American Consulate Attack in Libya

[dreadgeek]

Originally Posted by Ciaran

Actually, in my opinion, this touches on why there's an antagonism towards the USA across many parts of the world. It's incredibly arrogant for the USA to view itself as the world's policeman (or policewoman for that matter). No nation or collection of nations should think that they have the carte blanche right to interfere in the internal affairs of other parts of the world. Values are not absolute.

I'm not sure that last bit is true. Is there a single sane person on this planet that would argue that it is entirely acceptable if some nation should decide that they will round up some group X within their midst and put them all to death in a systemized, callous and utterly barbaric fashion? I would argue that there *are* absolute values. There may not be a whole lot of them but there are a few. I would say that no people, no matter how powerful, have leave to enslave another person. If it is not forbidden, even if that is simply in the sense that it's just one of those things you don't do , then it is permitted. We should be extraordinarily cautious around the idea that there are no absolute values.

Before I ask you some questions to show the point I'm making, please understand that I am assuming that every single person reading these words is entirely opposed to racism, violence, slavery, sexism, bigotry of all kinds, oppression of all sorts. In fact, I'm counting on everyone reading this being a humane and compassionate person who is operating out of goodwill. The throat clearing is simply so there can be no possibility of misunderstanding here.

Now, is there anyone who would argue that if a people decided to practice slavery that it would be acceptable? Is there anyone who would argue that it is okay for a society to have laws that take whole populations and put them outside normal legal protections? Is there anyone here who would argue that if a society says that the word of a woman in a rape case is worthless unless multiple men also back up her story that that is simply their choice? Anyone want to argue *in favor* of laws making homosexuality punishable by death?

These are not matters of simple prejudice. Would anyone argue that Jim Crow in the United States was simply a matter of preference in Dixie and we cannot say whether it was a bad thing? An unjust thing? Again, not simply matters of national, cultural or personal preference. If there are no absolute values, no places where either people or cultures should not go then we have no basis upon which to judge whether or not society today is better than society, say, 100 years ago. Anyone think that society was better off when women couldn't vote?

I'm sorry but enslaving other people is wrong. It wasn't evil because it happened in my nation, to my people. It was evil because it happened and had it been people from Africa who had sailed up north, grabbed a bunch of people from Scotland and taken them to North America where they sold them to the Native Americans, it would *still* be evil. It was evil because people were treated as mere property, tools, means to an end and not ends into themselves. Any culture that thinks it is acceptable to enslave people--*enslave them*--is doing something wrong. I emphasize slavery because I'm not talking about things that get called slavery. I'm talking about actual taken by force, held by force, transferrable to another person as property, right to slay you on the spot because the sky is blue, can take your children and sell them off, slavery. I'm not talking about horrible working conditions. Slavery.

I would say that what happened in Russia under Stalin when millions died in purges and gulags, that Russia was doing something wrong. It is wrong to kill people because of political disagreements. It doesn't matter if in so doing you are going to bring about a proletarian utopia, you can't slaughter your fellow citizens because they disagree with you politically. I don't think the state has the right to do so on behalf of the citizenry and I don't think the citizenry has a *normal* right to do this. If the citizenry is being slaughtered by their government, they have the right to defend itself. If a *legitimate* state (consent of the governed, minority rights, rule of law) is threatened it may use what measures are necessary to put down those who would overthrow it. States, like people, should be able to defend themselves. But the state doesn't have the right to arbitrarily take measures against its citizenry. For that matter, I would argue that majorities should not have the right to vote on the rights of minorities.

To say that slavery, bigotry, legal exclusion of minority, genocide are simply matters of cultural taste is to give up the ability to speak intelligibly about why we should prefer our own societies to be as they are now over as they were 400 years ago. Anyone want to go back to a time when witch burnings were a commonplace?

I'm sorry but I would say that any society that does not *allow* or *encourage* the burnings of witches is to be preferred over any society that does. A society that allows witch trials and witch burnings is likely to have a whole lot of cultural habits that will make life *very* unpleasant. Witch trials only work if there are no rules of evidence and if the accused must prove their innocence against accusers who need prove nothing but speak their testimony. They only work if torture is considered morally acceptable. Anyone want to argue that if a society chooses to torture that is acceptable? If you're willing to argue that, then what's the problem with the United States torturing?

