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Democrat Drops MN State House Run After Tweeting 'ISIS Isn't Necessarily Evil' (startribune.com)
An anonymous reader writes: Dan Kimmel, who works for U.S. Bank in its technology and operations section, dropped out of the race for a Minnesota House seat after unleashing a firestorm of criticism. The controversy erupted after Kimmel tweeted, "ISIS isn't necessarily evil. It is made up of people doing what they think is best for their community. Violence is not the answer, though." The tweet rapidly led to harsh criticism on twitter and spread from there. The DFL Party Chair issued a statement saying that Kimmel's "views have no place in our party. On behalf of the Minnesota DFL, I strongly condemn his comments. ..." The House Minority Leader for the DFL called for Kimmel to end his campaign. Kimmel issued a written apology and withdrew from the race.
Well it is made up of the religious righteous.
Well the 1A protects you from the law, not public opinion. He voluntarily resigned.
Another circumstance where the court of public opinion rules political correctness to be a greater virtue than the first amendment.
Because the first amendment is supposed to prevent people from judging political candidates based in part on what they say?
Chopping people's heads off to make a point and to recruit more crazies is not necessarily evil... uh huh. And Aristotle taught us that violence IS the answer. "We make war so that we may live in peace". This "violence is never the answer" is just a meaningless feel good politically correct statement to appease the liberal left. There is violence for the right reasons, and violence for the wrong reasons. We need more violence for the right reasons because war, after all, is a contest of violence. These crazy people must be rooted out and dealt with.
Seven puppies were harmed during the making of this post.
Well no. He was able to speak his mind. Now he's dealing with the consequences of not pandering to morons
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
That was going to go down well? After the other night?
I do not want your cheap brainburning drugs. They are useless for work. And I am a working man today.
Huh? Did he get arrested over this? Or was this just a case of a politician saying something that caused the electorate to decide not to vote for him? I wasn't aware the first amendment was able to protect you from that.
Another person who doesn't understand the first amendment. The first amendment says that the government can't mess with your free expression. They can't put you in jail because you say something they don't like, they can't shut down a news paper for reporting on things they don't want, and so on. It does NOT say that people have to listen to whatever you say, like it, and not respond in any way.
This guy didn't have his rights violated at all: He said something extremely stupid, and people then used their first amendment rights to express that he's a jackass. His political party decided that because he'd pissed off lots of voters, they weren't interested in supporting them. They aren't required to support anyone, the choose the candidates they like. He realized he'd fucked up, and had no chance of wining, and so withdrew.
Nothing improper here. You seem to think that the first amendment should mean speech without consequence. Of course that doesn't work without infringing on the rights of others. If you say something I don't like, I have to be free to say I don't like you for it, or my freedom of speech is being infringed upon. I have to be free to refuse to talk to you, do business with you, etc or my freedom of association is being infringed upon.
What's politically correct about pointing out that ISIS are a bunch of murderous selfish thugs that qualify as 'evil' by almost any definition of the word, and mocking the fuckwit that claimed otherwise?
I understand what he was trying to communicate, but brainwashing children to hate from the time they're born is the epitome of evil. However, yes; they are doing what they think is right. But, that doesn't make it right. Right?
ISIS is completely unnecessarily evil.
"It's such a fine line between stupid and clever" -- David St. Hubbins, Spinal Tap
I think perhaps the real issue here is that he's grossly under educated on a subject and he opened his ignorance hole on the subject. Because (so far) murdering 10,000 non-combatant Men, Women and children for not following Islam is totally just trying to protect their community, right?
Disclaimer: There is an application of sarcasm here. Please read carefully.
the supposedly rabid atheists around here who "bravely" stand up to those "totalitarian oppressor" church-ladies on here have a huge blind spot / sick fetish for the most hard-core Islamic fascim you can think of.
Then they're not really rabid, are they?
As for me, no, I'm like quite a lot of atheists who think Islam is the problem and there's no way to "fix" the religion. Nice attempt at trying to manufacture a hypocrisy where none exists, though.
Those who do not learn from commit history are doomed to regress it.
It seems like he was actually trying to be PC. He reflexively put out a PC-type spin on a tense situation to try to look wise.
And you seem at least as necessarily evil as ISIS is.
How so? Are you seriously comparing silly quotes from historically insignificant people to von Clausewitz and Aristotle? You think blowing up and shooting random people is equivalent to eliminating those who are sworn to do this? Sorry but you are the one who is misguided. If I tie you to a table, knock you out and stick a knife in you, that could be assault with a deadly weapon or surgery. It depends on the reason. THE MEANS DOES NOT JUSTIFY THE END.
Seven puppies were harmed during the making of this post.
How is this news for nerds?
and its only stuff that matters to the people who would have been voting for him
Honestly all this does is serve to prove that the people running for any office are some of the absolute dumbest people in our society. Because smart people don't want to have anything at all to do with it because you have to deal with the general population and that is the largest collection of dumb there is.
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
You could almost say this of Daesh even a few years ago, when they kept their antics mostly confined to their own territory. You'd still be wrong, because that argument requires you to ignore both the sheer enormity of the things they do to inside that territory and the blatant expansionism they practiced and continue to practice, but the argument could at least be considered semi-reasonable.
But that was before they started going after their own refugees: people who were outright running away. Quarrel or no, they posed no threat; indeed, posing no threat was, for many, a driving factor in their decision to leave. And if Daesh are willing to do this to refugees, then the only even half-baked argument left for calling them anything but pure evil is gone now. It is time to accept that we are dealing with the Nazis of our time, and treat them accordingly.
I guess I've heard shit like that before. From my German-side Grandpa.
I think there is a distinct area in which people and their views can be placed that is undoubtedly evil. Holding abysmally absurd theo-fascist views, chopping peoples heads of whilst chanting praises to your utlitmate-dictator-in-the-heavens god, preaching and trying to practice genocide, believing in truth by revelation rather than insight and forcing that truth to others at gunpoint, etc. pretty much puts people smack center of the 'evil' designation in my book. And in most other peoples book aswell, I would presume.
Give us an effin' break - please.
We suffer more in our imagination than in reality. - Seneca
"manufacture a hypocrisy where none exists" Really? Are you deliberately blind?
How about... a Gay Couple that raises hell when a Christian refused to make a cake supporting gay weddings... lawsuits... riots on the internet...
And then the Islamic Bakery that did the same thing with no repercussions what so ever?
Same request: Make me a cake. Same response: It goes against my religion. Completely different response: Christians "flayed alive". Islamic shop completely ignored.
Now... apply that to treatment of gays and women. Gays thrown off of buildings and women treated as second class citizens. Yet the evil that needs to be stopped is Christians and the religion that needs to be respected is Islam...
You are deliberately dense and ignorant if you don't see the hypocrisy.
Since when does the law apply in airports?
In the real world, "evil" people almost always think they do what they think is best for something.
If ISIS cannot be considered evil, then true evil only exist in fiction, and even then, it's only when writers don't put much thought into their villains.
Maybe that's actually the point : there is a bit of good in all of us, even the worst.
This first amendment gives him the right to tweet whatever he wants. It gives the rest of us the right to say we don't approve! The right to vote gives the rest of us the right to make it clear to him he might as well not bother standing for election.
Repeal the 17th Amendment TODAY! Also Please Read http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/right-to-read.html
Well the important thing is you've found someone to hate other than just ISIS.
I like how you make up a bunch of random stupid shit that's demonstrably not true, get really angry about it and then start hating on a whole bunch of people based on your weird fantasy. Sadly it appears this fantasy is not unique to you as you've been modded insightful.
Atheists are not exactly known for being in favour of violence and murder in the name of some god, you know.
SJW n. One who posts facts.
The first amendment means government can't pass a law prohibiting free speech. They didn't in this case.
That does not imply that if you say stupid things which cause outrage that you have no consequences from that.
So, you are free to say any stupid shit you want to. You are not free from the public telling you that what you said was stupid.
Free speech is not freedom from consequences and the reaction of other people, and never has been. You are legally free to say any stupid crap which you choose. And others are free to decide you're a fucking idiot.
People might even defend your right to say it, but the results of you saying it are all your own.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
You know, sooner or later people might get it through their heads that using Twitter is a strategy for fools.
