Back in the olden days, say you bought a set of wagon wheels, and one of them broke. You could pick that wagon wheel up, inspect the break, and either see that it was the result of a large rock in the road or the like, or, you would inspect it and find a defect, for example, a spoke that had a weak spot like a knot in the wood at the attachment point to the hub and that spoke never should have been used. That would clearly be a defect of manufacturing. If a local wagon wheel maker had sold it to you, he would be very concerned to set the situation right, his honor as well as his craft reputation being at stake.
I would wager, not having studied the subject, that people were more honorable because their reputation of person and craft was at stake when they did business with their neighbors and fellow townsfolk. Now we don't shake hands with the person who made the tape deck. We also are at their mercy because we can't just look at the thing and point out the problem. It sounds like defect to me if it busted after 8 months, and you never spilled anything in it or hooked it up wrong and blew it out yourself. They should be honor bound to fix the fucking thing, you should not have to have any warranty thing. People shouldn't even pay attention to that warranty shit. I pay money for something, it should work good like they say it will, they tell you how special that particular tape deck is, they really want you to buy it, you buy it, it better fucking just work. No need for these warranties. Rip 'em up.
The iPod had a big old problem with their batteries funking out after the first year, so these guys in New York City took it upon themselves to put up ads and such that got people talking, so Apple had to deal with the problem. Course the people at Apple are still greedy perverts, they called me up to see if I wanted to buy battery insurance for $99. I laughed and I got the guy on the other end of the phone to concede it was silly.
Are we really so mixed up on the right thing to do? Is everyone really that confused?
You know, I went to an NA meeting shortly after I got out of Straight (still a brainwashed weakened person) and for whatever reason I happened to talk about not knowing what was right or wrong, and that I just would quit speeding because I could not afford the ticket. Things didn't mean the same thing to me anymore. I had lost what was real and valuable to me before Straight, I think I was really saying that I could not figure out how I could know right from wrong.
I had my own way before Straight. It got me in trouble but it was my direct interpretation of the world and how I should be in it. Whatever happened in Straight, the intensity of the constant sitting in group, the huge white room, the barren environment, the physical abuse of even just sitting and watching the person talking, the demoralization, the depression, no friends, and then getting in my mind all the Straight ideas about strictness, a very mentally ill sort of honesty, the way they messed up even the way our families were towards us! I mean, my own family didn't care to notice how pale and weak and terrified I was after Straight. That should not surprise me, my parents had the obscene callousness to put me in there in the first place. The extended family didn't even take enough interest in where I was to offer me help afterwards.
That is just the culture I come from, I guess, but I know there is a better way.