A world without any kind of absolute values--and you did say categorically that values are not absolute--is a nihilistic world. In such a world, we cannot speak of justice or injustice for there is no measurement to give which any other person or people, who wish to get on with oppressing others, are bound to respect. This means there is precious little upon which to build a consensus to act upon.

I'm not defending either American or British imperialism. Rather, I'm arguing against a certain kind of nihilism.

Cheers
Aj

[Ciaran]

Originally Posted by dreadgeek

I'm not sure that last bit is true. Is there a single sane person on this planet that would argue that it is entirely acceptable if some nation should decide that they will round up some group X within their midst and put them all to death in a systemized, callous and utterly barbaric fashion? I would argue that there *are* absolute values. There may not be a whole lot of them but there are a few. I would say that no people, no matter how powerful, have leave to enslave another person. If it is not forbidden, even if that is simply in the sense that it's just one of those things you don't do , then it is permitted. We should be extraordinarily cautious around the idea that there are no absolute values.

Before I ask you some questions to show the point I'm making, please understand that I am assuming that every single person reading these words is entirely opposed to racism, violence, slavery, sexism, bigotry of all kinds, oppression of all sorts. In fact, I'm counting on everyone reading this being a humane and compassionate person who is operating out of goodwill. The throat clearing is simply so there can be no possibility of misunderstanding here.

Now, is there anyone who would argue that if a people decided to practice slavery that it would be acceptable? Is there anyone who would argue that it is okay for a society to have laws that take whole populations and put them outside normal legal protections? Is there anyone here who would argue that if a society says that the word of a woman in a rape case is worthless unless multiple men also back up her story that that is simply their choice? Anyone want to argue *in favor* of laws making homosexuality punishable by death?

These are not matters of simple prejudice. Would anyone argue that Jim Crow in the United States was simply a matter of preference in Dixie and we cannot say whether it was a bad thing? An unjust thing? Again, not simply matters of national, cultural or personal preference. If there are no absolute values, no places where either people or cultures should not go then we have no basis upon which to judge whether or not society today is better than society, say, 100 years ago. Anyone think that society was better off when women couldn't vote?

I'm sorry but enslaving other people is wrong. It wasn't evil because it happened in my nation, to my people. It was evil because it happened and had it been people from Africa who had sailed up north, grabbed a bunch of people from Scotland and taken them to North America where they sold them to the Native Americans, it would *still* be evil. It was evil because people were treated as mere property, tools, means to an end and not ends into themselves. Any culture that thinks it is acceptable to enslave people--*enslave them*--is doing something wrong. I emphasize slavery because I'm not talking about things that get called slavery. I'm talking about actual taken by force, held by force, transferrable to another person as property, right to slay you on the spot because the sky is blue, can take your children and sell them off, slavery. I'm not talking about horrible working conditions. Slavery.

I would say that what happened in Russia under Stalin when millions died in purges and gulags, that Russia was doing something wrong. It is wrong to kill people because of political disagreements. It doesn't matter if in so doing you are going to bring about a proletarian utopia, you can't slaughter your fellow citizens because they disagree with you politically. I don't think the state has the right to do so on behalf of the citizenry and I don't think the citizenry has a *normal* right to do this. If the citizenry is being slaughtered by their government, they have the right to defend itself. If a *legitimate* state (consent of the governed, minority rights, rule of law) is threatened it may use what measures are necessary to put down those who would overthrow it. States, like people, should be able to defend themselves. But the state doesn't have the right to arbitrarily take measures against its citizenry. For that matter, I would argue that majorities should not have the right to vote on the rights of minorities.

To say that slavery, bigotry, legal exclusion of minority, genocide are simply matters of cultural taste is to give up the ability to speak intelligibly about why we should prefer our own societies to be as they are now over as they were 400 years ago. Anyone want to go back to a time when witch burnings were a commonplace?

I'm sorry but I would say that any society that does not *allow* or *encourage* the burnings of witches is to be preferred over any society that does. A society that allows witch trials and witch burnings is likely to have a whole lot of cultural habits that will make life *very* unpleasant. Witch trials only work if there are no rules of evidence and if the accused must prove their innocence against accusers who need prove nothing but speak their testimony. They only work if torture is considered morally acceptable. Anyone want to argue that if a society chooses to torture that is acceptable? If you're willing to argue that, then what's the problem with the United States torturing?

