Someone tell me, what is the term for someone who constantly derides and accuses another nation without any basis other than prejudice?
December, what would you call such a person?
You are one.
Give me a break. This thread already has three separate cites about the problems of the Jews in France today. Two French education ministers stated that this was a problem.
Just because some French people are racist motherfuckers doesn’t change what you are.
december, you’re saying that you should be given a break since, even though your OP was total bullshit, there are problems with anti-semtism in France.
:rolleyes:
December, I was wrong to call you what I did in my last post to this thread.
I was out of line. It was anger that drove me to say that.
I raised the gag order issue incorrectly, but the several translations of the op article have substanciated my point about the verdict of the case.
However, you have painted me into a corner and I would like to see a retraction of your statement that I am unsympathetic to the victims of anti-semetic attacks.
While the claim was made directly at wring, it was also indirectly at me per your previous grouping of wrings postings and mine.
If you do not see fit to withdraw your statement, then I woukd at least like to see you reply to tomndebb’s post.
Our friend is now defending his post by saying that he posted a misrepresentation and that his assertions cannot be taken at face value. You can’t believe my posts, says December, you have to go read the linked articles and be fluent in the technical minutia of a foreign language to make sure I am not just making up the whole thing to support a contention that has no factual basis. If you believe my misrepresentations it is your fault and I am not in anyway culpable for the initial deception. You cannot take me at my word, says our friend.
What is this? Has this board just turned into a huge game of liar’s poker? Is there no obligation to be accurate and truthful around here? Is there no bond of trust and confidence? Should December’s posts carry a implicit disclaimer as follows: “This posting may be complete bullshit, dishonest, incomplete or manipulative. Read with scepticism. Believe at your own risk.”
What, they don’t already? Where have you been, Spavined Gelding? 
Well said, TwistofFate
I am sure you are not an anti-semite. I’m sorry my words implied that you were.
I must confess that I have relatives in France, which makes me more excited about this situation than most people. There has been a pattern of Arab attacks on French Jews, met by denial and inadequate response from the French government. The French government has now acknowledged the problem and is trying to do better, for which I salute them.
tomndebb wrote
tomndebb was just wrong. “Loser pays” or the “British rule” requires that the losing party pay the costs incurred by the winning party, including their legal expenses. In this case, the parents were required to pay court costs (apparently not legal expense) plus a fine a 4000 Euros. The fine amount was not based on the legal expense incurred by the Principal and Assistant Principal.
Spavined Gelding, the OP said that the parents were fined for failing to “cover up or paper over its antisemitism problems.” According to the translation of the article, the fine had three bases, one of which was tht the court blamed the parents for the thelarge amount of publicity given to this incident. (“A passage from the judgement adds that ‘nothing was done to respect the presumption of innocence, the court noticed in addition that this business was the object of a very important mobilization of the press (there were 20 journalists present… at least at the beginning of the trial) which is certainly not the doing of the court or of the defendants’.”)
I admit that the OP overlooked the other two bases for the fine.
Why? You have shown repeatedly that you prepared to entirely fabricate serious accusations. Even if we look only at this thread there’s a list of examples far better than anything you provided for your OP:
When it’s not hard at all. Hell, you didn’t even bother to get a proper translation of your main cite, for gods sake. You just posted your accusation without any thought of fairness.
Then, you got even better. You decide to totally fabricate two posters stance on a completely separate issue:
No basis or reason, just accusation aimed at those who disagree with you.
Then you really excel yourself. You go for the two pronged baseless attack - insulting poster and nation, all without any basis
Oh, and just for shits and giggles you then go to totally misrepresent someone to claim your view is supported:
Fang had said nothing of the fucking sort, and I do not think you so stupid that you could misread his statement so massively.
You tell me December. Should I find your behaviour here despicably stupid, or despicably prejudiced? What does it say to you that not a single person has yet agreed with your OP? Your premise wasn’t even arguable, just completely unfounded spite.
I don’t like to put words in peoples’ mouths (much!) but let me try to paraphrase and frame the above observation for you, december in two questions;
You lie, you manipulate information, you reject and ignore rational explanations, why, then, are you not an ugly racist fuck ?
And, given the above, why are you not at least the equal of ‘anti-Semitic’ (whatever that might mean in your world) in relation to France and French people ?
Because I don’t go around beating up French school girls.
So, saying a certain nation is inherently racist (even if you have no substantial proof of any kind) is OK, as long as you don’t beat them up over it. Because that would be the equivalent of “anti-Semitic”.
Huh?
If I beat up a Jew, I may be an anti-Semitic. Then again, maybe he had an affair with my wife, and I’m beating him up for a reason unrelated to his ethnicity.
