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HAL
Please don't shout at me - I can't help it.
Joined: 17 Mar 2003
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| Tannin wrote: | [quote="stui magpie"]To that, my response is **** "the people who genuinely need it". I earned the money, I paid my tax, I'll spend what i have left over on whatever the **** I want.
If I want to spend a few thousand on a pool table for the back room, who the hell has the right to tell me that i should go without that and give the money to the poor instead. I've been poor, now I can afford a few indulgences without being anywhere near being considered wealthy, so damned if I won't indulge myself if I feel like it.[/quote]
Indeed. Your case is, however, completely different. You [i]earned[/i] your money off the sweat of your own brow. You didn't steal it, you didn't extort it, and you did nothing immoral or underhand to accumulate it. A very different case indeed to that of Reinhardt, Sinidonos, or those Russian mafia thugs. |
Why do you want to do spend a few thousand on a pool table for the back room so much? I'm not sure I like that remark so much. |
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luvdids 
Joined: 22 Mar 2008
Location: work
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| stui magpie wrote: | Without reading all the article, just the highlights, I take it the point is about the excessive indulgences of people who were basically creating wealth for themself by corrupt means at the expense of others, and flaunting it on status symbols.
Fair point.
On the other hand, David finished his OP with the lines
| Quote: | | I'm sure none of us own thousand-dollar watches, but what of our own indulgences? Do we spend a lot of money on things we don't need? How can we best redirect that money to the people who genuinely need it? |
To that, my response is **** "the people who genuinely need it". I earned the money, I paid my tax, I'll spend what i have left over on whatever the **** I want.
If I want to spend a few thousand on a pool table for the back room, who the hell has the right to tell me that i should go without that and give the money to the poor instead. I've been poor, now I can afford a few indulgences without being anywhere near being considered wealthy, so damned if I won't indulge myself if I feel like it.
Oh, and I own a $400 watch that was a gift. The band keeps stuffing up so I wear one I bought from the market for $40 instead. I also have a $250 one for casual wear that needs a new battery. |
So I can keep buying Versace mugs, guilt free? |
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Tannin 
Can't remember
Joined: 06 Aug 2006
Location: Huon Valley Tasmania
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| stui magpie wrote: | ^
thank you. Indeed it's different from the situation in the article, but unless I was mistaken the tone of David's OP he would also consider my indulgences to be inappropriate. |
Quite so. David would never, ever, ever waste perfectly good money which could be feeding the starving millions or providing psychoanalysis for abused goats on the ephemeral trappings of a materialist western lifestyle, such as al fresco meals, movie tickets, entry to sporting events, spirituous liquor, or good coffee.
_________________
�Let's eat Grandma.� Commas save lives!
Last edited by Tannin on Fri Apr 11, 2014 7:22 pm; edited 1 time in total |
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stui magpie 
Prepare for the worst, hope for the best.
Joined: 03 May 2005
Location: In flagrante delicto
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| luvdids wrote: | | stui magpie wrote: | Without reading all the article, just the highlights, I take it the point is about the excessive indulgences of people who were basically creating wealth for themself by corrupt means at the expense of others, and flaunting it on status symbols.
Fair point.
On the other hand, David finished his OP with the lines
| Quote: | | I'm sure none of us own thousand-dollar watches, but what of our own indulgences? Do we spend a lot of money on things we don't need? How can we best redirect that money to the people who genuinely need it? |
To that, my response is **** "the people who genuinely need it". I earned the money, I paid my tax, I'll spend what i have left over on whatever the **** I want.
If I want to spend a few thousand on a pool table for the back room, who the hell has the right to tell me that i should go without that and give the money to the poor instead. I've been poor, now I can afford a few indulgences without being anywhere near being considered wealthy, so damned if I won't indulge myself if I feel like it.
Oh, and I own a $400 watch that was a gift. The band keeps stuffing up so I wear one I bought from the market for $40 instead. I also have a $250 one for casual wear that needs a new battery. |
So I can keep buying Versace mugs, guilt free? |
Absolutely. 
_________________
Every dead body on Mt Everest was once a highly motivated person, so maybe just calm the **** down. |
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Tannin
Can't remember
Joined: 06 Aug 2006
Location: Huon Valley Tasmania
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| Tannin wrote: | | Your case is, however, completely different. You earned your money off the sweat of your own brow. You didn't steal it, you didn't extort it, and you did nothing immoral or underhand to accumulate it.. |
Er ... at least not that I know about.
_________________
�Let's eat Grandma.� Commas save lives! |
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stui magpie
Prepare for the worst, hope for the best.
Joined: 03 May 2005
Location: In flagrante delicto
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| Tannin wrote: | | Tannin wrote: | | Your case is, however, completely different. You earned your money off the sweat of your own brow. You didn't steal it, you didn't extort it, and you did nothing immoral or underhand to accumulate it.. |
Er ... at least not that I know about. |
I did earn it, I didn't steal or extort it.
Define immoral and underhanded.  
_________________
Every dead body on Mt Everest was once a highly motivated person, so maybe just calm the **** down. |
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3.14159 
Joined: 12 Sep 2009
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| Wokko wrote: |
How is buying an expensive watch for yourself any different than someone spending 10s of thousands on jewellery such as an engagement ring?
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exactly.
