[em-bee]

“Yes my house is on fire now, but rather than put it out right now, we should research and develop fireproof houses.”

so then what is your suggestion to put out the fire?

to stay with the comparison: there is no water.

if your idea of putting out the fire is getting iphones, then that simply is not an option. and then you are getting back to bullying. giving in to bullys is not an acceptable solution. the iphone will not solve the problem here at all.

bullying needs to be addressed differently. but that is not even something i am worried about. simply the inability to participate is already a problem. and it's going to remain a problem for those that can't get those tech gadgets. so what do you propose that we do about this? run a fundraiser and donate iphones to poor kids? legislate that kids have a right to communicate and are thus entitled to get an iphone? force apple to lower their prices?

here is one that might actually work: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34993823 require apple to make imessage interoperable, or at least force them to support imessage to run on android. it would not make the FOSS advocate in me happy, but that at least would be putting out the fire.

[paulcole]

> giving in to bullys is not an acceptable solution

Of course it is! It’s called picking your battles and sometimes you give in and sometimes you don’t. Everybody loses sometimes.

[RalfWausE]

Nah... perhaps i am just too stubborn, but even my 8 year old self confronted the big bad russian kid that bullied me about a dozent times... got stomped in the ground in 9 of 10 times, but in the end i simply WON. He aknowledged, that i was more trouble than the bit fun bullying me was worth it.

Never "picked my fights" at any time in my life... make me feel treated unfair (or observe someone treated unfair) and i go full psycho mode. Yeah, i got stomped in the ground many times in my life (lost a few teeth, got broken bones, where fired or thrown out of places) but i am just too stubborn and stupid to give in.

[paulcole]

> i got stomped in the ground many times in my life (lost a few teeth, got broken bones, where fired or thrown out of places) but i am just too stubborn and stupid to give in.

Congrats.

[em-bee]

sorry, hard disagree. giving in is never good. it's not picking your battles, but it is letting the others win, and they'll keep doing it because by giving in you give them power over you.

[paulcole]

> it's not picking your battles, but it is letting the others

This is the literal definition of picking your battles.