“I mean outside of the areas that are documented by people that work, it is impossible.”

If you don’t actually understand why you got Trumped, making shit up to explain it is the wrong approach and just leads to another Trump or worse.

Which rule at the right says that again? I’m not seeing it.

And since when the fuck is. “Thank you” an insult?

And since when is lying about what you actually said (lying by omission is still lying) intellectually honest?

What is the “right way” and which of the rules at the right explain this?

I’m not as familiar with the history of telecom in the US–but also, the modern-day telecom industry is a hell of a lot healthier in the US.

Read up. It amazes me that we live in an age where information is at our fingertips in seconds and people still “debate” while saying things like “I don’t actually know …”. Read. The fuck. Up.

The reason the American telecom industry is “healthy” (FSVO “healthy”) right now is because the government stepped in. It was literally government intervention that caused telecoms to blossom.

(Hint: this happened in my lifetime, and not that long before your lifetime, likely.)

…the same way Consumer Reports gives safety ratings for cars without government funding.

After government enforced safety regulations set the baseline standards, yes. Again, just as with the telecoms industry (and the airline industry, for that matter) Read. The fuck. Up. This is not esoteric information that’s concealed and known only to a select few. This is the motherfucking public record.

And there’s the name-calling! Boy, you sure showed them libertarians!

You. You libertarians. (It’s utterly adorable that you’re pretending not to be one and are just “giving their side”. You’re transparent as all fucking Hell, with about the subtlety of a riot.)

Then why obfuscate it with all the verbiage? Just say “I don’t like any cheesecake but plain cheesecake.”

OK, so as I suspected, your “unpopular opinion” is, when all the blather is stripped away, “I don’t like anything but plain cheesecake”.

Not so impressive when worded that way, is it?

I gave a counterpoint re: healthcare, where free market healthcare worked really well.

The nation noted for its “free market healthcare” on the world stage has shit health stats. Working real well there, Sparky.

Telecom was largely rolled out by government monopolies, in order to do it quickly.

Time to open up a history book, there, dude. 'Cause you are so fucking far off the mark it’s hilarious.

I’m skeptical about airlines … They’d have worked themselves out eventually, if left to market forces, but that’s never been allowed to happen.

At what cost in bodies? I know to the libertarian mindset death counts are just number, but each increment of those numbers is a human life. The ultimate loss of liberty is death.

Want to see what “market forces” do in airline industries? Look at the 737-MAX fiasco, where government abrogated its oversight of the airline, permitting companies to “self-certify”, a decision that you can draw a direct line from to 346 dead bodies.

Seriously, go visit those 346 people’s families. Tell them that “market forces” would have eventually settled out the issues. Be ready to run. 346 times.

The idea of regulation is to stop the bodies from happening in the first place instead of waiting, while the body count racks up, for “market forces” to fix everything.

This religion of “the market solves all” is why libertarians are fuckwits.

Now, think of industries that suck, where the companies are really shitty causing people to complain about them all the time, but are nonetheless stuck using them for lack of options.

…

Or…were you maybe thinking (depending where you live) of banking, airline, healthcare, insurance, or telecom industries?

Okay, now, change of topic: think of some industries with lots of regulation and government intervention.

Did you by any chance come up with the same list?

Typical libertarian blather.

In each one of these cases the industry predates the regulation. The regulation of banking is a response to the shitty behaviour of pre-regulation banks. Ditto for airlines, health care, insurance, telecom, etc. etc. etc.

The old adage “each regulation is written in blood” applies (albeit the blood being metaphorical in some cases).

The libertarian cinematic universe (coughRandroidscough) has it that businessmen were just chugging along merrily making a profit when suddenly, out of nowhere, the government leaped in to slap regulations on things. The reality is that regulations (which are themselves, naturally, not perfect, often applied long after the need has vanished, and prone to being corrupted) are a response to corporate malfeasance. Very few regulations are made ahead of the fact. (Politicians are constitutionally incapable of thinking ahead, after all.)

