If you're not with me, you're against me.

@hamilton,

Bullshit. Sure this philosophy works for somethings, but if you're about to do something really stupid, what kind of dumb friend would follow you instead of cautioning you.
In other words, if you jump off a bridge I should too?

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@Ceili,

i was thinking of it in a more military sense. i just watched the third starwars last night, the one where anikan screams those lines into his masters face, and i began to think about it.

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@hamilton,

Again, looks what's happening in Libya or Syria. Here there are some pretty horrible dictators killing their citizens who peaceful protest.
On one hand, the army is killing people for their leader or because they have been ordered to do so, on the other, they are killing their neighbours and friends. Kind of a catch 22. Everything about it sucks. In the future, if their leader wins... they could be heroes. If they lose they could end up with a bulls-eye on their backs.

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@Ceili,

well i was thinking of in the way of resource demand in war. if a country stands neutral in a war between two countries, and it has the resources necessary to win the war for one of the other two, but withholds aid from the closer in endearment of them, then that action states that it does not favor that country that it was "supposed" to support. and if the country that it "favors" were to lose, the loser could simply blame it's loss on that neutral country's refusal to help.

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@hamilton,

Sorry but it is no concern of country C if country A need something from them that would allow them to defeat country B assuming they do not have a dog in the race.

Now the saying it more of a weak justification for country A to attack country C to take whatever by force of arms.

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@hamilton,

That quote actually comes from the bible and it is talking about if you are not for God you are against God.

Quote:

Matthew 12:30 - He that is not with me is against me; and he that gathereth not with me scattereth abroad.

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@hamilton,

"Man does not live by bread alone". Wait, that's a different Biblical passage where Jesus quoted from Deuteronomy.

"He who is not with me is against me" Matthew 12:30

I don't particular care for or follow
'for or against' thinking. Each person has their own thoughts and the right to follow their own drummer, distant or near. To sum it up, I don't subscribe to the statement for my life; but, you are fully entitled to.

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@Arella Mae,

That kind of a saying is as old as mankind so I question if a bible writer was the first to come up with it.

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I guess I need to make it a little clearer because obviously SOMEONE doesn't understand.

That is a QUOTE that Jesus made according to scripture.

Hint, hint: Google it and you will see it is attributed to Christ saying it.

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@Arella Mae,

I bet long before Jesus so call virgin birth that saying was in every language of the human race.

Alexander the Great and his father before him I am sure used that idea and saying in dealing with other Greek states.

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I bets and I am sures do not evidence make. Since SOMEONE thinks wikipedia is so wonderful, I am posting what they say about the phrase, and oh my, guess what? Their first record of it is Jesus saying it! Who knew?!! Rolling Eyes

Quote:

Historical quotations

Jesus is reported to have said, "He that is not with me is against me; and he that gathereth not with me scattereth abroad."[3]

Vladimir Ilyich Lenin, in a speech discussing the Chief Committee for Political Education, told the assembled delegates that "It is with absolute frankness that we speak of this struggle of the proletariat; each man must choose between joining our side or the other side. Any attempt to avoid taking sides in this issue must end in fiasco."[4]

George Orwell wrote in his 1942 essay "Pacifism and the War", "If you hamper the war effort of one side you automatically help that of the other. Nor is there any real way of remaining outside such a war as the present one. In practice, ‘he that is not with me is against me’. The idea that you can somehow remain aloof from and superior to the struggle, while living on food which British sailors have to risk their lives to bring you, is a bourgeois illusion bred of money and security."

Benito Mussolini declared in speeches across fascist Italy: "O con noi o contro di noi"--You're either with us or against us.[citation needed]
Hillary Clinton said on September 13, 2001: "Every nation has to either be with us, or against us. Those who harbor terrorists, or who finance them, are going to pay a price."[5]

President George W. Bush, in an address to a joint session of Congress on September 20, 2001 said, "Either you are with us, or you are with the terrorists."[6]

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@hamilton,

the phrase sums up, to me anyway, the worst of the american psyche since 9/11

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@djjd62,

Bush's statement indicates that we can never, under any circumstances, interact with "terrorists" (and this refers to anyone we can, by any stretch of the imagination, connect to real terrorists or the Axes of Evil category) except violently. This very attitude is "terrorist" if you ask me. But if you are an "exceptionalist" you'll conclude that American terrorism--as in the case of Shock and Awe and Heroshima--is morally acceptable. Domestically Bush's statement is also an expression of McCarthyism. His general attitude is very "unamerican" by my standards (I hope this is not an expression of Mirror Image McCarthyism on my part).
We must hold ourselves to the same standards we hold others.

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Just another way of saying, if you disagree with me you hate America.

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@Arella Mae,

Quote:

wonderful, I am posting what they say about the phrase, and oh my, guess what? Their first record of it is Jesus saying it! Who knew?!!

Let see we have someone we have no hard exist at all being given credit for saying something first written by an unknown person a few life times after the statement was said to had happen.

Now if is was someone like Caesar who in 30 BC something wrote a book that we still have I would give it some credit but not such a source as the bible.

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@Arella Mae,

Wikipedia does not suggest that the first use of the concept/phrase was by Jesus - they're simply identifying English-language Bibles as one of the sources for the phrase.

The concept is an ancient one that philosophers of many cultures have considered - look to Aristotle
http://changingminds.org/disciplines/argument/fallacies/aristotle_fallacies.htm ,
Socrates, Lao-Tzu, Confucius http://www.san.beck.org/EC14-Confucian.html etc - for discussions of the for/against proposal. It could be considered a form of logical fallacy.

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@Arella Mae,

Arella Mae wrote:

Their first record of it is Jesus saying it!

they have not suggested that it was the first time it was used.

It also probably wouldn't have taken that particular formulation in Aramaic as the grammar was/is so different.

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@ehBeth,

That was totally NOT the point. He always says he wants evidence of it. Well, I used his favorite source to at least show it was at least REPORTED that Jesus said it. He only had his I bets and I am sure which is no evidence.

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@Arella Mae,

Arella Mae wrote:

That quote actually comes from the bible

It is one source.

It is not the earliest source.

If Jesus said it, it certainly wasn't said in English.

What you've got is that someone took something that had been in use for millenia, may have been said by Jesus, and translated it into English. So, no, that quote doesn't actually come from the Bible (if anyone should want to use the Bible as a source document).

1 Reply

If you're not with me, you're against me.

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