That said, yes, the US has always had something of an authoritarian bent (hence the WoD and the high prison population, which are obviously linked). I think it comes from being started by a bunch of Puritans who left England because they didn't think it was uptight enough;-)
True, the US has also been involved in all the things you mention, but then there is documented proof that many countries (the UK, for one) tested bacteriological and chemical weapons (on unsuspecting conscripts, in our case), and half the current destabilisation in the middle east is our fault (the other half is the USA stepping in to meddle about the time we stopped, in the early part of the 20th century).
To be clear: my point was that the USA was much more of a good example of democracy in the past than it is now. Never one-tenth the example it thought it was, but nevertheless, it's fallen a long way even so.
I doubt that even anyone well-aware of its murky aspects would have predicted quite such a quick drop in liberty or such a stunning reversal of international prestige.
Actually, I'm neither paranoid nor a libertarian - I'm actually a pretty well-blanaced left-centrist in the UK (which, I suppose, makes me a dangerous left-wing radical in the US;-)
Tackling your points:
"Fascism is a philosophy, not a mystery syndrome."
Indeed. But surely to be a philosophy it must have some sort of core beliefs or "symptoms". There must be some sort of defining points, or we wouldn't be able to point to it when we saw it. These seem to be presented as a collection of "common aspects" of a fascist society.
"And maybe some people in the Administration do have authoritarian leanings but... even under Dr. Britt's criteria we still fall short, if only by degrees"
Indeed. But if my country exhibited even the majority of the things listed, I'd be very, very worried. Although not every point applies to the US 100% most of them do, and there are at least "shades of" the rest.
"To say that the U.S. has military supremacy is the most far-fetched of them all. I could only find two cabinet secretaries who had military service listed in their Wikipedia biography: Transportation Secretary Norman Mineta, and Veterans Affairs Secretary Jim Nicholson. That's troublesome in its own right, but might explain why there are so many hawks in the Administration. Regardless, when you start getting into fascist military cults... you don't see Bush and Cheney and Rumsfeld running around in military uniforms making up medals to give each other like Hitler, Mussolini, Tojo, or dare I say it: Hussein's government in Iraq all did."
Sorry to be an arse about this, but did you actually read the article, or merely peruse the headlines and miss the points it was making? Referring you to this very section:
"4. Supremacy of the Military
Even when there are widespread domestic problems, the military is given a disproportionate amount of government funding, and the domestic agenda is neglected. Soldiers and military service are glamorized. "
Are there widespread domestic problems in the US? Yes, undeniably. Drugs, crime, poverty, the list goes on.
Is "the military" given a disproportionate amount of funding? Not for bullet-proof vests in Iraq, but Bush is violating treaties and wasting billions on a new generation of bunker-busting nukes, the SDI scheme (that evidence suggests will never work), etc.
The point Britt's making is that military might is prioritised over more important matters. The US isn't run by a military junta, so of course Bush and the gang aren't awarding themselves military honours. However, they're very keen on press conferences on aircraft carriers, always pushing military "solutions" over diplomatic ones, always implying arguing against their policies constitutes "hating the army" and constantly portraying the left as "weak" for even considering diplomacy (or even trying to understand terrorists' motives to fight them better).
Neocons and the extreme right are clearly in love with the military, and the idea of military might. They speak the lingo, clothe their ideas in their terms and constantly identify themselves with the people actually doing the fighting. The only time the split happens is when they actually have to stand up and do their duty, when they suddenly come over all quiet and pull strings to get assigned to the National Guard (or similar).
"Again, it's not that I'm not scared: it could happen; we're inching towards it. But what's his face's attempt to force fit fascism into modern American society is a joke."
Actually, I haven't seen the original report, and neither have you - if you read the page properly you'll see it states right at the top "The excerpt is in accordance with the magazine's policy".
Finally, the page doesn't mention the USA once. I'm the only one who made the connection between the points listed and the USA.
Therefore the fact you don't like the conclusions it forces you into is no reason to reject the study.
In fact, this is never a reason, but it's such a prevalent mindset in the US these days it's almost futile to argue it.
Do you have any decent evidence to support this hypothesis? I'm not saying he hasn't, merely that your arguments seem deeply flawed, and are therefore no basis to allege such a conclusion.
"Why else would characteristic 3 include "terrorists" as a scapegoat when the regimes he allegedly used for the study never focused on such a group?"
Maybe because back then the word "terrorist" wasn't thrown around with quite such wild abandon as these days? Thesaurus.com gives us such synonyms as "agitator, insurgent, insurrectionist, malcontent, mutineer, nihilist, rebel, revolter, revolutionary" and "anarchist", and these have been used as scapegoats by authority figures since the beginning of time.
It's also interesting that Fascist states seem to have more problems with terrorists than non-fascist states, due primarily to their repressive and authoritarian actions.
"And since when is being a terrorist-- by definition someone who kills, steals, and destroys to force an agenda-- defensible? Are terrorists victims now? Lumping terrorists in with ethnic minorities and "liberals" (nice one, Larry) is suspect."
The point I think he's trying to make is not that these things are acceptable, but that they're scapegoated for things they didn't necessarily do, or their level of threat is wildly exaggerated to permit the authorities to become more repressive and have the population simply accept it.
Scapegoated has a different meaning from "rightly blamed", and scapegoating is always bad.
"Also, scratch number 4 (after all, the liberals keep telling me we didn't allocate enough troops to Iraq or Afghanistan originally and that costs money)"
Number 4 is not strongly so in the case of the US. Nevertheless:
1) Hypothetically, merely because the opposition is also arguing for a single "fascist" element that doesn't mean the party in power isn't also tending towards fascism. In addition, the "liberals" were initially campaigning not to go into Iraq. Now they've failed (and your troops are there), they're campaigning to at least give them enough equipment to have a chance of staying alive. This is very different to prioritising the overwhelming supremacy of the military, which is what the point is all about.
2) Bush is spending a disproportionate amount of money (and raising international tension) developing new high-tech military gadgets like bunker-buster nukes, SDI defence systems and the like.
The keyphrase here is "supremacy of the military", not "having more soldiers than anyone else", or "well-funding all aspects of the military equally".
"number 6 (please point out the state-sponsored censorship in the NYT, LA Times, or Air America Radio)"
Point six says "controlled mass media", not "rigid censorship". In fact it explicitely goes on to state "in other cases, the media is indirectly controlled by government regulation, or sympathetic media spokespeople and executives".
I'm not being offensive, but did you even read the linked article, or just decide you didn't like what it was saying and skim over a few words of it?
"number 10 (haven't seen troops breaking up strikes lately)"
Granted, this doesn't apply too strongly to the US, but then the "labour vs. bosses" fight was largely over many years ago, and workers now have certin rights enshrined in law. In reaction, corporations are simply off-shoring jobs to third-world countries with no such labour laws (and cheaper expenses), as fast as they can. Several Bush economic policies have also eased this flood, not stemmed it.
"The rest could conceivably be argued by some radicals."
Hehehehe, are you serious? I'd have said the following
But seriously, I wasn't trolling, I was attempting to make a serious point:
Merely because the current government in the Netherlands apparently isn't predisposed towards fascist/totalitarian behaviour, that's no reason to hand them the capability without thought.
Allowing the government additional powers isn't merely a question of "will they use it responsibly?".
It's actually a case of "will they, and every single government who comes after them, for the entire conceivable future of the country use these powers responsibly".
I'd submit that no "government" can be trusted for all time, since the people who make up each "government" change every few years, and while it's easy to restrict civil liberties and pass restrctive laws, these measures don't tend to be repealed by anything short of a revolution.
The (admittedly slightly emotive) example of the US was intended to illustrate this point - in the mid-90s you'd have been laughed at to suggest that the current situation would occur within 5-10 years, and yet the US has gone from shining beacon of liberty to the world to an unprecedented crackdown on civil liberties and an unprecedented drop in international esteem.
Apologies if you think I'm trolling, but that wasn't the intention at all. And when your Freaks list is at least as long as your Friends list, maybe you want to re-evaluate that hair-trigger on your killfile;-)
"The difference is the action that is being taken. With the Gestapo, you could get killed for venting your thoughts. No way that this is going to happen by action of the Dutch government."
Currently.
Ten years ago in USA you couldn't be arrested, detained without trial, denied even minimal Geneva Convention protections and tortured and abused without restitution merely for being in the wrong place at the wrong time.
And the USA was widely regarded as the shining example of representative democracy and civil liberties to the entire world.
You're right in what you say - the US is (for all their talk of "t3h fr33d0mZ!!!!!1111!") far closer to becoming a fascist state than the Netherlands currently is.
Read The 14 Characteristics of Fascism by Dr. Lawrence Britt - the USA hits every single point square-on, with the possible exception of point 5 (rampant sexism), although the paper goes on to clarify "opposition to abortion is high, as is homophobia and anti-gay legislation and national policy", so maybe half a point then.