You have two choices with Twitter: either you tweet some meaningless groupthink post, guaranteed not to offend anyone, OR you post something that offends someone, somewhere. And if you offend enough people, suddenly your life and career are in tatters when the Internet mob turns on you.
You'd think that enough peoples' lives have been ruined by thoughtless tweets that the lesson would have been learned. But it seems there's always another fool just waiting to make an example of him/herself.
Thank you for defending us against that straw man. Delightful of you to drag your personal conflicts into this discussion. No one is claiming that ISIS are not bad people, the point is that we should not become bad people ourselves in response. Our brains are wired to be irrational towards people we perceive as enemies (as your post demonstrates ably). We dehumanize them, we exaggerate their bad qualities, ignore the good, and so justify any malicious act against them.
In terms of human suffering, Paris was a drop in the ocean, and probably outweighed by deaths in Syria both in recent history and as a result of these retaliatory airstrikes. Interventionist policies are increasingly difficult to justify, and bombing hasn't seemed to do anything except provide welfare for munitions manufacturers.
To a rational person, this is a complicated situation. For the hawkish politician it's a great time for a power grab -- for some reason there's a tendency to want to fight fascism with fascism. By surrendering your reason to violent instinct you aid those who wish to control you, and work to spread suffering -- no matter who the villains-of-the-day happen to be. It's also not particularly Christ-like.
Those who advocate genocide deserve every protection afforded by law, and none afforded by common human decency.
Another circumstance where the court of public opinion rules political correctness to be a greater virtue than the first amendment.
I think you don't understand how the first amendment works. Allow me to clarify:
1) The first amendment protects you from the government, not from private citizens or companies in most cases so long as they don't violate the law in response to your speech.
2) The first amendment does not protect you against all possible consequences of saying something stupid or offensive.
3) People have as much right to say they don't like what you say as you have to say it. You have the right to be offensive but it might cost you your job if you exercise that right. You have a right to remain silent too but that seems to be exercised less often.
4) This was a private citizen exercising his right to free speech (however stupid it might be) and others exercising theirs. All peacefully. That's how it's supposed to work.
Actually, it may be even more than that. According to the Atlantic article What ISIS Really Wants, the goal of ISIS is to bring about the apocalypse and thus end the world. So maybe, they want to be evil, with a capital E. Because, I don't think you can get much more evil than wanting to kill everybody everywhere.
Fanatically anti-fanatical
Oh, the pompous Democratic assholes — the above-quoted view was perfectly in line with the party's (including government officials) thinking until last Friday.
Maybe, not all of the party, but hardly a far fringe — the man was endorsed by the same Star Tribune, which is now reporting on his dropping out. The whole idea, that evil is relative (unless it is Hitler or Bush) and that we don't really have enemies in the world — only friends, whose grievances we haven't accommodated just yet — is firmly planted in the Democratic party today. Mr. Kimmel's attempts to stop "othering" ISIS were perfectly in accordance with the opinions prevailing on the Left. The Left, which temporarily retreated into their "Healing Zone", but who will emerge from there with counter-arguments on how ISIS are different from Islam, and how murdering infidels is really "unislamic" — pretending to believe, they know the opinions and customs of ISIS' target-audience better than ISIS knows them themselves.
No, Mr. Kimmel's views do have a nice and comfortable place in the Democratic party — complete with a "Safe Zone" too — it was just silly of him to underline that point at such inopportune time. Should've waited a month or two...
In Soviet Washington the swamp drains you.
It is so easy to just lump people into a group called Evil. Then we need not think of the consequences. Do people stop to think what might drive other people to do "evil" acts? Consider, what might you do if a foreign country dropped a bomb on your land and killed your relatives? I bet you'd be inclined toward doing some "evil" things too. I think it is very hard for Americans to understand that the Iraq war and Syria civil war has resulted in hundreds of thousands dead and what that can do to people. While many people hold on to a shred of humanity, usually b/c they still have children to protect, others look for someone to blame and they look for groups to join to do something about it. Until we actually start discussing these nuances instead of just lumping everything into "Evil", these conflicts will never end, but simply continue in a cycle of endless escalation.
Not exactly that clear cut.
The government also makes laws that states you could be fired from your job for expressing an opinion, which just a proxy, much like the US government not being legal in snooping into your affairs without a warrant, but is perfectly cromulent to authorize a foreign government to do the snooping. Doubt you would be as sympathetic if you were fired for expressing your love of kittens. After all, it was just consequences of your speech. The government wasn't involved at all, except making it a legal argument for dismissal.
And all this ignores the spirit of the 1st Amendment, which is to foster debate, free from intrusion. Your line logic lead to free speech zones, which yes; you are free to say what ever you want (just like you could in prison), but far away from it being meaningful.
Well duh, you're only supposed to judge them by how much money they can scrounge together.
If we judged politicians by their words or actions, both Trump and Hillary would be in jail (and poor Bernie would be sedated in a looneybin somewhere).
Your own quote does not back you up. Analogies are not equivalencies. Furthermore, this particular analogy is apt.
We really live in a more complicated world than that; terms like "evil" have led us into really awful and short-sighted situations before. Perhaps this guy could have phrased his tweet a little more elegantly, but he does have a point that civilized discourse should not reduce itself to calling people - or organizations of people - "evil" (although twitter doesn't help that).
Damn_registrars has no butt-hole. Damn_registrars has no use for a butt-hole.
The Golden Rule has been observed in nature. It is natural. It is the basis of any sensible law and regulation. To not follow it is evil.
You are an idiot. Nobody's speech was restricted in any way. Was he prevented from making his stupid statement? Nope, and many people heard it. Was he guy arrested? Nope. Did he just 'disppear'? Nope. He used his right of free speech to say something that a majority of people disagree with. Many of those people used their right of free speech to say they disagreed with him (they do have this right, don't they?) Another group of people used their right of association to decide they didn't want to be associated with him, and they also used their right of free speech to state that. Seems like absolutely nobody had their rights infringed.
raging & foaming at the mouth is bad, be it ISIS, be it American religious nutjobs
Because, in your feeble mind, they are equivalent?
In other news, a politician has an opinion and is chastised for it. Let's not let these people think too hard lest they hurt themselves in the process. Just sit down and take your spoonfed soundbites like a good doggy. Here comes the plane! Prrrrrwooooooooeeeeeee!
Then you cling to the 4th, and 5th amendments, among others even.
Of course none of these protect you from being a fool.
deleting the extra space after periods so i can stay relevant, yeah.
His point could make for interesting academic discussion but in a political context in the U.S. it was moronic.
Perhaps a showcase example of being so smart you look stupid.
And we are going to argue "what is evil"??! I find that utterly fascinating!
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
I think that his point is that if someone is "evil", it carries a connotation that, there is an agreed upon morality, and they are doing something that is not only wrong, but that they agree is wrong, and that the simple wrongness of the act is in large part the motivation behind it.
This is opposed to differences in the accepted morality arising from cultural norms or otherwise.
This has a lot of practical considerations with how to deal with the person. If there are mere cultural differences, it may be possible to change a person's views on the matter through education and cultural conquest generally. Views on right and wrong are somewhat malleable and so pushing hard on westernized education, commerce, etc. can at least HELP alleviate a situation. However, if they already agree upon our system of values, and perform acts purely because they are wrong, education seems pointless, because they are already educated in your way of thinking, and wholesale destruction becomes the only obvious answer.
I'm not really acquainted with any ISIS members, so I'm not sure if they are truly evil or their actions are simply driven by a different world-view, but I like to hope that we can settle the situation through education and open communication (which is what, I think, this congressman was hoping as well); because the other option will be death and destruction, and lots of it.
I didn't read the quote as love for ISIS, just trying to acknowledge that those involved in the group are taking what they believe to be the best course of action, and then advocating peace. If the mob rule vilifies another group and calling them evil is the only acceptable answer this just foments more conflict since there is now an enemy and demands for confrontation and an escalation of the violence.
