Commie Chris

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Posts by Commie Chris

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  16

  Any good times?

  by tattoogrl333 in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  just wondering if there were any positives to being a jw.

  i have read most of the posts and see that a lot of people were jw for years and years and was thinking that not all that time could things have been bad?

  oh and somewhere in gen. it is supposed to state that we are living in the 7th day now????

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  Commie Chris

  Drinking. Lots and lots of drinking. That's what I remember most from my brief stint as a Dub. I am now a sober agnostic.
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  75

  Oh May We Ever Live Up To Our Chosen Name!

  by Englishman in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  there are some really weird and interesting names on this site.

  just out of interest, lets swap details of how we selected our chosen "stage name", it could be fun!.

  i chose "englishman" when i first started to lurk at h20.

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  Commie Chris

  I was a communist in my teens (yes, I was a Teenage Communist). Between 1977 and 1983, I was also the singer in a punk rock band. My band name was Commie Chris, for obvious reasons, and it stuck. I am still known as Commie Chris to many of my friends, and even to many of my colleagues in the legal profession (at least the few fun ones), although I am really more of an anarchist than a communist. Having said all of this, I would not want to be labeled, or to be thought of as nothing but a dull political activist. The struggle against imperialism and global corporate evil does not consume all of my time. I’m a fun guy. Really. I love reggae music, dancing, gourmet cooking, sports, and lots of other cool stuff. Not that the struggle against global corporate evil can't also be fun.

  - Commie Chris
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  27

  My Story

  by Commie Chris in

  1. jw
  2. experiences

  ive been lurking hear for a few weeks.

  heres my story:.

  i was raised in a catholic family in toronto and went to catholic schools until grade 9 (age 13).

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  Commie Chris

  Disengaged: I am not a litigation lawyer, I am a constitutional lawyer. That said, I know a little about suing individuals and organizations. However, I am not sure what you wish to sue elders for. Certainly if an elder molested, assaulted, or otherwise abused a person, he could be held liable. The more interesting question is whether elders, and the WTS, could be held liable for negligently allowing such abuse to continue and failing to protect "the flock". There is no simple answer to this question, it seems clear that the GB and other members of the hierarchy have done a pretty neat job of shielding themselves from liabilty, but I think there are some cases where they could be found liable. I am going to start a thread on the Main board suggesting that any current or pending legal actions be coordinated, in order to share information and resources about the Society's tactics in responding to such actions.
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  27

  My Story

  by Commie Chris in

  1. jw
  2. experiences

  ive been lurking hear for a few weeks.

  heres my story:.

  i was raised in a catholic family in toronto and went to catholic schools until grade 9 (age 13).

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  Commie Chris

  outnfree:

  You asked me to explain what libertarian socialists and anarchists are. Here goes, with 2 caveats:

  First, “libertarian socialist” and “anarchist” are merely labels. They don’t fully describe my beliefs, which are constantly evolving, but they come closer than any other labels.

  Second, I am not an intellectual. My beliefs are the result of my experience as an activist for social justice, not the result of extensive formal education or reading. I am fairly well educated (I am a lawyer) but I have not read a great deal of political theory or philosophy. I am certainly no expert on the philosophy of anarchism or libertarian socialism. I have been an activist since I was 12 (I am now 41) and have learned a few things through experience about what works and what doesn’t. There are much more intelligent and articulate exponents of these ideas than me. I would suggest reading Noam Chomsky and Murray Bookchin. You’ll find writings by and about them, and other anarchist thinkers, on the net.

  That said, the terms “libertarian”, “socialism” and “anarchy” have become grossly distorted in the past few decades, especially in the U.S. and Canada. “Libertarian” has come to be identified with a right-wing philosophy promoting freedom for big business, but little else. In the U.S. and Canada there are even fringe Libertarian Parties which essentially promote laissez fair economic policies (little or no taxation on the rich, no environmental protection laws, no laws promoting substantive equality, workers’ rights etc…).

  Libertarian socialism, however, has been around much longer than this new right-wing brand of “libertarianism”. It arose in the 1800s as a major branch of socialism. In fact, some people consider the terms “libertarian” and “socialist” to be virtually synonymous. Libertarian socialists and anarchists do not advocate highly centralized or authoritarian forms of government. On the contrary, they promote ownership of industry by workers, not the state, and maximum freedom of speech and other civil liberties. Anarchists and libertarian socialists believe that any authority or restriction on human freedom bears the burden of justifying itself. Any authority which cannot be justified should be abolished. Anarchy is not “chaos”, as it is sometimes defined, it is a society based on freedom and free association, where structures of governance are not imposed by the state, they are mutually agreed upon for the common good and are genuinely accountable to the people they claim to serve.

  Anarchists and libertarian socialists believe that any rational, objective study of human history shows that the desire to be free is a fundamental aspect of human nature. Human history is, in a sense, a history of the struggle against oppression and exploitation. However, unlike the right-wing “libertarian” parties, libertarian socialists believe that human freedom should not merely be freedom from oppressive “big” governments, but also freedom from the oppressive power of big business, state militaries etc.