However, by instituting a system such as the Netherlands', they make it much easier to start monitoring their citizens and restricting civil liberties in the future - all you need is to not stop updating the database after the child passes 18, and you've got some of the scariest bits of 1984 right there.
Short version: The US is far further down the track, but the Netherlands just massively upgraded how fast they can catch up.
"Let me know when we use Nuclear weapons again, and I will agree that we are terrorists... Though it is true, terrorist weapons are more limitted."
Granted. However, are you saying that, when your president publically threatens that he can nuke anyone, anywhere he wants, that the rest of the world should ignore it and just trust he isn't serious?
Granted, in a restricted, public war the US takes great pains to try to minimise civilian casualties, but it has that option. Take Vietnam, when (technologically) all you could do was carpet-bomb and napalm thousands of innocent people to catch the few combatants in a given area.
Again, I'm not agreeing with terrorism, but it's easy to criticise people for not being selective when they think they're in a mortal conflict for their right to self-determination and way of life, and they don't have that option.
"Personally, I believe that once you are forced into war (as in they come over and try to kill you), you use whatever means are necessary to destroy the enemy."
Exactly, which is all the terrorists think, too. The US has spent most of this century meddling overtly or covertly in the middle east - destabilising populist regimes and setting up unstable puppet governments because it's in their own interest to. As far as the terrorists are concerned, the US is already invading the middle east, and they have no option to strike back with but terrorism.
Again, not agreeing with the tactics used, but they don't hate you for your beliefs or your success - they hate you for the meddling you've done and the pain and suffering you've caused to further your own ends. I know this is not a popular view in the US, but try reading the foreign media (any foreign media) for a while, and you'll see how inward-looking and "goodthink"-obsessed the US media is.
"The Iraqis would be justified in defending themselves against the US, for example. But since the US isn't really killing Iraqis (and have pretty much convinced everyone that they do not want to be there long term), they are not the current target there - other muslims are."
First off, I don't know where you got the idea everyone's convinced the US will pull out of Iraq as soon as it can - many, many Iraqis (and the majority of the arab world) firmly believe that the US intends to use Iraq as a staging-post to conduct similar operations across the middle east. Again, read or watch foreign media occasionally - yours is (apologies, but it's true) practically an international joke.
"Thats why they are terrorists - they are killing people, not to defend their lives, but to force others into submission."
Hypothetically, if a fundamentalist regime invaded the US with no resistance, do you think you, personally, would be killed as a result? Do you think your life would change at all? So, would you offer up resistance to protect your way of life, even though if you didn't you wouldn't actually die?
Exactly the same situation. The US meddles in international affairs, and is quite happy to (prefers to?) destabilise (even populist) countries, to further their own agenda. They aren't happy with sitting back and persuading countries to embrace democracy and choice, they prefer to use trade embargoes, covert operations or invasive warfare to do it, and seems completely immune to the irony of forcing populations to embrace choice.
Don't get me wrong - I approve democracy above all else, but you can't force people to abandon their current system and adopt one of your choosing if the majority of people in that country don't want to do it.
Unfortunately, while the US often deposes dictators and the like, it's also got a depressing history of removing democratically-elected and populist regimes who merely happen to disagree with certain US policies. This instantly casts every such action like this by the US into doubt, since their stated aims (promoting democracy,
"However, that is not what happened. "US's worst foreign interferences" were decisions made to choose the lessor of two evils"
With the greatest respect, the US has consistently chosen the lesser of two evils to itself - it's shown remarkably little interest in the welfare or consequences on anyone else.
I'm well aware this is the prevalent opinion in the United States (with it's famously isolationist, inward-looking culture and media), but ask the rest of the world (who actually have to deal with the consequences of America's international policies) and you'll get a very different story.
It might surprise you to know that in a survey a year or two ago (when Bush's approval rating was if anything higher), the majority of UK respondants rated Bush as a greater threat to world peace than Saddam or Bin Laden.
So, which is more likely - the world irrationally hates you for no reason whatsoever, or (possibly), your foreign policy and unnecessary meddling (in your own self-interest) causes unnecessary suffering, but your highly isolationist attitudes mean your advertising-backed pop-media never bothers to report any of it back to you?
"or in rare occasions they were the result of illegal actions by powerfull individuals - and in the US we seek out and punish those individuals (unlike say, France, where trading weapons for oil will go unpunished)."
Except, to use your example, the US provided the majority of the chemical weapons Saddam Hussain used to gas Kurds all through the 90s. And Saddam Hussain was supplied and briefed by the CIA when he initially attempted to assassinate Prime Minister Qassim.
It's easy to write off everything bad or evil the US has ever done as "illegal actions by powerfull individuals", but when the "illegal actions" are destabilising entire countries for economic or political gain, and when the "powerful individuals" are your own government and intelligence services, the only conclusion is that America is not a force for good in the world, but one looking out for its own interests, and fuck the little guy.
"No one is perfect - but the US actively fights people (foriegn or domestic) that abuse power. I just didn't see that in the mid east prior to 9/11."
Pop quiz - did America invade Iraq because of:
i) Its poor humanitarian record? (Hint: Many other countries have far worse records, and they aren't always indispensable allies like Saudi Arabia) ii) A serious belief by anyone, anywhere, that Saddam had WMDs? (Hint: it's been a proven fact the Bush administration was planning to invade Iraq before they even took power, and the Downing Street Memo shows they knew there were no weapons before they invaded) iii) The danger of spreading Islamic fundamentalism? (Hint: Saddam was pretty much the only successful secular leader in the Gulf region, as such he was the poster-boy for non-theocratic regimes in the middle east, and as a result of Gulf War II Iraq now looks like being heavily influenced by Iran's fundamentalist politics, if it doesn't slide all the way into a repressive Islamic theocracy) iv) their rich oilfields, to secure a nice, cheap supply of oil for the next century. (Hint: Bush and Cheney's oil-industry backers have made billions already out of the Iraq conflict, and their associated companies, like Halliburton, are getting overwhelmingly more reconstruction contracts in Iraq than non-republican-linked corporations.
Seriously - I started off listening to your opinions with an open mind, but if you're going to seriously suggest that the US doens't habitually act in its own best interests (even where such actions destabilise whole regions), I can only respectfully suggest you read up on some foreign history (practically any, in fact) and re-examine your position...
"Hey I'm a parent, and I'm extremely vigilant in this regard. I certainly don't need laws to do my job for me!"
Kudos to you - I only wish you were in the majority;-)
"My problem is this: I can raise my boys to be ethical and as they get older, to understand entertainment violence in context, but my family is not an island."
Indeed not. However, they're your kids, not the government's - I'm (admittedly) not a parent myself, but isn't the job of the parent to insulate kids from things dangerous to them? It might not be easy, but I can't believe it's not possible - we've had violence, profanity and sex for the entire span of human existence, and we're still here. Indeed, many would say we're more civilised now than in the past.
I understand your position - if (for example) you ban your kids from watching TCM on DVD, they can just go round a friend's house and do it. If you never find out about it you can't stop it, but:
1) The mere fact they know they'd end up in trouble means they know what they're doing is wrong, which reduces its influence over them.
2) If your child's been raised to be honest, you stand a good chance of finding out about it anyway eventually.
3) If/when you find out about it, you should go straight round to the house and ask what the hell the other kid's parents are thinking, letting a young child watch horror films. If the parents are so irresponsible they can't (or won't) stop their own kid from doing it, you should: 3a) ban your child from visiting them. He can still see his friend at school, or playing in the park - he's just banned from going to their house. 3b) report them to the authorities for showing violent/sexual/profane material to a minor. The offence is a in a responsible adult showing the material to someone underage - it shouldn't be in selling (or buying) the material.
Again, I'm not a parent, but I was raised well - my parents didn't have 100% control over my every action, but if something was off-limits it was off-limits, and if I got caught doing it I was In Trouble.
Even if we allow that video games specifically can warp a child's perceptions, seeing or playing one once (or even rarely) isn't going to do anything. Even the most ardent pro-censorship crowd only seriously suggest that prolonged or regular exposure can harm a child, and unless your child's regularly disobeying you (like, daily), you can stop that.
If your child is disobeying you that regularly, that's just bad parenting - no two ways about it.
"That being said, the Law is a very blunt instrument when it comes to getting parents to take their responsibilities seriously... I'm just no sure how we can get parents to take an interest and to realise the responsibility they owe to their fellow citizens."
Exactly. Laws are a bad idea, and parents aren't taking responsibility anyway... so the solution is emphatically not "more laws", but "find a way of getting parents to take responsibility".
I'd shy away from making it legally an offence for parents to show their kids films/games that are over their age-rating, since responsible parents know best whether their kids are ready for that sort of thing (and laws in this area unreasonably restrict freedom to raise your child the way you see fit).
However, how about:
1) Making it an offence to show anyone else's children over-aged films/games, and 2) Requiring a specific complaint from that child's parents before prosecuting?
That way if you (or you and Billy's mum down the block) agree your 16 year-old(s) are mature enough to watch an NC-17 film no-one can stop you (and any harm is restricted to your own children). If your kid goes round to Fred's house and his dad lets them watch the Texas Chainsaw Massacre without your permission, the full weight of the law comes down on him like a ton of bricks.
