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Post by
Magician22773
Out of curiosity, Magician, how do you tie this belief in with your beliefs on abortion? You want it to be illegal for a woman to kill a child because all children have the right to life, even if they are not yet born. However, you believe we should kill children in other countries so that their parents will stop fighting a war. Not even their parents, probably, but people who might know their parents or be more distantly related tot hem. Please explain the morality of that.
Strawman....but
I can offer you dozens of other methods other than abortion that can resolve the "problem" of an unwanted pregnancy. As of yet, I cannot see any other method of stopping the radical Islamic intentions of waging war on the US.
Not sure what religion you are part of, I will assume Christianity, so you won't be mad if someone burned Bible? And that was a riot, chaos by civilians, not an organised military action.
Upset, yes. Mad, maybe. Rioting in the streets, killing people...nope. I am not a savage.
Post by
ElhonnaDS
That's the problem- at this point, all sides are in so deep that there's no quick fix. The fix would have been for the US to not have used Asian and African states as dummy war-fronts during the cold war, and not arm and install people who then proceeded to abuse their own people and create resentment. It would have been for the United Nations to pressure ALL sides to honor the peace treaties between the different Middle Eastern States, and not back any one party unconditionally when they violated them. It would have been to take the land and resources to make a Jewish state in WW2 from the country that actually committed the crimes, and not a colony that hadn't been involved in the war. Hell, it would have been for these countries to have been approached as trading partners and not conquered as colonies, stripped of resources and kept from building an infrastructure. All of these things have contributed to where we are now.
I don't know how to fix it fast, but I do know that the only way it will ever end is if these wounds are allowed to heal. On both sides. Hate is a domino effect. If 10 people hate our country, and we kill 100 innocent people to take them out, then 1000 people will be personally affected and will now replace the people we just killed. When they destroyed the towers, they mobilized millions against themselves. We went in and rooted out the vast majority of the people involved. There will always be people left who hate- just like there are people in this country who hate certain groups regardless of years of civil rights legislation and progress.
If we go in with a scorched earth campaign, and kill civilian and combatant alike, then we may cow the people in that country, but all of their allies, all sympathetic cultures, everyone around them will become our enemies. And if we deal with their civilian populations just as brutally, then the domino effect will continue further. Eventually we'll either be defeated, or be forced into war with everyone else.
The ONLY way that this will end is for someone to stop the cycle. Not to refuse to defend themselves, but to refuse to let defense spill over and become revenge. To no allow the actions of a few to incur their wrath against everyone with the same skin color, or religion, or nationality. Because the easiest way for your enemy to stir up hate against you is if it's justified. People who are suffering are desperate and angry. I think you know this personally. People whose families are are risk regardless of whether they fight or not have nothing to lose. People who fear us will fight out of self-defense. The greatest ammunition that our enemies have against us is people's desperation and fear. If we take that away from them, they won't be able to mobilize populations. It will take time, and people will still get hurt while the terrorists are wielding the fear and hate left over from all of the bad blood we've had up until this point. But eventually, if we concentrate our efforts against those who are actually attacking us, and not take this "F*** them all- bomb them" attitude, they are going the become the ones who are unreasonable and unjustifiably violent in their countrymen's eyes.
Also, since you seem to think I have no involvement, I actually have friends who are serving right now. My father went into the city (I'm from a suburb of NY) every day to help clean up, remove rubble, make repairs, etc. I'm not someone who never saw any of this, and is talking out of my rear end.
Post by
Magician22773
As for the Holy book burning...if it was the Bible that had been burned, more then likely you'd be clamoring along with god knows how many other people to go in there and kill them all for daring to burn a 'holy' artifact of your religion, but because it was a book of them silly towel heads, it doesn't count....cause they aren't people eh Magician?
You mean like we did here?
or here
In fact, I can't find an article where Christians took to the streets with AK-47s and started killing over a Bible being burned. Please feel free to provide the links for me.
