They’re crushing themselves to death by trampling. This fails to inspire terror deep in my soul. (Samaritan Suicide Squad, anybody?) I think their behavior is disgusting and embarrassing in an “oh shit, we’re the same species” kind of way, but they’re zero threat to my civilization, much less my life.
I like you better when you breathe.
There are already people yammering about accomidation, that our Freedom of Speech & of the Press is something that we should somehow be ashamed of, in the name of tolerance (which clearly doesn’t apply here).
The danger is that we will allow ourselves to be bullied into accepting a way of life imposed upon us against our will.
I wasn’t aware of you before, but now that I am, I think you’re an idiot.
Underpass salt-stain is cracking me up.
<wiping away tears>
So, communism was an essentially religious movement, even though it lacked the single property that distinguishes religious movements from other kinds of movements. 
I recall reading once that nuclear disaster between the U.S. and the U.S.S.R. was averted because “Russian leaders love their grandchildren, too”. No such constraint appears to be the case with Muslim society, where, it appears, they are only too happy to have family members die as long as someone they perceive to be an enemy or ‘infidel’ dies in the process. Frankly, I can see some of those nutjobs (and worse, their fanatical leaders) being perfectly happy to see their own country wiped from the face of the map if it would cause massive harm or destruction to a hated enemy country.
And as far as threats to western civilization are concerned, to me the threat comes either from the Middle East sparking a nuclear holocaust or WWIII – or from the continued influx of Muslim citizens into into democratic countries, where they can eventually take control by sheer virtue of the number of votes they can cast. (What kind of doo-doo do you suppose it would cause should France, for example, eventually be taken over democratically by an ever increasing Muslim population? And then worse, what if some crackpot like Khomeni or Ahmadinejad were to gain absolute control afterward?)
And of course Muslim hotheads can have a tremendously destructive impact upon the quality of life and the freedoms that currently exist in democratic countries in the meantime simply by virtue of the fear of reprisals anytime someone engages in behavior they dissaprove of. This has started already.
My guess is that as far as expansionism is concerned, they will eventually go too far with their intolerant and destructive behavior and the result will be a harsh crackdown in terms of containment and prejudice which will result in their lives being even more constricted and deprived than they are now. Countries that now try to welcome them will begin to bar them and to make those already there feel most unwelcome. Laws will be passed making murder, retaliation, and other types of mayhem caused by Muslim disapproval of various western freedoms punishable by very harsh penalties.
Which, of course, leaves only the threat of a nuclear holocaust…
I would be in favor of U.S. destruction of nuclear weaponry anywhere it may appear in the Muslim world from this point forward. If ever ‘national security’ was cause for military action should diplomatic efforts fail, IMO this is it! These countries simply cannot be allowed to develop weaponry that will allow them to wipe out other populations and/or trigger a world war.
Being civilized and recognizing the rights of other countries to have whatever they can develop is all well and good, but civilized behavior only works when the other side is civilized as well. These people are willing to kidnap and murder completely innocent people over cartoons, for crying out loud! Does anyone really think that allowing them to develop nuclear weapons is the higher moral imperative?
Yes, I am. “Our” is possessive. You wrote:
Look what you could have written: "Maybe not. But we can start by drawing a line at our own borders. As soon as the radicals start telling us what we can publish, what women can do, etc… " And voila, not possessive.
If you were talking about “our wives,” that’d be fine. Some people have wives. To say “our women” doesn’t work the same way.
Well, let’s not do that, then. I’m certainly not doing that. I hope you feel at least somewhat reassured.
(Mind you, that doesn’t mean that I personally approve of offensive and anti-Muslim cartoons, or that I would consider it decent to draw or publish such a thing. However, if somebody else sees fit to do so, I certainly think that the act should be defended on free-speech grounds, and that retaliation by violence or threats of violence is not to be tolerated.)
Huh? The use of suicide missions implies that a society doesn’t “love its grandchildren” enough to avoid destroying all its people in a nuclear holocaust? I don’t see it. The Japanese flew a lot of suicide missions in WWII; do the Japanese not love their grandchildren?
Doesn’t murder already carry pretty harsh penalties? What kind of additional crackdown on murder in western societies are you envisioning?
