Attack on Afghanistan

[fable]

Originally posted by at99:
Just seems the problems in those countries have caused angst among people who are looking for a scapegoat like USA and not themselves.

These are not problems "in those countries," by which I assume you mean MidEastern nations, without saying as much. These are international problems, which you might recall also have frequently involved terrorists in Ireland, Spain, Germany, Austria, the US, the UK, etc. The focus because of the last group of attacks has been on the MidEast, and these have resulted in the single greatest loss of life to date; but the other attacks, from European terrorist organizations, have actually been far more prevalent in the West. You realize that, don't you?

[ 10-09-2001: Message edited by: fable ]

[C Elegans]

Originally posted by Bloodstalker:
<STRONG>I personally have a problem understanding how one culture or way of life, can be deemed better or worse than another. People live their own way, the way that they are comfortable with, and that is supposedly what the U.S. stands for. I don't think that it is fair or acurate to to directly connect ones culture, ubringing, personal beliefs, etc. to a government that has total control over it's people. The government, in this case, the Taliban, may not speak on behalf of it's people. As a matter of fact, there is considerable opposition to the Taliban in Afgahnistan. While if someone asked me if The Taliban regime was wrong and unsatisfactory, I would say that yes, it is unsatisfactory. But there are also many people, (Northern Alliance) which would agree with me.

Remember, there was a time that the U.S. had to fight to break it's ties with a government that we did not feel represented it's people. This did not mean that we broke with everything that we had brought, culturally, from the British. Actually, we still share many similarities with our brothers across the sea. The British are our strongest friends in the international community in my opinion. It was not the people, or the things that we held in common that caused us to split, it was the government.

I think of Afghanistan the same way. Their government controls the press, as did The British government in the 1700's. Was that the people's fault? no, it wasn't.Look at the British government today. How did it change? it was the British people who changed the government and made the change.

As far as middle eastern culture being inferior to western culture, I don't see how that can be stated. Our views of the world, and even the realities of the world we live in, are very different. However, there are many peaceful muslims, many more than there are violent extremists. I know that all we see on the news is the worst side of middle eastern life, but honestly, that is about all we see on the news about our own country. The sad reality is that common, everyday people like me and you, who go to work, live normal lives, and don't cause trouble, are never on the news. We don't make for good ratings.

As far as civilizations and culture goes, remember that our own country is barely over 200 years old. While it is generally conceded that civilization pretty much began in the middle eastern area of the world.

To sum it up, I think the Taliban does not directly represent the majority of tha Afghan people. To group the people with the government in this situation is wrong, and flawed from the beginning.

That said, I would like to state that it was not my intention to irritate or anger anyone. I was simply stating my opinion on the matter. Do I think the Taliban is wrong? yes. Do I think the retaliation was warranted? yes. Do I blame the Afghan people or their culture? No.

I shall return to lurking now. I hope what I have said has made sense.</STRONG>

You have a lot of sense, IMO. Very good post, Bloodstalker. Nuanced and informed opinions are certainly needed in times of crisis when intense emotions make people wanting to simplify and dichotomise.

[Bloodstalker]

Thanks CE, like I said, I don't usually get serious, but oh well.

[ThorinOakensfield]

Originally posted by at99:
<STRONG>
Tell you what my man fable . You tell everyone why middle eastern cultures are as good as the west so we can all have a look or a laugh.

Lets just see how many people will agree with you.
</STRONG>

You damn SOB. You piece of ****. I would really love to kick your ass.

Posted by the same ass- Just seems the problems in those countries have caused angst among people who are looking for a scapegoat like USA and not themselves.

This is the same argument presented on Fox News and I am not alone.

Anyone else agree?

They have their reasons to hate the US.
I am not saying i support their reasons but these are the facts.
After England established Israel, the palestinians were thrown out. So they have their right to be pissed.

I also want to point out while i was listening to Bin Laden's speech after US attacked the Taliban, i noticed some things.
Bin Laden mentioned why does nobody care about the Palestinians that die. The Israelies can kill as many people as they want, but if an Israeli is killed everybody grieves for them.

He's got a point. Although i totally disagree with every other viiew of his, i agree with that one.

Since you people know i am a Pakistani, i'll add that my family is from India well, about 50 years ago they were. After patition we moved to Pakistan.

In India my grandparents' families were millionares. They were governers with massive estates. They were filthy rich like most of India back then.
Then the British came, and they took their money. If it hadn't been for the British, i would living as a millionare in India. What a great life that would be. i still have a grand uncle who is a millionare but has no heirs. I'm hoping he'll adopt me .
Anyway, I don't go around saying racist remarks about the British. yes it would be wonderful to be that rich, but there's nothing i can do about it.

