Politics


Esn

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Well, since the original has been locked & there are still some things that I want to say, I've decided to start a continuation thread to continue where the last one left off
http://www.gp32x.de/board/index.php?showt...opic=4491&st=15
(note to Rico: couldn't you have separated that thread into 2 parts instead of locking it? Sorry about making it go off topic though... I got a bit carried away with my first post there)

Well, ESN, it seems like you support the Democrats.
No, actually I do not see all that much difference between the Republicans and the Democrats.
Besides, I live in Canada (where I support the NDP or the Liberals), so why would I support either one of your two parties?
Well, did you ever think about the good things that are happening in Iraq? Thousands of schools are opening, and so many other things.
That's right, thousands of schools are opening, only a little worse for wear:

To find out what is happening in the schools, we go past the burning polytechnic to the ministry of education, which has already been gutted. Seven-year-olds are still scavenging for bits of wire, and the concrete floors are carpeted with old exam papers. One is for an English exam: "Re-write in cursive: The boy pats the dog. The Iraqi army is ready to liberate Palestine."

A group of armed men run in screaming at us. It turns out that they think we are looters. They used to work at the ministry as clerks, and have banded together to save the remnants of their office. Many of the 700 schools in Basra have also been looted. Unicef is trying to deliver as many "schools in a box" as it can - crates packed with paper, pencils, blackboard paint and chalk.

At Yomoma girls' school, a teacher points to the sweating seven-year-olds, and cries: "We have no fans, no milk or water for the children. They are being treated like animals going to market, not pupils receiving an education. We are the second richest oil country in the world, but we have nothing - it is madness."

The Americans are planning to restructure the curriculum but, at the moment, that is merely a matter of tearing out pages. What people need now are water supplies, lavatories, desks and teachers. Each school is operating on two-hour shifts; 25 per cent of children do not receive any education.
source: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml...5/19/wirq19.xml

I heard on, believe it or not, CNN, a reporter said she saw two girls SHOPPING ( sounds a little like the word freedom ) and they asked the reporter: "Do you listen to Metallica?"
You mean to say that girls could not shop in Baghdad while Hussein was in power? This is Iraq, not Afghanistan. Baghdad was a pretty modern city with relatively high standards of living. No city looks its best after being invaded.

The people are enjoying many more freedoms than we will ever see, because news agencies are so stuck on reporting the bad, not the good.
Freedom doesn't mean much when you don't have the basic human need of security. Freedom is relative, anyway; under Hussein, you couldn't speak badly about the government or praise America, but you had the freedom to walk the streets safely, work, buy food, and live.
Right now, everybody in Iraq has the freedom to criticize Hussein and praise America, but on the other hand many people do not have the freedom to walk the streets safely, drink clean water, work, or go to school.
Honestly, which kind of freedom do you think is most important?

no, you please understand, my mind is not CNN-washed, I watch FOX news much more.
Now I've never seen Fox news so I can't comment, but CNN is generally considered to be Republican propaganda in Toronto. I've heard that it is considered a "leftist" station in the US... :huh:

declaration said:
Iraqi children asking about Metallica seems a sad thing to me. it just represent the way in which the USA constantly imposes its culture on the rest of the world, eroding away the culture of far greater people.
Any conquering culture does that. The US is currently a powerful country, and therefore spreads its culture around as much as it can.
It is certainly not alone in history. Wether Iraqi culture and people are "greater" or not depends largely on your opinion.
Certainly, those $60million that the administration gave to certain companies to help American culture permiate Iraq could have better been used as funds to help people in Iraq, but what can you do?
The I-forget-how-many-billion-dollar price tag of the war would have been a huge help to the poor people in developing nations. However, the military machine has to get rid of its old stuff so that it can get money and room for more new weapons, and how can you get rid of weapons but by starting a war?

DECLARATION, I don't think you get my point either, but I will leave it at that.
Well, I hope I understood your point :unsure:
I'm not saying that Saddam Hussein was a nice guy; however, he held the country together.
One man can only affect the life of a regular person in Iraq to a certain degree, after all. People could live, love, and enjoy life under Hussein, if they were careful about what they said and did in public.

Now, after the invasion, they probably feel a lot more afraid than they did under the Baath regime.
 
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At one point in the old thread NssOne said...

"America is like alcohol: it's the cause of, and solution to, all of life's problems."

actually, I think a more accurate statement would be...

Religion is like alcohol: it's the cause of, and solution to, all of life's problems.

I am not saying that people shouldn't have the right to worship as they choose, just that religion is the root cause behind the vast majority of the world's problems.

