Torero

I don't know who said that, but that is exactly the point of the crony-casino-"capitalism" we are living in today. Every business is run on both success (hopefully) AND failure. And that's where the crony capitalists screwed the free market; it is now only gain (profit, success) and the losses/risks/negative outcomes are passed to others (via taxation, bailouts, regulations or any other kind). If you're against those creepy crony crooks, then one should embrace a world where these tricks do not work (anymore). They are not pawns, yet they thrive only because someone else (you and me) have their backs if it goes wrong. That honest world can only be achieved with a free market. Where a business has success but also failure. Just like that some life forms did not make it until today (and not because of mass extinctions), yet died out like an unsuccessful business.

Whut? I do not read any argument. Yet a set of personal attacks and the claim that "I sound pushy". How I sound is only up to you. I am not responsible for the sound you hear. I have no interest at all to "make it to [like it's some kind of achievement] the ruling circles". Can you at least try to formulate 1 argument or is that too much to ask?

To me the question arises: Is it really important if I like tattoos or not? Anyone is the owner of his/her own body (that includes skin) so it's up to that person to make a choice for a tattoo (or more) or not and like it or not. In case I would be disgusted by someones tattoo, it is still my choice. I can look away if I don't like it. Generalising "liking tattoos" doesn't seem fair to me. There are too many different (tattooed) people and too many different tattoos to generalise all of them at once. Like you say those Maori bodies are cool. Also some personal tattoos I like. It all depends on the person and if it fits him/her.

Laowai can not only be considered too lightweight for a decent rational discussion, more importantly he spoils a great topic and initiative by Zaccheus.

Ok, clear, thanks, also on your views on your own Christianity. I agree with you; stress situations (due to environmental factors) lead to evolutionary changes. A nice example is insular dwarfism; due to limited resources and space huge animals start to shrink and evolve into smaller species. Notable examples are: - the Dwarf elephants of the islands of the Mediterranean Sea - the Flores-man Evolution would take place all the time (mutations) but the result of it can be best observed over large periods of geological time or with condensed sections where evolution shows its results rapidly (the forcing described above). The problem is that the fossil record is not only fragmented but also biased. In drastic events many more fossils are found and it is these drastic events that lead to forced evolution (adaptation to the drastically new environment). On top of that the Earth is alive and most rocks have been buried (and not exposed again), eroded or altered (metamorphism). The task of the geologist/paleontologist is to try to solve these puzzles with little data, huge uncertainties and free space for interpretation. A nice task, if I may say so.

Hi jnabors, welcome back from the camping trip, glad it was good. You list two possibilities: - pure Creation - ongoing today - Creation + Evolution - the only process today would be evolution You state that science has taught you a lot about nature, yet you still say "I have no reason to believe in Evolution, or anything else". Do you consider yourself a nihilist? Or agnostic at this point? I also wonder how you see modern, clear "evolution" in play. For instance dogs (chihuahuas and huskies are both dogs but they do not look alike. They are "created" by humans. If Evolution would not be something you believe in, what process causes those genetical and physical variations? According to most research life has formed (or you may say created) some 3.8 billion years ago (that's about 3,800,000,000 years!). The real life explosion did not happen at or just before (Ediacaran fauna) the Cambrian Explosion, approximately 540-520 million years ago. So in 3.26 billion years the oceans were full of life, but that life was very basic (unicellular organisms). How does that fit into your idea on what happened on our beautiful blue-green planet? First Creation, then a pause of 2/3 of the planets existence and then finally the real life explosion? Cheers.

An argument against capitalism is an 'argument' against nature itself. Senseless. Capitalism, the free market, is the essence of our biological nature. It is observable all around in nature; when there's a niche, a species (or more) will fill it. There's competition, there's mutually beneficial business (symbiosis of lifeforms). Anti-capitalists are thus anti-nature. They think that some humans should have control over other humans and "arrange" markets. That's like calling a well-maintained park "nature" and looking for 'arguments' against plants and bugs wandering freely through that park. Makes no sense at all.

If I would smack you when you are jaywalking, am I a "responsible smacker"? "No, but this is about parents and their children!" Oh, are children in any sense less than other humans, who you just may smack when you feel the responsibility to do so? Parents own their offspring?? Stefan has made a podcast (from 1:26:00 onwards about the Princeton professor) about the horrors of non-parenting families. It's not either spanking or setting no boundaries at all. There's a lot of colour between the extremes...