A world without any kind of absolute values--and you did say categorically that values are not absolute--is a nihilistic world. In such a world, we cannot speak of justice or injustice for there is no measurement to give which any other person or people, who wish to get on with oppressing others, are bound to respect. This means there is precious little upon which to build a consensus to act upon.

I'm not defending either American or British imperialism. Rather, I'm arguing against a certain kind of nihilism.

Cheers
Aj

You have done a great job at taking a sentence and twisting it for your own ends in your rather long reply.

Values are not absolute. That does not, by definition, make society nihilistic. Rather, it means that values, and what's commonly accepted as right and wrong, changes over time. For example, what's most commonly referenced as an intrinsic value is the right to life. However, scratch under the surface and you'll find that sort of value means very different things to different people and, in fact, for some, their right to life means a right to end the lives of others i.e. death penalty states for prevention / punishment of serious crimes.

Much of what is accepted as "good" today will, no doubt, be viewed very differently by subsequent generations. Values are partly cultural - hence, your example to slavery. Most of us (not all of us) may be sickened by the idea of slavery today but, centuries ago, some of our forefathers and foremothers clearly thought otherwise.

Similarly, your reference to torture. You may believe that torture is wrong but clearly not everyone does - include many in senior positions in US society. As for racism? It's actually enshrined in law in some way or another in most countries that I've been to.

I have my values - they are strongly held and I am, in the original meaning of the word, a bigot. However, my value system is complex and, no doubt, impacted by many aspects. They are not absolute and we know that peoples' values systems change when their circumstances do (hence the rise of Nazism in post WWI Europe).

Values not being absolute doesn't equal a nihilistic world. Rather, it equals the world we live in for all the good and bad that it is.

[Martina]

From Juan Cole's blog:

Top Ten Likely Consequences of Muslim anti-US Embassy Riots

Posted on 09/15/2012 by Juan

1. Tourism in Egypt and Tunisia, the economies of which heavily depend on it, is likely to take a nosedive this fall. It is a shame, because Tunisia had been hoping for a near return to 2010 levels of 7 million visitors this year. And Egypt’s tourism was up 16% over the previous year, though still down by 300,000 visitors a month from summer of 2010.

2. Likewise, foreign investment will be discouraged. Ironically, the embassy riots broke out while a delegation of 100 US business executives was in Cairo looking for investment opportunities. Some of those planning to stay beyond Tuesday are said to have abruptly left the country and canny observers spoke of the good will generated during the visit being squandered.

3. Decline of tourism and of foreign investment implies even higher unemployment in countries already plagued by lack of jobs.

4. In Egypt and Tunisia, the Muslim fundamentalist-dominated governments may well get blamed for failing to maintain public order. In opinion polling, security and fear of crime are major concerns on the part of ordinary Egyptians.

5. Both the Muslim Brotherhood and the al-Nahdah in Tunisia, fundamentalist parties that did well in the first post-revolution elections, face new parliamentary elections in the near future. If they are in bad odor with the public for failure to provide public order, and for implicitly helping the Salafi rioters, and for failure to improve the economy, they could be punished at the polls. It would be ironic if the impassioned reaction of fundamentalists to a phantom Islamophobic film so turned off the public as to lead to the Muslim religious parties being turned out of office in the next elections.

6. As a result of these considerations, the fundamentalists will blame outside agents provocateurs for the violence, and Israel for provoking it, trying to convince the public that Muslim fundamentalists had nothing to do with the issue.

7. The attack on the US consulate in Benghazi and the killing of Ambassador Chris Stevens and three others almost certainly spells an end to any American interest in intervening in Syria. The longevity of Bashar al-Assad’s secular Baathist regime, now attempting to crush rebels that include a small number of radical Muslim vigilantes, may have just been lengthened. Meanwhile, the Muslim world will be unembarrassed that they got so upset about a Youtube trailer but didn’t seem to care if hundreds of Syrians were killed, arrested and/or tortured every day.

