Matt Miazga playing for Alaves

Discussion in 'Yanks Abroad' started by Gorky, Jan 25, 2015.

  1. freisland

    freisland Member+

    Jan 31, 2001
  2. TimB4Last

    TimB4Last Member+

    May 5, 2006
    Dystopia
    Financially, perhaps, but if those guys had stayed on they would have missed the opportunity of a lifetime ... a chance to go scuba diving with you.
     
  3. TimB4Last

    TimB4Last Member+

    May 5, 2006
    Dystopia
    It looks as though we still have a fighting chance to finish on top.
     
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  4. EruditeHobo

    EruditeHobo Member+

    Mar 29, 2007
    San Francisco, CA
    Club:
    Liverpool FC
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    Touche! Didn't know about the Yahoo buyout.
     
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  5. freisland

    freisland Member+

    Jan 31, 2001
    I'd forgotten. New Geocities was big, but forgot how stupid big it was for a minute.
     
  6. freisland

    freisland Member+

    Jan 31, 2001
    Climbing the table. The Gaffer has us in the right mindset to win this.
     
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  7. freisland

    freisland Member+

    Jan 31, 2001
    This is not untrue as near where we were diving the humpbacks were calving and we got to swim "with" - close enough to feel the draft of her tail - a really big momma. It was pretty amazing. Lifuka in the 90's was the untouched end of the world... amazing.
     
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  8. mschofield

    mschofield Member+

    May 16, 2000
    Berlin
    Club:
    Union Berlin
    Nat'l Team:
    Germany
    Off topic, but getreading (been reading it online so long I forget, i think the chronicle) is asking readers to consider whether they'd like to see Miazga remain with Reading beyond the end of his loan in June. 18 months on loan at one place is a long time. I'm not sure another loan is possible, but, well, who knows if there is a next season. I found this bit on Miazga interesting: "The loan has not completely gone to plan, however, with hamstring and ankle injuries hampering his time on the pitch.
    Miazga was always going to be in a fierce battle with skipper Liam Moore and Michael Morrison for the centre-back starting positions."
     
  9. y-lee-coyote

    y-lee-coyote Member+

    Dec 4, 2012
    Club:
    --other--
    I did say I wasn't going to see my Mom. additionally I never said I was going to a crowded beach or packed out places. I said I was going to live my life, without fear. Other than my work life, I mostly practice social isolation. Fishing is pretty much socially isolated even if it isn't locked in a house armed with a truckload of toilet paper and Clorox wipes. I am just not condemning those who choose to live their lives.

    You see, I believe in a thing called freedom, I fought for it, and would have died for it had that been in the cards. What many fail to realize is I fought for their freedoms too. I think you are perfectly free to lock yourself in your house, wait to see who lives and who dies. and hope that warm weather kills the thing off. Conversely I also fought for others rights to be stupid and go to crowded beaches and catch whatever the ******** they want to catch.

    Mostly I fought for each persons right to decide how they want to live their life. If you want to do the hermit thing go ahead, and if your neighbor chooses not to, then I am okay with that too.

    I do not trust the US govt regardless of how many folks trust in Obama or Trump, I would not want to have a beer with either of the ********ers. A handful of folks flew a plane into a building once upon a time and a few months later you could be subjected to anal cavity searches if that is what was deemed necessary for the safety of others. This is the EXACT thinking that has led to nearly every abuse of power in human history. If we are not vigilant this will end with costing us some of our freedoms.

    I fear a loss of individual freedom much more than I fear a virus that has a < 3% fatality rate for non-Italians. Mostly I do not want our government getting more power over any of us. I have this concern because there is not one case in human history where more government power over subjects has led to a positive outcome for those subjects.

    If you are Dutch I do see how your experience has led you to believe that Nanny state is good, however my experience as an American indicates that American government mostly fouls stuff up. At the end of the day if the answer to any problem is the U.S. government then you are asking to wrong question. It is so foucked up that if I were military enlistment age, I would not enlist to support them as they no longer are about freedom (if they ever were after the founders) We are now simply a resource procurement division for corporate America.
     
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  10. freisland

    freisland Member+

    Jan 31, 2001
    The "freedom" sanctimony is just stupid, irresponsible and potentially lethal.

    Do you enact your "Freedom" to drive fast through school zones? To pass school busses discharging students? Or drive through a group of bikers even if "they" are riding through a stop sign? Just cause you "can" do something does not make it smart, moral, right, or good.

    This is not about the "government" or "freedom" or "corporate America."

    This is about science, rational thinking and one's understanding of one's responsibility as a human in the community of man.

    The is obviously a virus we have no natural immunity for being passed around.