A degree in Criminology and then "just" a cop? Why say your education is worthless? You've got all freedom to apply your learnings! Private detective sounds good, right?! Well done, brave decision and hopefully an example for too many governmental useful idiots. Take care.

Tried San Pedro Sula yet?

"Don't you want your 14 year old to assault you? Then stop assaulting him and other children first." ?

Hi Laowai, I recently visited Europe again and the same appeared to me. I've lived there for the most part of my life, and got used to these minority-dominated (so becoming majority) neighbourhoods first hand. But now, it was very apparent in Barcelona. There all the waiters (!) were suddenly Chinese. That was not the case 10 years ago... The point is; there's no need nor reason to get frustrated and annoyed about it. Immigrants brought in by huge governments (and nothing can top Europe in (semi-)governmental structures...) are not parasites. They may have come unvoluntarily or voluntarily and want to stay in the richest countries of Europe (state debt not taken into the equation...) but does that make them parasites? They choose to migrate. They do not choose to be pampered; that's given to them. They essentially are victims of this huggie industry of "social" workers in European countries. They are their livestock. It's no surprise that the governments of Eastern European countries, despite having profited from vast EU-funds divided by the European "Union" nightmare project, are not willing to accept (many) refugees. They have much less of the huggie industry, the biggest statist industry in terms of money and especially manpower, present than Northwestern European EU countries like Germany, Sweden, Netherlands, etc. Less room to keep statists "working"... The money given to these refugees and "refugees" and accepted by them, the bizarre inequality in rights and obligations with the autochtonous population they got confronted with, is not something they chose. They got these "Unchosen Positive Obligations" (just listening to the podcast) against their asking for it. You cannot call them parasites then. Parasitical behaviour comes from choice, not against it. The people who start small businesses are even less of parasites; they generally have a freer market (including opening hours) than bigger, more traditional businesses. If you do not succeed in finding a job, you need to shape one yourself. List your qualities and look for what best fits you. If you are good at what you do, no migrant, person of other race (or any other senseless label to hide behind and claim racism ) will push you away from the job market. If you stay at home waiting for them to provide you a job, you may find a job at a fancy fair, showing the longest beard of all-time...

brucethecollie, I very much agree with Tyne. Excellent education and inspiring work. Nailed the case in the first reaction. PS: it is said that the name Santa Claus comes from Sinterklaas, the Dutch "predecessor" of the red-and-white saint of North America and later the world. Sinterklaas is every year a big topic, not only because of the unique Dutch tradition left, but also because of the various cultural-marxist "anti-racist" (while pointing at race all the time; irrational cause Black Pete is from Italian chimney cleaner origin...) leeches who want to destroy a nice tradition. Not meant as digression from the topic, just some background. http://www.thejournal.ie/arrests-black-pete-1782379-Nov2014/ Note the laissez faire reaction of "Sinterklaas" himself at the end.

If professor Myles Allen is so affected by drowning Bengalese, why is he not taking action and preventing them to be drowned by building dikes? The floodings of the delta are not the result of CO2 (we exhale it every second, this "pollutor" ) but of policies to have many people living in areas that belong to nature; the natural interplay of sea and river; a delta.

Excellent work, man! Inspiring to see your ethical activism having its honest heart in peaceful parenting and moral thinking.

