No, it was item one of the OP under why both parties are hated.
This is why I find myself rooting for John McCain despite disagreeing with him on damn near every issue. The guy has character, and I get the feeling that his stated opinions are his real opinions and not poll-obsessed, regurgitated party loyalty lines.
Well, keep in mind the reason most people know of him and why a lot of the left likes him is he seems to stand against almost everything the conservatives want to implement.
It could be that he is using that tactic as a way to garner public support as an outsider. Maybe not, but a valid speculation.
OK, who let the guy from the sixties in here???
I just want to say I agree with most of the OP. Too much stupidity all around. People want a team to cheer for more than they want anything specific.
Okay, I realize that for some, this is a real cool thing to say.
Why do you believe that? What makes you feel that it is simply a matter of choosing teams, versus believing strongly in a set of values and defending them?
The stereotypes are your oversimplified opinions and are based on uncritical generalizations. That goes for your stereotypes of both the Left and the Right.
Did you also find the death of Fernando Pereira hilarious when the Rainbow Warrior was blown up?
Are you familiar with the activities of the latest incarnation of the Rainbow Warrior – such as providing disaster relief to Tsunami victims?
If you want to take care only of you and yours, I can respect that. But I don’t have a lot of respect for your ridicule of those who reach beyond that small circle of interest to help others.
Yup. Bunch of do-gooder rabble rousers go out on the strength of their rightious indignation completely ignoring the fact that sometimes the rabble rouses back. Too bad, so sad, blah, blah, blah. I wouldn’t feel anything for a PETA nut shot in the head by a security guard as he was trying to release test animals or for an anti-choice lunatic who got kicked in the throat by a patient and choked to death on her own blood either.
As for the OP, I found it to be well stated with the exception of the tired old “war for oil” chestnut that the peacenicks like to trot out at every opportunity. Frankly, I would expect better from a poster who wrote an otherwise intelligent OP, I was somewhat disappointed. Overall I give it a B+.
Weirddave, you must find the evening news to be a laugh a minute.
Similarly, I found myself mordantly amused by the guy who couldn’t figure out that trains can’t exactly stop on a dime…
I commend you on your deep understanding of what a stereotype is. Congratulations, you’re now caught up with the rest of the class.
As for the death, the death doesn’t mitigate the lunacy of the whole event. I still think it’s funny that the French felt the need to sink the Rainbow Warrior. There are so many levels on which I find it funny. Especially, from a stereotypical American’s point of view where Green Peace and France are two of the biggest lefty organizations out there.
Yay the Rainbow Warrior is helping the Tsunami victims! That’s amazing they are continuing to do what they’ve always done! Holy shit!
Yes, I think outside of my own little circle. But I’d like to point out the converse side of caring about other people. Caring about other people outside of your sphere leads to things like genocide and regime change as well. It leads to gassing poor farmers in Colombia just so we can keep cocaine away from teenagers in Minneapolis. I think the drug war should end, but only because I “don’t CARE about the children”, yeah that must be it.
Frankly I think all this bullshit caring is killing us. I care so much about the Iraqi people that I am gonna let them sell their oil fields to American companies in a no bid contract! I care so much about the children in Afghanistan that I think we need to stop the Opium trade there, the children of the world need it to be stopped! (Nevermind that Opium is 40% of their economy and the families that rule the drug trade are the same ones that ruled it when China made it illegal hundreds of years ago.)
Another reason I hate the left AND the right:
Self-Righteous caring about people outside of their sphere.
Maybe if people took better care of those in their immediate vicinity, and less care of people halfway across the world that we don’t even know, the world would be a better place. But I probably think that because I don’t care about anyone outside of my small little circle.
The world is a network of small little overlapping spheres. If I take care of people in my circle, and they take care of people in their circle, so on and so forth, lo and behold we’ve got all of humanity covered! But no, let’s toss our money into paying for oil, tanks, soldiers, UN diplomats, cargo planes, choppers, and worldwide force projetion so that a UN aid worker can carry a bag of rice into Sri Lanka without getting shot while the government and rebels fight over control of the distribution of that rice. I’m so glad everybody cares so fucking much.
Erek
As for the Rainbow Warrior, I mean hell the name says it all. They call it a “warrior” so they have to expect to be treated like a warrior. There are casualties.
Though, there is a slight undercurrent in your post that implies that they SHOULDN’T have been doing what they were doing. I disagree, France’s nuclear testing affects the entire world. It’s most certainly EVERYONE’s business. Just as PETA members are entitled to be against animal sacrifice in the name of science. I don’t disagree with what they do, it doesn’t mean I can’t see the humor in it also.
Thanks for the backhanded praise. I stand by the war for oil thing. I’m not necessarily a peacenik, violence is a part of life and I can see myself in situations where I’d be willing to be violent, or support violence. The difference is, that this is not one of them.
There’s no reason that I can’t do a little for myself, for my family, my community and across international boundaries too. I don’t do “big” things very much. My best effort was teaching in inner city high schools for twenty years. But I still stay politically and environmentally active – at least with membership and letter writing.
As long as we choose to do something to make things better, does it really matter where it is?
Labels are easy. Stereotypes are trite. There is a lot more to your thinking than I originally could see. My fault.
Well first off this post was just a bitch session for me. I wasn’t bitching at people I was bitching at the stereotypes. It’s not so much that people don’t fit stereotypes but there are degrees to which they fit stereotypes and that ratio plays off of the degree to which they fit other conflicting stereotypes, the aggregate coming out to a whole person in the end.
I think it’s good to do something to fix the world, but I think a lot of it is like throwing money into a wishing well, it’s all well and good if you toss a couple coins in, but when you throw in a wad of cash that’s kind of stupid. I hate the tendency that people have to throw money at a problem, and consider that helping. Then they go on with their lives eating doritos in front of their big screen TV, feeling good about themselves for having “helped”. Then when they go back to work the next day in their unfulfilling cubical they curse not having enough money, only to throw another guilt check into the well.
Personally, my philosophy is that “God helps those who help themselves, and so do I.”, my sphere is rather large, and continues to grow. I have a great connection to a large group of people, but I maintain it through a manageable degree of seperation. In otherwords, I don’t help people I don’t know who are in situations I don’t understand. I find myself everyday realizing how little I knew about my friends that I see regularly, so how could I possibly know about another country? I’d rather see aid go to countries that are going to stabilize, not to places like Somalia where Warlords are going to attack the UN aid truck and steal it. As unfortunate as it is, war torn nations need to solve their own problems, colonialism has only made it worse, because it’s foundation is western liberal guilt that tells us at the same time as we are better than those people at governing ourselves, that we have a responsibility to help the “heathens”, and I am tired of that sort of agenda.
I’d like to see things done quite differently, with more emphasis being put on community groups than large aggregates. Help a couple strategically placed communities that WANT your help, become stabilized, then work through them to stabilize those around them.
Erek