As a second-best (but very american) solution, make it a civil matter, so you can sue Fred's dad for voluntarily putting your child at risk.
Either way, stronger (and involuntary) laws and penalties are not the way to do it.
1. Maybe you have, and maybe it wasn't news before. However, people also implicitely trusted your president's sanity before, and with Bush's foreign policies and the associated massive rise in international tension, it's certainly news now. That means a lot of people are seeing it for the first time, and it's going to scare them shitless. Scared people do stupid things.
2. Right, and re-drafting the protocols shows he's been thinking seriously about them. So you have a situation where most of the world trusts the president massively less than even you do, he's embroiled in two wars of invasion/regime-change, and then you hear he's fiddling with the rules for nuking anyone he wants. Mmmmm... I feel secure, and I'm in the UK, on your fucking side!
3. Exactly - maybe you should take an interest. This is the only reason the right in the US gets away with it - they can fuck up international politics as much as they like, but it never comes back to bite them where it hurts (in the polls) because of your isolationism and complete ignorance of the rest of the world.
If American culture (meaning the average US citizen) took more interest in international matters, rapacious dangerous wannabe-emperors like Bush would get voted out in one term, max. Because you take such pride in your complete igonrance of the effects he has on others, eventually you piss enough people off to the point one of them learns to fly, and flies a passenger-plane into the WTC.
Then, instead of wondering why, the religious right paints them unilaterally as irrational madmen and ramps up the very things that caused it in the first place.
Don't get me wrong - I'm not promoting (or even condoning) terrorism, but your attirude is a microcosm of exactly why this shit happens.
I've never seen a document like this before, so no surprise I'm concerned.
In addition (as I've stated elsewhere), I'd be less concerned if your administration hadn't recently almost single-handedly caused a massive rise in international tension, hadn't withdrawn from nuclear nonproliferation treaties, wasn't currently trying to start a space arms race, hadn't prosecuted a war against a regime on provably trumped-up charges, and wasn't now also threatening to nuke anyone who looked at them funny.
I'll see your accusation of stupidity, and raise you a complete lack of empathy and an overwhelming arrogance...:-)
When fundamentalists in the middle east snap and kill their own people, they're caught, imprisoned or killed as quickly as possible, just like the US.
When US fundamentalists organise a war against another entire culture perceived as a mortal threat, they're lauded and apologised-for by half the populace of the USA. Any surprise that it's the same for the Middle East?
I utterly disagree with terrorism, no argument. But (from an only slightly biased, Middle-eastern perspective) they only cheer and occasionally protect their "terrorists" - you vote yours into public office.
Obviously to us in the West (with our more highly evolved brains) there is a difference between:
"Nuking an arms depot and not caring if we kill hundreds of thousands of civilians, since it'll probably terrify the country concerned into submission anyway"
and
"Killing a few thousand civilians while making a strategic strike against a symbol (and apparatus) of the enemy's economic (and military) domination, because you're powerless to attack by more direct means",
but those crazy Muslims apparently aren't...
Yes, I'm deliberately painting a biased picture, but no more so that you were.
And if you need more convincing, meditate on the difference (if any) between the meanings of "terror" and "shock and awe". If your own side has to carefully cherry-pick its terminology to avoid sounding like the enemy, it's time to re-evaluate which side you're on.
"What they do believe is that compromising with people who fly airplanes filled with innocent civilians into buildings is letting them win."
Granted, one can't be seen to be giving in to terrorism, but at the same time you only get terrorism where you haven't listened to your opponent and he lacks any other way of making you listen.
I'd modify your statement to say "you can't compromise with people who advocate flying airplanes filled with innocent civilians into buildings". If you refuse point-blank to negotiate with anyone who's ever comitted a terrorit action, that's exactly the same as saying "you're either with us or against us" - you've unilaterally ruled out any hope of compromise, so you've both already lost.
If at any point (as with the IRA in Northern Ireland) the terrorists agree to give up violence, you must try to compromise with them, sinc ethat's the only way you can ever stop the problem.
The US adminstration's position is more like even if Al Qaeda offered to talk, they probably wouldn't accept - they'd rather hunt them down, capture or kill every one, and provide lots of lovely juicy martyrs for the next generation of Bin Ladens to grow up idolising.
"For the record, I am neither Republican nor Democrat. I see a lot of Republicans as self-centered religious zealots, and a lot of Democrats as well intentioned, well educated, but mind-bogglingly naive people."
Exactly the same here. In the US I'd probably fall more on the left than on the right, but I'm also disgusted with the Democrats a fair bit of the time. I prefer the Discordian answer - I'm a "political non-euclidean".;-)
This is exactly my position - it may be techno-utopianism, but I've seen the massive changes the internet has brought to our society in the last decade or so and it's pretty much the only thing that gives me hope for the future.
Our continuing evolution into an information society means information is ever-more-easily available, which is only a good thing. Sure, it means anyone can find out how to make pipe bombs, but at a greater (background/society-) level it also means we can more easily understand our enemies, and sometimes begin to empathise with them.
Case in point - the US administration has always painted Al Qaeda as irrational animal madmen who hate the US for their lifestyle and beliefs, but have carefully sidestepped the question of how "animal madmen" have managed to get so organised, win so many victories over the west, and (for the majority of them) still not be caught.
In contrast, easy access to Al Jazeera (or terrorists manifestos themselves) makes it easy to see the reality. Although they're committing atrocities, they aren't irrational - the terrorists have stated aims, a strategy, and they're carefully planning and pushing for specific results. We may not agree with their aims, or their barbaric methods, but they're at least still open to reason - killing every last one isn't the only option in dealing with them.
Once we realise what their aims are, there's at least a chance we can eventually talk and come to some sort of compromise ("Al Qaeda stops killing US civilians if the US pulls out some of their military bases on Muslim religious ground", for example). Sure, it leaves a bad taste in your mouth, but that's compromise - as long as it leaves an equally bad taste in the other guy's mouth, you know you haven't "lost", and that's the important thing.
A "War on Terrorism" is unwinnable - it's a tactic, a meme (like a War on Ambushes or a War on Saying "Flibble"), and without a government-approved brainchip you can't stamp out an idea, you can only demonstrate it's a bad one. Terrorism can spring up anywhere, with very little notice, and is completely impossible to stop. Every time a terrorist is killed, another one or two are created - the only hope of ever actually ending the situation is to (eventually, when the time is right) talk, debate and possibly compromise.
As Ghandi said: "An eye for an eye will make the whole world blind".
And one of my own: In an unwinnable conflict, demonising your opponent merely prolongs the conflict.
"Are you suggesting that a person is automatically in favour of ideas/actions that he or she does not actively oppose?"
"Yes. All that is necessary for evil to win is for good men to do nothing."
Having read your reponse to this, I have respect for your beliefs, so please don't take this as a troll, but:
Are you therefore implying that anyone in the Twin Towers who didn't actively support the Democrats or give money to campaigns against the US's worst foreign interferences somehow deserved, even a little bit, being killed in the atrocity?
Unless you're claiming some sort of special exemption for Americans over Muslims, it's a very clear fall-out consequence of the argument you just offered. It's also the very argument used by terrorists the world over to justify targeting civilians.
The actual situation is a spectrum, from "fertilised egg" to "definitely a person". Obviously a "definite person" has rights, but does a small ball of undifferentiated cells?
If so, why? It's not a person, it merely has the potential to become one. By that rationale, wanking is murder, and menstruation is manslaughter.
It's a spectrum, fading from white at one end to black at the other, and we have the unenviable task of drawing a single line somewhere along it.
The sensible thing to do would be to use the best scientific knowledge we have available to assess when a foetus can experience pain (or whatever other functionality you decide is relevent), and draw the line there.
Your over-simplifying and obscuring of the issue retards the progress of debate, and (in the interests of developing sensible guidelines and minimising harm to anything that can feel it), should be stopped.
First off, thanks for replying. I'll admit I was deliberately a bit provocative in the hope someone would;-)
"I can deny your silly comparisons. For one thing, there is no moral equivalency between a terrorist group and democratically elected government. That alone invalidates your comparison. Some other inconsistencies present themselves:"
My apologies - my comparisons were intended to be just that, comparisons. I'm not suggesting for one second that the current US administration is remotely as bad as the Taliban (or terrorist groups like Al Qaeda, but merely that they're one hell of a lot closer (ideologically and tactically) than the "terrorist sympathisers" they castigate on the left.
Consider all my arguments illustrations of this difference (similar directions, wildly different degree), rather than a serious implication there's no difference between the two groups.
"Abortion has nothing to do with womens rights"
I have to take issue with this. The abortion debate is nothing but a conflict between a woman's rights and the rights of the unborn foetus. Anti-abortionists value the unborn foetus as a "person", so the tiny person's right to life overrides the right of self-determination of its mother. Pro-abortionists generally don't consider a (certainly early-term) foetus to be a full human person, and hence the mother's right of self-determination overrides the "life" of a small ball of cells.