8. The attack on the embassy in Sanaa, Yemen, by some 4,000 angry protesters, will likely draw the US even more into internal Yemeni disputes, since Washington will want to try to destroy the fundamentalist movements there. US drone strikes on radical Muslim movements of an al-Qaeda sort have become commonplace in Yemen. However, no one in the United States will know that Yemen ever existed or that the embassy was attacked, or that the US is pursuing a policy of drone strikes in that country.

9. Assuming there aren’t any diplomats taken hostage, President Barack Obama will look presidential in dealing with these deaths in Benghazi and his electoral chances may improve.

10. Mitt Romney will go on switching back and forth among his various opinions of the Islamophobic film and of President Obama’s reaction to the Libyan consulate attack.

[dreadgeek]

Originally Posted by Martina

From Juan Cole's blog:

I love Juan Cole.

Several of the points he makes seem to me to be the kind of tragic death spiral I hate to see people get themselves into. For reasons that may seem like good ones, certainly at the time, people are protesting at American embassies. This is going to draw press because large protests at any embassy probably should get our attention. People, seeing these protests, become justifiably concerned about traveling to those nations. So plans are changed, money goes elsewhere. Which leads to more economic pain. Which just makes things worse in those nations, which creates more justification for protests, which leads to people changing their plans etc. The people protesting are doing what they think is correct. The people who are avoiding traveling to places where protests have erupted are justifiable in doing so, particularly if it is their nation's embassy being protested. The protests has led to a heightened presence of Marines at those embassies which will almost certainly be demagogued as aggression on the part of the Americans. However, the American officials have no choice *but* to have a more formidable security presence in those embassies. If the nation can do something to prevent diplomatic staff from being taken hostage as they were in 1979, then they are obliged to do so.

Cheers
Aj

[dreadgeek]

Originally Posted by Ciaran

You have done a great job at taking a sentence and twisting it for your own ends in your rather long reply.

I didn't twist anything you said. In fact, I took the most limited reading possible and assume that the statement 'values are not absolute' means just that. Values are not absolute. That means that there is no way to argue that we should prefer, if given a choice, value set A over value set B.

Values are not absolute. That does not, by definition, make society nihilistic. Rather, it means that values, and what's commonly accepted as right and wrong, changes over time. For example, what's most commonly referenced as an intrinsic value is the right to life. However, scratch under the surface and you'll find that sort of value means very different things to different people and, in fact, for some, their right to life means a right to end the lives of others i.e. death penalty states for prevention / punishment of serious crimes.

That would be a nonsensical reading of a right to life. It's one of the reasons why many on the American Left (such as it is) rightly object to the characterization of anti-choice partisans as being 'pro-life' because they are not 'pro-life'. What they are is anti-abortion. A consistent pro-life stance can't square itself with support of the death penalty.

Much of what is accepted as "good" today will, no doubt, be viewed very differently by subsequent generations. Values are partly cultural - hence, your example to slavery. Most of us (not all of us) may be sickened by the idea of slavery today but, centuries ago, some of our forefathers and foremothers clearly thought otherwise.

Yes, and they were wrong. Not just expressing a different but equally valid set of values. Their values were wrong. In the mid 1930s one of my mother's brothers was lynched. The people who did so *genuinely* believed that my uncle, his father and mother, all his siblings, all his nieces and nephews who had not yet been born, and every single member of his line stretching up and down through the eons, was not *actually* human. Because they were not fully human, their lives were not particularly valuable. Because their lives were not valuable, it was no crime to take his life because a white woman accused him of attacking her because he bumped into her. That wasn't just a cultural peccadillo but a sign of a culture with a bad set of values. Not different bad. Jim Crow was an evil system. Not a regrettable one, not one that I should be glad mostly had only secondary effects on me but an actually evil one. What we have now, imperfect equality as it is, is far and away better than the one my parents were living in from the 1920s until pretty much the time of my birth in the mid-1960s.

Similarly, your reference to torture. You may believe that torture is wrong but clearly not everyone does - include many in senior positions in US society. As for racism? It's actually enshrined in law in some way or another in most countries that I've been to.

Torture *is* wrong. It is wrong on moral grounds, it is wrong on utilitarian grounds and it is wrong on ethical grounds. I'm not opposed to torture because it was my government doing the torturing. I'm not opposed to torture because it was poor and middle-class whites torturing poor non-whites. I'm opposed to torture because it is morally indefensible.