Post by
Adamsm
Sure you aren't.....you are just a civilized man who believes the US should nuke anyone who disagrees with them back into the Stone Age...maybe the survivors will pick up your religion of choice and be 'good people' after eh?
Post by
557473
This post was from a user who has deleted their account.
Post by
MyTie
Not sure what religion you are part of, I will assume Christianity, so you won't be mad if someone burned Bible? And that was a riot, chaos by civilians, not an organised military action.
Upset, yes. Mad, maybe. Rioting in the streets, killing people...nope. I am not a savage.
I wouldn't even be mad. I'd be mad if someone burned MY Bible. I'd have to go out and buy a new one. But just burning Bibles, no. I'm rational enough to understand that it doesn't change anything.
Post by
134377
This post was from a user who has deleted their account.
Post by
Squishalot
Wow, I've missed a fair bit...
Oh well! Here's a
new article
- apparently, Australia's defence spending isn't sufficient to actually defend us.
Post by
OverZealous
Upset, yes. Mad, maybe. Rioting in the streets, killing people...nope. I am not a savage.
Tell me, if someone walked up to you in the street and told you that they wouldn't have second thoughts about nuking your entire country back to the Stone Age and killing everyone, what would you consider them?
Post by
ElhonnaDS
This
I don't even think it's worth an article. Basically, a company is paying homeless people to carry around devices that boosts wireless internet signals, and people can pay for access to their signal. That's just job- it may not be a great job, but it's a job. They're being paid, there's nothing in there about grueling conditions, or violations of labor, or substandard wages. It's no worse a job than the kids who spin the signs on the corner to attract business.
What's disgusting is the title of this article is "Homeless People Used in an Experiment."
Really? That's a really sad case of journalism right there.
And no, it's not Fox.
Post by
Squishalot
Ok, what's your issue with that particular title? Especially if it is an experiment?
1) Are you concerned that it's portraying the homeless as being nothing more than labrats?
2) Are you concerned that it's portraying the company involved as being heartless?
3) Are you concerned that the media is misrepresenting what the job is involving?
On a side note - the sign spinners are really annoying as a pedestrian. Worse still as a driver, because they're distracting and you still can't see what they're trying to advertise.
Post by
ElhonnaDS
I'm concerned that while technically accurate, it is misleading about the actual content of the article and designed to garner an emotional response based on nothing but shock language. It bothers me when media tries to use tricky and misleading wording in order to get ratings for shock value, because it distorts the public view of what's going on in the world, and I think that's damaging for society. In this case, anyone actually reading the article would most likely not come away thinking the homeless were portrayed as lab rats, or that the company was running any kind of human rights horror show, but people who DON'T read it will assume the worst, and tell 10 friends that they're running all sorts of experiments on homeless people now. I think it's irresponsible journalism.
It's like if I was writing about a poultry farm as an interest piece around the holidays, and my title was "Thousands Killed Only 5 miles from New York." Or, of I was writing a piece about the schools, and after watching a game of dodgeball where they separated the kids into teams based on blue and green armbands, I wrote an article titled "Cherry Grove Public School Separates Students Based on Color."
Not technically incorrect, but designed to make people glancing at the headline think that the situation is much different than it is.
Post by
Squishalot
So (3), in some respects then?
As much as I agree with you, we could fill the RB with the amount of misleading headlines around the world. I'm actually sortof used to it by now - I only use headlines for the purposes of determining if it's worth spending the next 5 seconds of my time to click and read the first paragraph.
On the topic of headlines generally, understanding that you dislike misleading headlines, what is your view on 'witty' ones? Where do you draw the line?
Post by
ElhonnaDS
I agree that there are a lot. This one stuck out, though, because I don't think it was even worth an article except as an excuse to use that title. At best, it would be a small human interest piece- not front page on AOL.
I think there's a difference between witty and misleading, but it's hard to quantify where because language isn't something you can boil down to numbers and percentages like math or science, and it's not a matter of prohibiting vulgar words. I generally judge it on a case by case basis.
