to fit the definition of evil to me. And then there are versions in between these two extremes.

Two, some people argue that workers in some businesses are similar in some ways to slaves - except they are paid for their efforts and they volunteer for their abuse. Many people are essentially trapped in their occupation. It's "do what I say or you are fired." "I don't particularly care if you say it's dangerous, do it anyway or you're fired." This is much more prevalent in other countries than the USA, but is certainly not unknown here. So...for some people, capitalism itself can be a form of slavery. We hear all the time of the deplorable and dangerous working conditions in poorer countries.

It's important to read posts carefully, in order to understand exactly what they mean. A single qualifying word can make a big difference with the intent of the post.

I agree. It should be the responsibility of the manufacturer of such products to warn us users of the dangers. Government regulations are really a kind of last-ditch effort to have something done to correct the problem, because the corporations do not really care if we die, as long as they can continue to make money. The regulations are intended to force responsibility that the corporations will not take. The idea is that coercive action or penalties should not have to be part of the situation, but all too often they are. That's one of the functions of government. It is changing somewhat now, with some corporations volunteering this information.

Car manufacturers are a good example. Remember the Ford Pinto, with their rear gas tanks? Quite a few people died (mostly children sitting in the back), burned to death before anything was done. Ford knew about it, but was slow to act. The numbers were pretty large. We were not warned. Now car manufacturers are recalling cars that have problems that almost no one knows about - a good thing. However, the negative aspects of this trend are one of the major problems with capitalism in general: money first, human lives maybe.

For sure that is also true. It is a matter of degree. We all have our own feelings on this subject. See my response to rightofattila above.

Yes, yes, what I wrote was an incomplete thought. Before the appeal to balance section, I should have included the following: All sides in politics include some level of bias. It is not possible to talk about politics on any level without an element of bias entering the conversation. Emotional responses can never be relied upon as being fundamental truth. I did not intend to state that any particular political view was sacrosanct and without problems of this kind. We individuals have to rise above the propaganda if we desire to understand what's really going on. If the message harms people in some way (there are exceptions, of course), there is probably something wrong (aka unbalanced) about it. An unbalanced view of the world will never end up good.

One word that they probably should've listed under "negative extreme" is "coma." In 2008, I was in a coma for approaching a month from meningitis and encephalitis together (I have essentially recovered). I made jokes about my coma later, but no one ever laughed. They made no vocalizations, like "uh," or anything, nor was anyone curious about it. It was completely something that was not talked about, and conversation continued as if I hadn't said anything. Even cancer has the possibility of complete recovery, but coma more than a week long always has an unknown prognosis. People in the worst comas can wake up with limbs missing, deaf and/or blind, or permanent retardation, if they survive. Apparently it's too negative to even think about.

Ooh, you missed it. Rainbows lead to pots of gold that have been there for years - long enough to be buried. You should have brought a shovel. You'd be rich today. LOL

Funny. You must be speaking in jest. No one's tongue is 15 inches long - it would hang down to your navel, and wouldn't fit in your mouth. We would have to see a photo to believe this (hint, hint). However, if true, you would never need Viagra when you're older, because.... as long as you maintain it as a very strong tongue. LOL

A good example of how this is being formalized as something to expect and admire is Fox News, which is known as a pervayor of misinformation. There is a UHH member who states that Fox News is the only TV he watches. For people who do not know how to think critically about information they are exposed to, Fox News seems to be some kind of panacea - their format panders to their fears and concerns about what's going on with seemingly easy answers to these concerns. There is balance in the real world that many people do not have a clue about. It is up to us individually to understand what this balance would be in a more equitable world, and to recognize the ways in which the world we live in does not meet these standards. Anything that appears to throw things into a greater imbalance should therefore be suspect.

This is one way that idiocy is spreading. Education about the reality of the world does not require a college degree, but there seems to be a problem disseminating real information about this.

It looks like the diameter of the lightning could easily be 100 feet. If lightning like that traveled to the ground on a regular basis, the human race would be in poor shape. What kind of charge must there be in the upper atmosphere to attract gigantic bolts like those?

Me too. Whenever I open a package in the mail, I expect to see large wads of cash, but, damn! But, someday, I just know it. LOL

I never heard that. As an adult, it sounds kinda gross, but then I realize that the child becomes more in tune with the fundamental realities of the world - "guts and all," so to speak. Playing with parts of a dead animal is something I bet a vast majority of parents would never consider letting their children do today as a matter pf principle - even something as essentially harmless as a dried-out chicken leg. The more we learn about the real world as children, the better able we are to navigate that same world as adults (they could always be messed up in other ways, of course). Many people are actually afraid to talk about bodily functions, for instance - even with their doctor, with whom it may be crucial to their treatment. Our bodily functions are a basic part of who and what we are as human beings, and, as such, we should be able to talk about them whenever something relevant comes along - though, perhaps at the dinner table is not always an appropriate venue. So, I guess I missed that early lesson when I was a kid - I had to learn it in other ways later.

It's too bad that as children grow up, they have no idea of how good (aka superior) their diet was in comparison with so many other kids today who hunger for MacDonalds or Burger King.

Same for parenting. Kids who grow up and do not turn into jerks, assholes, drug addicts, or alcoholics, have no idea of how lucky they were/are in comparison to other families. Decades later they may recognize this, but as kids everything seems normal, even if it could be vastly improved. Kids have no context with which to see these things. And their minds are too undeveloped to be that aware.

Here's how you do it the humane way, no doubt similar to the event mentioned above. WARNING graphic description ahead! I was 12 and my brother was 10 when we saw our father do it. You hold the chicken's legs in your left hand, so they can't move away. You nestle it in the crook of your elbow. You're right next to the chopping block. With the hatchet in your right hand, you slowly stroke the back of the chicken, which calms it down. Then - wham! - the chicken is swiftly moved to the block and its head cut off in the same motion. It doesn't even take one second. Then the chicken is quickly thrown to the ground where it does the proverbial.... My father put the two heads on a nearby flat stone. My brother and I went back to look at them three days later. They were moving, rocking back and forth! Our jaws dropped. Upon closer inspection, we could see that the heads were full of large, squirming maggots! Ooooh. We could never forget the whole incident.

This is the so-much-better way than the factories, where they hang the chickens upside down by their legs on a conveyor-type overhead trolley, one foot away from the next chicken. They're no doubt very stressed when they move to the machine that automatically cuts their heads off. Double Ooooh.

Ha, ha, I get it. You just did what the quote said people do.

Thanks for the link. My town has four above the allowable limit, and five below. For the last 20 years or so I've been drinking only from those large 5-gallon water bottles. Their plastic is not as bad as those quart bottles.

As I understand it, here in the US, it's a legal requirement that if the water you buy is not from a spring (which also includes artesion wells), it's filtered tap water, or, worse, treated water from the polluted river that runs through the city (several cities in the US use river water for drinking). Who knows how good the filter is, or how often they change it.