Any one who is advocating peace IMO should not be ridiculed and shamed. We also don't want to drop all our defenses and let them come in and take over because they are armed and we are disarmed. Conflict may be inevitable with an angry armed opponent at this point. Is anyone trying to follow the money? Who is supplying and training these folks? Who is providing them with documentation? The USA has supposedly been engaging them for over a year, and yet there's been little progress to show for it. Russia steps in and over a weekend the organization is reportedly in chaos and falling apart. WTF?!
in.news.yahoo.com/britain-vienna-talks-draw-syria-144131896.html
How 'bout the institutions that finance them? Nobody wants to talk about that, because we would discover something that nobody wants to know, much less accept. Hasn't anybody noticed that Al Qaeda is now an "ally" (again) in this little spat?
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
Third: I cringe watching how those stupid terrorists are killing our open society "by proxy" -- the dirty job being taken up by all you right-wing nutjobs. Go get a life. Go to Syria or Irak and enjoy your phantasies.
The right wingers just want to go kill the stupid terrorists. It's the left wingers who won't "let a good disaster to go to waste" (taking away rights) and actively seek such disasters when no options present themselves (growing ISIS via inaction).
He's not wrong. Christianity (and other religions) seek to turn the meaning of Bad to Evil, because their initial survival was predicated on demonizing their enemies. ISIS commits some terrible, immoral actions -- blowing up innocent civilians for political gain -- but their goal is first to create a nation-state, before world domination. Birds of a feather will flock together.
Remember kids, if you're not paying for the service, YOU ARE THE PRODUCT THAT IS BEING SOLD.
"I have to be free to refuse to ... do business with you ..."
Yeah we lost that one already. It was for a good cause, civil rights in the 60s and all, but we gave that right up long ago.
But interestingly enough, the supposedly rabid atheists around here who "bravely" stand up to those "totalitarian oppressor" church-ladies on here have a huge blind spot / sick fetish for the most hard-core Islamic fascim you can think of.
You are deeply ignorant of atheism and atheists. You might want to shut up before you embarrass yourself.
Some Christian doesn't want to bake a cake for a gay wedding? Government funded execution squad, no trial.
Too late.
Of course, there are two cases that I know of that kind-of-sort-of fit your description. In one, the case is ongoing although the cake maker has twice lost his case that refusing to sell a wedding cake to a gay couple isn't discriminatory, and in the other case the bakers were fined a large amount of money for publishing the home address of the complainants, recklessly publicising it, and inciting a campaign of harassment against the couple. In both cases, the defendants were tried and found guilty of violating the law.
ISIS executes gays by throwing them off of buildings? How dare you be intolerant of other people's culture!
So you're going to stand with Infowars and claim that not enough of the people you hate denounced ISIS for executing gays so they must be explicitly supporting ISIS even though the people you hate did denounce ISIS, but not enough for you to believe that they actually meant it? Or can you find a single example of someone saying that we should tolerate ISIS's murderous rampages?
I see no reasons to be more irate with ISIS when they are killing gays, then when they are killing Christians, or Muslims who don't believe the "correct" interpretation of the Koran, or doctors, or professors or really anyone else. They are a bloody-minded, murderous, bunch of religious fanatics that's not news. The news that religious fanatics who hate gays have killed 0.04% more people in their own territory for their invented reasons, just isn't spectacular enough to get people up in arms any more. Frankly, ISIS's murderous thugs killing anonymous gay people is just sad, depressing news, it's not shocking any more because the body count is already so very high.
Fanatically anti-fanatical
Do you know what "radical" is? That's the extremists who believe it's their duty to kill the infidels. Of course we're at war with them. What the heck do you think we're doing in Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria, etc?
If the mob rule vilifies another group and calling them evil is the only acceptable answer this just foments more conflict
How is someone *not* evil when they regularly saw off peoples' heads?
Any one who is advocating peace IMO should not be ridiculed and shamed.
You want to try to live peacefully with a group that burns people at the stake and beheads them regularly? If you want to advocate strict separatism and quarantining because getting involved in that region is unlikely to work out well, that's a reasonable-sounding position, but saying "let's make peace" with people this barbaric is just dumb.
Is anyone trying to follow the money? Who is supplying and training these folks? Who is providing them with documentation? The USA has supposedly been engaging them for over a year, and yet there's been little progress to show for it. Russia steps in and over a weekend the organization is reportedly in chaos and falling apart. WTF?!
Now this does raise a good point, though I have to call for "citation needed" on the bit about ISIS being "in chaos and falling apart"; I haven't read that at all. All Russia's done is dropped some bombs, and even then it looks like they bombed the wrong guys, they bombed some other anti-Assad groups, not ISIS (since their only real concern is propping up Assad). The French probably did more with their small bombing of Raqa in the last day or two. But that again makes me wonder: if we knew where these training camps and recruitment centers were, why weren't they bombed long ago? Honestly this whole thing kinda stinks: this enemy has no aircraft, no real AAA that I've heard of, just a bunch of Toyota trucks and AK47s and probably some other infantry equipment. How hard can it be to weaken them to the point where the Kurds can completely eliminate them on the ground?
Saudi Arabia beheads people almost every month.
And many of the state governments in the US routinely execute people (some innocent) plus the federal government kills innocent people all the time with drone and missile strikes while trying to assassinate people they deem terrorists. You really want to compare the human rights and execution record of the US with Saudi Arabia? It won't be pretty on either side of the ledger.
When asked about it, the State Department calls it unfortunate, not batshit crazy evil.
Because of practical Realpolitik reasons. Not as if the US government has its hands clean. If it was politically expedient for them to call out Saudi Arabia I'm sure they would even if that made them (more) hypcritical.
Christianity's early survival was predicated on accepting martyrdom as a death of honor and grace rather than shame. Hence why 10 of the original 12 apostles were crucified.
Actually, he said something decidedly un-PC. To be PC, he would shoot the leader of ISIS in Vikings Stadium, then go to the concession stand and order a beer.
Bonus points if the other guy is wearing a Packers uniform. Or the Giants.
Democrats of all people should know that morals and ethics are relative, as relativism is a fundamental tenet of leftism.
Democrats and liberals have an obligation to stand behind the tweet, because it was absolutely in line with democrat and liberal ideals.
Flawed logic. There is no reason for people anyone to act like we were dropped on our head multiple times as a baby and lack any common sense or perspective, and have to defend a tweet that has to hide behind extreme political correctness.
"Transparent" is a shit show that trades on every stereotype going. A man in drag is NOT a transsexual.
Aside from most of your comment being incoherent I'd like to hear your remedy. Is some authority supposed to force the Minnesota Democratic party to support this candidate? Should his oppressors be punished in some way for criminally criticizing him?
I'd really like to know what you think should happen to correct this injustice.
Maw! Fire up the karma burner!
We keep losing rights to good causes. Pretty soon we'll be out of rights.
poor Bernie would be sedated in a looneybin somewhere
Why is that?
Atheists are not exactly known for being in favour of violence and murder in the name of some god, you know.
No, but there has been a long history of atheist leaders using peoples belief in "some god" as an excuse to kill them en masse.
People have a tendency to see any competing ideology as opposition that must be eliminated, but the degree people are willing to go to eliminate that opposing belief varies greatly. In terms religions (which includes Atheism) it can be any other religion or even other factions of your own religion and they can try to eliminate it through proselytizing or just trying to lead by example or, as is the case of ISIS, just kill off anyone who disagrees with them.
Of course that's just my opinion...... you could be wrong!
Just a thought about all this evil nonsense. Imho only misguided people fall into this trap of believing that his opponent is evil. What humanity should have learned through infinite wars and numerous religious superstitions, is that man is capable of doing anything if he believes he is in his right to do so. And how easily a man can be misled into believing he is right. And please spare me this my God holier than thine religious chant, read your history books and be silent.
Well said.
No, but there has been a long history of atheist leaders using peoples belief in "some god" as an excuse to kill them en masse.
If you're thinking of Mao and Stalin, then you're essentially wrong. If you were an atheist who didn't worship the cult of Mao you'd be just as fucked as a during the cultural revolution.
People have a tendency to see any competing ideology as opposition that must be eliminated
You're confusing atheism which is not an ideology with leadership cults which are.
In terms religions (which includes Atheism)
Atheism is a religion in the same way that not collecting stamps is a hobby.
SJW n. One who posts facts.