"Comparing the repression of civil liberties by the Taliban to the current U.S. government is just moronic, or a sophomoric debating tactic."
Again, I'm not implying that the current US administration's policies are exactly as bad as the Taliban's, but that in some ways they're on the same wavelength.
In the Taliban you had a fundamentalist-influenced faith-based administration, restricting civil liberties wherever the opportunity arises, pushing an often religiously-motivated agenda, and habitually preferring invasive and violent tactics to diplomacy wherever possible.
In the current US adminstration you have a fundamentalist-influenced faith-based administration, restricting civil liberties wherever the opportunity arises, pushing an often religiously-motivated agenda, and habitually preferring invasive and violent tactics to diplomacy wherever possible.
Sure the Taliban was way, way, way further down the road than the US is now (and hopefully, ever will be). However, it's hypocriticial to accuse the left in America of being associated with terrorists, when the right is (both ideologically and in its comfort with violence and conflict) much closer to them.
"Terrorists don't cause civilian deaths in the pursuit of their goals, civilian deaths IS their goal. If this difference is meaningless to you, then you are beyond help."
Ignoring the insult (and apologies if you go apeshit), but the Terrorists' actual goal is "the removal of US troops from the middle east, the cessation of American interference in foreign nations' affairs, and (possibly, some records indicate) regime-change in America to bring it more in line with their beliefs".
Al Qaeda does target civilians, but they also target military and government personnel and resources - exclusively civilian targets (like the WTO, whom incidentally, as an entity, Al Qaeda consider an ally of the US government, and hence fair game) are a relatively new tactic, only taking the lead in the last few years. They aren't attacking civilians for the sheer fun of it, but because it (to them) seems the best chance of succeeding in their aims.
Likewise, the US government's stated aims are regime change in several countries (definitely, no conflicting reports there) to bring them more in line with their beliefs. They will use force against "military" targets (training camps, weapons caches, etc) where they can, but where this proves ineffective they are now quite happy to nuke the whole area, killing many
Without wanting to blow my own trumpet (hell, if I could do that I'd never leave the house), this seems to happen a lot around here with the minority crowds around here (right-wing, ID, whatever).
I've lost count of the number of times I've good-naturedly (and not) argued on various topics on/., and almost every debate seem to end one of two ways:
1) I read up and realise I'm wrong (or they offer an argument I can't logically spot the flaw in), at which point I apologise and either admit I was wrong or agree my conviction has been shaken and I'll reserve judgement pending more thinking.
2) I fire off my arguments (not normally as vitriolic as this, I must add), wait eagerly for the other side's reply, and watch as they argue until they're backed into a corner, then just stop posting to avoid having to admit they're wrong.
Even worse, I often see the self-same people in other threads advancing exactly the same arguments I'd shot down in previous debates, who then stop posting if I point out the problems again.
I try to judge people on their merits, and try to avoid sterotyping wherever I can, but the only explanation I can find is that the majority of Republicans and ID proponents are simply intellectually corrupt.
They don't appear to believe what they believe because of evidence or rationality, and having it demonstrably proven their position is untenable doesn't make them re-evaluate it - it just makes them duck out of the fight and try the same arguments and same fallacies the next time.
This idea of grading things from "my point of view" to "your point of view" (rather than "right" to "wrong") is completely alien to me, and it's quite disturbing to find how prevalent it is.
These people need to understand reality is not "Pick 'n' Mix" - everyone's entitled to their own opinion, but no-one's entitled to their own facts.
The religious right in the USA might rail against "moral relativism" (basically, the idea that it is possible to hold a valid opinion different to their own), but they're demonstrating a much more dangerous habit themselves - factual relativism.
Such wholesale rejection of reality is a symptom of mental illness, and it worries me greatly when it's exhibited regularly by people controlling the most powerful nation on earth.
Nah, for my money you're in for more of the same. Bush's handlers are too good, the media doens't even try to challenge him, and without events being reported popular opinion isn't an effective tool to oust them.
The republicans and neocons have spent decades investing in their infrastructure, pet "intellectuals" and media glovepuppets, while the democrats have pissed about and played by the rules.
Until the republicans stop dominating all three arms of your government, even if a democrat president got in he's be hanstrung by lack of support.
For my money it's Jeb Bush next time (now George has run out of terms), and he'll lurk in the Whitehouse until the Republicans push through the ammendment and Arnie can step up. I've got some vague hope at that point (Arnie's a republican, but appears a vaguely sensible one), but TBH I think by then twelve or sixteen years of unchecked neocon-influcneced republican rule will have fucked your economy and civil liberties to the point you're irreversibly on the way to third-world-nationhood.
Sorry to be pessemistic, but I think unless something's done at the next election, we'll have seen the peak of the American empire, and the beginnings of the rise of the Chinese one.
"Why would you expect or even want the feds to come in and declare martial law?"
Because that was the FEMA disaster plan from the beginning - in the event of a truly catastrophic incident FEMA and federal resources pre-empt local government. Don't just believe everything you hear in the media - go and research it. The Republicans have done a great job of spinning this as a failure of local government, but it's bullshit, and even if local government had sat on its hands, the feds would still have been culpable for allowing one or two people to cause unnecessary numbers of people to die by holding up relief efforts to an entire city.
You might also ask why the head of FEMA has now resigned, but no-one from the local NO authorities have, and reflect on the fact that the head of FEMA was a political old-boy appointee, whereas the local authorities were elected by the populace, and are answerable to them.
You might also ask why so many of the political right in the USA are currently engaged in trying to demonise the victims in this - blaming them for not evacuating, when most of the ones left are too elderly, poor or infirm to afford to leave. Why demonise already-traumatised refugees? It's a pathetically callous attempt at spin, to deflect their own horrendous fuck-up.
Finally, why were FEMA making trained fire and rescue personnel sit in sexual discrimination lectures, only leaving to stand in the background of a Bush press-shot, while the Mayor of New Orleans was on the radion, publically swearing at FEMA for lack of assistance?
"It's one thing to have police officers you know, from your community telling you to get out of your house, its another thing to have federal officers who who knows where and soldiers from Iraq telling you to go into a shelter or a dome somewhere."
Soldiers from Iraq? What? There are lots of American soldiers and National Guard still stationed on US soil, and you couldn't have flow enough people back form Iraq quick enough to make much of a difference.
Regarding your point, to be honest given a choice I'd rather have whoever had the most resources helping me out in a disaster, which is the federal government. In addition, I'd be a damn sight more likely to obey the army, because if they're involved
i) It's likely more serious ii) They have more manpower and more guns, and iii) If they're involved it's more likely martial law's been declared, so I'd be running more of a risk to disobey
I'll confess not from the US, so this whole "federal vs. state" thing make no sense to me at all. However, it makes even less sense that an entity with vastly greater resources would be supposed to sit on its hands until a much smaller one asks for its help - it's completely ludicrous.
And that's assuming you can't have both the federal and state forces involved at the same time - what, are they going to start shooting each other? Be serious.
Hypothetically, even if it wasn't the job of the federal government to render aid unasked, and even if the local authorities didn't ask for help, any administration that stuck to the letter of the rules at the expense of saving thousands of innocent lives is fucking incompetent, by definition.
The government has no reason for existence but to keep its citizens safe. Any government that allows red tape to come between that and obvious, simple actions that will save lives isn't a government worthy of the name.
All this proves is that, despite the fact it was FEMA's (and Bush's, who's responsible for their execrable leadership) responsiblility, even had it not been (as some right-wing pundits are erroneously trying to claim), they still would have dropped the ball for sticking to the letter of the rules while the very people they're charged to protect were drowning, starving and drinking floodwater laced with toxic waste and raw sewerage.
To summarise: Your point is retarded - would you rather be "evacuated by the (non-local!) army", or "left to drown in your home, or to die from drinking contaminated floodwater"?
The old TVTome also had this problem, and it had (I believe) a bunch of full-time editors. The Stargate SG-1 section was especially bad - some episode descriptions were a one- or two-line description, and some were a full three-paragraph blow-by-blow retelling of the episode, complete with ending.
I always treated TVTome as a useful resource for episode names (for renaming, erm, backups of DVDs that I own and had, erm, lost the box for, honest)... Avoid the descriptions for episodes you haven't seen yet and it was fine.
Mind you, that said I don't get overly bothered by spoilers, so maybe it was a bigger problem for others.
Either way, if you tolerated the spoilers and used TVTome before it became TV.com, I doubt this new Wiki version will upset you any more. And now it's a Wiki the spoiler-haters can at least directly edit the pages to remove them.
Slashdot Mirror
Not "my", mate, I'm from the UK.
;-)
That said, yes, the US has always had something of an authoritarian bent (hence the WoD and the high prison population, which are obviously linked). I think it comes from being started by a bunch of Puritans who left England because they didn't think it was uptight enough
True, the US has also been involved in all the things you mention, but then there is documented proof that many countries (the UK, for one) tested bacteriological and chemical weapons (on unsuspecting conscripts, in our case), and half the current destabilisation in the middle east is our fault (the other half is the USA stepping in to meddle about the time we stopped, in the early part of the 20th century).