    Sure, we can take a "Darwinian" approach and say - let's all get it fast, it'll kill some, not others, then we're mostly immune and bring on the next. Or we can do, together, the best we can to minimize the death (to those who get the virus as well as others who get ill, have babies, need surgery, have accidents etc.)

    I suggest we opt for the later, as it both seems to me the right thing to do, and it seems to me it's the most likely to minimize the length that the virus disrupts our lives.

    But, of course, everyone has a right to their opinion cause "freedom."
     
  11. EruditeHobo

    EruditeHobo Member+

    Mar 29, 2007
    San Francisco, CA
    Club:
    Liverpool FC
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    Yeah, y-lee... you're not really engaging with the cogent point here, I don't think. Waxing poetic about freedom really goes nowhere in this kind of argument IMO.

    We're talking about people's decisions, and the logic behind them, and what that means with regard to the bigger picture of this pandemic... because expressing these freedoms, when unnecessary and discouraged, MIGHT just directly manifest as X more people ending up hospitalized, and Y more people ending up dead. We're not advocating for posting armed guards at checkpoints outside of apartment buildings that lock from the outside. But people who don't self-isolate to some degree right now, in this period of uncertainty and potential lethality, are being at the very least quite irresponsible. And they should be labeled as such, and given as an example of what not to do. And freedom has almost nothing to do with THAT point.
     
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  12. Eighteen Alpha

    Eighteen Alpha Member+

    Aug 17, 2016
    Club:
    Stoke City FC
    Maybe the best post I have read on this site
     
  13. LouisianaViking07/09

    Aug 15, 2009
    we have freedoms? i suppose it depends on what color of skin or how much $ you have
     
  14. freisland

    freisland Member+

    Jan 31, 2001
    Except it's sheer hypocrisy: "I don't believe in social isolation "cuz freedom" but I'm not going to visit my mom and I'm going off fishing (ie. I'm socially isolating, but am lucky enough to be in a position where I can socially isolate doing something I enjoy, unlike ER docs, nurses, cops, nursing home aids, pediatricians, pharmacists.)

    That way "I" can spout libertarian BS without suffering the consequences - and ignore that what I'm saying and what I'm doing are diametrically opposed cause I'm a hypocrite who is more beholden to dogma than humans."
     
  15. Eighteen Alpha

    Eighteen Alpha Member+

    Aug 17, 2016
    Club:
    Stoke City FC
    I didn’t read it that way at all. On the contrary, I was a little disappointed with your reply, and this one as well, where you attributed quotes and feelings that Y-Lee didn’t express. I’m not sure if you are deliberately missing the point and engaging in misdirection or really are just emotional. From your posting history, I know you to be a thoughtful and reasonable person. Specifically, you are are attempting to take a mildly libertarian stance to it’s absurd extremes, such as speeding through a school zone, to refute what I thought was a completely reasonable and sane position. Given the perspective of time, I think we will all come to see that there has been enough idiocy on all sides in these turbulent times, that finger pointing, for the most part, will be self referential.
    What I saw from his post was simply this: as long as I am not harming others, I’m going to continue to live my life. If I die from it, at least it was my decision.
    Contrast that with the statements of the South Beach spring break idiots, and I think you will see they are completely different.
     
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  16. Suyuntuy

    Suyuntuy Member+

    Jul 16, 2007
    Vancouver, Canada
    "Absolute freedom" is an illogical concept that could only work if each person lived in total isolation.

    Otherwise, your "freedom" ends right where the rights of other people start. It comes with responsibilities. That's why even the most "free" society has jails.
     
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  17. Eighteen Alpha

    Eighteen Alpha Member+

    Aug 17, 2016
    Club:
    Stoke City FC
    Is this meant to be humorous? I can’t tell.
     
  18. EruditeHobo

    EruditeHobo Member+

    Mar 29, 2007
    San Francisco, CA
    Club:
    Liverpool FC
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    The problem is, we are mostly talking about the South Beach spring break idiots... or at least a version of that exact attitude.
     
  19. Eighteen Alpha

    Eighteen Alpha Member+

    Aug 17, 2016
    Club:
    Stoke City FC
    #6869 Eighteen Alpha, Mar 20, 2020
    Last edited: Mar 20, 2020
    Maybe we are, but should we conflate the two attitudes?

    edit: let me expand: if I decide to go fishing, camping, hunting, hiking, or any other solitary activity, am I exhibiting the same social irresponsibility as the brainless partiers?

    full disclosure: I happen to like the idea of personal freedom, where and when it does not impact the freedom or safety of others.
     
