The horror of Sept. 11th, 2001

@wandeljw,

If I remember correctly you said that it was the wrong day for the criticism, not the wrong thread for it. I have not been following this thread and if there is some kind of wrong-thread subtext that I'm not aware of I apologize, my point was meant to be general.

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@Robert Gentel,

Robert Gentel wrote:

Your "my country right or wrong" mentality is far more popular world wide than putting humanity first.

oh

well, I stand corrected.

excuse me, I need to go have a good cry now, and ask someone if these pants make my butt look big.

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@chai2,

No, your huge butt makes your butt look big . . .

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@Setanta,

Setanta wrote:

No, your huge butt makes your butt look big . . .

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@chai2,

Ok, I give up. What are you talking about?

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@Robert Gentel,

You give up?

Then I win!!

Actually I mean to quote you on your post about what's his face calling other people shrill.

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@chai2,

A pyrrhic victory, cause now I'm taking your callipygian theme and running with it:

I was thinking a bit about how it generally frustrates me that I can't harshly criticize America without it being an indictment to some of the more patriotic Americans. I've no wish to be "loathed" by Finn, nor do I court the disapproval from folks like roger whenever I criticize America and while I can't let that stop me from doing so I do sometimes wonder why it can't be a more objective discussion (like I was trying to describe with the toast example) and the example that came to mind was actually a big butt joke.

I realized that America is an object of their affection, and that saying that Beyonce has a big butt isn't taken in the same way as if you say someone's wife has a big butt. I wish it weren't this way, because it makes nearly all nationalistic conflicts hard to discuss (even in banal subjects like sports), and because I find it all so arbitrary for such a strong alliance but I can at least empathize with it more when I think of it that way and try to find better ways to couch it than "dude, your wife has a ginormous ass!"

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@Robert Gentel,

I have never seen a phrase more often misquoted, nor more misunderstood.

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@roger,

I know what you mean. I don't mean it in the "my country over my principles" way, I mean it in the "it's my country, whether it's right or wrong" way. The majority of the site's audience is American, and I'm saying that I think the majority of Americans feel like you do about criticism of America, in that it can get old to them pretty fast.

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@georgeob1,

Quote:

Has it occurred to you that some others may find all this a bit shrill, self-righteous and hypocritical?

Absolutely ******* amazing that you can even write **** like this, Gob. What is more shrill, self-righteous, hypocritical, self-absorbed than a country, a people, that after,

R.I.P the 48,644 Afgan and 1,690,903 Iraqi people that paid the ultimate price for a crime they didn't even commit. And are still paying for it!

you can still come up with your crap, the maudlin TV coverage, the absolute blindness. It's enough to make a sane person puke.

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@Eorl,

Eorl wrote:

If that makes me a traitor by your value system, so be it. I prefer the term humanist, and I think patriotism, nationalism and religion are various forms of bigotry that sit at the very heart of all of this.

THIS. Humanists would not have committed 9/11.

Quote:

I have seen several in this thread openly state that human beings of their own brand are of a higher value than others and frankly I find that appauling, for all its common acceptance.

I completely agree, this ability to value human life less as long as it's foreign to a particular demographic is essential to the terrorist mindset. It's a part of the problem, and even if someone doesn't take it as far as flying a plane into buildings it might make them amenable to supporting flying some planes over to drop some bombs, which in turn has a tendency to motivate those who value the lives of the bombed to want to do things like fly some planes into some buildings and it just goes on.

Tribalism is itself justified only by the tribalism of others. It's such a tedious cycle and I dislike so very much that human progress away from it can be measured in beard-seconds.

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@JTT,

Sometimes I wonder whether your real aim is to generate American patriotism.

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@Robert Gentel,

Quote:

I strongly oppose isolationism. But that is not the only alternative to warmongering.

Wasn't meant to be posed as the only alternative, just a reference to pre ww11 attitudes.

Quote:

No it isn't a fabrication, the US has a very long history of supporting tyrants who are corrupt in that they we have them in our pockets. Sure, the motivation isn't to subjugate them, that is just a means to and end

Tactics like that belong to a PITA demonstration. It's a fabrication, painting a picture far from the truth, ignoring the alternatives. Someone opposing isolationism should realize the complexities involved. Supporting stability always involves supporting unsavory characters sooner or later. We get accused because we weigh the balance according to the world economy, so suddenly it's a selfish end.

Quote:

Perhaps the hundreds of thousands of people America has killed? America doesn't like it when people kill their people and other people feel remarkably similar about that kind of thing

Such a remarkable generalization, killing is wrong, no argument there, but I must assume you're not talking about ww11 casualties, perhaps the civil war?
I shouldn't be a smart ass, but the point is, lets be specific here after all Britain begged us to enter ww11 and kill people.