The government also makes laws that states you could be fired from your job for expressing an opinion,...
True, but as the OP pointed out freedom of speech is not freedom of consequences. The government is not guilty of prior restraint, which would impinge on your free speech rights. Rights don't exist in a vacuum either, and it is necessary to balance one right against the other as well. For example, you may feel that the 1st give you the right to stand in front of someone's house and yell at them with a bullhorn at 2 AM but I would argue that stopping you from doing that after you start is a reasonable action by government and not a violation of your 1st amendment rights.
I'm a consultant - I convert gibberish into cash-flow.
First of all: this one quote ain't from Aristotle. It's from some Roman guy[1] who is as famous with you as my uncle Bob.
The quote is from the book Nicomachean Ethics, written by Aristotle in 350 BC, Long before the Roman empire was founded. Therefore, fool, I will not argue with you anymore because doing so is vain.
Seven puppies were harmed during the making of this post.
There is a big difference between waging war against military targets, making a great effort to target them intelligently to minimize civilian casualties...and deliberately targeting civilians.
Not if you're a civilian casualty. How are they even supposed to distinguish between a military accident and a deliberate act of violence? Do we issue an apology afterwards? Pay reparations? Try, convict, and sentence the offenders? Or do we call every military-age male a combatant in order to pretend our bombing campaign is just and legal?
Considering every military-age male to be a combatant gives them two choices: become a refugee, or take up arms in self-defense. Not only are you not holding anyone accountable (to anything more consequential than your bad opinion), you don't even know what's being done. Our hands are clean because we defined "dirty" in such a way that it doesn't apply to us.
Those who advocate genocide deserve every protection afforded by law, and none afforded by common human decency.
There are North Dakota Democratic-Nonpartisan League Party and Democratic farmers party in minnesota. This guy belongs to the later. They are far more like the old style dems from the 40-60s, rather than the losers of today. Of course, this guy still needs to go.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
Advocating politics that killed a hundred million last century.
And not having any way to pay for it.
300 million murdered in the 20th century by the atheists.
But your facts miss this #1 most violent religion: Atheism.
I see what you're trying to do, but it doesn't work. He clearly called out "radical Islam", not Islam as a whole. There may be non-violent people that identify with the IS, that would be the second quote. There is absolutely nothing wrong with saying we're at war with the radicals, he's right. Shame on you for trying to distort his speech.
All I can say is wow. I came back to check on responses to my comment four hours after posting it, and it looks like only the parent seems to have understood my meaning.
I know very well that the 1st Amendment is a limitation on actions the government may take against the people. My point had nothing to do with government action against an individual. My point is that we as a society would rather lynch anyone who dares to rationalize the actions of these bombers before we ever will find the courage to consider it ourselves.
In our rush to defend the victims of this tragedy and protect them from further harm, we are quick to decry any-and-all rhetoric that fails to condemn those responsible as anything less than psycopathic, sadistic, demented, and/or depraved. So, when someone has the courage to merely suggest that these individuals may be acting out in a manner that is, dare I say, human, we must as a society silence that voice. We will not allow ourselves to, as the parent put it, "foster debate, free from intrusion". These individuals who attacked civilians in Paris were/are monsters, we must forever see them that way, and we must treat them that way.
But it's that exact point-of-view that got us into a 10-year war in Iraq. It's that exact point-of-view that is keeping us in a 14-year war in Afghanistan. We as westerners do not understand the Arab mindset. (A decade ago, I lived for a year in Cairo, Egypt, myself. I'm not a Muslim, but it did certainly give me perspective on this subject.) The more we seek revenge / justice / reparations / etc. from these individuals, the more it will inflame them. We're pouring water on a gas fire, and it's only spreading further and further. If we want to ever succeed in solving this Crisis in the middle east, we -must- see these terrorists not as savages, but as humans. We need to understand what drives them to such ends, and cure the sickness rather than treat the symptoms.
And when a politician of all people has the courage to suggest as such, we cannot treat him or her as a monster either.
While it's a good thing to take a moment and thoughtfully consider where ISIS may be coming from ("know your enemy" is may be distasteful for the impatient, but it's the smart way to go), once you get past all the smoke and mirrors of all the religious and political propaganda, ISIS is a blown up street gang making their way by the classic trades of evil: murder, rape, pillaging, and extortion. That's how they survive. That's how the organization sustains itself, and the unknown fatcats who run it.
You think ISIS takes territory in Iraq over some holy mission? The Caliphate? Bullshit! They take territory because they gotta eat and buy more ammunition, or else the whole thing will start coming apart leaving the leaders with no protection. They rape and blow up ancient artifacts to keep themselves occupied during down time, lest some of the new recruits leave or start fighting each other or seek out revenge against the bosses who beat on them.
Every crime organization has some narrative for excusing the fact that they have to steal or extort everything they have, why they can't lead ordinary lives. ISIS is a glorified street gang, and once their completely invested in rape-murder-pillage-extortion for making their way in the world such that there's no turning back, you've got evil.
Again, it's good to think about them and figure their point of view, but recall the President in Independent Day. Even after DC, New York, and god knows where else had been blown up by the aliens, he was still like "they're not evil" until he accidentally mind-melded with one of them. Then, that idiot finally got what everyone in the audience already knew. Don't be like him. You don't have to mind-meld with a guy who makes a living strapping bombs onto kids to know he's an evil fuck, no matter what religious verses come out of his mouth.
Take it easy, Charlie, I've got an Angle...
We must be willing to accept any and every possible examination of the truth.
Comments like yours are what's making our country more difficult to live in. People are too afraid to share ideas, because they fear being judged for them.
In fact, the very essence of your comment is a quintessential illustration of the problem I was trying to highlight. Let's not debate the idea. Let's judge the voice.
Atheism is a religion in the same way that not collecting stamps is a hobby.
Not quite. Saying "there is no God" is just as much a religion as saying there is. It is a statement of faith concerning things unseen.
Now, if the "not stamp collector" were to deny the existence of stamps, you'd have a good analogy. But people who do not collect stamps rarely deny their existence, they only see no purpose in collecting them. Someone who admits there is a God but sees no purpose in "collecting" Him is not an atheist -- by definition.
You're trying to nitpick over something that's not there in his speech or my comments. Fine, drop the "identify with Nazis".. people of a party identify themselves as such, do they not?
Yes, I left off "Islam". There's only one group of radicals in this discussion. Yes, radical Islam. I dropped Islam because I thought it was pretty clear who we were discussing. My bad assuming you could follow a few lines of text without forgetting the context.
The clash of civilizations is between the supposed "Islamic State" versus the rest of the civilized world. That civilized world includes the billion and a half muslims who don't agree with the Islamic State's interpretation of their religion. To suggest that Rubio is saying anything else is absurd.
This is why politics suck so badly. I don't believe for one second that you really believe that Rubio was calling out an entire religion. You're looking for ways to pervert what he said in order to fit your agenda. I'm going to guess that's why you're posting as an anonymous coward as well. You don't want anyone to be able to connect these comments to you.
You know, sooner or later people might get it through their heads that using Twitter is a strategy for fools.
You have two choices with Twitter: either you tweet some meaningless groupthink post, guaranteed not to offend anyone, OR you post something that offends someone, somewhere. And if you offend enough people, suddenly your life and career are in tatters when the Internet mob turns on you.
You'd think that enough peoples' lives have been ruined by thoughtless tweets that the lesson would have been learned. But it seems there's always another fool just waiting to make an example of him/herself.
Ah, but there is a third-way: you tweet something that's considered to be cool and sparks a firestorm of debate and interest and sells a product. Corporation rewards you in some small but essentially meaningless way, hoping you'll keep promoting.
See, that's the real goal - as an advertising channel, Twitter can collect rents from their real customers who own large brand names! Free tchotchkes for all! Who would't want in on that?
Make sure everyone's vote counts: Verified Voting
hell, the bible advocates stoning for lots of things!
what was your point again?
This really illustrates what a problematic concept "evil" is. What does it mean? How do you determine what is evil?