So airlines being heavily-regulated? Go look at the history of the airline industry. Look at the accident rates caused by the complete and utter profiteering of early airlines. Then ask yourself if regulation made these industries evil, or if perhaps regulations came in because of the evil of said industries.

I’ll address your opinion once you define your terms. Specifically:

• define “good”

Calling the USA “cursed” is abrogation of responsibility, because a curse is a third-party affliction.

The USA’s situation is entirely a first-party affliction. It’s cultural insanity at work: gun worship, the belief that violence solves all problems, the clinical-grade paranoia over any kind of collective solution to anything, and, more recently, the worship of laissez-faire capitalism.

There’s no curse. There’s a fundamentally broken culture and society. That is all.

EDIT: hmmmmmm, it seems as if my UNPOPULAR OPINION, which I posted in the place for UNPOPULAR OPINIONS is immediately proving to be pretty UNPOPULAR. Please keep this in mind, when you’re getting ready to type your personal attacks.

I wonder if it’s your opinion that’s causing the attacks or the expression of it…? (Hint: it’s the latter.)

You don’t like the Muppets. We get it. Great. Nobody is expected to like everything by anybody who’s sane. For example I can’t fucking stand Doctor Who. I hated it as a child and I hate it more as an adult. I also hated Star Trek: The Next Generation onward in the Trek canon … except I kinda liked Enterprise. (Not loved. Kinda liked.)

But…

You see how I expressed that I can’t stand these shows? Notice how I didn’t at any point say that people who liked them are my inferiors for it? Let’s take a look at your performance now:

…none of that shit is appealing to adults. At least, it shouldn’t be.

Ooh! Strike one! Expressing BadWrongFun™. Right there you’ve got the reason your “opinion” is getting personal attacks. YOU FUCKING STARTED IT!

…a large number of people were simultaneously afraid that they were missing the joke, missing references, missing SOMETHING, and they didn’t want to be seen as stupid, soooooo they agreed with the small number of shitheads, who were like “BRILLIANT! THIS IS GOING TO CHANGE PUPPETRY FOREVER!”

YOU didn’t get it so anybody who likes it must be doing it for fake reasons. After all they can’t possibly like something you don’t! It must be faked! (Or shitheads.)

Yeah, I wonder why you’re getting personal attacks?

The only SENSIBLE reason that the fucking Muppets are actually beloved is that people in the English-speaking world all watched Sesame Street…

And more insulting reasons for people liking something you don’t. Yeah, there’s absolutely no reason why anybody would reach for personal attacks after your expression of your opinion.

Stop lionizing a deeply and pathetically unfunny, uninteresting man, just because he died tragically.

Except of course he was beloved long before he died. So not only do you suck at not being an offensive, yet somehow whiny, twat, you also have no clue how “time” works.

So, here’s a thought: if you’re going to break out the flamethrowers, don’t be whining when people toss fire back at you. Or maybe, just maybe, you could try expressing the opinion you have without the insulting takes on those who disagree with it, without ascribing motive with no evidence (because “proof by lack of imagination” is actually a logical fallacy), and with at least some hint displayed of knowing what “time” is and how it works.

Likely a popular opinion: @whosiearth@lemmy.ca is mostly a troll who seems, in his history, to adopt contrarian views just to get a response, thus disguising from himself the emptiness that rings hollowly where he once had a life.

For 99.44% of movies, I think your opinion could be more accurately stated thusly:

If your movie starts with a flashback, you suck

Ah. Another child has discovered profanity and decided it fucking rules.

Or K. Everybody always forgets K.

In some cases it is, yes, worse. But in many cases it’s just the press the Americans spew about themselves living in the “land of the free” while the jackboots march in unison ever closer.

This is a pile of horseshit right here.

Service in airlines was at its absolute worst when competition was at its tightest. It’s shit now, yes, but during the height of deregulation and “innovations” like the cattle car airlines it was far, far, far worse.

About that, yes. Not in-depth and not each day, obviously, but I have quite a sizable crowd I deal with on a regular basis. Comes from having a lot of former students I keep in touch with.