Quote:

I'm not trying to anthropomorphize America into some evil villain. I think America is a great force for good in many ways, but also a great danger to the world with its militaristic foreign policy. When its policies are heartless this does not mean the country is, there is no evil genius pulling the strings, it's just the product of many different forces in the political system, including the insular worldview and the apathy of Americans (many of the people here on this forum supported the wars that America waged in response to 9/11, hundreds of thousands of people were killed by their misguided support).

I can agree with you here.

Quote:

Furthermore, I find it a bit naive to say that America's great responsibility is to prevent nuclear war.

This isn't what I said, I said America has felt great responsibility, which is true, after ww11 America, and the world, were horrified by what had happened. Today's policies have developed from that stand point.
I don't support where these policies have gone, but I am not going to pretend the rest of the free world bears no responsibility for the path we went down.

Quote:

There is no bigger picture that justifies the hundreds of thousands of people America kills in unjust wars. There is no bigger picture that makes invading Iraq make sense. That is just wishful thinking.

I really dislike this tactic of generalization, it's simply an emotional appeal and fails to serve diplomacy.
I have never been a supporter of the war in Iraq, it never should have happened. IMO it was a knee jerk emotional reaction by an incompetent administration. The Texas swagger should have been the first clue, and has no place in world politics.
The problem, concerning the future, is that many Americans are still taken in by all the big talk and bluster, rather than the cool cucumber we really need for the long haul.

Quote:

In the competition between nations, history has never seen a competitor like America. And America didn't get there by playing Mother Theresa.

True, I would however say, that we citizens of America are some of the most caring the world has ever known, most of us would like nothing better than to see all the world enjoy our standard of living. Alas, we are also very human and the thinkers among us realize full well the realities of life on this planet.
I am grateful for the comforts and securities I enjoy, but I won't be made to feel guilty for it.

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@wayne,

Quote:

Britain begged us to enter ww11 and kill people.

Come on now, if you'd entered WW2 because we'd begged you to, you would have entered in 1940. You entered WW2 because of Peal Harbour, in 1941.

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@wayne,

Quote:

do you feel that we should not have pursued the Taliban in Afghanistan?

That was a war crime, Wayne! Just what is it that you can't grasp here. The Taliban were the government of a sovereign nation, a government I must remind you that was helped into power by the US.

That was an illegal War of Aggression as defined by international law; the same international law, again, I must remind you, that the US used to convict many Nazis and Japanese.

A government, again I must remind you, that was a good friend of the US until, until, the Taliban made a perfectly legitimate decision to not allow an American company the business position it sought.

Then the Taliban became Demon #[you fill in the blank].

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@chai2,

chai2 wrote:

what I can say wandel, is that I've never heard one man call another man "shrill" "a harpy" or "hysterical" here, nor have I heard one woman say it about another.

I have seen men say that to women.

I wonder if olga started an account as a man, and said those same words, if "he" would have been called shrill.

Of course not.

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@Robert Gentel,

Robert Gentel wrote:

Tribalism is itself justified only by the tribalism of others. It's such a tedious cycle and I dislike so very much that human progress away from it can be measured in beard-seconds.

Absolutely!

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@izzythepush,

There's truth in that, but not all of it, we didn't enter in 1940 because we were unsure of Britain's resolve. We knew we were likely to become involved, eventually, and didn't wish to waste resources if Britain was going to roll over.
When Churchill was willing to sink the French navy, rather than trust them to keep it out of German hands, we saw the extent of your resolve.
You guys can be quite ruthless Smile

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@wayne,

Quote:

Terrorism affects us all, sooner or later.

Yes, it does, but the affects really have come way way late to the western world, considering that the US has been engaged in full on terrorism for over a century.

Quote:

I hate the position we are in, but I cannot agree the job is finished until there is a reasonable guarantee that Afghanistan can form a government strong enough to prevent the Taliban operating with impunity.

Horsecrap. You simply repeating the propaganda you've been fed since early 2000. The problem is not with these countries that the US has brutally meddled in and with. They can easily sort things out.

Look at Vietnam. It took some 3 million deaths for you dickheads, present company excluded to realize that the Vietnamese could handle their own affairs. And yet, here we have the US dealing with a communist country.

What occurred on 9-11 was a long time coming. If y'all would just stop murdering, raping, torturing, brutalizing, stealing others wealth, these things simply wouldn't happen.

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@Robert Gentel,

I was speaking about this thread on that day.

I think....i said it a few days ago.

But can I clarify?

Do you object to the commemoration of the day in and of itself? Because I think that, in big tragedies, that a national recognition of the tragedy can be a very healing thing.

Or do you object to it Only when it is used as propaganda for hate mongering, reinforcement of patriotic hysteria and such?

1 Reply

The horror of Sept. 11th, 2001

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