He's entirely right that ISIS is doing what they believe to be right. They're fighting a holy war, and they're on the side of God. How do you categorize a person who believes "goodness" consists of doing something you believe is entirely evil? Do you judge them based on their actions? Their beliefs? The consistency between the two? Which is worse, a person who does terrible things because they think that's right, or a person who wants to be evil but accidentally ends up accomplishing good things instead? If someone sincerely believes that killing innocents is the right thing to do, is it better for them to act on their beliefs, or ignore their beliefs out of fear of taking risks? What's the "right" way to judge them?
Answer: you don't judge them. ISIS is dangerous. They're doing a huge amount of harm. Therefore, we need to stop them. But don't pretend that you have any right to cast moral judgements on any other human being.
"I'm too busy to research this and form an educated opinion, but I do have time to tell everyone my uninformed opinion."
The only thing separating the two is that the genuinely ethical people are able to keep the right wing nut cases around here under a little bit of control.
you just think you can insult everyone's intelligence by pretending otherwise with some no true scottsman thrown in for further shame fullness.
to pretend that other people are bad for doing the exact same things that me any my friends do.
It takes two seconds to create an account. That's why I say I'm pretty sure that you're trying to make something out of nothing. Words mean nothing. You won't even create an account on a free site where people would be able to tie your inane comments together. Your inaction there speaks volumes to me. Are you posting from a country that would behead you for quibbling on a tech discussion site, or are you carpet bombing trying to stir up a debate where there is none?
you can have two different bad things, with one being worse than the other.
but they are both bad.
get it now?
All this talk about evil means there is some definition of evil that has at its foundation the belief in right and wrong. We all have our definitions, but in general we agree for the most part what is right and what is wrong. We tend save the term evil for the worst and most blatant wrongdoing though you can argue that subtle wrong doing and wrong thinking can be evil too. No one is free from wrongdoing. The problem is we all have this tendency to be selfish and self-centered and that makes our wrong doing easy to do and easy to rationalize our wrong doing. The problem with evil is right in front of us or in us. We are the problem. We all hurt people. We are broken and messed up, because we do not always live up to the ideals of right living that we aspire to. People through out the ages have tried fix ourselves and produce a utopian society of well behaved people. They all have failed. Some have had some good ideas, but I believe they fail to get to the root of the problem, our selfishness. We are able to dream of utopia, where everyone is well behaved and loved, and everyone works for the common good, but we are not able to achieve that. Our self-centeredness is the real evil.
Yes but not in the false dichotomy you're presenting. We want them to stop their behavior and then live peacefully with them. However unrealistic this goal is, why is it not laudable to at least want that as a preference even if it is unlikely? If we can get them to stop, maybe prosecute the guilty, and then work to establish human rights in the region why would you NOT want to live at peace with them?
Because it's completely impossible. They don't want peace. They're a doomsday cult; their goal is to either establish a Caliphate (which means control and domination by them), or to bring about the end of the world as prophesied in the Quran. Peace is the last thing they want, unless perhaps you'd like to just voluntarily give them control over everything and just do whatever they want.
Your statement can only be taken to conclude that you want continued conflict with them.
You have two choices: either do whatever you can to eradicate them, OR pursue a strict policy of containment. There can be no peace with a group like that (unless you consider containment and isolation "peace").
If that is what your intent is then you're an idiot.
If you think you can have peaceful relations with ISIS, you're a complete moron.
There is no way to "kill them all" in a realistic manner.
Sure there is: you flatten all their cities with fuel-air bombs. Of course, no one wants to do that because it's genocide, so we're stuck with the current state of affairs. However, if ISIS goes too far, I do think that's *exactly* what's going to happen. My money's on Russia: they're going to piss off Russia somehow in a big way, and Russia is simply going to drop MOABs on them, civilian casualties be damned. What happens after that I really don't know. People like you say it'll drive recruitment, but it's pretty hard to recruit people when your entire organization has been obliterated, so at best it could end up creating a new version of ISIS, which could be sorta like how attacking Al Qaeda, plus the power vacuum in Iraq, ended up spawning ISIS.
So, yes, we want to live peacefully with these people so long as they stop their current behavior
They're not going to stop. That's the problem. That's like asking all Americans to willingly join Wahhabist Islam. You're dealing with a suicidal death cult that's reached a very large scale, and you're not going to convince them to abandon their ideology.
The government also makes laws that states you could be fired from your job for expressing an opinion
You are not forced to have such a job. That's the difference. If you want to go work for the government, you have to agree to be careful about the circumstances in which you say certain things. Why? Because YOU ARE NOW PART OF THE GOVERNMENT. And that changes your relationship with the rest of society. If you don't like being put in that position of having to be thoughtful about the sounds that come out of your mouth, just don't look to be part of the government. Get a job where the boss really doesn't care what you say or when or where you say it. How is this complicated?
Your line logic lead to free speech zones, which yes; you are free to say what ever you want (just like you could in prison), but far away from it being meaningful.
Ah, that old canard. Are you just pretending to not understand that topic, or have you simply never thought through what it's all about?
... but your objection to control over that space would mean that all they have to do is show up in bigger numbers and shout down your assembly. Beautiful, right? Just how you'd like things to go on? Do you really want a bunch of Occupy idiots sitting in the middle of the street stopping your planned, permitted, and carefully-made-safe event? Or the KKK? Or the local chapter of Islamic Jihad? Or Greenpeace, who will do anything for camera time?
... and enjoy the same protections for YOUR free speech that they're enjoying by not allowing you to shout them down if you don't like them.
Let's say your favored political party just won an election. You, as a caucus of legislators and as a group of people who have assembled under the protections of the first amendment, make the well understood arrangements to host a parade down Pennsylvania Avenue, to celebrate your candidate's inauguration. Traffic has to be controlled, police have to be around to deal with those who might want to hurt attendees, etc.
Now say that your political opponents would rather that your peaceful assembly is not allowed to go on, just because they don't like you and what you stand for. They didn't make arrangements for the use of the public space in question
EVERY ONE of those groups can do exactly the same thing YOU did: call up the Parks Department, and make arrangements to hold their OWN event in that same public space - with all of the same permitting costs and logistics that YOU had to take care of. And because it's their event, YOU don't get to gather a bunch of your friends and shout down their event. If they want to be magnanimous, perhaps they'll let you use some of the park space for which they obtained a permit, so that you can blow off some steam. And maybe you'll grant them the same courtesy when you hold a similar event.
You ARE free to say whatever you want. But if you want to crash someone else's pre-arranged, permitted, and secured event on what amounts to rented public property, too bad. Book the same space and do your own thing next week
Don't disappoint your bird dog. Go to the range.
i can say 'there is no god' and it doesn't require any faith to do so. i can also say 'there are no ghosts' and 'there are no aliens' and that requires no faith.
the burden of proof is on religions. until they have proof, saying 'there are no god, ghosts, or aliens' are the obvious and default rational beliefs.
atheism is the default natural state. any child raised in a religious vacuum would be an atheist.
freedom of speech is not freedom of consequences
It's platitudes all the way down!
And in this particular framing, government is some intractable beast held in check, but never a defender of those rights. Why it is perfectly apt to fire someone for being Jewish... oh, wait, no you can't; almost as if the government were also imbued with protecting the rights of the minority against the will of the majority.
Congress shall make no law... abridging the freedom of speech
You might want to revisit the meaning of this, since nowhere can it be found that this applies only to government, and the corollary to it is that congress is well within its powers to make laws promoting freedom of speech, of the press, and religion, as can be documented in hundreds of circumstances conveniently ignored.
And just as McCarthyism is viewed distastefully now, only the dim would suppose that disfavor was exclusive to government action. which is why you can safely work for a Republican even though you are a Democrat, and even have the audacity to have Sanders bumper sticker on your car without fear of legally losing your job.
I do believe that is freedom from consequences, damn that meddling government.
Well, I do usually try to live peacefully with people from the South-Eastern US, where there is a history of similar sorts of killings happening from a certain Christian organization, and in many cases the people responsible could easily still be alive. Somehow, we all moved on. It might take a generation, but we can probably make it work.
~Anguirel (lit. Living Star-Iron)
QA: The art of telling someone that their baby is ugly without getting punched.
In the past it was said "History is written by the victors." When Reagan characterized the anti-Sandanistas as 'freedom fighters', that was the same process at work.