  It became necessary to add the term “libertarian” to socialism when authoritarian forms of Marxism arose in the late 1800s and early 20th century. Authoritarian socialists (usually called Marxist-Leninists) believe that the working class must seize control of the state, with violence if necessary, and use the state power (police etc…) to maintain control and suppress the capitalist class. They believe that capitalists will stop at nothing to regain their power and they must be ruthlessly suppressed if the working class is to retain power for itself. Only after the capitalists’ power has been eliminated and a classless society has been achieved can the state begin to “wither away”. According to Marxist-Leninists, until the capitalists’ political power has been crushed, the state must control the economy because society remains on a sort of “war footing” (war between the classes).

  Lenin and his followers called themselves “socialists”, but their first action after consolidating their power in Russia in 1918 was actually to abolish true socialism. The worker-controlled industries, which had been taken over over by workers in the early days of the 1917 revolution, were seen as a threat to the centralized power of Lenin’s Communist Party. Workers’ councils were abolished and virtually all industry was taken over by the central government in Moscow.

  Libertarian socialists and anarchists such as Emma Goldman (Red Emma) correctly predicted that the authoritarian Soviet state would not “wither away”, and, everyone knows, it became further and further entrenched and more and more authoritarian. The transition to a free socialist society which was promised by the Marxist-Leninists never happened.

  Nevertheless, the Soviet Union, and other authoritarian states continued to call themselves “socialist”. This suited anti-socialists very well. The western media (especially in the U.S. and Canada) have constantly pointed to the Soviet Union, China, Cuba etc… as examples of the horrors of socialism. Likewise, they now point to the demise of the Soviet Union and its allies as the “failure of socialism”. In fact, these states were not socialist at all.

  BTW, for an excellent analysis of how the media, especially in the U.S., promotes capitalist ideology and suppresses any real, factual, free press, read Noam Chomsky’s “Manufacturing Consent”. Chomsky shows how the U.S. news media, which is tightly connected with other big business interests, controls the flow of information to ensure that North Americans are fed a steady diet of slanted pro-capitalist “news”. The idea that the press in the U.S., and other western countries, is “free” is a myth - it is a superb achievement of propaganda, especially in view of the fact that most people in the U.S. and Canada believe that they live in a “free society”, where there is no propaganda.

  The idea that “big government” and socialism are synonymous is a myth which has been promoted both by Marxist-Leninists and by the western capitalist media. In fact, big government in the west (primarily the U.S., Canada, Japan and Europe) is very much a creation of the huge multi-national corporations which own most of the media. Do they ever complain about the evils of “big government” when these governments are subsidizing big business through massive military spending, give-aways of natural resources, or other forms of government subsidies for the rich? No, they only oppose “big government” when governments undertake public health or education programs, or environmental and public health protection regulations.

  I am not “against big government” or “for big government”. I simply believe that people ought to be free to make choices, based on accurate information, about the kind of government they want. I seriously doubt that many Americans would choose to have their tax dollars spent subsidizing GM, IBM, Boeing etc… by giving them massive military contracts with guaranteed profits, to build weapons to use against 3rd world peoples. I doubt also that many Americans or Canadians would support big government programs which give public resource, such as oil and gas and minerals, to Exon, Gulf Oil etc…, and then regulate supply and demand to ensure massive profits for these corporations. Given a choice, I believe that most people would rather see their taxes spent on providing high quality health care and education and ensuring that public health and the environment are protected.

  Do we live in a democracy? I don’t think so, and I don’t think many other people really believe we do either. Polls consistently show that around 80% of Americans and Canadians think that our governments are controlled by the wealthy and powerful, and that national elections are basically just squabbles between different factions of this ruling class. I think they’re right. Libertarian socialists and anarchists want to break this monopoly of power return it to the people - to see real democratic control over decision-making which affects our lives.

  I would sum up my idea of libertarian socialism and anarchism in 2 words: people power.

  I could go on and on, but this is a very simplified and personal answer to your question about the terms “libertarian” and “socialist”.

  I would just note in closing that these issues are not just of historical or academic interest. There are very interesting and exciting developments occurring in the world today which are playing out these struggles between multi-national capitalism and the desire of people all over the world to be free from the incredible power of these corporations. The fight against globalization is very much a struggle between the interests of multi-national corporations, which want to use international “free trade agreements” to ensure that governments all over the world are prevented from enacting laws, such as environmental protection or workers rights protection, which would interfere with the “rights” of big business to conduct business as they see fit anywhere in the world. The protests of the past few years in Seatle, Quebec City, Genoa etc… reflect a growing movement against the globalization of the power of multi-national corporations. It’s no wonder these free trade agreements (GATT, FTAA, NAFTA etc.) are negotiated in secret, behind massive walls of security. This is democracy?

