No.Originally Posted by Hazir
So, presumably they'd be worse if this book was actually burned?Also, maybe it is a bit superfluous, but do I have to remind you that those violent protests took place without even a leaf of a book being close to fire?
When the sky above us fell
We descended into hell
Into kingdom come
The point of course is that they don't need any actual event to be offended and/or outraged.
Congratulations America
Sorta like the crazy religious in America
People who do mob violence may not be terrorists but they deserve to be killed just like terrorists... sooo I fail to see the issue here.That's a very simplistic view of the situation. Not everyone who decided to take potshots at coalition troops in Iraq or Afghanistan is a terrorist fanatic: there are cases of British soldiers dying in Iraq after being essentially mobbed by locals who were upset about something the British had done, or were perceived to have done.
When something offends others and they become belligerent and start with the violence you *NEVER* back down. You instead add extra fuel to show them that you think of their idiocy. You belittle them, you up the ante, you mock and continue to mock their pathetic rage.
You don't reward bad behavior by giving in.
How many dead American and British soldiers is your tough-guy bullshit worth?
When the sky above us fell
We descended into hell
Into kingdom come
I am curious to know. How many of you actually know or got relations to Muslims? I find it slightly odd to be talking their case while not having engaged them directly. Surely there are enough media coverage, but it's a whole different sensation than meeting Muslims in daily life.
I can account for that, as we got a very extrovert couple renting an apartment below our house. I am often invited there for dinner and snacks, occasionally requested for technical assistance and enjoy sometimes playing table tennis with them. The times we've had religious chats, they've always been upfront about condemning religion as a major influential force in one's life. At that point, I feel inclined to believe that this is a more representative picture of them as a people, largely due to the media never treating ordinary cases, even less so in neutrality.
Tomorrow is like an empty canvas that extends endlessly, what should I sketch on it?
I still consider myself one, and I have muslims in my family and circle of friends. What I do realise is that we are often very Western in our outlook but I don't see why the two wouldn't go together. Typically I feel no sympathy whatsoever for the kind of people that are running amok over the burning of a book on the other side of the planet. In my naughtier moods I call them 'mohammedans' rather than muslims.
My opinion is that some rough treatment of Islam actually is a good thing as most muslims are very little inclined to reflect on their religion. For most people being a good muslim only consists of doing the outwardly visible things without ever thinking about the basis. You can also see it in the deluge of religious edicts that deal with the most mundane of daily things.
Congratulations America
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/as_afghanistan
They hardly need an excuse. I think it's a bit silly to think that one individual act is going to have a direct effect. People who want to kill "occupiers" will always find an excuse to do so.
Hope is the denial of reality
If by tough-guy bull shit you mean not giving into intimidation? Heck we know Al-Queda and extremist Muslims want to bring down the US... we know that our continued support of our allies will cause future deaths of American soldiers. So should we just give up and give in? No we shouldn't. Weather its burning the Koran, supporting Israel or not abiding by Sharia law - you don't given in to their demands. Appeasement NEVER works.
What's your take on the Community Center with Mosque two blocks from Ground Zero?
I could have had class. I could have been a contender.
I could have been somebody. Instead of a bum
Which is what I am
I aim at the stars
But sometimes I hit London
I think that it upsets enough people to make somebody who claims to be building bridges reconsider the decision. Just repeating the matra that they have the right to build the center voids their claim that it is an hand outstretched.
Congratulations America
But that doesn't seem to be Lewk's sentiment which is why I asked him. I'll copy this in the Mosque thread by the way, because I don't want to derail this one with going into it.
I could have had class. I could have been a contender.
I could have been somebody. Instead of a bum
Which is what I am
I aim at the stars
But sometimes I hit London
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-south-asia-11280132
More evidence that you don't actually have to do anything to set these people off.
Hope is the denial of reality
An interesting statement from someone whose entire approach to law enforcement and foreign policy is based entirely on intimidation. You want America's enemies intimidated by it's massive military, you want criminals intimidated out of committing crime by harsh, disproportionate punishments but suddenly it's wrong to give in to intimation?
No, they want to establish a caliphate. The US is only subject of their ire in that it supports regimes they see as standing in the way of the goal, plus because of it's support for Israel (and because the US is a convenient outlet for Arab resentment for their own massive failure as a civilization and culture, and thus a useful recruiting tool, the usefulness of which is in no way diminished by a gesture like this).Heck we know Al-Queda and extremist Muslims want to bring down the US... we know that our continued support of our allies will cause future deaths of American soldiers.