You appear to be conflating the violation of intrinsic values with their not being intrinsic. Are you prepared to argue that because racism is enshrined in the laws of many nations that racism isn't wrong? If you aren't, and it is vanishingly improbable that you are prepared to do so, then by what do you justify preferring to live in a society that is not explicitly racist than one is? By what argument are you prepared to state that American society circa 2012 is a better society than America circa 1942. I *am* prepared to make that argument because there are things that are intrinsically wrong and to violate them means that your society is behaving wrongly. Just because societies break the rules and take some action that is intrinsically wrong doesn't mean that it isn't wrong.

Just because someone breaks into a house to steal the stuff inside and, discovering that the owners are home, kills them, doesn't mean that neither murder nor theft are wrong. In the same way just because Germany slaughtered millions of innocents in adherence to a racially eliminationist philosophy doesn't mean that genocide isn't wrong. What the German people allowed themselves to become was evil. What the German people did during the period of 1932 to 1945 was evil. It wasn't just a cultural practice that we cannot and should not try to judge because trying not to say that the Germans shouldn't have done what they did puts us in very ugly and vile moral territory.

If there are not intrinsic rights and wrongs, things that under almost no (if not absolutely no) circumstances a people should not be allowed to get away with, how do you argue that Britain is a better nation without the Empire or that America is better without Jim Crow? Personal preference? It's better today because now we recognize it is better but it was better then because they thought it was better back then? I knew a whole generation, all deceased now, that would argue strenuously that the America their grandchildren or great-grandchildren live in now is far and away a better one than the one they were born to, all self-interest put aside.

Cheers
Aj

[Kätzchen]

Item no. 8 in the article Martina submitted above is covered in this recent press release of former President Jimmy Carter's speech, as delivered, at Drake University.


http://qctimes.com/news/state-and-re...a4bcf887a.html


Carter: U.S. drone attacks violate human rights

Former President delivers speech at Drake University


September 14, 2012 10:38 am • Rod Boshart


DES MOINES – Former President Jimmy Carter said Thursday that America is engaging in — and its citizens are accepting — human rights violations that “would never have been dreamed of” before the terrorist attacks that occurred in this country 11 years ago.

The nation’s 39th president said the U.S. government under both Republican and Democratic administrations has violated 10 of 30 provisions set out in a universal declaration of human rights that was forged after World War II, including perpetually detaining people in prison without informing them of any charges, providing them access to legal counsel or bringing them to trial and, more recently, by killing people via the use of unmanned drones.

“We have now decided as a nation that it’s OK to kill people without a trial with our drones, and this includes former American citizens who are looked upon as dangerous to us,” Carter told a group of Drake University students involved in a social-justice learning program.

“Not just terrorists, but innocent participants in weddings and so forth that happen to be there. I think this is acting in a way that turns people against us unnecessarily because there is a great deal of animosity about the United States that is unnecessary, in my opinion, because our drones are performing these things” in places like Pakistan, Afghanistan, Yemen and even in the Philippines, he said.

“These are the kinds of actions that would never have been dreamed of before 9/11,” Carter noted, referencing the terrorist attacks on Sept. 11, 2001.

“I think we need to go back to the purity of the guarantees of basic human rights,” he added. “Most Americans either don’t know about it or accept it. I’m not criticizing one leader compared to another because both Democratic and Republican leaders are participating in these violations. We should all look upon human rights as something that is precious to us because we need to get back and be the champion of human rights and I believe the champion of peace as well.”

Carter, a Georgia Democrat who served as U.S. president from 1977-81, and his wife, Rosalynn – founders of The Carter Center – delivered the 29th Martin Bucksbaum Distinguished Lecture on Thursday evening at Drake’s Knapp Center. Before that event, the former president and 2002 Nobel Peace Prize recipient and his wife heard students discuss a wide range of social justice they are involved in, descriptions that the Carters found emotionally moving.

During a question-and-answer session, the former president addressed a number of international topics.

Carter disagreed with delegates to his Democratic Party’s national convention who restored a platform position that Jerusalem is the capital of Israel, saying the same thing happened when he was running for president in the 1970s and he made a public announcement in opposition to it. He said the best hope for peace in the Middle East is a two-state solution for Israel and Palestine with Jerusalem as a shared capital.

