When I joined the Army I weighed ~ 120lbs. Less than a year later I had completed basic training, advanced infantry training, jump school and the Ranger Indoctrination Program (programs completed in the order listed). After graduating RIP I served in special operations as an Airborne Ranger.
I'll never forget something that happened during my first training mission with the 75th Ranger Regt. After several hours of rafting and patrolling I was walking up a hill carrying a full load plus an M4. I was sucking hard, covered in sweat and my whole body was on fire. A tabbed E4 walks by me, not a drop of sweat on him, and up the hill like it's nothing. He looks over at me, as he's walking by, and says "you're carrying that and I'm carrying this." He was carrying a 240G (probably 5x the weight of my M4). I leave it up to you to form your own interpretation of his words.
~5 years in Regiment I weighed 170lbs and could run through everything I did my first deployment carrying twice the weight.
I generally read comments here to see if an article is worth reading. I bounced back and forth on this article.
I agree with you that the article is under generalized. It really has little to do with Apple. I also feel that the arguments are misplaced; the "46 million Americans [who] are on food stamps" probably feel that those of us who own Apple (and other similar tech.) products are on the other side of the income gap.
How about this gem: "How dare they—followed by near-instantaneous submission. In short, it charted the pattern (half-serious critical recoil, more centric smart takes, and finally, open-armed acceptance) of just about every major Apple hype cycle ever." If we look at the press who follow this cycle then the article falls squarely in the "How dare they" phase.
I'd suggest skipping the article. There's nothing in the article to suggest that any of this is valid and instead isn't just part of the clickbait trend towards "major Apple hype cycle[s]" perpetrated by journalists.
I didn't get that this was a joke. It's my fault, I read the first few lines and thought that you were serious and that it was a waste of time to continue reading. I actually came here to write, "this must be a joke."
I think the argument is that assault rifle has become a politically charged label that is meaningless. A rifle with a detachable magazine is just a rifle.
Generally I agree that using this sort of thing to get a 'gotcha' moment out of it is a waste of time. The problem is that context doesn't help me understand what a person means when they say assualt rifle. I've had someone describe an assault rifle as anything that's specifically made to kill people.
I didn't read the article you linked to and I'm not trying to contradict anything you've written. There are a few words in the citation that lead me to believe the article is biased or that they ended up with a particularly bad sample; indulge, hegemonic masculinity and fantasy. Also who fantasises about self-defense? I mean violence I get but how do you fantasies about self-defense?
Seriously? Go visit some gun forums or any generic conservative forums. Fantasising about how some criminals "picked the wrong guy to mess with" and "weren't ready for my $massive_gun" is commonplace. It's so common that it's a well established meme: http://i.imgur.com/TJUNFCg.jpg
As for your dismissal of a scientific article just based on worlds you don't like the look of and findings you don't agree with, well I think that speaks for itself.
> "picked the wrong guy to mess with" and "weren't ready for my $massive_gun" is commonplace. It's so common that it's a well established meme: http://i.imgur.com/TJUNFCg.jpg
That's a fantasy of violence not a fantasy of self-defense.
> As for your dismissal of a scientific article just based on worlds you don't like the look of and findings you don't agree with, well I think that speaks for itself.
I'm assuming you meant words not worlds (I'm not picking on your spelling just making sure I'm haven't misunderstood what you've written). The article is behind a paywall. The citation is pretty damning and doesn't look impartial at all. These aren't words I don't; like these are words that indicate a bias and I think I made it clear that I cannot disagree with the findings because I have not read the article. I'm assuming that you have read the article because you're calling it science.
The fact that you don't see these words as a warning sign and that you've made this personal tell me something as well.
Look, I've attended a CHL course. The course was a sham, there were people that had never used a firearm before and I did not have a high regard for the intelligence of the people attending. On the other hand I know plenty of people, who do have a CHL, who are responsible, who do not look forward to having to use a firearm and who carry a firearm solely because they see it as a tool, that one day, might help in the defense of themselves or others.
The image you linked to doesn't, as far as I can tell, depict a self-defense fantasy (again what is that). You'll notice the comic is far from, "the civilian with a handgun in a chaotic shootout." Instead it's riffing on the fact that active-shooter situations are hard and the misconception that the act of self-defense will not result in injury to bystandards. Call it a fantasy of self-defense if you'd like; not a self-defense fantasy.
Where did the label "gun patriot" come from? I'm always interested with how people label themselves/others. This one is particularly interesting, to me, because I can't figure out where this comes from or why you're using it.
I'm pro-second amendment and I care very much out our liberties. In fact I believe that the same arguments made for and against the second amendment can also be made for and against the others you've mentioned.
Are those in favor of gun control also in favor of controlling speech, religion and assembly?
I own a few firearms and don't play with any of them.
I use RSS, Google Reader, and Reeder on my iPad/iPhone. Still I think it's fair to say that RSS is dead because the general public does not use it. Of course that's also a good reason to kill off G+. Google is killing Reader because they no longer see the benefit of providing the service or they get a benefit by not providing the service.
I would've been happy to pay for Google Reader. Truth is I'll move to another RSS service and be happy to pay. I'm not sure what it costs Goole to run Reader so this is all conjecture.
I'll never forget something that happened during my first training mission with the 75th Ranger Regt. After several hours of rafting and patrolling I was walking up a hill carrying a full load plus an M4. I was sucking hard, covered in sweat and my whole body was on fire. A tabbed E4 walks by me, not a drop of sweat on him, and up the hill like it's nothing. He looks over at me, as he's walking by, and says "you're carrying that and I'm carrying this." He was carrying a 240G (probably 5x the weight of my M4). I leave it up to you to form your own interpretation of his words.
~5 years in Regiment I weighed 170lbs and could run through everything I did my first deployment carrying twice the weight.
The importance of training is immeasurable.