Back in the day watches were an important new technology essential to astronomy, cartography, physics, navagation, you name it.
Watches were invented by a bloke that made clocks from word in a day when sundials were the most accurate way of telling it was time for a smoko.
20 years ago we used them to discover if we were running late for train, how much longer we've got on lunchtime and they were handy to look at when that uninvited guest just couldn't take a hint.
These days we all carry phones that can tell the time better than any mechanical contrivance (wood or other-wise) ever could.
These daze I don't carry a phone, or wear a watch.
Instead I rely on the radio for time prompts but they too are going the way of all things so I look out the window when I drive and tell the time by where the sun is...also good for developing a sense of adventure.
Watches are some of the most beautiful and sublime machines man ever made, some selling for millions of dollars.
~
Now days watches are a status symbol, made to impress and dazzle.
They have no real input into modern lives yet we fawn and poor over them as if they confer some right to mentality worthy of a Monty Phython script.
...Modern bling watches are (as wokko said) just jewellery.
The world has become so tech dependant I wonder what would happen if the internet crashed ... and we needed to tell the time?
(Probably have to learn how to make sun-dials).
Last edited by 3.14159 on Fri Apr 11, 2014 10:22 pm; edited 1 time in total |
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David 
I dare you to try
Joined: 27 Jul 2003
Location: Andromeda
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| Wokko wrote: | | And what makes you or anyone else the moral arbiter of what is a 'good' use of ones personal property and what is a 'bad' use? |
That's not quite what I'm saying. I totally support the right of people to buy what they like with the money they have. What I don't support is people having absurd amounts of money to waste in the first place.
To be clear, I'm not imposing my moral values on other people. It's not a moral issue for me. I just think that money could be spent on building much better infrastructure, for instance. It's not like our health and education sectors couldn't do with another few billion dollars.
Unless you disagree with the concept of taxation in principle (which you may well), what wrong is there in limiting people's ability to accrue income by redirecting excess money to worthier causes? Not just local infrastructure, but foreign aid to people whose lives depend on it? Speaking in terms of basic ethics, the answer is simple: surely the right of Little Johnny from South Sudan to have access to clean drinking water is more important than Wazza's right to buy a third sportscar.
| Wokko wrote: | | How is buying an expensive watch for yourself any different than someone spending 10s of thousands on jewellery such as an engagement ring? |
I feel exactly the same about that. It's obscene and wasteful. This may be an extreme example, but I only spent $60 on my fiancee's engagement ring. She's very proud of it and wears it almost every day. It's not about cash value (at least not for everyone, thankfully).
_________________
All watched over by machines of loving grace |
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stui magpie
Prepare for the worst, hope for the best.
Joined: 03 May 2005
Location: In flagrante delicto
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| Quote: | | She's very proud of it and wears it almost every day. |
_________________
Every dead body on Mt Everest was once a highly motivated person, so maybe just calm the **** down. |
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pietillidie
Joined: 07 Jan 2005
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In answer to the OP, it's because wealth both awes and intimidates, so the more visible it is the better if your goal is to control people. The more unequal the society, the more this is the case, particularly as class status has traditionally been very conspicuously "uniformed".
(Wealth awes and intimidates no doubt due to very primitive brain calculations needed for survival and our own basic desire for security and stability. Given how much power we allow the wealthy to purchase without constraint, it is going to take a lot more work yet to overcome its pernicious effects).
_________________
In the end the rain comes down, washes clean the streets of a blue sky town.
Help Nick's: http://www.magpies.net/nick/bb/fundraising.htm
Last edited by pietillidie on Sat Apr 12, 2014 5:02 pm; edited 1 time in total |
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David
I dare you to try
Joined: 27 Jul 2003
Location: Andromeda
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| stui magpie wrote: | | Quote: | | She's very proud of it and wears it almost every day. |
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Lol. Perhaps we're out of touch with social conventions, but I wouldn't wear a wedding or engagement ring every day. Better when it's done consciously than merely out of habit, I think. 
_________________
All watched over by machines of loving grace |
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HAL
Please don't shout at me - I can't help it.
Joined: 17 Mar 2003
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| How does she look? |
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Tannin
Can't remember
Joined: 06 Aug 2006
Location: Huon Valley Tasmania
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| David wrote: | | Perhaps we're out of touch with social conventions, but I wouldn't wear a wedding or engagement ring every day. |
Quite right. It is very impolite to wear your wedding ring while you are screwing a barmaid.
_________________
�Let's eat Grandma.� Commas save lives! |
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Wokko 
Come and take it.
Joined: 04 Oct 2005
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| David wrote: | | stui magpie wrote: | | Quote: | | She's very proud of it and wears it almost every day. |
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Lol. Perhaps we're out of touch with social conventions, but I wouldn't wear a wedding or engagement ring every day. Better when it's done consciously than merely out of habit, I think. |
The point of them is to warn off suitors, although from what I've heard a wedding ring on a male hand tends to have the opposite effect.  |
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David
I dare you to try
Joined: 27 Jul 2003
Location: Andromeda
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| Wokko wrote: | | The point of them is to warn off suitors |
Really? That seems a cynical view. What about polyamorous couples? Surely there's more to this ritual than mere possessiveness.
If that is a popular view, it makes the practice of buying expensive rings seem even more distasteful.
_________________
All watched over by machines of loving grace |
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