For example, where I went to college we had a lot of funding from a specific religious organization that isn't very widely known, and whose "prophet" is still alive and well (or was at the time- I haven't been checking up on him, or anything). We also had a much larger than average sized population of people who belonged to that particular religion.
Even though it was a secular college, we sometimes ran into issues with the religious beliefs of this group (who were still a minority of the students) affecting school policy. There were attempts on censorship on the school newspaper (which I was on the editorial staff for), pressure to cancel date auctions for charity, they closed the on-campus bar (which was probably a good idea, but we were annoyed at the time), etc. So, there was a little bit of friction.
Well, at one point (before my time on the newspaper), the prophet and leader of this religion came to the campus for a visit, and the elevators which we had been complaining about for months because they were breaking all the time, broke down with him inside. The next day the article ran with the title "Savior's Ascent Halted." It was probably in poor taste (like I said, it was before my time), but I don't think it was designed to be misleading. If anything, people would have no idea what they could be talking about without reading the article.
I think a good litmus test is to read the title, and go with what your first assumptions are as to what it's about, in terms of whether or not it's misleading.
Post by
Magician22773
I also think part of the problem is the "we/us" attitude. 9/11 was committed by an international, loosely affiliated group. To attack entire countries in reprisal smacks of Magicians characterization of "towelheads" as "rats". Sounds like "untermenschen" to me. There was an earlier attack on the trade centre. The pentagon didn't launch a shock and awe offensive on the state that guy came from...
First....I did not use the racial slur here....that was Adamsm.
Second, I used rats as an analogy, not a characterization.
Third, the first attack on te trade center was the SAME DAMN GUY behind it. Thanks for making my point even clearer. If we had used shock and awe, the towers would still be standing, 3000+ people would still be alive, and maybe we would not be stuck in a 10+ year quagmire of a war.
Tell me, if someone walked up to you in the street and told you that they wouldn't have second thoughts about nuking your entire country back to the Stone Age and killing everyone, what would you consider them?
For starters, I grew up during the Cold War, so your concept is nothing new to me. We used to have "Fallout Drills" just as often as we had Fire Drills in school. Also, I never mentioned nuking anyone. I said drop a MOAB on them. The MOAB is the Mother Of All Bombs, which is the largest, most powerful conventional bomb in the US military arsenal.
But....I would not be real happy with someone wanting to drop either one, so if I was (a) part of the group of people that were causing then to want to bomb me, I would probably rethink my position, and stop blowing up their soldiers as they drove by, or (b) if I wasn't part of that group, I would do my best to find and turn in those that were. Which, honestly, is what we had hoped would be the outcome of the war to begin with, the Afgans would be happy the Taliban were knowcked out of power, and would use their own security to keep them out.
Post by
ElhonnaDS
Which is again what Al Quaeda was hoping by bombing the world trade center. They hoped that:
1) Those people in our government that WERE interfering in politics in their countries would probably rethink their position, if it caused people to want to bomb them.
2) That those in the US who weren't part of that group would do their best to stop the politicians that were part of that group.
So basically, if you condone this, you think that their methods were justified, their logic was correct and the only way to win is to do what they did. All you're counting on is the fact that we have more bombs and can do much more damage, so we'll win that fight.
It's a paradox really- you are saying the exact same things that they were, for pretty much the same reasons. The more you push this idea, the more you justify their actions. But the only reason you're so angry is that you feel that their actions were unjustified.
Post by
Azazel
Matthew 7:12
"Do to others whatever you would like them to do to you."
Post by
204878
This post was from a user who has deleted their account.
Post by
Azazel
Matthew 7:12
"Do to others whatever you would like them to do to you."
Except in the case of war with foreign nations,
as Ron Paul found out
.
I saw that video some time ago. I just can't grasp the stupidity in it.
Post by
204878
This post was from a user who has deleted their account.
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