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  20. freisland

    freisland Member+

    Jan 31, 2001
    Earlier Y-Lee took the position that this was "herd panic" and "If they [others] want to go hang out on crowded beaches, that is on them and unless I wanted to go for a walk on an isolated beach then it really does not bother me." It may not bother him but if those idiot spring breakers getting on a plane, spreading the virus to someone in his mom's (or my mom's) hometown and taking up a few valuable hospital beds, that may contribute to someone else's untimely death.

    Of course we can't eliminate all risk, and, sure, everyone has "freedom" to do whatever they want, as stupid as it might be. But it's quite clear this virus can be lethal, is unusual, can perhaps be somewhat contained by public behavior and can't yet be predicted as to ultimate vector/mutation. The idea that, in that context, it is acceptable for some to put the rest of us in danger simply because one claims to believe in "freedom" (especially as the "free" behavior in question is not critical, short-lived, and has little long-term consequence) seems to me to be unhinged.

    I get being suspicious of government, big business and conventional wisdom - I'm suspicious of them all as well. But "freedom" as a justification for irresponsibility, to me, is dangerous, and insincere.
     
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  21. Eighteen Alpha

    Eighteen Alpha Member+

    Aug 17, 2016
    Club:
    Stoke City FC
    OK, I agree that the position of accepting the idiocy of others is problematic, but only because it does, in fact, endanger others.
     
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  22. freisland

    freisland Member+

    Jan 31, 2001
    And that's my point: the idea of the "everyone is free to do their thing" ignores the - "as long as we all understand there are potentially serious, fatal consequences to their actions." (BTW, Italians now blame not taking the early warning to isolate more seriously for the scale of their problem, whether that is accurate or not.)

    I know it's extreme, but the "drive fast past an unloading school bus" is not something many folks would say "it doesn't bother me if they do..." because "freedom." We'd say (most of us, I imagine) "Selfish jerk is going to kill some poor kid. WTF! Slow down..."

    There is simply an unsolvable tension between "everyone do their thing, doesn't bother me" and a thing like a virus with unknown transmission vectors where "doing your thing" may silently cause others to die. (And, indeed, this is true every day in "regular" life, as well, but here we have a situation that can be more clearly isolated.)
     
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  23. Eighteen Alpha

    Eighteen Alpha Member+

    Aug 17, 2016
    Club:
    Stoke City FC
    #6873 Eighteen Alpha, Mar 20, 2020
    Last edited: Mar 20, 2020
    There really may not be a more important debate in our lifetime than this. I consider myself more libertarian than most. But, take, for example, the typical libertarian stance of not having to wear a motorcycle helmet. While I agree that each individual’s right to roll the dice is their’s alone, it doesn’t seem fair to me me that a significant proportion of brain injury motorcyclists receive critical care on the public dole, sucking up vital resources while waiting to die.
    I think most reasonable people can make a distinction between individual rights and sheer selfishness, if they really think about it.
    What concerns me in the current situation is there are far too many people seeking some sort of gain, be it political or economic, from what, though serious, is not quantitatively worse than past pandemics.
    To y-lee coyote’s point, some of us really believe in personal freedom and don’t consider it a “bullshit” position that government over reach presents a threat to this freedom. If you really think of it, what is the correct amount of government intervention, how much is it really helping, and are draconian measures on the balance more or less likely help us, or ultimately hurt us?
    Also, To the point of panic, I think it is a logical position that wide spread panic, with its attendant strain on public health resources, the worried well, etc., is much more dangerous than COVID-19 alone.
     
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  24. freisland

    freisland Member+

    Jan 31, 2001
    There's a huge philosophical debate to be had around these questions that we can unpack across quarantine.

    But my starting point is that too often (I believe) people overweight "freedom" without valuing it's counterweight of "responsibility."

    "Freedom" without a sense of responsibility - even if that is just being willing to be personally responsible for what happens to you and responsible enough to try not to hurt others - is something I don't endorse.

    If you wish to be of a "society" of some sort, your "freedom" requires an equal measure (in rough terms) of "responsibility" to work properly.
     
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  25. Sufjan Guzan

    Sufjan Guzan Member+

    Feb 13, 2016
    Coronavirus is going to be used as a case study for when climate change threatens civilization's way of life on a mass scale. The smart countries are going to be the ones that have contingency plans to be self-reliant, as well as early lockdown of borders with adequate defense to protect those border.

    You know, if we don't have technological advancements that combat/mitigate it.

    But still though and I'm right with you as someone under thirty years old about how there would be worse things than a virus wiping out a sizable amount of an age population that really doesn't work anymore and to some degree society provides for... BUT, not all pandemics are the same and it's entirely possible that eventually this thing evolves into something deadlier OR the next pandemic is something that threatens everyone. So from that perspective if you use Rawls's "veil of ignorance" you would want society to be doing what it is currently doing, which is shutting down.
     
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