Kaz, I see you got enough arguments from the others already, but let me go back to a post you made on page 1: You seem to define “Freedom” as a kind of commodity. That you can give to people. Freedom is not a commodity which you can give. You can only stop taking it away from people. Freedom is the natural base situation. Saying you can give freedom to someone is like saying you give life to somebody by not killing him. It is supposed to be? According to whom? To your definition of democracy? Average person? How the heck do you define an “average person” knowing that we differ from each other on almost everything we have? How do you calculate the “average” between a left-wing racist homosexual diabetic dwarf and a conservative freethinking vanilla ice loving basketball player measuring 7’2” ?? Whut? No; a vote is a sign of support someone can give to a system. You will find a lot of non-voters here. Voting in my opinion is immoral, as it credits the system and gives an OK to it. OK’ing immorality (statism) is immoral itself. If there’s anything NOT happening at the moment, it’s that the “wealthy” (Elites I’d call them, it’s more about power than money) are stopped from rigging the laws constantly. Laws which you and me need to obey, but apparently others are less equal and in this crony capitalist hell are negotiating to be lifted from laws. You consider that fair?? Watched Stefans latest show on The Stock Market Collapse? Most voters do not care at all, they just take the ballot as a disguise for the bullet; forcing others to pay for their wishes. You call that “social”? If your wife says “I really want to take care of stray dogs and then says that you need to pay for it, you would laugh at her, right? Why is it perfectly ok to do just the same but then with more distant people? "quote": The masses are resolved to the Democratic freedom limits that should be set “Democratic freedom limits” (what’s this?) that “should be set”? What? Why? And by whom? And by which authority? With your magical Willy these Wonka's politicians finally listen tool? "quote": on the representatives to profit from financial trickery and the revolving door, yet these clear democratically supported ideas are not being proposed and supported by elected officials. No, and that will never change. It’s the system that is set up to prevent this from happening. With a vote you give an ok to a representative (and if enough people give the same ok, then he/she gets elected), but there’s no way to enforce that person to stick to the narrative played out in the campaigns. Nice try you want to create a contract with a politician, but that’s like starting a trust fund with the mafia. You will always lose. "quote": We are running on Freedom (slavery to the rich is what happens when you have complete freedom), So by taking freedoms away you avoid become a slave to “the rich” (to whom are given freedoms that we don't get)? How do you see that happening? And who exactly is authorized to decide which freedoms should be taken away (see the analogue; how many lives should be taken)?? "quote": and democracy, which is supposed to ensure that Freedom is limited to one that is in the best interest of the common man.. “The best interest” of the “common” man? What are you talking about? Who is this “common man”? And what are “uncommon men” then? And “best interests”? Who do you think is best to judge his/her interests, that same “common man” or you as the enforcer? And what if that best interest of that "common man" changes, are you the one enforcing new things to be in line with the new “best interests” of others (which may well be worst interests of again others...?)? All planned with your "I am shaping the world because I know what's best" computer sims? Do they come with the voting tool? "quote": is not counteracting the dangers of anarchic Freedom...because the voting public have been duped into thinking that their vote is a process where they select one of several uncountable stranger for whome there is no central point of comparable reliable information, not that there can be any information! There are no facts because there is requirement to provide an accountable mandate. Much like a camera is required to list it's specifications and warranty terms etc They still do their marketing, but clever consumers ignore that and look at the specs. Which are completely rigged too. That you worked as a self-righteous liberal in your Green Party (your spelling doesn’t show that to be honest; it is “lose”, not “loose”…), makes that you are not objective. The whole system is corrupt but you seem to think or spread that “as long as you read enough texts by politicians, you understand them and they suddenly become moral honest thinkers”? "quote": Presently we are unable to be 'clever consumers' in any situation of appointing a leader. Why all this generalized unfounded by arguments group talk? “We are”, “unable”, “not clever”, “in any situation”? A leader is someone who can take the lead. That is not the same as enforcer or violator. Stefan is a leader in online philosophy. Yet there’s no force involved. He is not “appointed” (the narrative of statists), but grew. And that is exactly what you are afraid of. Other people shouldn’t grow, societies that are free shouldn’t develop, because… it will fall into chaos and mayhem… Just how do you see the current statist system then? Stealing 50% upfront of your income and spending it on bombing innocent people in countries far away? That you call “freedom” or “democracy”? Don’t you have any moral standards?? "quote": If we won't stand and offer facts..we can't complain. Offer facts? Facts are there, they are not offered. And which “we”? Why do you think you and me have something in common, other than participating in the same forum? "quote": If we won't do that...we are most certainly not going to find anarchy and prettier. That’s the whole problem with you statists. You want to shape the world, mold people into things they don’t choose voluntarily. You want to “create change” (as you said in one of your earlier posts). Change cannot be “created”. Change can only grow. Out of self-aware people, inspiring individuals, free thinkers, moral actors. If you don’t understand that, you will keep throwing your straw men at anarchism (which you call anarchy, not coincidentally) and never proceed in moral thinking and just maintaining and enforcing the global state slavery, paying for your "hey guys, this voting tool really works, suddenly all those darn psychos wonderful people will listen to you, we can save the pyramid game by primitive poker addicts, listen to me, this voting tool will work! You anarchists cause chaos, we cause prosperity. By starting to believe even more of these fuck-ups drinking free champagne for an average months wage in their own country, we will set the world free! More state slavery, more crony cocain, more demonic debt, more foolish falling for trickery! Yes, Kaz! Yes!" web site.

Is that Icelandic statist in favour of or against the Icelandic membership of and participation in international political statist organisations or associations?

Islam a foothold? Islam is a religion, muslims are people. What foothold? Islamic law (sharia)? If people want to live by these laws and there's no coercion involved upon other people/non muslims/muslims that do not want sharia, what's the problem? Why should "Islam" be pushed back (by force? ) but your christian fantasies would be no problem to get "a foothold"?

