I'm not historian enough to argue about WW2, but I think there was some context to those wars, even if technically one country can be blamed. It didn't come out of nowhere.
In any case I seriously doubt there was more free speech in earlier times than now (off the top of my head, what about those commie hunting days?). SOPA has not yet been passed, either.
People don't care for each other yadda yadda yadda. Sorry, that is just ideological bullshit. I don't think people are less emotional today than they used to be. And people will never change, complaining about that is just a waste of time.
As for the economic problems, wake me when Apple (a company that has 60% markup on their products) is no longer the most valuable company in the world. Poor people don't buy iPhones.
What would it mean if the most successful corporation made a product poor people used? How is that relevant? (Let's ignore Google, creator of perhaps the most valuable product ever created, which they charge absolutely nothing for.) It would be something like real estate, slum lording, which is a quite profitable industry (but no one consolidated company), that isn't helping anyone.
In any case I seriously doubt there was more free speech in earlier times than now (off the top of my head, what about those commie hunting days?)
Oh, but there was. For one, to have commie hunting days, you had to have commies. Which you did. And you also had a mighty, not communistic, labor union movement.
Nowadays, not many are sticking up their necks that much, if anyone.
What about the OccupyWhatever movement? I don't miss commies, but I don't think in the commie hunting days everybody who was hunted actually was a commie.
What would you stick up your neck for? I mean what things would get you into trouble? Wikileaks is the only example that comes to mind (and pretending to be a terrorist, obviously).
What would you stick up your neck for? I mean what things would get you into trouble? Wikileaks is the only example that comes to mind
Things worth to stick up your neck for and/or that will get you in trouble if you do? Lots of things. From ACTA/SOPA/PIPA, to labour laws, to the bailout, to the mass (statistically imbalanced) imprisonment of blacks, to the profitable prison work-for-rent industry, to the death penalty, to mass surveillance, to foreign policy, the patriot act, to bio-ethics, to Monsanto, to the sorry state of news reporting, to the race for the bottom for jobs (moving to cheap foreign labour), to corporates getting their way, the list goes on and on. Seriously challenging any of those will get you in trouble.
In any case I seriously doubt there was more free speech in earlier times than now (off the top of my head, what about those commie hunting days?). SOPA has not yet been passed, either.
People don't care for each other yadda yadda yadda. Sorry, that is just ideological bullshit. I don't think people are less emotional today than they used to be. And people will never change, complaining about that is just a waste of time.
As for the economic problems, wake me when Apple (a company that has 60% markup on their products) is no longer the most valuable company in the world. Poor people don't buy iPhones.