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[Misha]

lyrai, that terry pratchett quote, circa 1992, has basically nothing to do with the topic at hand.

[A²]

I can't read

I think there's this mental illness where you're normal except for this one thing that sends you into supercrazy land

A quote stating that Burrito's thoughts can apply to everyone

[Thad]

Yeah, I hate to spout the specific tenets of The Joker here, but I think pretty much anybody is capable of this sort of thing if you press the right set of buttons.

Maybe.  But lots of fucking people have had messy divorces and lost their jobs.

I mean, all right, if you stuck me in Room 101 and tortured me, I'd probably be capable of anything too.  But this falls pretty fucking short of that; in fact it's something pretty damned common.

The details of the plot are part of what makes it exceptional, too.  If he'd JUST shot up his ex and his in-laws, that'd be abhorrent, but it wouldn't really be "WTF?" territory.  A normal guy who snaps and kills people who he believes have wronged him is a common enough story.  A guy who dresses up like Santa Claus, shoots a little girl in the face, and then burns the house down with a homemade firebomb goes into, yes, Joker territory.

(And incidentally, since you bring it up, the Joker was wrong, in both The Killing Joke AND The Dark Knight.)

[Friday]

Well, he was wrong about the boats but right about Dent, in DK.

I personally think he wasn't right or wrong, but rather somewhere in-between, unless you took his meaning literally when he said anyone was capable of etc.

Honestly, I think there's a certain percentage of people that will snap, and I am not going to guess at the number because it would probably depress me.

[Saturn]

Hilarious Vancouver rental listing

I'm pretty sure a lot of those requirements are massively illegal! 

Pretty much..

I will say that someone can be pretty smart about it.  If someone's willing to put up with two months worth of gaff, they can pretty much change the locks, have the court order the landlord and landlady to change the electrical wiring, and have a basement suite just south of one of the nicer parts of town for 480.  The thing is that it is very hard to evict a tenant once the John Hancock has been written and copied. 

If I was renting out there, even the administrative hurdle would be tempting..

That and when you go about 4-8 blocks north, it really becomes one of the nicer parts of town.  Really nice.

found this little nugget on that same government site

"Terms which are unconscionable are not enforceable. Whether a term is unconscionable depends upon a variety of factors. To be unconscionable the term must be oppressive or grossly unfair."

[Disposable Ninja]

Oh my personal favorite bit on that thing?

CONTRABAND: The following items are considered contraband – alcohol, illegal drugs, tobacco, weapons, lock picking equipment. If any contraband is discovered to be in your possession, you will be subject to a minimum $1,000.00 fine. In addition, your items will be confiscated permanently. Second offense – you will be evicted without notice. A bailiff will escort you and your belongings off the premises. Your security deposit will not be returned.

Yes, that's right. A bailiff. A bailiff is going to escort you out of your basement apartment. It would only be too wonderful is this were serious.

[Brentai]

I got halfway through a rant about the lockpicks being considered contraband when I realized we were all falling for another craigslist troll.  I really gotta be more cynical about this stuff.

[Doom]

Just wanted to mention for the Santa Story: There is controversy about the Killdozer guy having guns on the Killdozer, but he never killed anybody and arguably went out pretty clean in his quest for justice.

[Zaratustra]

"There are hardly any excesses of the most crazed psychopath that cannot easily be duplicated by a normal, kindly family man who just comes in to work every day and has a job to do." - Terry Prachett.

Hell, I'd even bet on the family man.

[Mongrel]

You guys all know that that's just another reference to Hannah Arendt, the 'banality of evil' and social theories of that ilk, right?

I mean, you can technically apply it as it's being applied in this thread... but "I do not think that quote refers to what you think it does".

[A²]

Hitler said a lot of things that can be applied to everyday situations, but in context probably referred to things we don't want to think about. :godwin:

[Mongrel]

I didn't invoke Godwin. I just lampshaded the fact that Godwin was already invoked a full page ago.

[Thad]

Via GP, some guy dragged his girlfriend down to flights of stairs because she got him a Wii and he wanted a $1,000 airplane.

Throw this in the "What makes people do crazy shit?" cocktail -- Christmas stress can cause relatively stable people to trample temps to death at Wal-Mart; if somebody's already unstable, well, I'm sure it doesn't help.

...It's a sounder theory than blaming GTA, at least.  Hey, CNN!  Where's MY interview?

[A²]

I didn't invoke Godwin. I just lampshaded the fact that Godwin was already invoked a full page ago.

Nono, I was invoking Godwin on myself there.

[Royal☭]

So you made a post specifically invoking Godwin so you could point out in the same post how you were invoking Godwin?

[Friday]

I think we should start shooting people in the kneecaps as a form of punishment if you do something horrible because someone got you a present but it wasn't as good a present as you wanted.

Seriously. A grown man acting like a rich spoiled brat on her sweet 16 birthday throwing a temper tantrum because the car she got didn't have leather seats?

Except the tantrum involves dragging another human being down the stairs or etc, instead of just whining, crying, and running to your room and slamming your door?

Kneecaps. Bang. Bang.

OK, you can go. No prison term. No fine. No medical attention.

[Brentai]

It's like I've been saying.  Bring back the Code of Hammurabi.  You can adjust it a little to fit modern humanitarianism, but, you know, keep the utilitarian ones - castration for rape, cutting off hands for thievery, etc.

Do it right and you don't even NEED prison.  All the rapists are dickless and the murderers are dead, so we can use that land for... I dunno.  Mass graves.

[Romosome]

See, the problem with that is the whole false accusation thing, accurately determining guilt and all.

...oh, wait, no, I see what you're saying.  Combine that with the modern court system?  Sure, why not, it's not like it'd be any worse.

[Mongrel]

DRAW! Yew yellah bellied snide-wynder...

[Niku]

I think we should start shooting people in the kneecaps as a form of punishment if you do something horrible because someone got you a present but it wasn't as good a present as you wanted.

It's a special macaroni plate.