There's a not especially fine line between non-appeasement and provocation. For example, Alfie threatens to hit Barry with a hammer if Alfie doesn't give Barry money - the Alfie is the aggressor, if Alfie gives the money to Barry, that's appeasement (though it might be sensible if Barry has no way to defend himself against Alfie's hammer). But in a different scenario, Barry is saying he's going to spit on Alfie and Alfie threatens to retaliate with his hammer. In this scenario Barry is the aggressor, because he's threatening to spit on Alfie, he's not "appeasing" Barry by not spitting on him, he's just refraining from being a jackass. That fact that it took a threat of force to get him to not do something most decent people wouldn't do anyway just makes him a jackass.So should we just give up and give in? No we shouldn't. Weather its burning the Koran, supporting Israel or not abiding by Sharia law - you don't given in to their demands.
Oh, and here's the other thing. Pastor Fuckwit and his congregation of inbred yokels aren't the one who will suffer any at all consequences from burning a Koran, it'll be soldiers, aid workers and other westerners abroad. So it's not really a very courageous stand, just a meaningless gesture that can only make the job in Afghanistan harder.
So, the Taliban were right to refuse America's demands to hand over bin Laden back in 2001, right? Because appeasement NEVER works? Is Iran right to refuse to give up it's nuclear program, for the same reason?Appeasement NEVER works.
Who exactly are "these people"? Muslim extremists, or Muslim's generally? Do you think there's some kind of hard distinction between them, or do you think maybe that there are degrees of militancy, and degrees of resentment towards the US/the West and that there might be young men out there who resent the US, but not enough to go and blow themselves up on a school bus or shoot up a convoy over it, but that things like this might just push a few over the edge ? Everything I've read from ex-Muslim extremists about how the ended up that way and why they thought to the way they did points to the perception of injustices against Muslims and insults against Islam as being the prime cause of radicalization. It may suit yours and Lewk's childish ideologies to just write off militant islam as an irrational, unexplainable force of nature, but the people who actually have to deal with it - law enforcement, the army, the intelligence services - have to understand why and how these movements and organizations recruit, so they can try and counter the process. Burning the Koran - now that it's become an official Media Event thanks to the ever restrained and responsible mass media - isn't going to help anyone actively fighting against militant Islam, which is why the US gov has been practically begging the guy not to do it.
When the sky above us fell
We descended into hell
Into kingdom come
Fine with me.
Of course its wrong to give in to intimidation from terrorists. Its all about force and the consequences of giving in. If you give in you give the enemy power. Now as a society we do want police to have power to stop criminals. We don't want to give terrorists power.An interesting statement from someone whose entire approach to law enforcement and foreign policy is based entirely on intimidation. You want America's enemies intimidated by it's massive military, you want criminals intimidated out of committing crime by harsh, disproportionate punishments but suddenly it's wrong to give in to intimation?
I'm not saying its a courageous stand. However once the terrorists start making threats and idiots start rioting that would make me want to encourage the burning just to spite the whiners and the further drive home their powerlessness.Oh, and here's the other thing. Pastor Fuckwit and his congregation of inbred yokels aren't the one who will suffer any at all consequences from burning a Koran, it'll be soldiers, aid workers and other westerners abroad. So it's not really a very courageous stand, just a meaningless gesture that can only make the job in Afghanistan harder.
That is the difference between the good guys and the bad guys. No country if they believe they are right should give up their autonomy to another country. Now because the Taliban believed terrorists were OK we had to take them out.So, the Taliban were right to refuse America's demands to hand over bin Laden back in 2001, right? Because appeasement NEVER works? Is Iran right to refuse to give up it's nuclear program, for the same reason?
Ditto with Iran. Of course Iran should refuse another countries attempt to tell them what to do... if they weren't the bad guys. But because they are we can not let those crazies get their hands on nukes. That it is why it is up to us, the superior country to lay down the law and make the bad guys capitulate.
Anyone who's hyper-sensitive about these things. There are always reasons to get pissed off. All that needs to happen is for these people to feel aggrieved, to have some imam who thinks it in their interest to rile up their supporters, and for anything remotely offensive to happen in the West (even when Western governments condemn the events in question, as is the case now).
Hope is the denial of reality
You sound like a right wing American extremist.
Everything's a sound byte with you, isn't it.
