Wildest Bill, I’d like to reiterate the question I asked in the pit. You made some broad anti-Muslim remarks earlier, and then apologized for them, but now you’re making more anti-Muslim remarks. Could you explain to us just what you were apologizing for in the first place? So many people were so willing to accept your apology, that I think they deserve a little clarification about what, exactly, you were offering. Because I must say, in light of this thread it’s very unclear to me what you meant.
Ben I apogized for wanting to nuke their countries. Nuking someone and calling someone a silly name is to different things wouldn’t you say? Also this was just a question type thread. If you don’t understand it, read Rickjay second post. He not looking to find fault in me (like you do all the time) understood what I was getting at. Secondly, I clarified and said why don’t we just call the terrorist towel heads.
Esprix if you don’t like me or my threads, why the heck do you read 'em?
Same individual. After he, essentially, declared himself to be the fourth member of the Godhead, I commenced calling him F[sub]ourth[/sub]o[sub]f[/sub]G[sub]od[/sub].
I’ve got to hand it to you. You are far and away the best kite flyer I have ever seen. Your strategy is to dream up an issue, anything will do as long as it’s controversial, and submit it for discussion knowing that many replies will follow, 99% of them disagreeing with your OP.
This is OK as far as it goes, but you are not really interested in the issue, you are interested in the kite.
And people do reply. Why this is, I just do not know. And when the kite looks like dropping you return to make a few adjustments in order to keep it aloft.
When the kite eventually falls, you may apologise, or not as the case may be, before grabbing another kite and floating that one instead.
I am not saying you are wrong to do this. Not at all. If you can get away with it, all well and good. Personally I read very few of your threads. I can tell what’s in them just by looking at the title.
It’s because Silence=Assent at least in many people’s minds. When Bill posts assinine comments like (paraphrased, but based on a real WB thread…I can’t find the original thread) “Hay, ya’ll gay guys. If youd jsut try it with a girl, yo’ud like it!”, everyone knows it’s idiotic, but you can’t just let the statement stand unchallenged any more than you could leave an equally contemptible statement like…“Hey Black Dopers? Do you really like watermelon and white women?” It’s why I strongly belive that we have to challenge Fred Phelps types, Holocaust Deniers and Klansmen every chance we get, rebutting and mocking their arguements. If we stay silent, their bile starts to become accepted as normal.
If we ignore WB’s periodic tantrums, he might go away, but then again, he might not and he’ll be able to point to earlier threads, saying “But you didn’t argue with me there!” (or, more accurately “Buut ya’ll dnid’t aurgue with me their!”)
In addition, as a wild-ass guess, 95% of the people who read this board don’t post frequently or at all. When people are lurking, I don’t want them getting the idea that WB’s views are so accepted that they represent the majority opinion. Frankly (and this’ll never happen), I’d like to see WB’s attempts at outrageousness met with nothing but a wall of posters responding with nothing but :rolleyes:. We’re never going to convince him of anything as Ben has so aptly pointed out earlier in the thread and debating him is like debating sand: there’s nothing to grab onto. If thirty or fourty Dopers would just enter his threads posting only :rolleyes:, we could show the contempt we have for his ideas and not give him the jollies he gets when people try to argue back. But like I said: it ain’t gonna happen.
And Nostradamus, I think your “kite” analogy is dead on.
An Indian immigrant has been killed in Mesa, AZ, because as a Sikh he is required to wear a turban. That his religion has zero to do with Islam meant nothing to the person who killed him.
A Pakistani immigrant had his tire store burned down.
Mosques have been violently attacked.
An Egyptian Christian was killed.
Is that enough for you, Wildest Bill? It’s not funny. It’s contemptible. Go away.
Wildest Bill , Rudyard Kipling you are not. “Towel Heads” will never become a socially benign phrase such as “Fuzzy-Wuzzy” a descriptive name (because of their crainial appearance) ascribed to members of the Hadandoa tribe of the Beja peoples of the Eastern Sudan. There is a lesson here, lest we get too cocky. The Fuzzy-wuzzy, tribes of islamic fundamentalists opposed to western imperialism literally wiped out in one battle, 10,000 troops (save 250)of the most powerful nation on earth
Sure, Bill…just as long as I can call you “white trash”!
Didn’t like that, did you? It was insulting, stupid and beneath your dignity, right? Quite possibly totally inaccurate, even.
Just like the term “towel head”.
And take this into consideration…who blew up the Murrah building in Oklahoma City? Tim McVeigh…a white, Protestant guy. So, does that mean I can go around saying slurs about Methodists, screaming at Baptists that they are terrorists, and threatening their personal safety? I think not.
To the rest of the Dopers…look, if Bible quotes won’t get it through his skull, maybe that will…
Personally, I think you hit the nail right on the head. And I think it’s ok here, as it’s a valid opinion about motivation, not a slur aimed at the OP’er. But IANAM (moderator), so my opinion’s only worth what you paid for it.
I wasn’t debating that it is objectionable, that is obvious…I was just wondering why it was…
Racial epithets are by their nature mocking and insulting, and this one is decidedly not…I mean, what is the implication here, that we are somehow better than them because they were cloth on their heads? I don’t get it…If every single Arab wore a turbin or scarf (or even an actual towel) on their head all day, every day, it wouldn’t make them any less intellegent or civilized or capable…Hell, in the desert, its probably a good idea…
Again, I’m not defending use of the term…Just knowing that people take offense to it is enough to exclude it from my vocabulary…But I hate avoiding something and not knowing why…
There is no percentage in fighting ignorance which is not there.
Wildest Bill does not lack information, or knowledge, or education. He merely chooses to exercise his mind in ways which prove time-consuming to the other posters on this board.
It is clear to me that Wildest Bill’s brain is an untapped source of wisdom which could be used effectively for the good of mankind.
Do not mock me, for if you do, you mock Wildest Bill.
Instead of helping Wildest Bill keep his kites aloft, would it not be better to dust off your own kites and fly those for Wildest Bill’s attention and comment.
This policy will achieve two objectives. Firstly, Wildest Bill’s kites will no longer have air superiority, and secondly Wildest Bill’s brain will be stimulated into using the 99% which currently lies dormant.
I appreciate that Wildest Bill’s threads may ultimately develop into a source of ironic amusement if this stratagem is adopted, but this will address the concerns of Fenris, who makes a telling point concerning the way these threads are seen by readers who do not post.
The worst case scenario is that Wildest Bill’s brain shuts down completely, like HAL in 2001: A Space Odyssey, and this would indeed be tragic.
Nevertheless, sacrifices are often necessary in the fight against ignorance, and no doubt a collection could be organised to fund the erection of a Monument to this underused organ, should the unthinkable ever happen.
Look hereand check out “Hate Crimes…Arab-Americans” in the “Dateline” section. I found the Islamic Fundamentalist family to be most interesting. So much for stereotypes.
This story will get play in the Arab world, and other than the behaviour of some Americans just being wrong, will undermine our efforts to claim we are not at war with Islam. I hope our bigoted, violent, minority does not make the geopolitical situation worse.