Throughout history more people have died from wars, conflicts, purgings, genocides, etc... caused by religious differences than all wars, conflicts, etc... not caused by religious differences.

Without religion, the whole Middle East conflict would be pretty close to non existant.

Here is my favorite quote on religion...

Organized religion is the opiate of the masses

John
 
Toymaker posted on Oct 10 2003 at 02:32 PM said:
At one point in the old thread NssOne said...

"America is like alcohol: it's the cause of, and solution to, all of life's problems."

actually, I think a more accurate statement would be...

Religion is like alcohol: it's the cause of, and solution to, all of life's problems.

I am not saying that people shouldn't have the right to worship as they choose, just that religion is the root cause behind the vast majority of the world's problems.

Throughout history more people have died from wars, conflicts, purgings, genocides, etc... caused by religious differences than all wars, conflicts, etc... not caused by religious differences.

Without religion, the whole Middle East conflict would be pretty close to non existant.

Here is my favorite quote on religion...

Organized religion is the opiate of the masses

John
Marx fan ? ;)
 
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Esn posted on Oct 10 2003 at 05:01 AM said:
Freedom doesn't mean much when you don't have the basic human need of security. Freedom is relative, anyway; under Hussein, you couldn't speak badly about the government or praise America, but you had the freedom to walk the streets safely, work, buy food, and live.
Right now, everybody in Iraq has the freedom to criticize Hussein and praise America, but on the other hand many people do not have the freedom to walk the streets safely, drink clean water, work, or go to school.
Honestly, which kind of freedom do you think is most important?

I'm not saying that Saddam Hussein was a nice guy; however, he held the country together.
One man can only affect the life of a regular person in Iraq to a certain degree, after all. People could live, love, and enjoy life under Hussein, if they were careful about what they said and did in public.

Now, after the invasion, they probably feel a lot more afraid than they did under the Baath regime.
Currently in Iraq, the citizens have the right to criticize anyone, Hussein, America, Britain, Isreal, etc...

There have been protests, political rallys, marches, media publishing numerous different views, all of which were not allowed under Hussein.

Personal freedom is at the core of security. If you do not have the freedom to express your own personal feelings without having to worry about being tortured or killed, than you do not lead a secure life.

In pre-war Iraq you had the "freedom" to live the life imposed upon you by Hussein and his government. If you wanted to live your life any differently, you were subject to arrest, torture, and death. Even those who followed Saddam's rules were subject to rape, torture, and murder at the whim of the government. Their own Olympic Athletes were tortured and killed for not winning. How secure a life is that? To have to constantly be wondering if you are "meeting expectations".

Saying that Saddam held the country together is a joke. The country was together out of fear.

Let us look back through history...
Life was "secure" under pretty much every major dictator throughout history as long as your "life" matched what the dictator's opinion of what your life should be. In addition, in many cases you were not given the option to even decide whether or not to follow the dictator's doctrine. Hussein, Hitler, Stalin, and more discriminated against people solely on their ethnic or religious background. How much freedom is there when you are not even given the chance to follow the dictatorship's doctrine?

Nazi Germany under Hitler was safe and secure for those in the Nazi party who followed Hitler's "vision".

The U.S.S.R under Stalin was safe and secure for those in the communist party who followed Stalin's "vision".

Iraq under Hussein was safe for those in the Baath party who followed Hussein's "vision".

Idi Amin, Pol Pot, etc... I could go on and on.
 
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I am not trying to say that there was no hypocrisy connected to the Coalition invasion of Iraq.

I am saying that the removal of Saddam Hussein was justified. I could care less about weapons of mass destruction. He should have been removed years ago after the gassing of the Kurds, and the atrocities that he has committed against the Shiites and others who did not follow his doctrine.

I believe that ANY government that forces their citizens to follow the government's view on what "life" should be like needs to be removed through any means possible.

What constitutes forcing their "view" upon the citizens? No freedom of speech, press, etc... Not allowing peaceful protests, and not allowing non-violent criticism of the government or other opposing groups.
 
DoriC posted on Oct 10 2003 at 02:56 PM said:
Marx fan ? ;)
No, not a Marx fan. Although I have read pretty much all of his works.

I just feel that any organization, whether it is a religion, government, etc... that needs to control the actions of it's members is wrong.

Recently I read a book on the difference between a religion and an organized religion.

A religion defines / tells you WHAT / WHO to worship.

An organized religion also tells you HOW to worship.

