Hmm, let’s see:
I believe that you do deserve to be crushed to death by a bulldozer if you stand right in the bulldozer’s path. You deserve to fall to your death if you walk into an open elevator shaft. You deserve to have your brains blown out if you point the pistol into your temple and pull the trigger.
Rachel Corrie got what she deserved.
I’m don’t know the specifics of the Rachel Corrie case, but, in general, are you saying that if a burglar comes into your house, and tells you to sit down or he’ll shoot, and at some point you try to get up and he shoots you, that “you got what you deserve”?
In my opinion, you would be at fault, to a degree, for not following the burglar’s orders and putting your life in danger, but that does not remove blame from the burglar who actually shot you.
September must be bad analogy month. We aren’t dealing with burglars or turning your car at this time or that; we are dealing with a suicidal person willingly standing in front of a massive bulldozer. A massive moving bulldozer, at that. There is no need to come up with yet another bad analogy. Just deal with the matter at hand!
Re: Rachel Corrie.
The thing is about IDF D-9 operators, these guys aren’t killers. They aren’t even regular soldiers - they’re reservists called up to utilize skills they use as civilians. These are professional heavy machinery operators, construction people, grizzly guys with beer bellies and ball caps. They’re professionals, and the last thing they want to do is kill people. If they could have been prevented Rachel Corrie’s death, they would have.
Why would they want to kill her, anyway? Even if they happen to be callous murderers - and these aren’t brainwashed stormtroopers, remember - they’re there to do a job, and having people die is just another delay.
And I guess all months are asinine-sarcastic-drivel-from-Brutus months
The reason for the burglary analogy wasn’t to show that it was similar to the case at hand, it was to see if there is any common ground for discussion of the bulldozer case.
The bulldozer incident is complicated by issues like whether you consider what the bulldozers were doing was evil or not, whether the driver of the bulldozer is “just following orders”, whether the victim was visible or not, etc
The burglary case is more clear-cut, with the above complications removed. This allows us to get to what people think about the fundamental principal at hand.
That is, if someone found the burglary victim who was shot because he disobeyed the burglar and got in his way “got what he deserved”, and did not blame the burglar for the murder, then there is no reason for me to discuss the bulldozer incident further with this person; there is no common ground.
But, if someone says that in the burglary example the victim was foolish and is partly to blame for his death, but the burglar also is to blame for actually killing the person, then there is common ground to discuss the bulldozer issue, with all its complex aspects.
Simple clear-cut examples allow people to determine whether they have any common ground to debate the issue at hand, which is much more complex. It’s a simple way of avoiding long debates on complex issues when they two parties disagree on the most basic principles.
So, if someone stands in front of your car and you can’t drive to work unless you run over them, even if that is suicidal behavior, does that give you the right to run over them? You certainly don’t have the legal right to do so, but do you think you have the moral right to do so?
I believe that you do deserve to be shot if you stand your ground in a firefight with an evil enemy. I believe you do deserve to die if you recklessly but not deliberately fall down an open lift shaft while trying to save valuable property.
I believe that until you find a cite for the proposition that Corrie deliberately engaged in behaviour which she intended to cause her own death your last analogy is irrelevant.
I believe that some of my above statements are sarcastic.
We aren’t dealing with someone who debates. We are dealing with someone who states their unsupported, citeless opinion as fact.
He was? Which one? And even if so, why is it OK for him to respond to a specific post, but not OK for me to respond to his specific post?
Are you perhaps utterly one eyed?
Spare me. You and your fellow travellers want to get this down to the visibility characteristics of a D9 and I want to raise the wider issues such as what the D9’s were doing and why others felt they should attempt to stop that. But my side is taking things out of context?
You seem confused. You think Corrie intentionally killed herself (though you can’t come up with a cite). I’ve never suggested anyone intentionally killed anyone.
Try to keep up, won’t you? It’s tedious having to remind you of your own position.
This is relevant how?
So, umm, is that a yes, they are blameless?
Polerius, Princhester–you seem to be exclusively interested in seeing to it that Your Sacred Cause Wins.
Therefore, I suspect that you’re going to be very disappointed in the SDMB, because we eat Sacred Causes for breakfast, right along with Sacred Cows, Sacred Coffee, Sacred OJ, & our Sacred Wheat Bread Toast with a little Sacred Strawberry Jam on it.
There is no evidence that—
[list=a]
[li]The CAT drivers wanted to kill this woman.[/li][li]That anything other than the destruction of a smuggling tunnel was planned.[/li][li]That these devices were intended as weapons from their construction.[/li][li]That the Caterpiller Corporation believed that these construction machine would be misused, if in fact they were misused.[/li][li]That this young woman was acting in any fashion responsibly.[/li][/list]
This is independent of any general Middle East opinions I have formed.
I suggest that you learn that “My Side, Right Or Wrong” is a poor credo to live by.
What sacred cause?
Thanks for the heads up, Bosda. After nearly four years of waiting for the SDMB to support my sacred cows, I must admit doubts had begun to creep in.
There is no evidence that I have contradicted anything you list except (b) and possibly in one sense (e).
As to (b), go and read the Wikipedia cite provided on the first page of this thread. I don’t purport to take any particularly solid position on the issue (how can one in the “fog of war” that surrounds the Israel/Palestine conflict), but there is at least as much evidence that the intention was to destroy houses, including in particular the house of a physician friend of Corrie’s (which she is said to have been standing in front of when killed) as there is that the intention was only to destroy a smuggling tunnel.