(Please, everybody, don’t draw Art’s attention to Pakistan. Thanks.)
I don’t quite see that as a problem, though. Rising living standards in China will make importing from there more expensive, inviting competition and factory-building in other nations, and hopefully pax capitalista will take hold in, among other place, Indonesia, and large Muslim populations will learn that working with the West is more profitable than acting like idiots.
Alternately, there’s always the chance China and India will go to war, cancelling each other out.
The Japanese military leadership in WWII sacrificed great numbers of civilians (and soldiers) in situations where it was clear that victory could not be won (i.e. Okinawa). There was also considerable willingness toward the end to fight to the last civilian (leaders contemplated the “shattered jewel death” of the entire Japanese civilian population, referred to in James Bradley’s account of the role of air power in the Pacific war (“Flyboys”). More rational heads ultimately prevailed, but not before tremendous civilian casualties were incurred in the firebombing of major Japanese cities, not to mention the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombings.
“Love for one’s grandchildren” was a tenuous thing in the Japan of that era.
As to “Muslim society” not caring about its grandchildren- that’s a pretty broad brush, but what do you make of the comment by former Iranian President Rafsanjani (as reported in the LA Times 8/4/03 and by other sources, including Iran’s Press Service):
"On December 14, 2001, former Iranian president Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani said that it might be a good thing to strike Israel with nuclear weapons. “The application of an atomic bomb would not leave anything in Israel, but the same thing would just produce damages in the Muslim world,” Mr. Rafsanjani said. “Jews shall expect to be once again scattered and wandering around the globe the day when this appendix [Israel] is extracted from the region and the Muslim world.”
Not to worry, atomic bombing would “just produce damages” as far as Muslims are concerned.
Um, I don’t see the love here. :dubious:
You’ve apparently missed videos of proud, smiling mothers sending their children off to die in a suicide bombing the next day. And you’ve apparently missed videos of mothers saying they’re happy to have their children die if (in this case) Jews die in the process. You’ve apparently missed information about how perfectly innocent daughters and sisters are murdered for the crime of being raped or in retaliation for something someone, somewhere… or hell, anywhere…in their village did or supposedly did.
Sorry, but my impression is that it is a society (actually a group of societies) that values the lives of its own far less than it angrily and murderously values the dogma of its religion.
Oh, I don’t know…something like execution, perhaps? (We’re speaking of European countries here, remember.) But I wasn’t speaking only (or even primarily) of murder. I’m talking about civil offenses such as demonstrations over this or that perceived slight; or the trashing of this or that property; or physical attacks on citizens that don’t result in death; etc., etc. And I’m talking about highly restrictive immigration policies that will be clearly aimed at keeping Muslims out, and what might eventually become draconian measures to rid themselves of those already within their borders.
I believe that eventually the time will come when these countries start to stand up for themselves against the Muslim populations in their own midst in ways that few of us would favor…or they will succumb to having their own countries taken over from within. Either way, it ain’t gonna be pretty unless they start to act both decisively and soon. Otherwise, a lot of innocent people are going to suffer, regardless of which way it goes.
Yes, it does, except to those with a terminal case of political correctness. For the rest of us, “our women” carries no such horrible connotations.
No, you’ve apparently missed the point. As I noted, the Japanese in WWII also sent their children off to die in suicide missions, and the Japanese haven’t annihilated their own society. If you’re afraid that Islamist extremists will do so, then you need to suggest another reason, because the use of suicide missions evidently isn’t enough to make it happen.
Jackmannii, on the other hand, seems to be suggesting that in fact, the use of suicide missions does arguably correspond to a heightened level of recklessness in a whole society, and that that applies to WWII Japanese as well as to modern Islamist extremists. So the “kamikaze” mentality could indeed have incinerated the whole of Japanese society in WWII. I don’t know if that’s true (and it didn’t actually work out that way), but it’s a reasonable point to make.
First you argue that the Islamist extremists are pathologically ready to endure risk and suffering for the sake of inflicting harm on their perceived enemies, even going so far as to embrace suicide bombing. Now you’re suggesting that they could be deterred by capital punishment?
Make up your mind—either they’re so irrationally addicted to hatred that they don’t have a rational aversion to death, or else they do have a rational aversion to death and therefore the prospect of death would deter them from attacking others.
