no_one_is_a_loser Dredge It's simply a state of mind. 051021 ... grinnygringrin that's nice to here. 051023 ... Twitch you spelt hear all wrong... but that doesn't make you a loser. 051024 ... no one hey thats not very nice. some_one_is_a_loser i feel postively outraged. 051024 ... Dredge thats the spirit! 051024 ... Dredge I meant Twitch's comment... ...It's not nice to call someone a loser... 051024 ... nocturnal it's not nice, but sometimes facts is facts. better to call the person who came in last in a competition a loser than to use some sad euphemism. they know they lost, it's not a secret. I know, y'all are referring to 'loser' in its more social sense, but in some cases the same argument applies. a loser will usually know that he is a loser. but I agree, just cuz it's true don't make it a nice thing to call someone. 051025 ... andru235 oh, yikes. in the social sense, you actually perceive there to be people who are losers?!? that's more of a statement about you than the "loser". to each his own, of course. 051026 ... dipperwell Calling someone a loser is a particularly interesting insult, since lose/win is a dualism and for you to note someone's loss, you must, logically, be the winner. It would be a convenient title, if only the game had rules. 051026 ... oren If this is true, then everyone must be a winner. Hmm. If everyone is a winner, then clean out the hall_of_fame museum for every sport; melt_down every trophy ever awarded; cancel all competitions; wipe the pages clean of every history book ever written. If everyone is a winner, then there are no_heroes, no_legends, no_role_models. 051026 ... Twitch Well, maybe some people are just used to the loser_mindset. ...I think we have to agree on a definition on what a loser is, and what a winner is to really be able to discuss this. I think a loser is someone who is not happy with their situation, and won't bother to try and change it. A winner is someone who is someone who constantly fights for a better situation, or is content (I know, it can be argued that some bums are content...but...maybe they're winners too... 051027 ... dipperwell It's funny how culturally influenced the concept of winning/losing, or even our definitions of winner/loser, are when we apply them to life - we have such an individualist culture, rather than collectivist, and we are so capitalist, that everything becomes a game to be won with players, triumph, defeat, the winner, the loser, the omniscient God refereeing all of it, cut and dry. But everything in nature, including humans, functions on a continuum, and there is no "loser" or "winner", just a lot of people with varying definitions of success, of happiness, of what a noble goal is, of achievement. I realize that this response will be one of dullest ones, but there you go. Who says the hero is the winner, who says that a burning building is a game? 051027 ... stork daddy all depends on what you consider a win or a loss. because people have defined various games, and people win and lose those games. but i agree that by my standards, by my operative game's definition, no one is a loser. 051027 ... andru235 sometimes while playing a board game, the person who lost happened to have the most fun, whereas the person who won was in a desperate heat to succeed. who really won? i agree that it seems very relative...i'd rather "lose" and have fun than "win" after an anxious bout of sweating. if one wins a chess game with mate in 2, there is almost zero satisfaction for the winner. i'd rather lose after 30 turns than win after 4. 051027 ... stork daddy right, but there you're defining your own "win" standard and "loss" standard. where as the shared societal standard of the game your playing would suggest that you were at least a loser in some sense of the word. 051027 ... andru235 not necessarily. most people i know play board games for fun; winning is usually irrelevant other than as a goal to induce fun-ness. thus, the societal standard is no less blurry than the personal one. parhaps you are a member of a particularily competitive social circle? 051028 ... andru235 [does it really matter that much if i correct "parhaps?" is anyone truly challenged as to what i meant?] 051028 ... stork daddy seriously. Milton Bradley says you're a loser. That's a shared societal standard, in that it is well known and understood and very widely validated by many in society. No my friends don't berate me as a loser everytime I end up with Baltic Avenue when we play Monopoly. That doesn't mean they give me their money. We can still be playing the game of lets all have fun (in which there are also losers silly) while simultaneously playing the game of Monopoly. Whether you are a loser in your sum totality is kind of a meaningless question unless you can define the objective to be reached or not reached or halfway reached or so on. But there are clear objectives defined in many pursuits, and the very word lose was developed to describe the failure to achieve some objective. For instance, I have a boxing match. Now of course the definition of boxing match is relative. All words are. But in the most widely shared useage of the word, if I get knocked out in the first round, I lost. Now maybe I had more fun than the other guy, or maybe it was more meaningful of an experience to me. But in terms of the "boxing match" in the sense of the average meaning given to it by both the individual and the shared groups of individuals that constitute the larger society, i lost. I really don't see what's wrong with that. Also as a side note. I disagree with a lot of what you say, but I'm not about to start a multi-front battle with you on hundreds of pages, because it's pointless and I don't have time to blathe all day like some people. Besides I tried it with Dafremen and nobody got anywhere. So you win! And I lose! 051028 ... stork daddy oh the irony of arguing over whether a person can lose or not. i wonder who will lose...i mean be wrong. i mean be convinced. yeah. that's better, now we both win, and all i had to do was redefine some words! 