Current world crisis and events.

[Miyuki]

So yah, we know there's riots @ Thailand
- http://www.mymmogames.net/forum/news...k-airport.html

And also mass killing @ Mumbai
- http://www.mymmogames.net/forum/news...d-updated.html

So what's your views on these happening? And what caused these to happens?

Discuss discuss.

[Ryugen]

A shortage of resources has always (historically) caused violence and a fight for said resources. I believe that is what is to blame for the recent violence around the world within the past 9 years especially.

[Catharsis]

Power struggle. I lol at the upper middle class using a proletariat approach to battling the proletariat-elected government. 8D

Nice little article that summarizes the whole Thai fiasco: http://edition.cnn.com/2008/WORLD/as...ner/index.html

[Dook]

I think the whole Muslim extremists activity is linked to the Palestine/Israel fiasco; so power struggle/land ownership I guess is another reason for wars.
I'm not sure if the latest terror attack in Mumbai is related to the same extremist group but perhaps their hatred towards the 'westerners' is fuelled by the same thing?

[Ryugen]

It could also be that promise of the virgins in heaven for martyrs. (psst, most martyrs are single and in islam a man can have more than one female partner, thus there are few single girls).

Sex. The great universal motivater!

[Kenjii]

Or how about America and it's increasing debt and the ****ing stupid move of doing a bailout.

[Ryugen]

The government forking over cash to the banks is pretty much the only way to keep the system working (temporarily) and thus keep the food moving. The world is already suffering a recession, and a lot of people are going to die over the next few years from malnutrition as it is.

If a government didn't fork over a bailout to the banks, it would lose the confidence of the people. So many people love to live their cosy lives and complain the loudest when it's all taken away. I'm sure Obama, just like every world leader, wants to stay in power for as long as possible.

[Kenjii]

The problem is that the bailout isn't working. All that it even did was give free money to big corporations. Have you seen what the companies like AIG done with the bailout money? They have a "corporate" meeting at some over-the-top luxurious hotel, with TAXPAYER money.

This is the thing. Our economy is capitalistic. We shouldn't be doing shit like this, because the economy always stabilizes on its own.

[Ryugen]

Heh, good point, never trust a capitalist organisation to spend money responsibly XD

[CactuarJoe]

Originally Posted by Kenjii

This is the thing. Our economy is capitalistic. We shouldn't be doing shit like this, because the economy always stabilizes on its own.

That's... not really true. The problems we're having with banks right now can be traced to bad mortgage lending practices - giving mortgages at absurdly low rates to people who then can no longer afford them when the bank inevitably raises that rate. This, in turn, was made possible by the banking deregulation that the Republican-controlled US government pursued in the last eight years under the banner of "free market capitalism."

Thing is, free market capitalism tends to end up going out of control. That's what happened here, just like the stock market crash in the last Great Depression - the main difference was that it was a wheat bubble, not a housing bubble. But anyway. Without proper regulation, you get stupid things like bankers giving out predatory loans, stock market fluctuation, and loss of consumer confidence.

[Kenjii]

The banks that lose their money because of the mortgages will go out of business. That means the smaller business or the businesses that didn't do it will rise, and everyone learns a lesson. Not only that, the banks will eventually fix itself and we'd only have to bear with a bad economy only temporarily. But now with a bailout, we gave them a shit load of money in the TRILLIONS, and the stock market is STILL dropping. The government is FURTHER in debt, and we'll enter a bad economy anyways.

Government intervention will lead to completely totalitarian government. It's like how Hitler rise into power. He used scare tactics, and made the people support him and got into office, etc. etc.

[Ryugen]

But Kenjii, everyone loves stop-gap measures *bricked*

[CactuarJoe]

Originally Posted by Kenjii

The banks that lose their money because of the mortgages will go out of business. That means the smaller business or the businesses that didn't do it will rise, and everyone learns a lesson. Not only that, the banks will eventually fix itself and we'd only have to bear with a bad economy only temporarily. But now with a bailout, we gave them a shit load of money in the TRILLIONS, and the stock market is STILL dropping. The government is FURTHER in debt, and we'll enter a bad economy anyways.

Government intervention will lead to completely totalitarian government. It's like how Hitler rise into power. He used scare tactics, and made the people support him and got into office, etc. etc.