Until recently, state violence was usually characterized as 'war'. You have two aggressors killing each other for some period of time. There may or may not be a winner.
However politicized the language, however 'tres moderne' that language becomes, it's the same tactic in use for thousands of years. The hundreds of ancient dead countries in the middle east are proof are still Truth speaking. Rallying around the flag may discredit the truth-tellers, but not the Truth. The outcome has been the same for lo, these many thousands of years.
"You must try to forget all you have learned. You must begin to dream." -- Sherwood Anderson
Third: I cringe watching how those stupid terrorists are killing our open society "by proxy" -- the dirty job being taken up by all you right-wing nutjobs. Go get a life. Go to Syria or Irak and enjoy your phantasies.
The right wingers just want to go kill the stupid terrorists. It's the left wingers who won't "let a good disaster to go to waste" (taking away rights) and actively seek such disasters when no options present themselves (growing ISIS via inaction).
"Taking away rights" in the name of security isn't a left-wing thing, or at least it's not only a left-wing thing. The right is just as likely to restrict whatever is needed in the name of fighting terrorism. Just listen to Marco Rubio (I'm certain he'll be the Republican choice for President) blasting Rand Paul for his opposition to the US government's overarching surveillance program. He blames successful suicide attacks on people opposed to extreme actions justified by finding and defeating terrorists. Except for the few libertarian-leaning folks, the right-wing in the US is all about letting the national security folks do whatever they want to "keep America safe."
The only discussion point in what you posted is your attempt to read something into Rubio's speech that wasn't there. That is about you, and I'm not the one whose comments are preceded by "anonymous coward". So congrats on your second attempt at spin. I'm sure MSNBC has a staff position for you.
Everybody must get stoned?
Not quite. Saying "there is no God" is just as much a religion as saying there is. It is a statement of faith concerning things unseen.
No, not really. Saying "there is no God" is as much as a statement of faith as saying "there are no unicorns", "there are no faries" or "Zeus does not rule us from Mount Olympus".
It is a statement of faith concerning things unseen.
Same with unicorns. I've never seen them, you've never seen them, but neither of us can prove they don't exist. I'd say however the likelihood is so low that they do exist that going with "they don't exist" is entirely reasonable. Same for god(s).
Now, if the "not stamp collector" were to deny the existence of stamps, you'd have a good analogy.
Not really. Not doing something is not the same as actively doing the negative of something.
Someone who admits there is a God but sees no purpose in "collecting" Him is not an atheist -- by definition.
You have confused the analogy. God is not being equated to stamps. The act of believing is being equated to the act of collecting, because I'm making a point about the act. Like I said not doing something is not the same as actively doing the opposite.
I don't sit around actively believing in no god: there's simply never been anything which would make me believe in a god I cannot see, interact with or sense in any other manner. I can conceive of an uncountably infinite number of things which fall into that category (I'm not very imaginative: they're all different species of magical unicorn which almost all have an transcendental number of horns, some horns being incomplete you see---as you can tell I like unicorns and numbers), and there are many other far-fetched things like Russell's Teapot and so on.
The point is they all have identical properties to god: there is no way of sensing their existence. Given that is makes no sense to me to elevate the concept of god above the concept of any of those other rhetorical devices.
I doubt I'm going to change your mind, but the point is, faith is just that, faith. It's something you know in your gut is true precisely without evidence (wouldn't be faith otherwise). I lack that gut feeling of truth that (I'm assuming) you have. I don't have the strong gut feeling that god doesn't exist, just the same general feeling that god sits with all those other things don't exist.
To me, belief in god is irrational. For me to be deeply critical of it would be however hypocritical. Like every other person, it would be absurd to claim I live my life as a rational robot (I try to be rational as much as possible, but I know I cannot always succeed, and fail frequently). Belief in god does not make someone de facto more stupid than me (that would be an astoundingly arrogant claim especially given some scientists I've known who are regular churchgoers).
However your arguments seem designed to try to justify your act of faith by painting it philosophically as the same as not having faith in some way. If you succeed it's not really much of an act of faith.
SJW n. One who posts facts.
But that's just the thing.. what he said is not stupid.. At best its poor timing, and at worst, he needed to frame it and put a different spin on it so people understand what he means.
You may not like it, or even agree with it, but I think his point is, not EVERYONE involved and on the mailing list agrees (or condones) the methods used, even if they agree with the sentiment. (for example, I HATE the TSA.. I'm not going to go bomb buildings or even agree those that do, but I agree with the sentiments of those that want to see it dismantled/tossed in the rubbish bin).. Does that mean that if someone DOES do that, I condone it.. of course not. But the problem is, this is a very emotional topic and what everyone seems to want is blood rather than using some clear and rational thinking to figure out how to end this without becoming the enemy (which will NEVER end)
God made the Idiot for practice, and then He made the School Board -- Mark Twain Look for http://Thebar.steelbeachca
Congress shall make no law... abridging the freedom of speech
You might want to revisit the meaning of this, since nowhere can it be found that this applies only to government,
The Congress shall make no law makes it pretty clear it applies to the Federal government; as does the history behind the Bill of Rights. To a rogue that it somehow applies to non-Federal actions; nor that it says anything, beyond preventing the establishment of a religion as to what Congress may do to promote the others.
I'm a consultant - I convert gibberish into cash-flow.
The right wingers just want to go kill the stupid terrorists.
And who exactly is a terrorist? That's the problem. The US Government has arrested and detained innocent people in the past. The US Government has mistakenly killed innocent people presumed to be terrorists in the past. Almost every anti-terrorism operation kills civilians. So "Just want to go kill stupid terrorists." also means invading Iraq, destabilizing the country and arguably creating the environment in which ISIS emerged. So saying that liberals are creating a disaster through inaction is no more true than saying that conservatives are creating a disaster through action. However when inaction and action both produce equally terrible outcomes--maybe the cheaper option is the better terrible outcome. That's not to say that every action is certainly or even most likely worse than inaction but it is to say that "Just go kill stupid terrorists" is not a logically acceptable path. It costs lives, it costs money and it will inevitably kill far more than 140 civilians so it had better be pretty clearly superior to inaction.
Lastly it was conservatives who opened Guantanamo and refuse to close it, conservatives who passed the Patriot Act, conservatives who called anti-war activists "treasonous". It's pretty hard to take the high road on liberties unless you mean "Gun Control" which is as much an innate right as "The Right to Own High Explosives" which nobody claims because thankfully it wasn't deemed sensible 300 years ago to say "the people's right to bare C4 shall not be infringed.".
Of course it only applies to the government. Any law that attempted to say you can't be shouted down, or told to shut up, or to get off my property, or anything else would be a restriction on someone else's rights. And then we are right back to Congress shall make no law...
The KKK never became a theocratic government, nor were they ever all that murderous. They just liked to scare people into submission mostly, and did a few lynchings here and there, but basically just operated as a criminal gang. ISIS is not a gang, it's a government. It has an army, military weaponry, and utterly controls a large amount of territory. The KKK never had any of that, and never had that many members. It was comparatively easy to marginalize the KKK. Not so with ISIS; the only way to dislodge them is to conquer them. And you're an idiot if you think you can live peacefully with them: their stated goal is to conquer all of the middle east and much of Europe to reinstate their Caliphate. The only way to live peacefully with them is to submit to their brutal rule under Sharia Law.
Some Christian doesn't want to bake a cake for a gay wedding?
You need to use "sudo bake me a cake". No, wait, that would be a lie....
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
No, not really. Saying "there is no God" is as much as a statement of faith as saying "there are no unicorns",
Not true. Unicorns are physical creatures, or would be were they to exist. God, however, is not. His existence (were he to exist) is outside the physical universe as we can determine it. I.e., if unicorns exist, you could see them. If God exists, you cannot. It is an order of magnitude different to claim there is no physical object called "unicorn" compared to claiming there is no unobservable object called "God."
Same with unicorns. I've never seen them, you've never seen them, but neither of us can prove they don't exist. I'd say however the likelihood is so low that they do exist that going with "they don't exist" is entirely reasonable. Same for god(s).
As I've just explained, not it is not the same with God. Or Gods.