To be clear: my point was that the USA was much more of a good example of democracy in the past than it is now. Never one-tenth the example it thought it was, but nevertheless, it's fallen a long way even so.
I doubt that even anyone well-aware of its murky aspects would have predicted quite such a quick drop in liberty or such a stunning reversal of international prestige.
Actually, I'm neither paranoid nor a libertarian - I'm actually a pretty well-blanaced left-centrist in the UK (which, I suppose, makes me a dangerous left-wing radical in the US ;-)
Tackling your points:
"Fascism is a philosophy, not a mystery syndrome."
Indeed. But surely to be a philosophy it must have some sort of core beliefs or "symptoms". There must be some sort of defining points, or we wouldn't be able to point to it when we saw it. These seem to be presented as a collection of "common aspects" of a fascist society.
"And maybe some people in the Administration do have authoritarian leanings but... even under Dr. Britt's criteria we still fall short, if only by degrees"
Indeed. But if my country exhibited even the majority of the things listed, I'd be very, very worried. Although not every point applies to the US 100% most of them do, and there are at least "shades of" the rest.
"To say that the U.S. has military supremacy is the most far-fetched of them all. I could only find two cabinet secretaries who had military service listed in their Wikipedia biography: Transportation Secretary Norman Mineta, and Veterans Affairs Secretary Jim Nicholson. That's troublesome in its own right, but might explain why there are so many hawks in the Administration. Regardless, when you start getting into fascist military cults... you don't see Bush and Cheney and Rumsfeld running around in military uniforms making up medals to give each other like Hitler, Mussolini, Tojo, or dare I say it: Hussein's government in Iraq all did."
Sorry to be an arse about this, but did you actually read the article, or merely peruse the headlines and miss the points it was making? Referring you to this very section:
"4. Supremacy of the Military
Even when there are widespread domestic problems, the military is given a disproportionate amount of government funding, and the domestic agenda is neglected. Soldiers and military service are glamorized. "
Are there widespread domestic problems in the US? Yes, undeniably. Drugs, crime, poverty, the list goes on.
Is "the military" given a disproportionate amount of funding? Not for bullet-proof vests in Iraq, but Bush is violating treaties and wasting billions on a new generation of bunker-busting nukes, the SDI scheme (that evidence suggests will never work), etc.
The point Britt's making is that military might is prioritised over more important matters. The US isn't run by a military junta, so of course Bush and the gang aren't awarding themselves military honours. However, they're very keen on press conferences on aircraft carriers, always pushing military "solutions" over diplomatic ones, always implying arguing against their policies constitutes "hating the army" and constantly portraying the left as "weak" for even considering diplomacy (or even trying to understand terrorists' motives to fight them better).
Neocons and the extreme right are clearly in love with the military, and the idea of military might. They speak the lingo, clothe their ideas in their terms and constantly identify themselves with the people actually doing the fighting. The only time the split happens is when they actually have to stand up and do their duty, when they suddenly come over all quiet and pull strings to get assigned to the National Guard (or similar).
"Again, it's not that I'm not scared: it could happen; we're inching towards it. But what's his face's attempt to force fit fascism into modern American society is a joke."
Actually, I haven't seen the original report, and neither have you - if you read the page properly you'll see it states right at the top "The excerpt is in accordance with the magazine's policy".
Finally, the page doesn't mention the USA once. I'm the only one who made the connection between the points listed and the USA.
Therefore the fact you don't like the conclusions it forces you into is no reason to reject the study.
In fact, this is never a reason, but it's such a prevalent mindset in the US these days it's almost futile to argue it.
"Britt bent his data to fit his hypothesis."
Do you have any decent evidence to support this hypothesis? I'm not saying he hasn't, merely that your arguments seem deeply flawed, and are therefore no basis to allege such a conclusion.
"Why else would characteristic 3 include "terrorists" as a scapegoat when the regimes he allegedly used for the study never focused on such a group?"
Maybe because back then the word "terrorist" wasn't thrown around with quite such wild abandon as these days? Thesaurus.com gives us such synonyms as "agitator, insurgent, insurrectionist, malcontent, mutineer, nihilist, rebel, revolter, revolutionary" and "anarchist", and these have been used as scapegoats by authority figures since the beginning of time.
It's also interesting that Fascist states seem to have more problems with terrorists than non-fascist states, due primarily to their repressive and authoritarian actions.
"And since when is being a terrorist-- by definition someone who kills, steals, and destroys to force an agenda-- defensible? Are terrorists victims now? Lumping terrorists in with ethnic minorities and "liberals" (nice one, Larry) is suspect."
The point I think he's trying to make is not that these things are acceptable, but that they're scapegoated for things they didn't necessarily do, or their level of threat is wildly exaggerated to permit the authorities to become more repressive and have the population simply accept it.
Scapegoated has a different meaning from "rightly blamed", and scapegoating is always bad.
"Also, scratch number 4 (after all, the liberals keep telling me we didn't allocate enough troops to Iraq or Afghanistan originally and that costs money)"
Number 4 is not strongly so in the case of the US. Nevertheless:
1) Hypothetically, merely because the opposition is also arguing for a single "fascist" element that doesn't mean the party in power isn't also tending towards fascism. In addition, the "liberals" were initially campaigning not to go into Iraq. Now they've failed (and your troops are there), they're campaigning to at least give them enough equipment to have a chance of staying alive. This is very different to prioritising the overwhelming supremacy of the military, which is what the point is all about.
2) Bush is spending a disproportionate amount of money (and raising international tension) developing new high-tech military gadgets like bunker-buster nukes, SDI defence systems and the like.
The keyphrase here is "supremacy of the military", not "having more soldiers than anyone else", or "well-funding all aspects of the military equally".
"number 6 (please point out the state-sponsored censorship in the NYT, LA Times, or Air America Radio)"
Point six says "controlled mass media", not "rigid censorship". In fact it explicitely goes on to state "in other cases, the media is indirectly controlled by government regulation, or sympathetic media spokespeople and executives".
I'm not being offensive, but did you even read the linked article, or just decide you didn't like what it was saying and skim over a few words of it?
"number 10 (haven't seen troops breaking up strikes lately)"
Granted, this doesn't apply too strongly to the US, but then the "labour vs. bosses" fight was largely over many years ago, and workers now have certin rights enshrined in law. In reaction, corporations are simply off-shoring jobs to third-world countries with no such labour laws (and cheaper expenses), as fast as they can. Several Bush economic policies have also eased this flood, not stemmed it.
"The rest could conceivably be argued by some radicals."
Hehehehe, are you serious? I'd have said the following
Yay! My first Freak!
;-)
But seriously, I wasn't trolling, I was attempting to make a serious point:
Merely because the current government in the Netherlands apparently isn't predisposed towards fascist/totalitarian behaviour, that's no reason to hand them the capability without thought.
Allowing the government additional powers isn't merely a question of "will they use it responsibly?".
It's actually a case of "will they, and every single government who comes after them, for the entire conceivable future of the country use these powers responsibly".
I'd submit that no "government" can be trusted for all time, since the people who make up each "government" change every few years, and while it's easy to restrict civil liberties and pass restrctive laws, these measures don't tend to be repealed by anything short of a revolution.
The (admittedly slightly emotive) example of the US was intended to illustrate this point - in the mid-90s you'd have been laughed at to suggest that the current situation would occur within 5-10 years, and yet the US has gone from shining beacon of liberty to the world to an unprecedented crackdown on civil liberties and an unprecedented drop in international esteem.
Apologies if you think I'm trolling, but that wasn't the intention at all. And when your Freaks list is at least as long as your Friends list, maybe you want to re-evaluate that hair-trigger on your killfile
"The difference is the action that is being taken. With the Gestapo, you could get killed for venting your thoughts. No way that this is going to happen by action of the Dutch government."
Currently.
Ten years ago in USA you couldn't be arrested, detained without trial, denied even minimal Geneva Convention protections and tortured and abused without restitution merely for being in the wrong place at the wrong time.
And the USA was widely regarded as the shining example of representative democracy and civil liberties to the entire world.
Your point?
You're right in what you say - the US is (for all their talk of "t3h fr33d0mZ!!!!!1111!") far closer to becoming a fascist state than the Netherlands currently is.
Read The 14 Characteristics of Fascism by Dr. Lawrence Britt - the USA hits every single point square-on, with the possible exception of point 5 (rampant sexism), although the paper goes on to clarify "opposition to abortion is high, as is homophobia and anti-gay legislation and national policy", so maybe half a point then.
However, by instituting a system such as the Netherlands', they make it much easier to start monitoring their citizens and restricting civil liberties in the future - all you need is to not stop updating the database after the child passes 18, and you've got some of the scariest bits of 1984 right there.
Short version: The US is far further down the track, but the Netherlands just massively upgraded how fast they can catch up.