Who decides what constitutes terrorism? Your pastor? Your president? And how the Hell do you convince the people being oppressed and intimidated that this is the proper, right kind of intimidation, but gosh darnit let's go fight the wrong kind of intimidation going on next door? By this logic, everyone in prison in the US should riot and try to escape, but you'd probably like the aftermath of that so why am I posting any of this
In the future, the Berlin wall will be a mile high, and made of steel. You too will be made to crawl, to lick children's blood from jackboots. There will be no creativity, only productivity. Instead of love there will be fear and distrust, instead of surrender there will be submission. Contact will be replaced with isolation, and joy with shame. Hope will cease to exist as a concept. The Earth will be covered with steel and concrete. There will be an electronic policeman in every head. Your children will be born in chains, live only to serve, and die in anguish and ignorance.
The universe we observe has precisely the properties we should expect if there is, at bottom, no design, no purpose, no evil, no good, nothing but blind, pitiless indifference.
But they're doing exactly what you are suggesting every country should do, because life isn't a god damn Disney movie, and Khomeini isn't sitting around stroking his beard like some Jaffar wannabe wondering what types of evil he should be up to today. No, in his opinion he's the good guy, and Iran is the underdog being bullied by the United States, and he's trying to do what he thinks is good and right. From his frame of reference, and using your logic, he should focus on building as many nukes and nuclear reactors as possible, while telling us to piss off, just to enrage us.
If everyone applied your logic we'd all be dead long ago.
. . .
And we should kill him before he can finish the nuclear reactors.From his frame of reference, and using your logic, he should focus on building as many nukes and nuclear reactors as possible, while telling us to piss off, just to enrage us.
What about, say, China, or Iran?
Childish. Anyway, they're not powerless while we have people over there trying to do a job, and the lives of those people are still worth something to us. That's why it's important to get that job done and get out as quickly as possible. Afghanistan is a huge pain the ass to anyone with significant numbers of troops doing combat activities there (read: US, UK, Canada), a strategic mill stone, and anything that makes doing that job harder and means we have to be there longer should be avoided, even if that means we can't indulge the childish, petulant, foot stomping self aggrandizement of fuckwit US rural conservatives. Wait till we have no troops actively deployed in the Middle East - you can burn as many Korans as you like then.I'm not saying its a courageous stand. However once the terrorists start making threats and idiots start rioting that would make me want to encourage the burning just to spite the whiners and the further drive home their powerlessness.
And if they are childish, then what does it matter whether or not you give in to their 'intimidation' or not?
Yeah, everyone thinks they're the good guys.That is the difference between the good guys and the bad guys. No country if they believe they are right should give up their autonomy to another country. Now because the Taliban believed terrorists were OK we had to take them out.
This system of thought seems to be based on the idea that bad guys will self-identify as bad guys and back down accordingly. That doesn't seem to be happening, interestingly enough.Ditto with Iran. Of course Iran should refuse another countries attempt to tell them what to do... if they weren't the bad guys. But because they are we can not let those crazies get their hands on nukes. That it is why it is up to us, the superior country to lay down the law and make the bad guys capitulate.
When the sky above us fell
We descended into hell
Into kingdom come
Thats just because we haven't bombed them yet.This system of thought seems to be based on the idea that bad guys will self-identify as bad guys and back down accordingly. That doesn't seem to be happening, interestingly enough.
China already has nukes so the cat is already out of the bag.What about, say, China, or Iran?
Principle. America is a country that prides itself and doing what we want regardless of who gets pissed off. Being awesome lets you do that.And if they are childish, then what does it matter whether or not you give in to their 'intimidation' or not?The day we start giving in to the demands of terrorists is the day we have lost the war on terror.
I doubt that will make them self-identify as the bad guys. But I suppose the point is their thoughts don't matter since they can no longer act on them?
In the future, the Berlin wall will be a mile high, and made of steel. You too will be made to crawl, to lick children's blood from jackboots. There will be no creativity, only productivity. Instead of love there will be fear and distrust, instead of surrender there will be submission. Contact will be replaced with isolation, and joy with shame. Hope will cease to exist as a concept. The Earth will be covered with steel and concrete. There will be an electronic policeman in every head. Your children will be born in chains, live only to serve, and die in anguish and ignorance.
The universe we observe has precisely the properties we should expect if there is, at bottom, no design, no purpose, no evil, no good, nothing but blind, pitiless indifference.
Lewk continues to act as if the world operates like a large Disney movie or Star Wars where there are clearly defined bad guys, who know they're bad/evil, and behave the way they do because they enjoy being evil.
. . .
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