Now, if the "not stamp collector" were to deny the existence of stamps, you'd have a good analogy.
Not really. Not doing something is not the same as actively doing the negative of something.
Yes, that was exactly my point. "Not stamp collecting" is not the same as "believing there is no God". One is inaction, the other an action. One admits the existence of the object referred to, the other denies it.
The act of believing is being equated to the act of collecting, because I'm making a point about the act.
Exactly. The act of believing there is no God because he is "irrational" and thus cannot exist would be analogous to not collecting stamps because they are "irrational" and cannot exist. This is why the analogy fails. Nobody claims that stamps don't exist no matter how uninteresting they find the hobby of collecting them to be.
Given that is makes no sense to me .... To me, belief in god is irrational.
Your basis for your disbelief, that the existence of God would be "irrational", is akin to claiming that anything you don't understand doesn't exist. This is certainly not true. For centuries man did not understand the simple virus and yet they certainly did suffer from the "common cold" or worse.
However your arguments seem designed to try to justify your act of faith by painting it philosophically as the same as not having faith in some way.
Not at all. It is just as much an act of faith to say "there is no God" as to say there is. Both beliefs cannot be proven by any scientific method. Both beliefs are faith-based. Atheism is based on faith in man's intellect and if his intellect cannot find it rational then God cannot exist. It is a faith in the human mind being able to comprehend the universe and saying what it does not contain. Every time an atheist says "if God existed he would ..." he is basing that statement on his own understanding of what he thinks God would do were he to think like humans. Faith in man's superior intellect is still faith.
I actually made no statement of faith, if you read carefully. I simply pointed out the fact that atheism is a faith just as much as any theistic belief. You say you won't change my mind, and indeed, you have not, because I am not here to argue whether God exists or not -- and therefore your arguments that he does not are relevant only in that they prove my point.
Not true. Unicorns are physical creatures, or would be were they to exist.
They're frequently portrayed as magical creatures. I don't see why they have to always manifest a physical manifestation in this realm.
God, however,
How does he hold his hammer if he's not physical? Also, yoking his rams would extremely difficuly with no hands. Or are you actually referring to Yaweh/Jehova who is not physical yet apparentlly make man in his image.
I.e., if unicorns exist, you could see them.
Only if they visit this realm, which they chose to do rarely if ever. If they want to be seen to you, they will come here and show themselves. There is no way for you to enter their realm unless they chose to bring you there. The vast majority of unicorns are neither powerful enough to show themselves to you or to bring you to their realm, however.
It is an order of magnitude different to claim there is no physical object called "unicorn" compared to claiming there is no unobservable object called "God."
You don't seem to be very up to speed on the mythology of unicorns. They are creatures of magic from another realm, not merely some horned horse inhabiting an unknown forest.
Not at all. It is just as much an act of faith to say "there is no God" as to say there is.
It is as much an act of faith so claim god in all probability doesn't exist based on the evidence as it is to say that in all likelihood unicorns don't exist based on the evidence. Once the likelihood becomes overwhelming one takes a shortcut and says "doesn't exist".
Both beliefs cannot be proven by any scientific method. Both beliefs are faith-based.
I can invent many things which cannot be proven/disproven (note the word there) by the scientific method. I can claim for example, that there is a nice, cherry red ceramic teapot orbiting galaxy MACS0647-JD, a lightyear out beyond its most distant star. It's scientifically impossible for us to observe it because it's a small object 13.3 billion lightyears away and we can only just observe the entire galaxy. And there's no possible way to get close enough to observe it.
Is it an act of faith for you to disbelieve me?
To me, the absurd teapot is like god. Its existence can be postulated but it can never be observed. However the existence of the teapot is so wildly unlikely, that I'm going to outright claim it doesn't exist. Like god, it has no observable effect on the universe. So, like god, I see no reason to transfer it from "category of unobservable things I don't believe in" to another category.
Atheism is based on faith in man's intellect and if his intellect cannot find it rational then God cannot exist.
It's a looser claim. First, I'd like to note that you seem to have a fairly clear idea what god is. You refer to it with a capital G and in the singular. Atheism is simply applying the reasoning by which we live our day to day lives. We don't believe in almost everything that can be conceived of. Nor is it a matter of faith that we don't believe in them (at least not in the sense that "faith" is normally used in English). To claim that "god" is special and that not believing in it is an act of faith (unlike my unicorns) is in itself an act of faith because you are axiomatically treating god as different from almost everything else. Since it's an axiom, it's outside of the logic of whatever follows. An axiom like that however is a matter of faith.
I actually made no statement of faith, if you read carefully.
It is, if you follow the reasoning behind the words. You are elevating god to a very special position to which you do not elevate an infinite number of unobservable imaginings. I don't think you're ever going to believe in unicorns (or the teapot) or regard your disbelief as a lack of faith.
What about the other creatures of mythology and legend? Poltergeists? Ghosts? Faeries? Unicorns ad I imagine them? All supernatural or creatures of magi
SJW n. One who posts facts.
Hmm, how about commenting on what the guy actually said? But no, it has immediately descended into a stupid dick-waving contest about why Muslims with their Jihad are evil and Christians with their Crusades aren't. This is nothing to do with religion - terrorism is simply a form of organised crime with a thin veneer of 'ideology', 'religion' or 'honour'. There are many parallels with how the Mafia arose and operates.
Now about mr Kimmel's comments - it is of course an amazingly clumsy way to put it, as well as being very uninformed, but he is actually trying to make us think a little bit deeper over the issues, instead of just screaming "Attack". After all, we haven't really had much success with that so far. So how about coming up with some intelligent ideas about what can be done?
We shouldn't naively think that people we regard as evil, see themselves as evil - on the contrary, I strongly suspect that all of them - Hitler, Pol Pot, al Qaeda, ISIS etc - are or were convinced that they are good and stand for a noble cause, and that if they are harsh, it is only because it is necessary. I'm also sure that many, if not all, are fundamentally bullies - and bullies are fundametally cowards; it's just that what they are afraid of is not necessarily what normal people are afraid of.
So how can we act against these bullies - what are they really afraid of, when they clearly aren't afraid of dying? They think they are going straight to Paradise if they go out and get themselves killed in a 'jihad' - so one way of might be to start teaching them that actually, it doesn't quitework that way. God is clever enough to understand that if you strive to get killed, it is no more than suicide with a bit of extra emphasis; dying for God may be right if you do so reluctantly, to protect what is holy, but being eager to die, hiding behind a feeble excuse and compounding it with crimes like murder is never going to be more than a perverse form of suicide. Probably the harshest punishment we can inflict on these people would be to force them to live, having to contemplate the vileness of their crimes - that and castration plus being force-fed pig blood.
There is no doubt that we will wipe ISIS out in terms of military, but we have to look deeper and understand better why there are so many, who turn against normal society. We have to be willing to recognise our own role in creating this situation, not just what the Western powers have done during past imperialism, but also what we allow large corporations to do and perhaps even more importantly, how we treat immigrants, who come to live in our neighborhoods - if we regards them with suspicion and treat them as second class, it is hardly any wonder that they and their children become resentful. And when you have nothing to live for, maybe you can find something to die for? Some thing that can hurt the smug society that didn't let you in? We have to break out of this vicious cycle.
The gay couple went to a bakery, and was turned down. They filed a complaint with the appropriate authorities, which in the normal course of things would have resulted in a small fine, no real problem.
Then the assholes who ran the bakery got all offended and started an internet campaign against the couple, by people who call themselves Christians and don't act anything like Jesus. The lawsuit was about the harassment the couple suffered. You appear to have a definitions of "flayed alive" I was not previously familiar with, which is apparently "sued for damages for the harm they caused". I seem to have missed the passage in the Gospels where Jesus encouraged the crowd to persecute people who were different and stone the adulterer.
If an Islamic bakery did the same thing, they probably turned the couple away and did nothing more about them. Had a complaint been filed, they would have owed a small fine. Just like the "Christian" bakery, if they had let the matter lay there would have been no lawsuit and no significant consequences.