As there is no collective Islam (every individual muslim has his/her personal beliefs, just like any other human being), there is no collective 'response' possible nor needed. The vast majority of muslims just live their lives peacefully, apart from the circumcision horrors. A response to that mutilation has been given by Stefan extensively.

Why would you spread this disinfo from the perpetrators of the space hoaxes? Have you read what I wrote about these fantasy "parking places" in "space"? Can you answer in your own words?

How do you know that "speed cameras have proven to be 'quite' effective (up to 50% in 'some' cases) in lowering the number of car accidents"? Is there a causal relation between the two? Are there no other factors? How reliable are numbers presented by a government who is also the one putting the cameras there? What about speed cameras causing more accidents (because people suddenly brake and others fail to react)? I'd say if the responsibility for car accidents is put upon the driver, people are more cautious when needed. Also the German Autobahn in many places doesn't have speed limits. Surprisingly few accidents are reported (and yes, the same question about reliability of that data stands here), but if it were so dangerous, wouldn't you think the smart German governments would have installed cameras and introduce speed limits everywhere?

Hi Mike, I don't know much about the Mormon faith so I really cannot help you with that. But what I have seen in the last years is that there's more common ground between religious people and anarchists than between anarchists and statists. Like you say; there's no inherent contradiction to be both anarchist and religious. I was raised antitheistic by my parents, or rather, they were and I got dragged into it (like is common in Western Europe), but now I see that religious people and anarchists share much more. Belief in a State is much more dangerous than belief in a deity, hence the fierce focus on the latter by statists. If you believe God is providing moral, then wouldn't you discard a State defining that for you, almost automatically? My girlfriend is catholic, but not practising (no church visits, not praying, only the gestures when passing a church or cemetery). I've had discussions about moral lately with her and I found much more common ground with her than with previous girlfriends, all atheists and statists. Doesn't the Mormon faith already have a built-in antipathy against statism? Try to find the similarities between your faith and the moral stance on not accepting the force of statism. Look for the common factors, that would work much better than convincing her to give up something that's important to her. The latter I fear will cost you your marriage and that would not be the way to go.

No, those are labels and mind characterisations you put on me. I didn't choose your labels. Nor do I have a distrust of others motives. Offensive is true of course, but that's merely the cynical boomerang I threw. If you do not want straw men, yet an intelligent debate, I spent a whole evening summarising my points in the Single Mom topic. Feel free to react to them. By the way, English is not my first language, but it's "you're", not "your".