“I personally think that’s a mistake for the Democratic and Republican parties to call for Jerusalem to be the capital just for the Jews,” he said.

Carter did not discuss the heightened security at American embassies and consulates around the world after an attack this week that killed the U.S. ambassador in Libya, but he parted ways with President Obama on the question of whether Egypt is an American ally after Obama told an interviewer that “I don’t think that we would consider them an ally, but we don’t consider them an enemy” after protesters attacked the U.S. embassy in Cairo this week.

Carter, who knows Egyptian President Mohammed Morsi personally and monitored recent elections in Egypt and Libya, said Egypt is an ally of the United States and “we ought to make sure that we continue the long-standing friendship we’ve had” by encouraging efforts to forge a democratic Egyptian government.

He noted that after the U.S. independence in 1776, it took a dozen years to finalize the constitution and solidify the government, “so we can’t expect the Egyptians to do it in less than one year. I think we have to be patient with them and let them find their own way, but give them support so they won’t go in the wrong direction,” Carter said.

On the civil strife in Syria, Carter said it would not be appropriate for the United States to intervene militarily, but he would like to see the United Nations call for free elections that would allow the people to choose the nation’s future direction.

“But if that’s not possible, then I think we just have wait and see how much of a tragedy is going to develop,” he said. “There’s no way to predict what is going to happen in the next few months.”

[Ciaran]

Originally Posted by dreadgeek

I didn't twist anything you said. In fact, I took the most limited reading possible and assume that the statement 'values are not absolute' means just that. Values are not absolute. That means that there is no way to argue that we should prefer, if given a choice, value set A over value set B.



That would be a nonsensical reading of a right to life. It's one of the reasons why many on the American Left (such as it is) rightly object to the characterization of anti-choice partisans as being 'pro-life' because they are not 'pro-life'. What they are is anti-abortion. A consistent pro-life stance can't square itself with support of the death penalty.



Yes, and they were wrong. Not just expressing a different but equally valid set of values. Their values were wrong. In the mid 1930s one of my mother's brothers was lynched. The people who did so *genuinely* believed that my uncle, his father and mother, all his siblings, all his nieces and nephews who had not yet been born, and every single member of his line stretching up and down through the eons, was not *actually* human. Because they were not fully human, their lives were not particularly valuable. Because their lives were not valuable, it was no crime to take his life because a white woman accused him of attacking her because he bumped into her. That wasn't just a cultural peccadillo but a sign of a culture with a bad set of values. Not different bad. Jim Crow was an evil system. Not a regrettable one, not one that I should be glad mostly had only secondary effects on me but an actually evil one. What we have now, imperfect equality as it is, is far and away better than the one my parents were living in from the 1920s until pretty much the time of my birth in the mid-1960s.



Torture *is* wrong. It is wrong on moral grounds, it is wrong on utilitarian grounds and it is wrong on ethical grounds. I'm not opposed to torture because it was my government doing the torturing. I'm not opposed to torture because it was poor and middle-class whites torturing poor non-whites. I'm opposed to torture because it is morally indefensible.

You appear to be conflating the violation of intrinsic values with their not being intrinsic. Are you prepared to argue that because racism is enshrined in the laws of many nations that racism isn't wrong? If you aren't, and it is vanishingly improbable that you are prepared to do so, then by what do you justify preferring to live in a society that is not explicitly racist than one is? By what argument are you prepared to state that American society circa 2012 is a better society than America circa 1942. I *am* prepared to make that argument because there are things that are intrinsically wrong and to violate them means that your society is behaving wrongly. Just because societies break the rules and take some action that is intrinsically wrong doesn't mean that it isn't wrong.

Just because someone breaks into a house to steal the stuff inside and, discovering that the owners are home, kills them, doesn't mean that neither murder nor theft are wrong. In the same way just because Germany slaughtered millions of innocents in adherence to a racially eliminationist philosophy doesn't mean that genocide isn't wrong. What the German people allowed themselves to become was evil. What the German people did during the period of 1932 to 1945 was evil. It wasn't just a cultural practice that we cannot and should not try to judge because trying not to say that the Germans shouldn't have done what they did puts us in very ugly and vile moral territory.