051028 ... stork daddy i mean you really only need one example of a non-blurry societal standard and whammo! there's a loser. 051028 ... andru235 societal standards are not so easily defined. many (not all) people play games because they find them entertaining. for them, entertainment is the point of playing : "fun" is the figurative win condition. there is little gained by literally "winning" the game itself, except perhaps as a small emotional bonus, as it is merely target to shoot for. what is sought after, in most cases, is a feeling or experience. if everyone has a horrible time while playing, for some "winners" it is really a lose-lose experience. and if everyone has fun, it isn't just the milton-bradley-defined winner that wins. perhaps in boxing the societal standard carries more subjective weight, but by your "own operative game's definition, no one is a loser," and just like that, in your own reality, whammo! there are no losers. it is only for some people that "societal standards" consititute working definitions for some matters. blurry lines abound - most definitions are an individuals perogative. it's that darn old gem again, isn't it. in this, as with so many other things, there is a spectrum of infinitesimal gradation. and vantage point is really rather critical. for yourself, you are quite right, i suppose. i'm not remotely surprised, 1983 sd 42, that you disagree with most of what i say. i am, however, quite surprised that you felt it was necessary to mention, and here, of all places. is your disagreement really perhaps more based upon a personal dislike? for otherwise it would seem rather futile to state something you have made quite apparent prior to this. the multi-front battle, if that is how you see it (a revealing choice of words, if it is), has been underway for some time already. and passive-aggressive comments like "I don't have time to blathe all day like some people" give a slightly hostile impression. here we are, agreeing that no one is a loser, and there you go, pointlessly insinuating mild derogations. are you actually mad?!? isn't merely disagreeing enough? so really, what was that side note supposed to add to this dialogue? 051028 ... stork daddy well first of all, i'm not who you think i am, but that's besides the point. secondly, i was a little annoyed at the condescension i, somewhat reasonably, thought i detected in your intellectual property blathe. i don't personally dislike you. anyone who likes castlevania music is alright by me. i do happen to disagree with a them of a lot of your postings that the world we navigate through is completely subjective in all but a technical sense. i think most people's minds have evolved to reflect a reality that is workable and easily shared. i'm sure people are capable of deluding themselves as to the standards of others, but i don't feel it will get them very far in their relationships with others. it'd be hard for a team to make the argument that they should be awarded the super bowl trophy after having a lower score than the other team at the end of the game on the premise that they were playing their own subjective games which they really won. it's hard to tell a person who lost a court case and is going away for a long time that they really won some other game. the title of this blathe is that no one is a loser. i'm saying that literally that isn't true. the definition of the word lose presupposes there is some objective that either can or can't be reached, and that the word lose in its most commonly used and literal sense is limited to the scope of whatever particular game it is referring to. when people try to persuade one another, they can either achieve that end or not. believe it or not, i'm not a hyper-competitive person in reality, but that doesn't mean i'm not going to voice disagreement. i only meant that i disagree with some of your themes that you state in assured tone as if they are absolute truths. you can argue that they are absolute truths to you. i'm reminding you of the effects other people and their subjective beliefs have on truth. and i'm positing that what we agree on is what's the most useful to go by when navigating society. i'm also saying that the fact that there is a lot of overlap in any two people's subjective truths at least suggests that there is more to truth than what i or you independantly believe. didn't mean to ruffle your feathers and you have a good day. 051028 ... stork daddy games are just social constructs. when we consent to them, in a sense i feel we consent to their value sets or some nonsense. anyways. nobody is really a loser. that's what i can agree to. or else we're all really losers. i'm not sure which! 051028 ... dipperwell I would like to casually point out the irony of arguing about winner vs. losers and games/competitions and then disappear from this here blathe. 051028 ... Keil indeed 060508 ... LS When you lose, take the oppurtunity to learn from it and win. When you win, then try to top yourself, makeing yourself a loser compared to the new goal you set. I dunno...the race isn't over till your dead, and the only person your trying to outrun is yourself... How can there be a winner or a loser if you arn't both? 060508 ... hyena there is no win without fail. 060514 ... Doar roll the @#$%@#% dice already. 060515 what's it to you? who go blather from