Hi Joanna
The rhetoric both in that speech and elsewhere is exactly what I have been trying to discuss, so thank you.
I have yet to see one arguement from Perry that proves (using George W's comments and speeches as evidence) that he does not believe in some kind of spiritual backing.
In fact, as you and many have observed, using that same pool of evidence George W seems to believe he has got divine backing.
Now, he's entitled to his own beliefs, but what of the agnostics, athiests, Musilims, CHristains opposed to war who dop not believe god backs his fight? How can he make such statements when he has a responsibility to represent them too?
How can he make such statements, when he knows any statement like that will be seized on as propoganda by Islamic fundamentalists to support their claim it is about religion?
At the very least such talk is inconsiderate and foolish. At the worst it could lead to hubris, pride before a fall.
God on your side, most powerful millitary machine in the history of the world, what could possibly go BOOM!?
As you say though, some people kid themselves...
Perry
The obsenities really don't accomplish anything do they? I mean really, you are an intelligent guy right? Don't you want good hearted people to be attracted to your leftist cause?
Red herring, strawman, switch and bait. You lie. Please show me where I used obsenities. Oh, and make sure you look up what an obsenity is.
All the hatred for the USA, conservatism, people of faith, etc; really does nothing but to show by comparison, that George Bush is nothing more than a president, probably not much different than your own prime minister, who is simply trying to protect his country.
Strawman, switch and bait. I don't hate any of the things you mention. Funny how you are quite happy to lie about me to support your arguement, but would wail in indignation if I was not accurate in my assertions about you. Hyp-hyp-Hurray?
Now, in the interest of fairness and civility, I ask you to please hold your obsenities to a minimum so we can get through this. Can you do this? Sure you can; you and I have been down this road before.
Repeated red herring; these obsenities are in your head. Where are they? Please quote, from this thread...
I have sifted through much of your dialog and tried to pick out the key points that you are trying to put forth here. Now stay with me.
What about your factual errors Perry?
Do you really think people are that stupid, that they cannot see your evasion? You may delude yourself. In fact you're the first person I've met who has delusions of adequacy. But I don't think you fool other people. I have a feeling that your knowledge of other areas is as reliable and well informed as your knowledge of the Netherlands...
You plainly agreed that you are fearful of "anyone who believes in god" right?
Strawman. I never agreed to such a thing. You are a liar, or have a problem with reading.
Now George Bush does believe in God, so logically that makes you fearful of him right?
This is getting tedious. Why not base your arguement on the things I have said, rather than the things you want me to have said? Is it because you can't actually counter the things I have said, so to protect your delicate iddle ego have to spin a fantasy world where, even if you have to trample on truth, you can make it look, to yourself, as though you are wise and tolerant, when in fact you are neither?
The fact that he leads the USA, which is now under major attack from a ring of international terrorists, and will likely result in retaliation doesn't help your fear level either does it?Ok now that we understand the reasoning behind your thread, let's examine some of your more specific fears.
This is you continuing the conversation you're having with yourself about things you say I say or feel, which I have not said or do not feel. What you're doing is self-abuse with a keyboard Perry, it's not a discussion.
You admitted that you are trying to compare all people of faith with Bin Laden. I directly asked you this question and you answered Yup. I take that as a yes. Does it make sense to you to compare all atheists with Stalin? He murdered untold millions of people. No doubt he reasoned that since survival of the fittest meant that he was the fittest, he was justified in elimanating people who disagreed with him. That is in harmony with nature.
You miss the point I made in that very paragraph that 'faith' has nothing to do with good or bad. You also fail to take on board I have acknowledged that the secular and the sectarian are equally capable of being beastly to one another. This entire paragraph above is just more self-abuse with a keyboard. Partial quoting to make a point is a bad habit. Who have you been associating with? Where did you get it and all the other pointless little tricks you try? Debating Society? I think not, you'd have been torn to shreds.
Can you understand how a severly uneducated person, say a person heavily laden with phobias not unlike people leaving destructive cults could be fearful of all atheists? That seems perposterous to you doesn't it? It should because it is. Just because a person chooses to be atheist doesn't mean that he will take it to it's most radical and heartless end does it? Of course not.
You're still constructing an arguement based on unfounded libels you've made against me. Yawn. I hope it makes you feel good - this amount of self-decption early in the morning makes ME want to be ill.
Likewise, a person with faith will not declare a holy war against all people unlike himself just because Bin Laden chose to see his existence as a divine mandate from God to kill Americans and Jews. It is easy to jump to conclusions when someone as powerful as the president holds different personal views than you do. You don't understand him because you are not like him, you are not an American, and thus are not familiar with his possible reactions.
Conversly, someone like myself who lives in Texas, likes the example set by Jesus Christ, and has seen Bush's direct interest in people and their freedoms will feel far more comfortable with his leadership. But that's the point he is our leader not yours. Still, I understand your viewpoint.
No you don't. You lie about what I say, and don't have a shred of evidence to back up those lies. You make continual use of arguementative tactics like red herrings, straw man, and switch and bait. You fail to engage in the issue, as you're far too involved in proving how right you are to actually think about facts, and why it's neccesary for you to distort them to back-up your arguement. You fail to respond to an obvious and massive amount of mis-information about the Netherlands you tried to use to back up your arguement, or at least to switch and bait the line of discussion.