I think there's a slight difference between bailing out banks and blaming everything on the Jews to win an election and then setting the Reichstag on fire. But Godwin is as Godwin does, so we'll move on.

As to the theory of natural selection for banks, as the larger banks fail, they'll take billions of dollars worth of investments down with them. The resulting depression would likely capsize a wide variety of smaller banks as well, either through a widespread refusal by the populace to place money in banks that are percieved as risky, or by a simple lack of operating capital. The end result would be a widespread credit freeze, since none of the banks would be large enough to issue the everyday operating loans that make up the lifeblood of commerce. It'd be like a major power transformer exploding, taking most of the power grid with it. It may be galling that taxpayer money is going to shore up banks whose problems are a result of frankly idiotic banking practices, but the alternative is another Great Depression.

Now, if we were talking about the proposed bailout of the big three car companies, that'd be a different matter. There, we're talking about old dinosaurs that have been about three steps from extinction for years now, and a bailout would be like putting a skeleton on life support. And there are many, many competitors aching to take their place, and who can do so quickly and with a minimum of fuss. This isn't the case with the banks.

[Kenjii]

We're entering a Great Depression anyways. The increasing government debt makes the loaners from overseas lose interest in the US and our dollar is rapidly decreasing, making people lose their investments in the long run.

[Ryugen]

Great Depression isn't the half of it. Current world problems are;

Oil shortage (main quick energy source for transport) ~ Oil is also used to produce plastic, and a great many things are made of plastic.
Metal shortage (used to construct a great many things) ~ Copper, Aluminium, Tin, etc.
Greenhouse Gas Increase (from factories and production plants) ~ Has a great many effects, as listed below, in order of cause and effect;

• Temperature Increase (we're receiving more heat from the sun than we're giving off) ~ Faster on land than in the seas and oceans
• Sea Level Rise (from the water expanding from temperatures rising as well as ice melting for the same reason) ~ Although land temperature increases will be slightly more devestating
• Crop Loss (as land temperature increases and sea levels rise, previously arible land will become deserts, or ocean shores)
• Mass Death from Malnutrician (many smaller nations will not be able to keep up food production or solicite world aid as the oil for transporting the food wont be available and many more will die) ~ entire countries in places like Africa may even disappear.

All through this will be social revolutions, governments blamed and overthrown, governments controlling resources just to be able to supply their countries with enough food to eat. There will be power blackouts in many places because the grid wont be able to support the energy consumption as climate change shifts rivers from damns, wind direction and strength changes away from some wind farms, and old fuel powerplants have little to no fuel. Disease will once again be a killer as painkillers and antibiotics made from crude oil will no longer exist. The old "bite the bullet" saying might come back into fashion and practical use.

The USA is in particular trouble with its consumption rate, level of debt, and the stupidity of the capitalists. Did you know a lot of land that is good for crops is now being used to plant trees for bio-fuels to run cars on, and that it wont actually be useable until beyond 2020? Did you hear about how the car production companies are asking for payouts in the billions to pay staff in a dieing industry. The USA is in deep cr*p, and throwing money at the banks is indeed, only a temporary stop gap measure.

There are some people who are working to create a sustainable society, and guess what, they're the ones who will survive the current worsening world crisis. Sadly, there aren't enough people taking initiatives for a sustainable society. It's going to cost more to keep running than anyone will ever make out of it, just because capitalists will want to make a profit.

Studies show that the ultimate sustainable society would be cities of no more than 30,000 people (being able to support itself without impacting the environment detrimentally). Two thirds of that population (20,000 people) would have to be involved in agriculture (growing food for everyone else) just to keep everyone alive. That's a lot of farmers.

Fun facts about climate change;
It happens over time anyway, we just messed up and put too much of the greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, and suddenly the planets ecosystem is unstable.
Rising sea level will make a lot of costal areas uninhabitale. All low-lying areas (below 2m above sea level) will either disappear, become uninhabitable, or decay away into the ocean over the next few hundred years.
All this will start happening and have a major impact within the lifetimes of everyone who will be alive in 5 - 6 years time (when it's all very much underway more horrifically than it already is).
Many people are not concerned about the impending crisis as they think it wont happen in their own lifetimes, and they don't really care about what happens to their children during that time, or are too concerned with their own lives and careers to even think about how their lifestyle will impact their children. The whole "not my problem" cliche.

Good luck to everyone here, and their families, in the coming years.