Hi D-Rex, interesting topic and questions and I of course agree with most of what the others said. Still, let me shed my 2 cents (of which 1.39 taxed) on the question you pose. First of all, the institute doing this research is heavily political in nature. Direct advisory to/part of the UN and proudly presenting themselves on this website as "Sustainable Development Solutions Network". That is some unveiled statism in the name only... I've lived over 75 % of my life in country number 4 on this "list" so let me share some experiences and observations which may help you. - like the others mentioned; happiness is impossible to measure objectively and consistently. It varies from person to person, from day to day and also the questions that are asked direct the respondents to certain, wanted (after all it's politics) outcomes - your original question about the socialist (or "socialist") countries is interesting, as indeed 4 out of 5 of these countries one can call socialist. Socialist in a broader sense than purely a text book definition It might however be possible to rephrase the two questions a bit: 1 - "what makes people -in general- happy?" 2 - "what makes a country -in essence- socialist?" As tools in looking for answers we can look for statistics, anecdotes or rather reason; arguments. I very much prefer the latter, backed up by the first two if needed. Like I said I know The Netherlands pretty well (both from first-hand experience and a 14 year experience on internet forums), the others unfortunately not so well, but many factors are common in these countries. Switzerland is the big exception; I would not call that enclave of happiness, trading history and direct democratic (within a statist system still the most preferable way) relative paradise within the European "Union" superstate a socialist country. The others yes. 1 - what makes people -in general- (keeping in mind the disclaimer) happy? I would say it is based on a couple of common and a lot of varying factors. Common factors include stability, safety, access to goods and services and health. Varying factors are much harder to quantify and I will try to explain some that make people in these socialist countries generally less happy than in other countries. The common factors are the base of the Maslow pyramid; without safety for yourself and loved ones, without health (or the access to care for it) and without a basic access to goods one would not be so happy. To falsify the argument; it's pretty hard to be hippie happy when starving, badly hurt and in a WWI trench, so to say. The varying factors are much more and more impacting and exactly the ones that the UN statism political subgroup does not want to see as important, because that would spoil their simplistic "Correlation = causation" claim they intend to justify with this "research" (sociology is not an exact science, so also not hard research; it's more a set of opinions with a sauce of selective statistics). See below for more on those. 2 - what makes a country -in essence- socialist? Rather than a pure state system description or a narrow economic one, I would like to focus on just that aspect that these researchers are trying to use: sociology. What, sociologically, so regarding the public opinion and dynamic of a country, makes these 4 out of 5 countries socialist? I would list the following factors from own experience and want to ask the fellow members from or with experience in the other countries (including the fellow dutchies) to add, comment or correct: - the influence of the state on public life in general - how much statism or statist organisations do people come across when living in these countries - the access (or rather lack thereof) to non-statist, private education - afaik there's only 1 private university in Holland, on a population of nearly 17 million (!) - the amount of media-driven statism - the state broadcast channel has a dedicated daily Youth News show where the statism is drilled into the young unspoilt minds from a very early age on - the general feeling of the public with respect to income inequality - many people I know do regard that as one of the most horrible things possible and thus the look at other countries (Western; like US and Canada and the countries in development; like here in Latin America, or Asian growing countries like China, Vietnam, Malaysia, etc.) with an enormous amount of standard disrespect - although politically Holland is behaving like a friend of US politics, the general stance of the people is more like a French anti-US feeling (funnily nobody seems to talk about Canada) which is supported and driven by the media and education system. Personal anecdote: an ex-colleague of mine, an averagely smart, non-leftist, independent and very internationally minded lady congratulated a US American student of mine with the election of Obama in November 2008. When the student said he was sad cause Republican voter, she could not believe her ears and direct, honest and open as we dutchies are she expressed that very clearly. She could not comprehend that someone who was smart, young, not religious was voting Republican; that is for hyperreligious warmongering crazies, she said and I am paraphrasing. She is far from the exception, rather she represents the general opinion of Dutch people - the drilling for equality in general, or rather the distorted Northwest European version of it and the fear of being called discriminatory (discriminating between everything and everyone to me is the essence of good and moral individualism, but I am an exception in that aspect) - which means that everything must hold for everyone. There are some good sides to that(not treating poor or disadvantaged people like animals, like the horrific Indian kaste system is doing), but the people make the mistake to connect that to the statist version of it which is not only flawed but counterproductive. Publicly known anecdotes on (Captain) Sweden are known and spread all over the internet - the automated answer by people, not even (only) the poor, that "the state should take care of the people from crib to grave" (a literal translation of the meme in Dutch). Criticising that or even thinking differently will make you an outcast, much like what the person above said about Sweden; do not fall outside of the "public opinion" or your head gets chopped off. - the conviction that there's no corruption in those countries. And knowing the Dutch arrogance; it is extremely hard to break that brainwashed idea. There's enormous amount of corruption in the countries, yet it's not of the stereotypical Russian or "banana republic" Latin American kind, but far better hidden and most importantly institutionalised. It simply became part of the system, the vast statist moloch. The "best" example is the European Union; the biggest most corrupt system in the world as it holds the biggest money supply (combined; 2nd economy) and the most docile people (~500 million). The "funny" thing is that because of this there's also a huge trust in politicians. Chinese and Brazilian politicians lie, are corrupt and abuse the people, our politicians care for us, although not always