But if I merely say things like “Jews are greedy” and “all Jews hate Muslims”, then that obviously doesn’t make me anti-Semitic, per december’s logic. See, I didn’t actually do anything, so I’m home free.
december, what colour is the sky in your world?
Ready … Shoot … Aim
Coldfire, I provided substantial proof, both on this thread and during other debates. There has been a major problem in France of Arabs attacking Jews and Jewish institutions. The government had denied the problem, but they are now facing it, to their credit. In addition to the cites already provided, here’s some background.
december do you think that the US is racist? I could throw sites at you all day about racist groups in the US.
I don’t think anybody is doubting that France has it’s share of race problems.
This matters little however to your OP.
But none of that is your particular angle. Let me spell it out for you, december. What you’re doing here is attempting to propagate hatred based (knowingly) on misinformation and lies - none of this particular OP is credible. Period. It’s lies than even the scantest of perusals reveals. The way you’ve – no one else, not even the French Government, just you - wrote it encourages hatred of a people. That’s your choice, you did that.
Now, I haven’t had reason to look at the exact terms of the fairly recent (so-called) ‘hate-crime’ legislation in both our countries (and others) but I’d be very surprised if what you post here doesn’t sometimes rub up against the intention of that legislation.
But I don’t know for sure, so I’ll check it out over the weekend. It’s a new territory for all of us.
I’m sure you’re never thought of yourself as a hate criminal but, I guess you’ll know from history, sometimes those are the worst kind.
This is an utter crock of shit. It misses the whole point of the policy behind “loser pays:” namely, to reduce meritless lawsuits by imposing a financial cost on the plaintiffs that bring them. Whether that cost is in the form of reimbursement of court costs and defendant’s legal fees or in the form of a fine is irrelevant. Hell, I’d even go out on a limb and say that for particularly meritless lawsuits, a fine on top of the reimbursement of costs is a pretty damned sensible policy – I have very little problem with penalizing people for wasting the court’s time or otherwise interfering with the performance of the court’s duties.
You’ve managed to totally reverse course on one conservative policy (loser pays). You’re also coming pretty damned close to reversing course on another conservative position, opposition to hate crime legislation. You blithely assume that, based on the race and religion of attacker and victim, the assault was anti-Semetic. Yes, France has had problems with antisemitic violence, but that doesn’t say anything about the particulars of this specific case. I would posit that this kind of presumption is exactly the kind of things most conservatives decry in America – the notion that just because a white guy kills a black guy, the crime was racially motivated (and thus is another statistic supporting hate crimes legislation).
Shit like this makes me embarrassed to be a conservative. Would it kill you to think your argument through BEFORE you post?
Plus did you ever think that drivel like this lawsuit, not to mention your entire OP, are exactly the kind of thing that contribute to anti-Semitic sentiment?
From the OP:
From Page 2:
Why do I think that if a “liberal” journalist had totally misrepresented an article, december would be up in arms about the dishonesty of left-wing journalists, but when it’s someone who agrees with his blinkered worldview, it’s shrugged off with no comment? Or are you intending to start a pit thread, december, about how this Andrew Sullivan needs to learn french to avoid making himself (and you by association) look like an idiot?
But maybe your energy should be saved for the next thread where you twist facts and engage in lies in the pursuit of your agenda. And I thought trolling was forbidden at this message board. :rolleyes:
You have a point, DCU. As you say, the judge found that the suit was meritless. OTOH, there are two rebuttals.
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The situation is unclear because the fine had multiple reasons. The judge also said that the parents were to blame for giving undue publicity to the case and for insulting the Principal and Vice Principal.
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I think it was unreasonable for the judge to find the suit to be meritless. The finding looks weird. In this country, if a schoolgirl traveled to another school to take an exam, and she was beaten up by a group of students there, the parents could probably win a suit against the school for failing to protect the girl – especially if the Minister of Education had recently sent out a warning about that sort of thing! Even if the parents lost the suit, it would be incredible for a judge to find the suit totally without merit.
I didn’t mean to address hate crime legislation. (BTW I have mixed feelings about that issue.) Saying that hate crimes exist is not to say that hate-crime legislation is the right way to deal with the problem.
True. Still, IMHO the conclusion seems overwhelmingly likely.
Of course, a couple of newspaper articles can’t absolutely prove it was a hate crime, but there’s every indication that it was. Note that three Jewish girls were beaten up by a group of Arab students. AFAIK the attackers didn’t know the victims, since they went to different schools. Furthermore, the level of Arab on Jew violence in France today is a lot higher than white on black violence in this country.
Note that the case generated wide media attention (“There were twenty journalists present”) Presumably the media saw this as a hate crime, not just a playground spat between school children. For all these reasons, I think it’s highly likely that this really was a hate crime.