The Middle East, China and India were the locations of the first civilizations and some of the greatest.
The Ottomans, a muslim empire, ruled lands that belonged to Christians and Jews. But they didn't go killing them. They infact made a special force to protect them from fundamentalist muslims.
In eastern europe, the ottomans took men as slaves(because it was forbidden to take a muslim as a slave), and made the slavs into politicians and warlords. Muslim families pretended to be Christian so that they would take their sons to be slaves, trained and become rich nobles.

US thinks that Iraq is evil and that they hate Christians and the US. One of the highest ranking politicians in Iraq is a Christian.

I don't sink down to a racist level. Sure they took my families wealth, but the British people of now are good people like most in the world.


So I am a Muslim. So my view points differ from others. I defend my people but i don't attack anybody else except the fundamentalists of all relgions.


@at99: You are the a SOB. I would love to se you thrown out of here. I hope you go to your hell.

[ThorinOakensfield]

double post

[ 10-11-2001: Message edited by: ThorinOakensfield ]

[T'lainya]

Thorin, I realize you're angry and upset but please don't swear. The other person was warned about racist comments already.
thank you T'lainya

[C Elegans]

I just wanted to add that apart from the minor formality of swear words, Thorin's post has a very thoughworthy content and sound reasoning. I wish more people would reason this way, and I want to say I share Thorins view in these questions.

Racism is always uncalled for - if a person can't get his opinions through in any other way or can't see more complex explanations for why things happen, then that person needs to do some serious rethinking and analysis and broaden his perspective a lot.

[Crassus]

Further to C Elegans' post, I would like to add the following:

In college, I heard someone say racism is a disease. At the time, that statement didn't make sense to me. I was in college a very open-minded person, and I thought I had no prejudices at all.

I'm six years out of college now, and I've spent three years in the working world. During times of stress, I've found myself thinking some awful, prejudiced thoughts about other people. Then I would stop and think, what's happening to me?

I think every person faces a constant struggle to stay unbiased and free from prejudice. Racism is indeed a disease, and it can infect anyone. Especially during times like the past month (I can't believe it's been one month already since 9/11), we all are more vulnerable to the racism disease.

If I may recount a personal story, during the week after September 11, I found myself questioning whether my firm should be in the business of counseling a client which sources funds from the Gulf. It was a purely irrational thought, and I feel guilty for it.

Well, I don't have a good closing to make, except to say I think we should all be on guard to fend off racism from infecting ourselves.

[at99]

i am questioning cultures.
Not race. Racism is wrong. Looking at cultures is another story. So get off my back.

A lot of countries do poor economicaly are governed poorly. Everybody is to scared to say what they feel in case harm comes to them.

[C Elegans]

Originally posted by at99:
<STRONG>i am questioning cultures.
Not race. Racism is wrong. Looking at cultures is another story. So get off my back.</STRONG>

Obviously you are oblivious to the term "culture-racism". I know you are not questioning biological race, but you are saying other peoples culture, ie their religion, their values and their choosen life style are inferior to your own. That is the same a racism, just another kind. If you really want to dicuss those issues, I suggest you motivate very well what factors make the cultures in the Middle east less good than US or European culture. I am well prepared to take on a serious discussion, and we are many people here who have plenty of knowledge about many different cultures.

So far, you have written posts that have made the impression of being both ignorant and prejudiced. You are welcome to prove me wrong.

[fable]

Originally posted by at99:
<STRONG>i am questioning cultures.
Not race. Racism is wrong. Looking at cultures is another story. So get off my back.

A lot of countries do poor economicaly are governed poorly. Everybody is to scared to say what they feel in case harm comes to them. </STRONG>

The economic and political success of nations fluctuate, and vary in ways that have nothing whatsoever to do with "cultural values," whatever that is. Costa Rica in the 19th century had nothing much of either. Today, it has plenty of both. The US has had periods of miserable failure and great success is these areas, but there isn't any reasonable measuring stick that could say "this culture is good--or bad" based on these matters that can change massively in a decade.

In any case, if you're not indulging in a form of racism against specific cultures, then what creditable sources have you used to gather information about those cultures, sufficient to form the basis of any reasonable judgment? Unless you have read and thought about a group you're condemning, then that condemnation rightly opens you to the charge of bigotry.

[ 10-11-2001: Message edited by: fable ]

[Weasel]

Originally posted by at99:
<STRONG>
i am questioning cultures.
Not race. Racism is wrong. Looking at cultures is another story. So get off my back.

A lot of countries do poor economicaly are governed poorly.</STRONG>

To judge any culture, be prepared to judge yourself.

Originally posted by at99:
<STRONG>
Everybody is to scared to say what they feel in case harm comes to them.

</STRONG>

Everyone dies. The day you are born is the first day towards your death. What is a life if you are scared to live it?