like we want it to be, but hey, it's not too bad after all. - well it is even worse; the people from countries with a much more obvious kind of corruption are far more aware of the problem and not so brainwashed like you guys... - the amount of feminism is staggering. It is part of the system everywhere and everytime, with the standard distorted views that Stefan has addressed in detail in many videos. I've been raised by a fierce feminist (my father took care of us for the most part in typical mother things), I've seen it all from very close by. - the size and especially organisation of the welfare state. If you think US American food stamps, Obamacare and housing benefits are bad, you will be shocked by what is played out on the poor in Holland, and I don't even want to know the levels in Scandinavia; they must outgrow that even more. - it makes people extremely dependent on the state, causes poverty traps if they want to work (more hours) cause that makes them lose "benefits" and the institutionalised fear that causes that in the society. It's ridiculous how many subsidies there are and how they all are part of this horrific scamdalous scheme paternalising and feeding of the poor and dependent. It's like a foie gras goose. This is not only directed at the poor; in Holland there's a rather unique system that the government returns tax benefits for home owners. It is a huge part of the annual state budget and because many people have bought a house, they all depend on it, also because the house prices are driven up by it. House prices in Holland are much higher than those in Belgium or Germany for comparable houses. - something Holland is "suffering" from and the Scandinavian countries much less is the collectively drilled self shame about the colonial past. For such a small country we had a lot of territory in the world; South Africa, Indonesia, Suriname ("traded" with the British for New York + 1 dollar ) and smaller colonies in Brazil, Ghana, Sri Lanka and the Caribbean. And the playing of the media and educational system that slavery and colonialism is not something inherent to dirty statism (the truth) but rather the lack of it; more statism prevents us, horrible human beings, from committing those awful deeds. How intelligent people still can fall for this, keeps amazing me. I am not proud of those oxymorons (pun intended). - last but not least and in my opinion one of the root causes for all of this and the main reason that only Stefans approach of "philosophy via the womb" can change this, is the apparent secularity of the people. I can speak for the Dutch situation but I think the Scandinavian countries have the same problem; the belief in God has been replaced by a belief in the State, yet more powerful, in ways less ethical and due to the arrogance of antitheists much harder to change. Moral values in general (smaller countryside religious communities still do exist, but most of the city citizens are atheist and many antitheist) are not transmitted by the Church, yet by the State. In the many forms outlined above and many more. Especially comparing my home country to Colombia and other Latin American countries I visit regularly that is really obvious and causes a volatility in moral; what a politician, law or state media says is considered morally good and much better than "those religious crazies". I was raised by two antitheists and statists, of which 1 feminist and 1 non-masculine follower (my dad) of that. The attacks on religious values were huge, while at the same time defending the statist doctrine. From an early age I opposed a lot to that and thus I was happy to see the video Stefan made on it, which exactly said what I was saying for years (and found with Bakunin afterwards). Now I am a proud full atheist; I do not believe in Church nor State "values" yet in philosophy, reason, ethics, moral and intelligent debate Coming back to the connection of the two questions and the many variables on which basis people can call themselves "happy". People in Holland, and please add for the other morally-socialist states, may present themselves in such simple interviews as happy, but in general they are not. They are suffering from these huge dependencies on the state which is pervasive in all life. They are chained and submitted to the statist doctrine (it really is that) like a devote muslim to Allah. They are cuckolded to the state money as a whore to the pimp. For someone without ambition, will to grow and like the example of the Scandinavian poor professor it is indeed “the perfect solution” which makes people to a certain extent satisfied. But happiness does not equate to satisfaction. What makes people happier, in general, is a good family life (the destruction of the family is far more widespread in Holland than in the US or Canada), respectable and nice people around, less regulations or fines set upon you (the amount of speeding cameras in Norway, Sweden and Holland – Denmark I’ve never been- is insane). Also how the Northwest European countries import the world’s problems from overseas on their 55” flatscreens (and the many discussions about it) makes people unnecessarily unhappy. I decided to stop watching tv 9 years ago and never regretted it. The amount of war propaganda I “had to” swallow from CNN and BBC in 2 days while on holidays when the MH17 event took place made me truly sick. Do people watch this shit every day?? There’s another “happiness” index which is called the “Happy Planet Index”. Again, the same principles hold for this one (directing questions, dubious research, preconceived ideas etc.) but at least the outcome of it coincides much much better with my personal experiences in those countries. The top 10 for 2012 (the most recent one): 1 – Costa Rica 2 – Vietnam 3 – Colombia 4 – Belize 5 – El Salvador 6 – Jamaica 7 – Panama 8 – Nicaragua 9 – Venezuela – that will change in next rating....? 10 – Guatemala I am not calling this rating more true that the UN one, but at least it makes more sense to me. And although there are some very socialist countries in the list (Vietnam?, Nicaragua, Venezuela), I think other factors play a much more important role, such as the family, the satisfaction with life (including poverty), weather and the acceptation of the unfortunately very high crime rates in some of these countries but also the decision not to be led by that. Main point is the way people behave; more respect and patience than in rushed colder climate countries. Ecological footprint is taken into account, but can never explain all the differences between the countries. And number 2 and 3, Vietnam and Colombia are considered heavy growth areas where the economies are booming and development is high, also something which lacks a lot in Europe and makes people happy. The map for the outdated 2006 list looked like this:

"The latest report indicates that up to 50 newborns have died in the hospital in the past month, all of a similar infection." So about 43.6 single moms less. Some readers would be delighted to see the "loss" of those "terrible, terrible, terrible, terrible, terrible leeching parasites". Let's see how many downvotes I get for my cynicism