As to (e), I think it just depends on your point of view. I’m sure she acted recklessly. If you assume she was fighting a just fight (undoubtedly her point of view) she was perhaps acting responsibly. If you assume she was protecting terrorists she wasn’t.
My whole point is and always has been that you cannot arrive at a conclusion that she was solely to blame without making an underlying assumption that what she was risking her life for wasn’t legitimate and/or that what the authorities were doing was legitimate.
Your post shows that you haven’t come to grips with what I am saying at all, something that I find very disappointing given how much regard I usually have for your opinions.
You’ve given me no choice, Princhester. It’s time for me to use the “sister strategy”*.
You’re right, Princhester. You’re right. Caterpillar should assume all responsibility for the use of their products in all circumstances, Rachel Corrie was acting in a 100% responsible manner at all times and was killed by the bloodthirsty and completely irresponsible Israelis.
For that matter, Israel is always in the wrong. Always. But not you, Princhester, because you’re 100% correct.
No, no, no. I insist. You’re right. We’re all incorrect. You win.
[sub]* The “sister strategy” is when your argumentative sister is so desperate to prove that she is right that she will come up with argument after argument in an attempt to vindicate herself, resulting in exasperation and a desire to end the conversation, which requires a total, unconditional concession on your behalf. It doesn’t mean that you agree, it means that you recognize the futility in discussing something any longer.[/sub]
If you say so. Personally I think what you are saying is ridiculous. As I’ve said.
Before engage sarcasm, read thread.
I did read the thread. I even responded early on.
The only thing I see you doing is ignoring every argument made that she did it to herself or deflecting it with more off-the-wall analogies, and then you expect us to agree with those analogies.
In short, you’re either assuming victory because you think that your interpretation of events is the only correct one, or you’re arguing for the sake of arguing. The first option is incorrect, and the second option is petty and childish.
Either way the argument is stupid, and a severe hijack from the premise of the OP.
Nice countermeasure, by the way. I conceded your point, and in your zeal to continue arguing you reject my concession. Are you sure that you’re not my sister? You sure do argue like her.
Frankly, if you’ll allow me to blow off a little steam, I ab-so-lutely sick to friggin’ death of the fact that I can’t make a specific, limited and particular point without having to spend the next umpteen pages fending off other posters who are quite determined to change my point into something it isn’t in order to attack it.
In my very first effin’ post I said that I didn’t think the dozer killed Corrie deliberately. How the hell many times am I subsequently going to be accused of saying the opposite?
In my very first effin’ post I say I think the OP is a crock. How the hell many times am I going to be accused of supporting it?
I have never said anything one way or the other in support of a particular side of the conflict, beyond saying simply that there are those with views other than the Israeli view. I have said only that without forming a view on which side you support, the characterisation of Corrie’s behaviour is moot. How many times am I nonetheless going to be told that (presumably by even so much as suggesting there are those that have a view different to that of the Israeli’s, never mind what I think) I must think the Israeli’s are evil?
Can you people bloody read or what?
On preview, I see this:
Jesus Cwist on a cwutch, Airman. What the hell does it take?
Read this next bit very slowly: the points you make are not my bloody points. They never have been. I don’t know why you think they are.
Sheesh.
I think the driver does share some of the culpability in this accident. he was operating the vehicle without the spotters to confirm the way was clear for him to proceed.
Regarding (b), the tunnels usually run under the houses, which have trap doors to access them. The houses shelter the smugglers, and keeps them from being seen.
Regarding (e), IMO she was somewhere she shouldn’t have been, involving herself in something that was not hers to be in. I would think that way no matter which side she was defending. IMNSHO people without military training do not belong in military zones.
I also find it interesting that she got lots of media attention, while Americans who have been killed by Palistinian suidice bombers seldom get a mention in the paper. I guess tourists eating in restaurants and students riding busses aren’t interesting enough fodder for the media. http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/Terrorism/usvictims.html
If people can’t figure out what your point is, maybe that’s a hint that your writing isn’t as clear as you think it is? Because I’ve read through this thread and I can’t figure out what the hell you’re trying to say.
This thread is based on a fairly inane premise anyway. The bulldozers are not “weaponized” in the sense that you need to do any modifications at all to a bulldozer to make it lethal. They are armored so that the operators don’t get killed by snipers. Calling them “weaponized” is a rhetorical tactic designed to lead to the conclusion that the operators are deliberately targeting human beings (as implied in Polerius’ idiotic analogy). In fact, I’m not seeing a whole lot of reports of protestors (or anyone else) run down by bulldozers. The bulldozers are not being used as weapons, and one accident doesn’t make it so.
Further, and just for the record, Caterpillar has addressed the issue of bulldozers and Israel in the only court that they are legally responsible to do so – with their shareholders.
I didn’t know I *had * a “Sacred Cause”. Can you inform me what it is?
I should remind you that I know nothing of the specifics of this case, I was only responding to specific claims that I thought were wrong, such as “Caterpillars are bulldozers, not weapons, so there is no way in hell Caterpillar can be responsible”.
I proposed a scenario where it might be, without implying that the specific case in the OP falls under the scenario. I was simply attacking the general “rule” that we could never conceivably blame Caterpillar.
Ah.
Feeble humor, or endemic disingenuousness? It’s so hard to tell…
Can you answer the question?
Bad analogy…Corrie CAN walk away from a D-9 without being hit, your homeowner doesn’t have that SAME ability to dodge bullets fired by the burglar.