I find it most illuminative;
YOU MUST HAVE KNOWINGLY MADE UP ALL THE FACTS YOU USED ABOUT HOLLAND, AS YOU CANNOT FIND ANYWHERE THAT REPEATS SUCH OBVIOUSLY FALSE STATEMENTS.
I believe this is the clearest indicator of your level of personal integrity. What was it 'your' book says about judging trees by their fruits? Who is said to be the father of the lie? Who's your daddy Perry?
Now, I want to address your concerns about native americans. The european puritans viewed themselves as evil and in need of redemption, the natives viewed themselves asa mixture of good and evil. A puritan knew he'd go to heaven and the native knew he'd return to mother earth. The Puritan plowed the earth for food and the native saw this as anathema. How could he rip his own mother up? They definitely tried to live peaceably. The indian had no concept of individual land ownership, just communal. Sounds good until you try to plant a crop and someone decides to take the food.
Wonderful, a few days into the debate and he actually does some research. God bless Google! Funnily enough, the Indian tribes the Puritans had contact with actually used agriculture. THAT'S HOW THEY WERE ABLE TO KEEP THE MAYFLOWER PILGRIMS ALIVE. Learn your own history man, you should be ashamed of yourself.
This was a clash of cultures that neither native americans nor the europeans were equipped to deal with. Although fascinated with each other, they really were both in a quandry as to what to do with one another. Organization won out like it has over and over throughout the centuries. People escaped the bloodbaths of Europe only to find themselves embroiled with neighbors whose concept of freedom seemed like slavery to the elements to them.
This is all leading up to the point where it's okay to kill Indians, isn't it?
Did the indians eventually feel that they had a spiritual mandate to stop the european? Sure they did. Just like the europeans felt like they had a mandate to "civilize" them. People always find a legitimization for their will to survive.
Yup, it was.
It is a long held right, Perry, of people to defend their homelands from invasion. Most modern people will agree that the behaviour of the Europeans and Americans towards the indigenous populations of land they invaded was to the largest extent unjustifiable. Let's see how far down this apologetic road you will travel...
The world is facing another clash of cultures right now. Militant Islam is marching against the rest of the world. They seek to dominate western ideals and bring people into subjection to Allah. I believe that the world is now educated enough to not let the attrocities of the recent past to continue.
Regardless of someone's justifications, religious, moral, civil, or natural to protect themselves, they have a right to do that. This conflict is not one over land. It is not one over money. It is not one over survival. It is a conflict born out of hatred for the infidel. They do not like the success of the west. They are terrified of it destroying the carefully crafted fear structures and control mechanisms they have installed in the minds of people under autocratic rule. They seek to turn back the progress of the last several hundred years and plummet the region into a religious rule of phobic prophets.
You have no fear from people of faith that respect the rights of others, just as you have no reason to fear atheists that do not act like despots. What however, is a real and present fear is people who use WMD and seek to subjugate their neighbors under tyranny.
Nice little speech at the end there, reassuring me that something I know and have never had issue with ('You have no fear from people of faith that respect the rights of others'). You can't win an arguement by avoiding all the mistakes you made, acting superior, using crude arguementative techniques left right and centre, distorting the facts, and then summing up in a grandious fashion with a comment that any one will agree with. However sweet you make the end smell, people will realise that it's built on 'fertiliser'. And do you know who use exactly the same techniques Perry? Shame on you!
Let's see what you've failed to respond to;
1/ Your deliberate attempt to present a distorted and inaccurate view of the Netherlands that you must have just made up of the top of your head, as none of the 'facts' you used are supported anywhere. You should also include the 'well-documented' human rights abuses you claim have taken place in Holland, or apologise for having lied about this.
2/ Your continual use of arguementative strategies, especially strawman, i.e., putting words into my mouth.
3/ Whether you suffer from a reading disorder, as this would make your lack of comprehension something I could feel sympathy for, rather than assuming you're being manipulative.
4/ If, as you asserted, that liberal countries like the Netherlands are so permissive, and that this is bad, why the less liberal, less permissive USA has more severe social problems?
5/ Whether or not you believe Christians are more right or better than other religions.
6/ Whether it is bad to mix religion with politics; for example, Bush is anti-choice as regards Abortion. Fine, he doesn't have to have one. But to let this effect his policy making, when those policies will effect the freedoms of people who are American as he, but who have a different opinion, is wrong. Therefore his religious beliefs should NOT influence his political actions. You avoided responding to this point last time.
7/ Whether you define evil as;
'to train and supply despots and terrorists, and then, when they bite the hand that feeds them, expect the world to help sorting out the problem they caused by training and supplying such characters'
Or as;
'kills peaceful unarmed civilians'.
8/ While you are at it, please explain what you mean by 'are taught the proper role of the state and religion'. It cracked me up.
9/ Could you tell us what 'cognitive dissonance' is?
Regarding your conversation with Xander about Native Americans... the American Indians only developed any response to the Divine Mandate that was used to make their treatment as animals okay towards the very end of the Indian Wars. Look up Ghost Dance. From memory, I think they just expected the White Man to be swept away by the Great Spirit, not that they would have the divine mandate from the Great Spirit to do the sweeping away. Big difference. The basic attitude was not that they had a right to drive the White Man away from his lands, but that the White Man had no right to drive them away from their lands. I think you missed Xanders point, found two quotes that refer to a prayer for luck in battle (like some Christians do), and thought this countered the point about the Divine Mandate, when in fact it doesn't, as the Indians had no opposite doctrine.
edited for typos
Edited by - Abaddon on 31 January 2003 7:0:42