This is why the supermarkets in the UK fought so hard to get the book price agreement abolished. They use cheap Harry Potter’s as the lure, knowing once the mother is there, she isn’t going to go else where. Little bookshops needed the blockbusters to support them for selling the other stuff, that isn’t going to shift by the shelf load. I wouldn’t be surprised if in a few years it is virtually impossible to find anything not by Rowling, Dan Brown etc. People say ‘you can order anything on Amazon’- true, but you have to know it exists- you can’t browse Amazon, you rely on them presenting things to you.

By the same token, everyone loooooooves the low prices (and convenience) of big box shopping and huge discounts. The Main Street / High Street shops can only survive, in that environment, by differentiating what they provide — better quality, local providers, different “boutique” product, better service.

Municipalities, by the same token, need to figure out for real whether what discounted revenue they get from luring a WalMart in with big tax breaks is actually worth it, especially with what it does to local retailers, impact on traffic, utilities, etc. Everyone’s seduced by the big shiny box, but it’s not a seduction with a happy ending.

Supermarkets are a good example of this in a more tangible example. I don’t know about now, but I do remember the figures from when I was studying it back in the early 90s. People say supermarkets are good for the local economy. In 1990 a Superstore supported 1 job per £250,000 of sales. High street shops it was £50k per job. Additionally the presence of shops helps support other shops with passing trade- superstores due to their size and car parking requirtements tend to be out of walking distance of the high street. Plus the money stays local and in circulation in that town.

No doubt its size also allows Amazon the oppotunity to pull the more immoral scams (if it wished to) that some supermarkets to.
Buyer “We’ll buy your Turkeys at 50p lb”
Farmer “You told me 70p in April, – I’d make a 5p lb loss”
Buyer “But now it is 2 weeks before Christmas- what you going to do with 20,000 turkeys”

Ever notice how all the fruit and veg looks the same- all apples the same etc. The Buyer only pays for that part of the crop which meets an arbitary standard, the rest is thrown and the farmer receives nothing.

Ever wonder why your favourite produt is on the top shelf, or too low? It may be the supply didn’t pay the placement fee demanded by the buyer.

Fruit farmers in the UK provided proof that when some of the supermarkets ‘gave to charity’ they got sent the demand “We are giving £10,000 to charity- please do so or we will stop buying from you.”

Those who are arrogant in the correctness of their beliefs think that they are stepping in to save others from a terrible mistake, and they believe that it’s justified by the Golden Rule.

There’s certainly some of that, for, I think some folks. I think some others, perhaps, that’s an excuse. “Well, I get to promote Christianity because, y’know, everyone needs to be saved. Plus, it makes me feel important.” (That such a feeling is the opposite of the servant ministry preached by Jesus is just part of the irony).

I do believe that much of Christianist sentiment is motivated less by religious fervor and Godly devotion than by simple social power exercises — particularly given the norm / majority status of Christianity.

I do feel that too much certainty is a form of arrogance — and, yes, thus a form of pride which the Medieval “seven deadly sins” would find a problem. The difference between faith and arrogance is a fairly gray line, though, possibly much in the eye of the beholder.

On the other hand, would a Christian want someone to prevent them from making a ghastly mistake, one which would result in much pain and grief? Yes of course, and I believe this is the root of the problem. Those who are arrogant in the correctness of their beliefs think that they are stepping in to save others from a terrible mistake, and they believe that it’s justified by the Golden Rule.

We might call this the Tyranny of the Arrogant, and I hope that Christians would recognize that they do not want to be told what is right by those who arrogantly believe that their religious beliefs are correct and that Christian beliefs are false. The arrogant will of course say “but We’re Right, and They’re Wrong!” Perhaps, in order to step in to stop someone from making a mistake, one must be justified in doing so, perhaps even justified in a way that those who are to be saved from their own mistakes will recognize and accept. This is unlikely in the context of modern religious society, and perhaps it is impossible.

I think this kind of reasoning arguably leads to the conclusion that the Golden Rule prohibits public prayer and proselytizing, though of course many Christians will disagree. If arrogance is a kind of pride, then trying to justify those activities using the Golden Rule could also be a sin in the Christian tradition. But of course, I’m an agnostic and a philosopher, so what do I know about morality.

The point I was cheifly making was that the accent that you are thinking of, representing dons from the University, is not that of the town in which it sits. Oxfordshire is a has a mild ‘oo-arr’ accent, your cliched yokel ‘mummerset’ speech.

‘Oxbridge’ was coined to indicate a certain priviledge in upbringing/education, though not necessarily having attended Oxford of Cambridge. “The senior civil service is seen as the last bastion of Oxbridge education, where who you know is more important than what you know.” I suppose a Columbine version would be something like “Yarvard” – i.e. coming from an ‘WASP’ family via an Ivy League university.

Thus, John Cleese has an Oxbridge accent, the little scrote who has just nicked your car to do handbrake turns round the Blackbird Leys estate has an Oxford accent. :)

thanks for the note.

Most of the atheists I know aren’t interested in forbidding prayer, and would defend people of all faiths being able to pray on their own as they will. They just object to the use of facilities and events that they, too, pay for with their tax dollar as platforms for a given religion.

While the writer of the piece mentions that a visitor to a sporting event in Israel, Iraq, or China might expect to hear prayers of the majority’s faith, I suspect that if I were not a visitor but a native Christian citizen in those countries, that would make me feel like an outsider, less of a “real” citizen, someone that society and the government wanted to coerce and convert to their beliefs.

That’s not what I think America’s about. Nor is it how I think Jesus calls on us to pray (Matt. 6:1-8).

The piece, by the way, is not by Andy Rooney (or Paul Harvey, to whom it’s also attributed). It was originally written by a Texas sportswriter, Nick Gholson (http://www.snopes.com/politics/soapbox/prayer.asp)

Thanks for sending this along, and God bless.

Will ponder.

And while it’s not a clear, inevitable series of steps from there to the auto-de-fe, it’s also not impossible to believe the chain between state endorsement of religion and the state imposition of religion.

The resentment that such theists feel over “atheists” imposing on something that seems so natural is, ironically, not dissimilar to that felt by those “atheists” having someone impose on them.

I’m trying to decide how to address this back to the very nice lady (and/or her CC list). Probably something simpler than the above.

Re Oxonian vs Oxbridge, I will bow to your knowledge. I find references to an Oxonian accent, but if the Oxford sorts don’t mind linguistically hobnobbing with the Cambridge crew, who am I to question? :-)

I’m disappointed in you, that you may have ever considered it to be an effectation