John
 
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Religion is like alcohol: it's the cause of, and solution to, all of life's problems.

I am not saying that people shouldn't have the right to worship as they choose, just that religion is the root cause behind the vast majority of the world's problems.

Throughout history more people have died from wars, conflicts, purgings, genocides, etc... caused by religious differences than all wars, conflicts, etc... not caused by religious differences.

Without religion, the whole Middle East conflict would be pretty close to non existant.
The root cause of the conflict is not religion; if that were the case, Toronto and other multicultural cities around the world would be in a total internal war.

The factor of religion only enters into play when there is a deeper reason for the conflict. Once a conflict arises between two peoples (aka Palestinians and Israelies), and those two peoples are conveniently of different religions, then religion divides the rest of the area into two polarized factions.

Religion is a lot like a treaty really. WW1, for example, started because the entire continent of Europe was divided into two alliances. So when a conflict arose between two countries (Serbia and Austria) who each belonged to the other alliance, the rest of the bigger players of the war, such as Germany, Russia, England and France, etc. , were forced to come to the aid of their allies. And so, what should have been a small confict between two countries over the assassination of a Duke turned into one of humanity's most horrible wars.

Something similar is happening in the middle east, only on a less grand, and more personal, scale. America is despised initially not because it's religion is different (that comes later), but because it gives a lot of money to Israel, and so helps Israel to attack the Palestinians/defend itself against the Palestinians.

When people of different religions live together, and interact with each other peacefully on a daily basis, the factor of religion is not so important anymore. It is only when the people of the other religion are far away that religious zealots can brand them all under the label of "muslim-hating infidels" and get away with it.

Personal freedom is at the core of security. If you do not have the freedom to express your own personal feelings without having to worry about being tortured or killed, than you do not lead a secure life.
I would rather live in that kind of a country, where the rules for what to do and what not to do are generally clear, than in one where crime is rampant, life is unpredictable, and there is no guarantee about anything, no laws, etc.
Of course, neither is good. But in the former example, the power is held by the government, not by whoever has the most friends and the most muscle out on the street.

In pre-war Iraq you had the "freedom" to live the life imposed upon you by Hussein and his government. If you wanted to live your life any differently, you were subject to arrest, torture, and death. Even those who followed Saddam's rules were subject to rape, torture, and murder at the whim of the government. Their own Olympic Athletes were tortured and killed for not winning. How secure a life is that? To have to constantly be wondering if you are "meeting expectations".
Keep a low profile, and I'd imagine that it's pretty secure...
What the Baath regime did to those people was horrible, I'm not arguing that. However, a lot less than 1% of any country's population is important enough to merit such special attention by the government.

I'm not exactly sure that the living conditions of regular Iraqis will be improved by this invasion. Most people are certainly worse off now than they were before the invasion, because the infrastructure of the country was destroyed.

Saying that Saddam held the country together is a joke. The country was together out of fear.
Quite true.
Now that Hussein is gone, however, the country has fallen into complete disorder.

And there are different fears now. The Kurds who were so brutally murdered under the Baath regime are likely going to find themselves under Turkish occupation soon.
Terrorists have entered a country which was once safe from them (despite the claims of the Bush administration linking Hussein and bin Laden).

I believe that ANY government that forces their citizens to follow the government's view on what "life" should be like needs to be removed through any means possible.
"any means possible"?
First of all, sometimes the "means" is too much of a price to pay.
Second of all, I have yet to see that America cares at all about the living conditions and freedoms of the people of the countries that they conquer.
The US government seems more concerned with profitability for themselves than for the people of any country that they "liberate". The governments that have been set up after past invasions have been often more brutal than the original ones, and of an extremely capitalistic nature (moneymoneymoney for American companies).
Examples of this can be seen in Chile, where the US gov. overthrew the world's only democratically elected Communist government and replaced it with a brutal dictatorship. Also in Cuba, although in that rare case the American-backed Bautista regime (again, strongly capitalist) was overthrown by the communist revolution of Fidel Castro. The Fidel Castro dictatorship has its own share of problems (people were asking us for clothes to get through the winter), but when I was in Cuba it seemed to be a somewhat more relaxed version of "communism"; religions are allowed, for what that's worth. In any case, better than many other dictatorship governments around the world that the US sees no problems with because they just happen to be capitalist allies.

BTW, I'll bet that in a year or so, the US government and the media will forget about Iraq just like they did about Afghanistan (which is now in the hands of warlords and terrorists outside of Kabul).
 
finally, thanks TOYMAKER, you see how I see. :D
 
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