If there are not intrinsic rights and wrongs, things that under almost no (if not absolutely no) circumstances a people should not be allowed to get away with, how do you argue that Britain is a better nation without the Empire or that America is better without Jim Crow? Personal preference? It's better today because now we recognize it is better but it was better then because they thought it was better back then? I knew a whole generation, all deceased now, that would argue strenuously that the America their grandchildren or great-grandchildren live in now is far and away a better one than the one they were born to, all self-interest put aside.

Cheers
Aj

This is a diatribe and clearly written for an audience.

I don't understand your words or theories so won't try to give them an answer and I thank my God for that.

[Martina]

Originally Posted by Ciaran

This is a diatribe and clearly written for an audience.

I don't understand your words or theories so won't try to give them an answer and I thank my God for that.

Charming. Really charming. *shakes head*

[Martina]

This from an article in the Times today:

“An attack on the holy prophet is an attack on the core belief of 1.5 billion Muslims. Therefore, this is something that is unacceptable,” said Prime Minister Raja Pervez Ashraf in an address to a religious conference Friday morning in Islamabad.

Mr. Ashraf called on the United Nations and international community to formulate a law outlawing hate speech across the world. “Blasphemy of the kind witnessed in this case is nothing short of hate speech, equal to the worst kind of anti-Semitism or other kind of bigotry,” he said.

Surely he knows better.

Hate speech is defined in terms of inciting violence AGAINST the party being maligned. The people causing violence in this case are the folks who are the targets of the offensive speech.

Speaking as a high school teacher, there is an element of immaturity to this that boggles my mind. Someone hurt me deeply, so I beat them up. Please put them in jail, not me. What someone said made me feel a really strong feeling. A REALLY strong one. My behavior after that is no longer my responsibility, but theirs.

A young (tres hip) Muslim man was on NPR yesterday talking about how he couldn't believe people were taking the bait. He understood the video as bait. And he was upset at the naivete of folks who just grabbed it.

Bait or not. Intended to offend not. It did not incite violence AGAINST Muslims.

GOD, this makes me grateful for the Constitution.

HEAR me, Ciaran and others whose comments make ME feel labeled as a jingoistic American. I am so god damned proud of my Constitution. SO GRATEFUL for the U.S. Constitution.

Understand that?

Edited to add: I know that a lot of the anger with the U.S. and other western countries stems from the historical relationships we have imposed on the region -- as subaltern states. They have not had the power to affect us, and our decisions have had ruinous effects on some of the nations there -- for generations.

[dreadgeek]

Originally Posted by Martina

This from an article in the Times today:
Surely he knows better.

Hate speech is defined in terms of inciting violence AGAINST the party being maligned. The people causing violence in this case are the folks who are the targets of the offensive speech.

I was thinking about this walking the dog this morning. Imagine, if you will, if black people in America had spent *just* the years between 1900 and 1990 going on a rampage and breaking things every time something offensive was said to us or about us. Just in the last 90 years and *just* in the USA. Can you imagine? Black people have had to develop a pretty hard outer shell because I am here to tell you that the first *half* of my life incredibly racist things were just part of everyday American discourse. From the restaurant chain Sambo to the the rantings of Rush Limbaugh, hardly a day would go by when I wouldn't hear something or see some imagine denigrating of blacks.

By my mid-twenties, I had learned two things: 1) I can't make people not look down upon me because of the color of my skin and 2) I can't stop people who hold racist sentiments from speaking their mind.

From there, I recognized that to save my sanity and to give my son a fighting chance to save his sanity, I had to learn to hold my head up high and not give racists the satisfaction of responding how they expect me to respond. The expected response from me, as a black woman, is to freak out, start moving my head back and forth, yelling and carrying on. That way the racist can look at me and say "see, this is how 'they' always act. No self-control." I confound them because I don't lose my temper and I outsmart them and nothing--no thing--makes a racist squirm more than to be bested by someone who he or she thinks they are superior to. Perhaps I shouldn't enjoy their discomfort as much as I do but I do and so be it.

Speaking as a high school teacher, there is an element of immaturity to this that boggles my mind. Someone hurt me deeply, so I beat them up. Please put them in jail, not me. What someone said made me feel a really strong feeling. A REALLY strong one. My behavior after that is no longer my responsibility, but theirs.