"Let me know when we use Nuclear weapons again, and I will agree that we are terrorists... Though it is true, terrorist weapons are more limitted."
Granted. However, are you saying that, when your president publically threatens that he can nuke anyone, anywhere he wants, that the rest of the world should ignore it and just trust he isn't serious?
Granted, in a restricted, public war the US takes great pains to try to minimise civilian casualties, but it has that option. Take Vietnam, when (technologically) all you could do was carpet-bomb and napalm thousands of innocent people to catch the few combatants in a given area.
Again, I'm not agreeing with terrorism, but it's easy to criticise people for not being selective when they think they're in a mortal conflict for their right to self-determination and way of life, and they don't have that option.
"Personally, I believe that once you are forced into war (as in they come over and try to kill you), you use whatever means are necessary to destroy the enemy."
Exactly, which is all the terrorists think, too. The US has spent most of this century meddling overtly or covertly in the middle east - destabilising populist regimes and setting up unstable puppet governments because it's in their own interest to. As far as the terrorists are concerned, the US is already invading the middle east, and they have no option to strike back with but terrorism.
Again, not agreeing with the tactics used, but they don't hate you for your beliefs or your success - they hate you for the meddling you've done and the pain and suffering you've caused to further your own ends. I know this is not a popular view in the US, but try reading the foreign media (any foreign media) for a while, and you'll see how inward-looking and "goodthink"-obsessed the US media is.
"The Iraqis would be justified in defending themselves against the US, for example. But since the US isn't really killing Iraqis (and have pretty much convinced everyone that they do not want to be there long term), they are not the current target there - other muslims are."
First off, I don't know where you got the idea everyone's convinced the US will pull out of Iraq as soon as it can - many, many Iraqis (and the majority of the arab world) firmly believe that the US intends to use Iraq as a staging-post to conduct similar operations across the middle east. Again, read or watch foreign media occasionally - yours is (apologies, but it's true) practically an international joke.
"Thats why they are terrorists - they are killing people, not to defend their lives, but to force others into submission."
Hypothetically, if a fundamentalist regime invaded the US with no resistance, do you think you, personally, would be killed as a result? Do you think your life would change at all? So, would you offer up resistance to protect your way of life, even though if you didn't you wouldn't actually die?
Exactly the same situation. The US meddles in international affairs, and is quite happy to (prefers to?) destabilise (even populist) countries, to further their own agenda. They aren't happy with sitting back and persuading countries to embrace democracy and choice, they prefer to use trade embargoes, covert operations or invasive warfare to do it, and seems completely immune to the irony of forcing populations to embrace choice.
Don't get me wrong - I approve democracy above all else, but you can't force people to abandon their current system and adopt one of your choosing if the majority of people in that country don't want to do it.
Unfortunately, while the US often deposes dictators and the like, it's also got a depressing history of removing democratically-elected and populist regimes who merely happen to disagree with certain US policies. This instantly casts every such action like this by the US into doubt, since their stated aims (promoting democracy,
"However, that is not what happened. "US's worst foreign interferences" were decisions made to choose the lessor of two evils"
With the greatest respect, the US has consistently chosen the lesser of two evils to itself - it's shown remarkably little interest in the welfare or consequences on anyone else.
I'm well aware this is the prevalent opinion in the United States (with it's famously isolationist, inward-looking culture and media), but ask the rest of the world (who actually have to deal with the consequences of America's international policies) and you'll get a very different story.
It might surprise you to know that in a survey a year or two ago (when Bush's approval rating was if anything higher), the majority of UK respondants rated Bush as a greater threat to world peace than Saddam or Bin Laden.
So, which is more likely - the world irrationally hates you for no reason whatsoever, or (possibly), your foreign policy and unnecessary meddling (in your own self-interest) causes unnecessary suffering, but your highly isolationist attitudes mean your advertising-backed pop-media never bothers to report any of it back to you?
"or in rare occasions they were the result of illegal actions by powerfull individuals - and in the US we seek out and punish those individuals (unlike say, France, where trading weapons for oil will go unpunished)."
Except, to use your example, the US provided the majority of the chemical weapons Saddam Hussain used to gas Kurds all through the 90s. And Saddam Hussain was supplied and briefed by the CIA when he initially attempted to assassinate Prime Minister Qassim.
It's easy to write off everything bad or evil the US has ever done as "illegal actions by powerfull individuals", but when the "illegal actions" are destabilising entire countries for economic or political gain, and when the "powerful individuals" are your own government and intelligence services, the only conclusion is that America is not a force for good in the world, but one looking out for its own interests, and fuck the little guy.
"No one is perfect - but the US actively fights people (foriegn or domestic) that abuse power. I just didn't see that in the mid east prior to 9/11."
Pop quiz - did America invade Iraq because of:
i) Its poor humanitarian record? (Hint: Many other countries have far worse records, and they aren't always indispensable allies like Saudi Arabia)
ii) A serious belief by anyone, anywhere, that Saddam had WMDs? (Hint: it's been a proven fact the Bush administration was planning to invade Iraq before they even took power, and the Downing Street Memo shows they knew there were no weapons before they invaded)
iii) The danger of spreading Islamic fundamentalism? (Hint: Saddam was pretty much the only successful secular leader in the Gulf region, as such he was the poster-boy for non-theocratic regimes in the middle east, and as a result of Gulf War II Iraq now looks like being heavily influenced by Iran's fundamentalist politics, if it doesn't slide all the way into a repressive Islamic theocracy)
iv) their rich oilfields, to secure a nice, cheap supply of oil for the next century. (Hint: Bush and Cheney's oil-industry backers have made billions already out of the Iraq conflict, and their associated companies, like Halliburton, are getting overwhelmingly more reconstruction contracts in Iraq than non-republican-linked corporations.
Seriously - I started off listening to your opinions with an open mind, but if you're going to seriously suggest that the US doens't habitually act in its own best interests (even where such actions destabilise whole regions), I can only respectfully suggest you read up on some foreign history (practically any, in fact) and re-examine your position...
"Hey I'm a parent, and I'm extremely vigilant in this regard. I certainly don't need laws to do my job for me!"
;-)
Kudos to you - I only wish you were in the majority
"My problem is this: I can raise my boys to be ethical and as they get older, to understand entertainment violence in context, but my family is not an island."
Indeed not. However, they're your kids, not the government's - I'm (admittedly) not a parent myself, but isn't the job of the parent to insulate kids from things dangerous to them? It might not be easy, but I can't believe it's not possible - we've had violence, profanity and sex for the entire span of human existence, and we're still here. Indeed, many would say we're more civilised now than in the past.
I understand your position - if (for example) you ban your kids from watching TCM on DVD, they can just go round a friend's house and do it. If you never find out about it you can't stop it, but:
1) The mere fact they know they'd end up in trouble means they know what they're doing is wrong, which reduces its influence over them.
2) If your child's been raised to be honest, you stand a good chance of finding out about it anyway eventually.
3) If/when you find out about it, you should go straight round to the house and ask what the hell the other kid's parents are thinking, letting a young child watch horror films. If the parents are so irresponsible they can't (or won't) stop their own kid from doing it, you should:
3a) ban your child from visiting them. He can still see his friend at school, or playing in the park - he's just banned from going to their house.
3b) report them to the authorities for showing violent/sexual/profane material to a minor. The offence is a in a responsible adult showing the material to someone underage - it shouldn't be in selling (or buying) the material.
Again, I'm not a parent, but I was raised well - my parents didn't have 100% control over my every action, but if something was off-limits it was off-limits, and if I got caught doing it I was In Trouble.
Even if we allow that video games specifically can warp a child's perceptions, seeing or playing one once (or even rarely) isn't going to do anything. Even the most ardent pro-censorship crowd only seriously suggest that prolonged or regular exposure can harm a child, and unless your child's regularly disobeying you (like, daily), you can stop that.
If your child is disobeying you that regularly, that's just bad parenting - no two ways about it.
"That being said, the Law is a very blunt instrument when it comes to getting parents to take their responsibilities seriously... I'm just no sure how we can get parents to take an interest and to realise the responsibility they owe to their fellow citizens."
Exactly. Laws are a bad idea, and parents aren't taking responsibility anyway... so the solution is emphatically not "more laws", but "find a way of getting parents to take responsibility".
I'd shy away from making it legally an offence for parents to show their kids films/games that are over their age-rating, since responsible parents know best whether their kids are ready for that sort of thing (and laws in this area unreasonably restrict freedom to raise your child the way you see fit).
However, how about:
1) Making it an offence to show anyone else's children over-aged films/games, and
2) Requiring a specific complaint from that child's parents before prosecuting?
That way if you (or you and Billy's mum down the block) agree your 16 year-old(s) are mature enough to watch an NC-17 film no-one can stop you (and any harm is restricted to your own children). If your kid goes round to Fred's house and his dad lets them watch the Texas Chainsaw Massacre without your permission, the full weight of the law comes down on him like a ton of bricks.
As a second-best (but very american) solution, make it a civil matter, so you can sue Fred's dad for voluntarily putting your child at risk.
