Trab

Gee whillickers, Gee Whillickers, that's scary. I think you may well be right, but the other aspect of this is that corporations, particularly large ones, are effectively immortal beings with no humanity and therefore their goals are not the goals of you, me, or any other human being, and they are effectively immune to any damage they cause unless either the populace or government slaps them down for it. Any punishments or reparations are simply the cost of doing business and if that cost is lower than the cost of 'doing it right' things will just get worse.

I notice a lot of the comment there are about the problems with 'for profit' prisons. Sadly, it is NOT just prisons, but anything that is 'for profit' which is and should be treated as a public service. That goes from prisons to safety enforcement for workers, safety regulations and enforcement of food and products to air traffic controllers, police to fire, not to mention medical and environmental. Each time the profit bottom line is in conflict with the public good there is a risk, an enormous risk, to the public.

Great article and very accurate assessment, it seems to me. Certainly describes the balancing of my budget.

I'm confused. You never actually got to finish it, but you've read it and want to reread it. As I said, I'm confused.

Distressing, but excellent.

Lovely story. Thoroughly enjoyed it.

Pretty much my point, but said so much better.

I think that kids respect respect, and if the parent has failed to totally meet the kids' expectations the kid will look elsewhere. In other words, if you don't trust your child with your own feelings, even if they are sadness at some debt, or other frustration, they aren't going to learn to trust their feelings to you. The kids who don't do much wrong, or lie, are the ones who have been treated as a 100% member of the family group, and not someone apart from the family in some way. Spoiling a child is just as harmful, long term, as abusing a child; having no rules is just as bad as having too many rules, and those rules should be the same for everyone. If you, as a parent, don't tell your kids when and where you are going, you really can't expect them to have that courtesy. Of course all this is from someone without kids, only great parents.

Sounds as if it has been arranged in what we used to call, in maths classes "sets", which could overlap, or be completely separate from the others. It sounds much more natural than Facebook; I have my personal people, sports people, LGBTQ people, radio people, aspergers people and volunteering people all in different personal sets, and with no ability to really segregate them on Facebook, I've limited my use of it tremendously. Sounds like Google+ might be just the thing...do you know if you can actually delete oneself from it? I know you cannot with Facebook, the best you can do that is deactivate your account till they trick you into accidentally activating it again with some underhanded email.

Interesting premise. I'm not sure I like the subtle encouragement of the view that homosexuality is a personality trait as opposed to a deep level genetic one, but the premise makes for some interesting potential discussion points, and a fascinating storyline. (I grimaced when Hess SAT his notes down, rather than SET them down though.)

Forget overseas, even Canada is locked out.

I can't disagree, and I've even told the author my thoughts on too many sex scenes. Amazingly, he still communicates with me, although the number of sex scenes haven't diminished.

With apologies to Dan Savage, "it gets better".

Interesting, VWL, since I found the story because of its title. The double meanings, of love being made on the rocks (presumably on the seashore) or the love affair running aground on the rocks, intrigued me no end. I guess it really is in the eye of the beholder.

That is a nasty quibble, since the title is also the title of one of the lead characters' title song. The author has steadfastly responded to all my emails, which in itself is a nice (and reassuring) thing.

While I respect your thoughts, and what you do for people, Richard, I simply cannot accept that genetics isn't a more major factor. We have found people in our own family, who split away several generations back, and have had no contact with my branch, and they behave almost identically to us. That's genetics, pure and simple. I won't say it is everything, but it is certainly more than just a vague and marginal factor.

One blow for sanity; how many more are needed before sanity prevails?

I just realized that I didn't answer the whole of your question post. Redemption, it seems to me, is an external thing, originally religious in nature, but now transposed to people...I think that most people will be quick to condemn and slow to forgive, meaning that redemption from outside ones own self is unlikely, even if you have become a completely changed person. As for love, I think that an amazing number of people will put up with, or even desire, the strangest and possibly revolting behaviours and characteristics, with the only problem being actually FINDING those people in order to join them in 'true love'.

Of course your definition of 'bad' is important, since a cadaver is a person 'gone bad', but I suspect that isn't what you wanted to discuss. Genetics plays a very large role, although situation environmental circumstances can alter things dramatically. Those include nurturing, or lack thereof, diet, and probably even electrical fields and contact with bad air quality, not to mention just being in the right place at the right time to maybe meet that person who 'completes you', as the romance movies say it.

His life story primed me for some tears, but that voice totally put me over the edge. Wonderful, and he seems so 'okay' after what he's barely mentioned of his life so far. Amazing young man.

There's nothing quite like expressing your love for someone by beating them up, is there? It seems to be the tradition when it comes to religious tolerance.

I'm with Cole on this. Great article, and great comments on it.

Fooking brilliant.

You have 'hit the nail on the head'.

Personally, I prefer stories a bit more wrapped up, probably because I have little imagination of my own and can't really make my own ending. That said, it was quite fascinating, and certainly leaves me wanting to know more about the whole situation, and our protagonist. It is also interesting to consider that one can have something other than in instant "fight" or "flight" reaction, instead making a decision to change course. The use of "it's" for possessive instead of the correct "its" bothered me somewhat. In the case of "it", the apostrophe S actually means "is" as in "it is".