This is why I have taken the stand I have about this issue. First, we say "well, you know what, we'll do that. You can't say anything against the Prophet or portray him in any manner that would not be acceptable to the *most* restrictive Islamic sects". The next day the demand will be that you can't show any art, play any music or publish any book that might give offense to this or that sectarian group. So suddenly, at the behest of this or that religious group that nude sculptures or women in diaphanous gowns be covered up in the name of modesty. The day after that, it will be that you can't speak out against religiously inspired bigotry be that against racial, ethnic, religious or sexual minorities.

Once you start to give in on this matter, you tend to have to continue to give in on it. How could you not? If I can't say X because it might offend the sectarians of this or that religion, then by what justification can I say Y because it might *also* give offense? I can't see how. "Well, in the case of X you are saying something offensive to a religious group that was born of out disdain for this group but in the case of Y you are defending an oppressed group against bigotry" seems a fairly weak place upon which to stand. If I've learned nothing else about bigotry (not just racism but bigotry) is that the vast majority of bigots likely do not see themselves as bigots.

If I had a dollar for each time I've heard some variant of "I'm not racist but..." or "I'm not sexist but..." or "I'm not anti-gay but..." I'd have enough money that I would only have to pay in taxes what Mittens has to pay. The people who are posting pictures of the White House lawn covered in watermelons, or Obama's face on the body of a chimp, or now hanging chairs in effigy don't think they are racists. Todd Akin doesn't think his 'legitimate rape' comments are sexist. Fred Phelps doesn't think he's a bigot for being anti-gay. Terry Jones doesn't think he's being a bigot in his rabid anti-Muslim tirades. Rush Limbaugh doesn't think he was being sexist calling Sandra Fluke a slut.

So when we stand up and speak out against Akin, or Phelps or Jones or Limbaugh or any one else who is advocating bigotry, we are unlikely to hear them say "oh well, that's different". Instead, they will argue that we are on the wrong side of the issue from God, or they will argue that we are being anti-American, or anti-Christian, or anti-straight but they will *not* agree that they are in the wrong. So if we decide that a mob in Pakistan should dictate what is acceptable and unacceptable public utterance is in London or San Francisco or anywhere else, what do we say when the *next* thing some other mob, perhaps closer to home, demands that no longer should it be spoken that being against gay rights is bigotry? That we will heed the words of an angry crowd on the other side of the globe but ignore the words of those closer to home even though, truth be told, the positions of the crowd outside the embassy in Islamabad and that of customers outside of Chik-fil-a are pretty close at least as far as it concerns homosexuals.



Cheers
Aj

[Kätzchen]

Originally Posted by Ciaran

This is a diatribe and clearly written for an audience.

I don't understand your words or theories so won't try to give them an answer and I thank my God for that.

I would argue that your post is clearly designed and written for a specific audience too.

However, I don't buy the justification you give for not understanding the value of Aj's message or postulations or theoretical application. You then go on and say that you 'thank your God for that'.

In the very arrogance you prize for the perception you percieve about your own brand of aristocracy, I do believe that sets of behaviors like yours deserve a closer inspection.

To me, your set of views illustrate the time immemorial struggle for power.


I do not find your brand of engagement useful; however, sets of behaviors exemplified in your approach seemingly share a type of relationship that are present in local, regional, national and international disputes over resources and percieved power.

[dreadgeek]

Originally Posted by Ciaran

This is a diatribe and clearly written for an audience.

I don't understand your words or theories so won't try to give them an answer and I thank my God for that.

All writing that isn't in a diary or journal is written for an audience. As a now long-deceased English scientist once observed "How odd it is that anyone should not see that all observation must be for or against some view to be of any service." I would amend that for these circumstances to say that it is very odd that someone would not see that all public writing must be intended for an audience if it is to be of any service.

Are you saying that when you post on a thread you aren't writing to communicate something to the other participants? That seems a very strange way to write. You speak as if writing in order that one's words would be read is a bad thing.

Cheers
Aj

[Corkey]

We all write for an audience, and it is best to know ones audience if one is to communicate thoughts. Just an observation.
We in the US don't do things the way Briton does, we had that war long ago.