"When you have eliminated the unacceptable, whatever is left, however improbable, must be the truthiness" - Holmes
Mr. Kimmel is actually correct: ISIS is NOT necessarily evil; albeit it certainly seems they do relatively evil things - from OUR perspective. ANY intelligent human can see that Mr. Kimmel's remark reflects that understanding the deeper MO of ISIS as being reactionary for their cause seems an important consideration in getting to an effective mitigation for ultimately ending the violence. I get nearly nowhere when I yell at my subordinates (i.e. proverbially cut off their heads). I get MUCH further when I take the time to understand my subordinates' mistake and work to show them a more effective and mutually beneficial resolution (i.e. explain the part they apparently misunderstood). (I guess I am luck that I have friends that do this for me!)
Self-importance and self-indulgence is the root of ALL evil.
How does he hold his hammer if he's not physical?
Thank you for proving my point better than I could ever do. Your faith in your logical reasoning about God is shining through with every word. Faith. God cannot exist because I don't understand how he could hold a hammer, and I have ultimate faith in my ability to understand.
Let's go back 200 years and ask this: how could we hear a man's voice if he were not in the room speaking to us? Let's go back 20 years: how can we put five hours of music recording into something that is smaller than one of Aunt Martha's compacts? How can a man walk on the moon when there is no air? Clearly such ideas are irrational and impossible.
It is as much an act of faith so claim god in all probability doesn't exist based on the evidence as it is to say that in all likelihood unicorns don't exist based on the evidence.
I've covered that error already. Finding no physical evidence of a being that, should he exist, would have no physical presence means nothing. Finding no physical evidence of a physical object has more significance. Your conversion of a horned horse into a magical beast that nobody could see even if it was standing in front of him is interesting, but only serves to prove the distance you have to go to make that analogy.
I actually made no statement of faith, if you read carefully.
It is, if you follow the reasoning behind the words. You are elevating god to a very special position ...
Sorry, but no. I pointed out that atheism is a belief system that requires faith just as much as theism is. I am not the one who created the concept of the being you cannot believe in because you cannot understand him.
Every time an atheist says "if God existed he would ..."
That's a straw man.
No, sir, that is the very heart of the matter. "I cannot understand this, therefore it cannot exist." That is a statement of faith in one's own ability to sense the universe and understand it based on incomplete information. When you consider the recorded history of mankind, you'd realize that "cannot understand" is a very poor way to determine what does and does not exist. To make a statement that something that couldn't be observed if it did exist does not exist because it hasn't been observed is a statement of faith.
Thank you for proving my point better than I could ever do. Your faith in your logical reasoning about God is shining through with every word. Faith. God cannot exist because I don't understand how he could hold a hammer, and I have ultimate faith in my ability to understand.
I pointed out two posts ago that it's matter of faith. Now you smugly bring up as if its a great revelation with which you will strike me down. A clue: when you make a point I already made to you, it's not a great revelation.
But yes, well done for conceding that it's a matter of FAITH. That was my point.
Clearly such ideas are irrational and impossible.
Not really sure what your point is. Those things are all observable. You said yourself that God isn't. So what are you equating to what precisely?
Your conversion of a horned horse into a magical beast that nobody could see even if it was standing in front of him is interesting, but only serves to prove the distance you have to go to make that analogy.
Not really, no. To me there's little difference between your God, who is apparently an unobservable being without substance and one of my hypothetical unicorns. Besides, they could allow you to see them if they wanted. I guess they don't generally want to be seen however. But the ones who can visit this realm are creatures of very advanced magic, so they can be invisible if they choose.
Sorry, but no. I pointed out that atheism is a belief system that requires faith just as much as theism is.
No, you keep asserting it, not pointing it out. There's a difference in that you're not making a reasoned argument, you're simply stating the same point repeatedly.
I am not the one who created the concept of the being you cannot believe in because you cannot understand him. ,
I don't follow. How is not believing in god (who I cannot observe) different in not believing that teapot exists?
No, sir, that is the very heart of the matter.
It is because you're putting words into my mouth. I never said anything along the lines of "if god existed he would... blah". You're arguing vociferously against something which I never said. That is the definition of a straw man.
"I cannot understand this, therefore it cannot exist."
At this point, I'm beginning to winder if you're intentionally misrepresenting what I'm saying. I'm saying:
If it's unobservable, then I have no reason to believe in it (just like any other unobservable thing I can dream of such as my unicorns).
"cannot understand"
Again you're arguing against something I didn't say. Cannot understand is not the same as cannot observe.
To make a statement that something that couldn't be observed if it did exist does not exist because it hasn't been observed is a statement of faith.
If you concede the point you just made (I can only assume you do as you made it) then it is equally a matter of faith that I don't believe in unicorns and that I don't believe in that teapot orbiting a galaxy 13.3 billion lightyears away.
Neither of those things can be observed and so according to you, making the statement that they don't exist is a matter of faith.
SJW n. One who posts facts.
But Americans don't want that, they want to be lied to. They don't want to hear that we created ISIS, or that the USA is detested because we've meddled in their regional affairs and killed people's kids. Or that the USA supports murderous regimes and horrific Islamic violence in countries like Saudi Arabia. Nope, everybody is too busy covering their ears shouting USA USA USA.
Let's turn his comment and audience around. If an up-and-coming ISIS leader said "America isn't necessarily evil. It is made up of people doing what they think is best for their community. Violence is not the answer, though." what would happen? You'd find his corpse being used as an illustration for others who question their ideology of violence. When you have no right to speak freely without fear, you have no rights at all.
Organization? You must be joking..
I’m not sure if this was his point or not, but there is a point to make about what motivates some people to join a terrorist group.
Many huge companies are psychopathic in that they will “be evil” against consumers in order to maintain capital growth, but the individuals working there are not necessarily fully aware of what otherwise seemingly innocent decisions are causing the harm. The Nazi regime was pure evil and killed millions of innocent people, but Adolf Hitler thougth he was doing the right thing for his country. There’s this little boy who has been bullying my daughter, and he thinks it’s perfectly okay to grab her and push her around despite her objections, but as innocent as he thinks he is, he still has to be stopped.
So probably the majority of people in ISIS think they’re doing the right thing. From their perspective, they are not evil. And this is because they have been brainwashed into an extreme form of a religion that already has belligerent tendencies. They’re taught that the West and non-Muslims in general are enemies of Allah, and that what Allah wants is to cleanse the world of those sinners and infidels who would otherwise corrupt their children with immoral ideas.
It’s important to realize that a minority of these people, if any, are doing this because they enjoy violence and hurting people. They are urged to do this on the basis or an outrage that they have been indoctrinated into. ISIS as an organizatinon is evil. But its members? No, they’re just sad, ignorant, misinformed people. They’re also dangerous and must be stopped, and I am saddened that the only way to stop them is that many of them have to die. Because, sadly, they’re way beyond having their minds changed on this. A grizzly bear thinks you’re a threat, and no matter what you do, it’s going to try to kill you if you come upon each other in the woods, so your only option for saving your own life may be to kill the bear. And that’s sad for the bear.
This is just one example of a general phenomenon found in many humans. Christianity says not to like and cheat, but many have been found to do just those things when they feel that the ends justify the means. There are non-believers who are a danger to their world view, and they’ll do whatever it takes to fight that, even if it means that they get to exempt themselves from the very same morals they insist on other people having. (See for instance https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kitzmiller_v._Dover_Area_School_District and recall that there is a paper trail where people substituted “intelligent design” in place of “creationism” in literature, using clever wording an deception in order to trick educators into putting religious beliefs into science classes.) Muslims and Christians aren’t all that different. Go back 1000 years, and we have Catholics traipsing all over Eurasia killing heretics and nonbelievers.
So, when you fight this evil, keep in mind that those people think they’re doing the right thing. This is an important element of the psychology of the situation and that awareness will make you more effective at fighting it. That’s because you’ll be fighting the real problem and not an “all those people are pure evil” fiction you’ve made up in your mind. The outrage felt by the victims is totally valid, but the response needs to be surgical to prevent future harm, as opposed to some disorganized blind rage where we go killing Syrians indiscriminately.
It’s all terribly sad. It’s sad that terrorist organizations exist and kill innocent people, and it’s sad that they only way to stop them is millitary action, which results in even more deaths. You may have a different opinion, but I think every human life is important, not to be thrown away over differences of world view.