I presume you’re not suggesting capital punishment for such offenses? In any case, I certainly don’t have a problem with legal penalties for crimes like destruction of property or physical assault. But I kind of wonder how a free society would justify punishing people merely for participating in demonstrations.
I hope not. Hardly seems worth defending yourself from the assaults of violent, repressive, intolerant societies just in order to become a violent, repressive, intolerant society yourself.
Huh? Of course it does. Talking about “our women” is a classic expression of reactionary-chauvinist-pigness, and the phrase certainly does carry “connotations” of that attitude. Now, I’m as sure as you are that Sam didn’t mean to imply any such thing. But it’s silly to argue that the phrase “our women” in itself doesn’t tend to make the speaker sound like a harrumphing old country squire, mustache a-quiver with alarm and indignation. C’mon, even I giggled when I read that, and I know full well that Sam is not a chauvinist-pig old country squire. (Reactionary, maybe. ;))
What is it with you and this ‘Japan’ kick? There’s no correlation between the Japanese mindset during WWII and Muslim extremism throughout the world.
Complexity comes into play here…or is it your opinion that any Muslim murderer in a European country would ipso facto be a suicide bomber in a Muslim country? I doubt that the idiot who killed Theo Van Gogh would have been willing to sacrifice his life in order to do so.
And besides, we’re positing a reactionary scenario here in which various European countries are forced to take repressive measures in order to protect themselves from the Muslims in their midst. Equitability, fairness and rationality are likely to take a back seat as a result.
And besides, you asked what could be more harsh. 
You assume correctly. I forsee things like prolonged imprisonment and/or deportation becoming the response of choice in these kinds of cases.
What I’m proposing is that these countries will eventually become ‘not so free’ under the scenario I’ve described. When repression is deliberate, justness and fairness are not likely to be the result. This is why I’m saying that violent (and/or expansionist) behavior of Muslims in western countries is likely to result in making things very much worse for them.
Well, if you were France, would you want a society that was repressive and intolerant toward an ideology that was theatening your very existence (an existence that includes many wonderful, beautiful things and ways of life), or would you want life there turned into a version of Iran under the Ayatollahs or Afghanistan under the Taliban? Ugly things can happen when one is faced with such a choice, and I’m afraid that the longer these things go on the uglier the outcome is going to be.
Just for the record, I’m not pleased at either prospect. But if the Muslim mainstream doesn’t begin to get on board and start taking action to stop these things (and I see scant evidence that they’re inclined to do so), I can foresee a future in which they are very much repressed and treated badly.
It was shorthand for “Women in our society”. If you’re stop jerking your politically-correct knee and pay attention to what I’ve been saying, you might notice that I have been defending the rights of women. If you’ve been paying attention, you might also note that I’m not a fundie, and am in fact an athiest/agnostic. I think you’re the only one in this thread who read what I wrote and thought, “Hey, Sam Stone thinks women are property!”
If you still want to believe the nonsense you spouted, well, screw you again.
Sam Stone and I don’t agree on much, but on this “our women” thing, we certainly do. The property interpretation is ludicrous in context.
bluethree, it’s kind of stody, old-fashioned turn of phrase, but it was obvious there was no sexist or possessive intent on Sam Stone’s part (any more than saying “our national forests” would be tree-ist).
That should be stodgy, but anyway…
Well, the answer is obvious. We must immediately invade Denmark to search for CMD (Cartoons of Mass Distraction) before they are moved to Sweden.
If proof is found that the CMD were indeed moved to Sweden, I will volunteer to spearhead the search, starting with the Swedish bikini team.
If I may quote a little from the latest NY Times story about this fiasco:
This is, in no particular order, infuriating, confusing, and suspicious. Why the fuck are these people chanting about Israel when they’re pissed about Danish cartoons? Gee, I wonder if somebody’s encouraging them. :rolleyes:
By the way, is anybody else a little irritating that NONE of the people who are outraged about these drawings seems to understand how a free press works? Do any of them understand the concept that the cartoons aren’t statements by the government of Denmark (or any of these other countries)? It doesn’t sound like they have a clue. I don’t know how many the countries presently rioting even have presses not run by the state. Of course, that’s probably Israel’s fault, too.