  There is also an interesting thread in the academic literature of libertarian socialism, called the “ecology of freedom”, or “social ecology”. This is a philosophy which stresses the unique place of the human species in the planetary eco-system. The ecology of freedom is grounded in evolutionary theory and critiques the destructive effects of the artificial development of hierarchies in human society. According to social ecology, the idea that our fellow humans, or the natural world, can “belong” to certain classes of people, and therefore can be exploited by them, is a perversion of the “diversity of nature” . In other words, it is contrary to nature, of which we humans are a part, and therefore, not surprisingly, gives rise to all sorts of societal and personal dysfunction.

  I hope some of this is interesting, and maybe even useful.

  Commie Chris
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  9

  One World Government?

  by chappy in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  one of the basic tenets of the wt org.

  has been the establishment of a one world government.. you may have noticed news reports today on the g8 summit in italy and the demonstrations and riots associated with it.

  there have also been lots of other public discord at some of the earlier international summits like the wto conference in seattle wash.last year.

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  Commie Chris

  Over the past few years there has been a concerted effort by trans-national corporations (primarily US and European based) to ensure that the whole world is a "free trade" playground for the very rich. The G8, APEC, GATT, NAFTA and FTAA are all integral parts of this movement. The goal is clearly to ensure that governments all over the world are subjected to "international agreements" which supercede any domestic laws which would interfere with the unfettered rights of huge corporations to invest and transfer capital as they see fit. Thus, laws which protect the environment, the rights of workers etc… are now deemed "regulatory taking" (tantamount to expropriation) and are being eroded and struck down all over the world under the terms of the "free trade" agreements which virtually all governments now seem to feel compelled to sign. The impacts have so far mostly been felt in the 3rd world, where these international agreements ensure low wages, the suppression of unions, and virtually no environmental protection laws, but they are also now beginning to have similar impacts in North America and Europe. Why do you think the G8, GATT, FTAA etc… meetings (Seatle, Quebec City, Genoa etc…) take place entirely in secret and behind massive walls of security? As more and more people learn the truth about the "new world order" which is being developed in these meetings, there are growing protests. While I do not support violence, the militancy of some protesters is certainly understandable, given the grave issues at stake, and it is insignificant compared to the violence which is increasingly being inflicted on people all over the world in the interests of "free trade".
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  86

  Submit your favorite quote!

  by Spartacus in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  when a difficulty is deep and painful, the triumph is glorious and jubilant.. -spartacus 2001

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  Commie Chris

  No matter where you go, there you are.

  - Buckaroo Bonzai
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  86

  Submit your favorite quote!

  by Spartacus in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  when a difficulty is deep and painful, the triumph is glorious and jubilant.. -spartacus 2001

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  Commie Chris

  Freedom, by any means necessary.

  - Malcom X
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  9

  Steroids: Another Drug Thread

  by Bendrr in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  ok, another drug post.. has anyone here used anabolic steroids?.

  what were the good effects and what were the bad effects?.

  which one(s) did you take and what was your dosage?

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  Commie Chris

  I have never used steroids of any kind. From what I understand, they can destroy your liver and kidneys, as well as causing all kinds of other health problems. I have tried various natural, over the counter supplements. The only one that I have found that does anything is creatine. I find a slight but noticeable increase in both strength and size - about 3-5%. I have been lifting weights for about 10 years and my weight normally stays stuck at about 180 lbs (I'm 6'1''). When I use creatine my weight goes up to about 185, and my body fat is still well under 10%. The best part is the slight increase in strength.

  Forget the steroids dude - they're dangerous and illegal. Plus, it's entirely black market, so you really will not have any idea whether you're buying real drugs or fakes. Even if you do manage to get good steroids, you will lose the gains as soon as you stop using them.

  Work out hard and eat lots and lots of good food, and you'll get big. Once you've reached your body's natural limit, if you really need a little extra, try creatine. Everything else is a waste of money.
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  41

  Visit my Circuit Overseer page

  by Carlo in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  hello brothers and sisters.

  i'm a circuitoverseer.

  you are welcome to visit my page at.

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  Commie Chris

  You're right about SNL, but I say Carlo is Andy Kaufman. Andy lives.
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  10

  The most frightening haircut of my life ...

  by dedalus in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  this morning i went for a haircut, and since my usual stylist (caroline, quick with the clippers and a joke, does magic with my floppy mop of hair), was out, i told the receptionist i'd settle for whoever was available.

  after a moment i was handed over to "winnie," whom i recognized as a witness from a neighboring congregation -- alas, not before she'd roughly dunked my head in the sink.

  i was pretty sure she recognized me, too.. "so how have you been, dedalus," she said.. "um, just fine, and you?

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  Commie Chris

  YIKES! I'm having a vasectomy tomorrow. I'm nervous enough as it is. Now I've got one more thing to worry about.