Either way, stronger (and involuntary) laws and penalties are not the way to do it.
1. Maybe you have, and maybe it wasn't news before. However, people also implicitely trusted your president's sanity before, and with Bush's foreign policies and the associated massive rise in international tension, it's certainly news now. That means a lot of people are seeing it for the first time, and it's going to scare them shitless. Scared people do stupid things.
2. Right, and re-drafting the protocols shows he's been thinking seriously about them. So you have a situation where most of the world trusts the president massively less than even you do, he's embroiled in two wars of invasion/regime-change, and then you hear he's fiddling with the rules for nuking anyone he wants. Mmmmm... I feel secure, and I'm in the UK, on your fucking side!
3. Exactly - maybe you should take an interest. This is the only reason the right in the US gets away with it - they can fuck up international politics as much as they like, but it never comes back to bite them where it hurts (in the polls) because of your isolationism and complete ignorance of the rest of the world.
If American culture (meaning the average US citizen) took more interest in international matters, rapacious dangerous wannabe-emperors like Bush would get voted out in one term, max. Because you take such pride in your complete igonrance of the effects he has on others, eventually you piss enough people off to the point one of them learns to fly, and flies a passenger-plane into the WTC.
Then, instead of wondering why, the religious right paints them unilaterally as irrational madmen and ramps up the very things that caused it in the first place.
Don't get me wrong - I'm not promoting (or even condoning) terrorism, but your attirude is a microcosm of exactly why this shit happens.
I've never seen a document like this before, so no surprise I'm concerned.
:-)
In addition (as I've stated elsewhere), I'd be less concerned if your administration hadn't recently almost single-handedly caused a massive rise in international tension, hadn't withdrawn from nuclear nonproliferation treaties, wasn't currently trying to start a space arms race, hadn't prosecuted a war against a regime on provably trumped-up charges, and wasn't now also threatening to nuke anyone who looked at them funny.
I'll see your accusation of stupidity, and raise you a complete lack of empathy and an overwhelming arrogance...
When fundamentalists in the middle east snap and kill their own people, they're caught, imprisoned or killed as quickly as possible, just like the US.
When US fundamentalists organise a war against another entire culture perceived as a mortal threat, they're lauded and apologised-for by half the populace of the USA. Any surprise that it's the same for the Middle East?
I utterly disagree with terrorism, no argument.
But (from an only slightly biased, Middle-eastern perspective) they only cheer and occasionally protect their "terrorists" - you vote yours into public office.
Obviously to us in the West (with our more highly evolved brains) there is a difference between:
"Nuking an arms depot and not caring if we kill hundreds of thousands of civilians, since it'll probably terrify the country concerned into submission anyway"
and
"Killing a few thousand civilians while making a strategic strike against a symbol (and apparatus) of the enemy's economic (and military) domination, because you're powerless to attack by more direct means",
but those crazy Muslims apparently aren't...
Yes, I'm deliberately painting a biased picture, but no more so that you were.
And if you need more convincing, meditate on the difference (if any) between the meanings of "terror" and "shock and awe". If your own side has to carefully cherry-pick its terminology to avoid sounding like the enemy, it's time to re-evaluate which side you're on.
"What they do believe is that compromising with people who fly airplanes filled with innocent civilians into buildings is letting them win."
;-)
Granted, one can't be seen to be giving in to terrorism, but at the same time you only get terrorism where you haven't listened to your opponent and he lacks any other way of making you listen.
I'd modify your statement to say "you can't compromise with people who advocate flying airplanes filled with innocent civilians into buildings". If you refuse point-blank to negotiate with anyone who's ever comitted a terrorit action, that's exactly the same as saying "you're either with us or against us" - you've unilaterally ruled out any hope of compromise, so you've both already lost.
If at any point (as with the IRA in Northern Ireland) the terrorists agree to give up violence, you must try to compromise with them, sinc ethat's the only way you can ever stop the problem.
The US adminstration's position is more like even if Al Qaeda offered to talk, they probably wouldn't accept - they'd rather hunt them down, capture or kill every one, and provide lots of lovely juicy martyrs for the next generation of Bin Ladens to grow up idolising.
"For the record, I am neither Republican nor Democrat. I see a lot of Republicans as self-centered religious zealots, and a lot of Democrats as well intentioned, well educated, but mind-bogglingly naive people."
Exactly the same here. In the US I'd probably fall more on the left than on the right, but I'm also disgusted with the Democrats a fair bit of the time. I prefer the Discordian answer - I'm a "political non-euclidean".
This is exactly my position - it may be techno-utopianism, but I've seen the massive changes the internet has brought to our society in the last decade or so and it's pretty much the only thing that gives me hope for the future.
Our continuing evolution into an information society means information is ever-more-easily available, which is only a good thing. Sure, it means anyone can find out how to make pipe bombs, but at a greater (background/society-) level it also means we can more easily understand our enemies, and sometimes begin to empathise with them.
Case in point - the US administration has always painted Al Qaeda as irrational animal madmen who hate the US for their lifestyle and beliefs, but have carefully sidestepped the question of how "animal madmen" have managed to get so organised, win so many victories over the west, and (for the majority of them) still not be caught.
In contrast, easy access to Al Jazeera (or terrorists manifestos themselves) makes it easy to see the reality. Although they're committing atrocities, they aren't irrational - the terrorists have stated aims, a strategy, and they're carefully planning and pushing for specific results. We may not agree with their aims, or their barbaric methods, but they're at least still open to reason - killing every last one isn't the only option in dealing with them.
Once we realise what their aims are, there's at least a chance we can eventually talk and come to some sort of compromise ("Al Qaeda stops killing US civilians if the US pulls out some of their military bases on Muslim religious ground", for example). Sure, it leaves a bad taste in your mouth, but that's compromise - as long as it leaves an equally bad taste in the other guy's mouth, you know you haven't "lost", and that's the important thing.
A "War on Terrorism" is unwinnable - it's a tactic, a meme (like a War on Ambushes or a War on Saying "Flibble"), and without a government-approved brainchip you can't stamp out an idea, you can only demonstrate it's a bad one. Terrorism can spring up anywhere, with very little notice, and is completely impossible to stop. Every time a terrorist is killed, another one or two are created - the only hope of ever actually ending the situation is to (eventually, when the time is right) talk, debate and possibly compromise.
As Ghandi said: "An eye for an eye will make the whole world blind".
And one of my own: In an unwinnable conflict, demonising your opponent merely prolongs the conflict.
"Are you suggesting that a person is automatically in favour of ideas/actions that he or she does not actively oppose?"
"Yes. All that is necessary for evil to win is for good men to do nothing."
Having read your reponse to this, I have respect for your beliefs, so please don't take this as a troll, but:
Are you therefore implying that anyone in the Twin Towers who didn't actively support the Democrats or give money to campaigns against the US's worst foreign interferences somehow deserved, even a little bit, being killed in the atrocity?
Unless you're claiming some sort of special exemption for Americans over Muslims, it's a very clear fall-out consequence of the argument you just offered. It's also the very argument used by terrorists the world over to justify targeting civilians.
Are you sure you've thought this through?
Small ball of cells != person
The actual situation is a spectrum, from "fertilised egg" to "definitely a person". Obviously a "definite person" has rights, but does a small ball of undifferentiated cells?
If so, why? It's not a person, it merely has the potential to become one. By that rationale, wanking is murder, and menstruation is manslaughter.
It's a spectrum, fading from white at one end to black at the other, and we have the unenviable task of drawing a single line somewhere along it.
The sensible thing to do would be to use the best scientific knowledge we have available to assess when a foetus can experience pain (or whatever other functionality you decide is relevent), and draw the line there.
Your over-simplifying and obscuring of the issue retards the progress of debate, and (in the interests of developing sensible guidelines and minimising harm to anything that can feel it), should be stopped.
First off, thanks for replying. I'll admit I was deliberately a bit provocative in the hope someone would ;-)
"I can deny your silly comparisons. For one thing, there is no moral equivalency between a terrorist group and democratically elected government. That alone invalidates your comparison. Some other inconsistencies present themselves:"
My apologies - my comparisons were intended to be just that, comparisons. I'm not suggesting for one second that the current US administration is remotely as bad as the Taliban (or terrorist groups like Al Qaeda, but merely that they're one hell of a lot closer (ideologically and tactically) than the "terrorist sympathisers" they castigate on the left.
Consider all my arguments illustrations of this difference (similar directions, wildly different degree), rather than a serious implication there's no difference between the two groups.
"Abortion has nothing to do with womens rights"
I have to take issue with this. The abortion debate is nothing but a conflict between a woman's rights and the rights of the unborn foetus. Anti-abortionists value the unborn foetus as a "person", so the tiny person's right to life overrides the right of self-determination of its mother. Pro-abortionists generally don't consider a (certainly early-term) foetus to be a full human person, and hence the mother's right of self-determination overrides the "life" of a small ball of cells.
"Comparing the repression of civil liberties by the Taliban to the current U.S. government is just moronic, or a sophomoric debating tactic."
Again, I'm not implying that the current US administration's policies are exactly as bad as the Taliban's, but that in some ways they're on the same wavelength.
In the Taliban you had a fundamentalist-influenced faith-based administration, restricting civil liberties wherever the opportunity arises, pushing an often religiously-motivated agenda, and habitually preferring invasive and violent tactics to diplomacy wherever possible.
In the current US adminstration you have a fundamentalist-influenced faith-based administration, restricting civil liberties wherever the opportunity arises, pushing an often religiously-motivated agenda, and habitually preferring invasive and violent tactics to diplomacy wherever possible.
Sure the Taliban was way, way, way further down the road than the US is now (and hopefully, ever will be). However, it's hypocriticial to accuse the left in America of being associated with terrorists, when the right is (both ideologically and in its comfort with violence and conflict) much closer to them.
"Terrorists don't cause civilian deaths in the pursuit of their goals, civilian deaths IS their goal. If this difference is meaningless to you, then you are beyond help."
Ignoring the insult (and apologies if you go apeshit), but the Terrorists' actual goal is "the removal of US troops from the middle east, the cessation of American interference in foreign nations' affairs, and (possibly, some records indicate) regime-change in America to bring it more in line with their beliefs".
Al Qaeda does target civilians, but they also target military and government personnel and resources - exclusively civilian targets (like the WTO, whom incidentally, as an entity, Al Qaeda consider an ally of the US government, and hence fair game) are a relatively new tactic, only taking the lead in the last few years. They aren't attacking civilians for the sheer fun of it, but because it (to them) seems the best chance of succeeding in their aims.
Likewise, the US government's stated aims are regime change in several countries (definitely, no conflicting reports there) to bring them more in line with their beliefs. They will use force against "military" targets (training camps, weapons caches, etc) where they can, but where this proves ineffective they are now quite happy to nuke the whole area, killing many
Ah - sorry. Completely misunderstood your first post, and thought you'd misunderstood the word "inadvertently".
Sorry. Long day. My bad <:-)
Without wanting to blow my own trumpet (hell, if I could do that I'd never leave the house), this seems to happen a lot around here with the minority crowds around here (right-wing, ID, whatever).
/., and almost every debate seem to end one of two ways:
I've lost count of the number of times I've good-naturedly (and not) argued on various topics on
1) I read up and realise I'm wrong (or they offer an argument I can't logically spot the flaw in), at which point I apologise and either admit I was wrong or agree my conviction has been shaken and I'll reserve judgement pending more thinking.
2) I fire off my arguments (not normally as vitriolic as this, I must add), wait eagerly for the other side's reply, and watch as they argue until they're backed into a corner, then just stop posting to avoid having to admit they're wrong.
Even worse, I often see the self-same people in other threads advancing exactly the same arguments I'd shot down in previous debates, who then stop posting if I point out the problems again.
I try to judge people on their merits, and try to avoid sterotyping wherever I can, but the only explanation I can find is that the majority of Republicans and ID proponents are simply intellectually corrupt.
They don't appear to believe what they believe because of evidence or rationality, and having it demonstrably proven their position is untenable doesn't make them re-evaluate it - it just makes them duck out of the fight and try the same arguments and same fallacies the next time.
This idea of grading things from "my point of view" to "your point of view" (rather than "right" to "wrong") is completely alien to me, and it's quite disturbing to find how prevalent it is.
These people need to understand reality is not "Pick 'n' Mix" - everyone's entitled to their own opinion, but no-one's entitled to their own facts.
The religious right in the USA might rail against "moral relativism" (basically, the idea that it is possible to hold a valid opinion different to their own), but they're demonstrating a much more dangerous habit themselves - factual relativism.
Such wholesale rejection of reality is a symptom of mental illness, and it worries me greatly when it's exhibited regularly by people controlling the most powerful nation on earth.
Aaaaah. That makes sense.
;-)
After you with the holy water, then
"Microsoft has talked about XML export for a long time and now they're following through."
;-)
What, you mean it'll be shit?
(BadumCSSSHHHH! I'm here all week! Remember to tip your waitress...
.... Indeed.
A wardrobe malfunction that lead to Jackson inadvertently showing her nipple.
Nah, for my money you're in for more of the same. Bush's handlers are too good, the media doens't even try to challenge him, and without events being reported popular opinion isn't an effective tool to oust them.
The republicans and neocons have spent decades investing in their infrastructure, pet "intellectuals" and media glovepuppets, while the democrats have pissed about and played by the rules.
Until the republicans stop dominating all three arms of your government, even if a democrat president got in he's be hanstrung by lack of support.
For my money it's Jeb Bush next time (now George has run out of terms), and he'll lurk in the Whitehouse until the Republicans push through the ammendment and Arnie can step up. I've got some vague hope at that point (Arnie's a republican, but appears a vaguely sensible one), but TBH I think by then twelve or sixteen years of unchecked neocon-influcneced republican rule will have fucked your economy and civil liberties to the point you're irreversibly on the way to third-world-nationhood.
Sorry to be pessemistic, but I think unless something's done at the next election, we'll have seen the peak of the American empire, and the beginnings of the rise of the Chinese one.
"Why would you expect or even want the feds to come in and declare martial law?"
Because that was the FEMA disaster plan from the beginning - in the event of a truly catastrophic incident FEMA and federal resources pre-empt local government. Don't just believe everything you hear in the media - go and research it. The Republicans have done a great job of spinning this as a failure of local government, but it's bullshit, and even if local government had sat on its hands, the feds would still have been culpable for allowing one or two people to cause unnecessary numbers of people to die by holding up relief efforts to an entire city.
You might also ask why the head of FEMA has now resigned, but no-one from the local NO authorities have, and reflect on the fact that the head of FEMA was a political old-boy appointee, whereas the local authorities were elected by the populace, and are answerable to them.
You might also ask why so many of the political right in the USA are currently engaged in trying to demonise the victims in this - blaming them for not evacuating, when most of the ones left are too elderly, poor or infirm to afford to leave. Why demonise already-traumatised refugees? It's a pathetically callous attempt at spin, to deflect their own horrendous fuck-up.
Finally, why were FEMA making trained fire and rescue personnel sit in sexual discrimination lectures, only leaving to stand in the background of a Bush press-shot, while the Mayor of New Orleans was on the radion, publically swearing at FEMA for lack of assistance?
"It's one thing to have police officers you know, from your community telling you to get out of your house, its another thing to have federal officers who who knows where and soldiers from Iraq telling you to go into a shelter or a dome somewhere."
Soldiers from Iraq? What? There are lots of American soldiers and National Guard still stationed on US soil, and you couldn't have flow enough people back form Iraq quick enough to make much of a difference.
Regarding your point, to be honest given a choice I'd rather have whoever had the most resources helping me out in a disaster, which is the federal government. In addition, I'd be a damn sight more likely to obey the army, because if they're involved
i) It's likely more serious
ii) They have more manpower and more guns, and
iii) If they're involved it's more likely martial law's been declared, so I'd be running more of a risk to disobey
I'll confess not from the US, so this whole "federal vs. state" thing make no sense to me at all. However, it makes even less sense that an entity with vastly greater resources would be supposed to sit on its hands until a much smaller one asks for its help - it's completely ludicrous.
And that's assuming you can't have both the federal and state forces involved at the same time - what, are they going to start shooting each other? Be serious.
Hypothetically, even if it wasn't the job of the federal government to render aid unasked, and even if the local authorities didn't ask for help, any administration that stuck to the letter of the rules at the expense of saving thousands of innocent lives is fucking incompetent, by definition.
The government has no reason for existence but to keep its citizens safe. Any government that allows red tape to come between that and obvious, simple actions that will save lives isn't a government worthy of the name.
All this proves is that, despite the fact it was FEMA's (and Bush's, who's responsible for their execrable leadership) responsiblility, even had it not been (as some right-wing pundits are erroneously trying to claim), they still would have dropped the ball for sticking to the letter of the rules while the very people they're charged to protect were drowning, starving and drinking floodwater laced with toxic waste and raw sewerage.
To summarise: Your point is retarded - would you rather be "evacuated by the (non-local!) army", or "left to drown in your home, or to die from drinking contaminated floodwater"?
The old TVTome also had this problem, and it had (I believe) a bunch of full-time editors. The Stargate SG-1 section was especially bad - some episode descriptions were a one- or two-line description, and some were a full three-paragraph blow-by-blow retelling of the episode, complete with ending.
I always treated TVTome as a useful resource for episode names (for renaming, erm, backups of DVDs that I own and had, erm, lost the box for, honest)... Avoid the descriptions for episodes you haven't seen yet and it was fine.
Mind you, that said I don't get overly bothered by spoilers, so maybe it was a bigger problem for others.
Either way, if you tolerated the spoilers and used TVTome before it became TV.com, I doubt this new Wiki version will upset you any more. And now it's a Wiki the spoiler-haters can at least directly edit the pages to remove them.