[fable]

@At99, I'm truly not out to castigate you (believe it or not). But I don't understand how anybody who is knowledgeable about the cultures you're ragging on can have the opinions you do. With a little informed reading you simply couldn't make some of the statements you have about either cultures in general, or those of Arabic nations in particular.

Help me out, here, by telling me what your sources are for your all-inconclusive remarks about Islamic, Arabic, or MidEastern cultures (which are definitely not the same). If you don't have any but would like to learn more about the subject, I'm sure several of us would be glad to provide some very good reference materials, assuming you're interested.

[ 10-12-2001: Message edited by: fable ]

[NCT]

Originally posted by at99:
<STRONG>i am questioning cultures.
Not race. Racism is wrong. Looking at cultures is another story. So get off my back.

A lot of countries do poor economicaly are governed poorly. Everybody is to scared to say what they feel in case harm comes to them.

</STRONG>

It seems that the people here have shown a great deal of willingness to understand your views and engage you in serious discussion.By not responding in kind,or rather by responding as you do,you only belittle yourself and what you represent,whatever that is.

[ThorinOakensfield]

Originally posted by at99:
<STRONG>i am questioning cultures.
Not race. Racism is wrong. Looking at cultures is another story. So get off my back.


</STRONG>

Cultures= ethnicity
ethnicity= race
therefor
culture=race
transitive property, mind you.

Saying that one culture is lesser than others is also prejudice.

So according to you, discriminating against a race is wrong, but discriminating against one's culture is okay?

[Lazarus]

Hmmmm. If I may ... I think what this 99 dude is arguing against is the social system that many nations (around the world, I would say, not just in the middle east) have adopted. Very, very few nations have built as free and open a system as, say, the United States. Can this be viewed objectively and without regard to race or culture or ethnicity? I believe so. If a nation does not respect the rights of it's population, it is LESS GOOD than a nation that does. Take Afghanistan: it has in place a fascist dictatorship, and can objectively be said to be a worse place to live than the US. But many, many nations around the world take a half-step in the direction of Afghanistan. Pakistan, as many of us know, is currently run by a general who seized power in a coup. South Africa repressed the majority for ages, and now appears to be willing to suppress the minority instead.

So, yes, I think you can say that certain WAYS OF LIVING are better than certain other ways of living; but to assign any particular manner of living to a whole race or culture of people is indeed wrong.

Make any sense?

[Yshania]

Posted by NCT -

It seems that the people here have shown a great deal of willingness to understand your views and engage you in serious discussion.By not responding in kind,or rather by responding as you do,you only belittle yourself and what you represent,whatever that is.

Unfortunately this has happened before only in less serious circumstances. It appears there are some who get a kick out of dropping in, posting, then jumping clear

[fable]

Originally posted by Lazarus:
Hmmmm. If I may ... I think what this 99 dude is arguing against is the social system that many nations (around the world, I would say, not just in the middle east) have adopted. Very, very few nations have built as free and open a system as, say, the United States. Can this be viewed objectively and without regard to race or culture or ethnicity? I believe so. If a nation does not respect the rights of it's population, it is LESS GOOD than a nation that does...

@Lazarus, with respect, you are judging entire nations as good or bad in one breath, then speaking of objectivity in the next. We are all members of a given culture and series of subcultures, whatever those may be, and there's no way to achieve objectivity, as a result.

Consider: you speak of the US social system as "free" and "fair." Yet until the 20th century, it was demonstrably unfree and unfair to all but white males over the age of 21. Women had no vote, and no rights. Until the 1960s, it was again unfree to blacks, who had the system rigged against them to permit no vote, and regular discrimination in housing, education, etc.

So was it always free and fair? Why, yes, to those who could partake freely of it: of minority until recently.

Today, there are still many who would say the US still has a very unequal social system, in which people are subject to spot strip searches, car searches, and ID checks because they visibly belong to minorities or are poor. The shutting down of national legal services for the poor all over the US during the Reagan administration was demonstrably not a gesture of fairness, either.

Many would justifiably point to the US' past, built (as were the UK's, France's, the Soviet's, etc) on the back of other nations' economies, which were essentially broken for raw materials to feed American families and finished goods productions.

No, I'm not arguing that the US is unfair or unfree--but I do think that it can be shown there are different ways of looking at this record. It's not one that can be viewed objectively, because there are too many aspects, and because the viewer is always subjective.

As far as Afghanistan goes, until the 1970s it was a relatively peaceful place of urban areas and desert nomads. Given the extreme aridity of much of the soil, the terrible climate, the mixture of very different societies and the absence of foreign investment, I would say that what they'd achieved amounted almost to a miracle, under the circumstances.

[ 10-12-2001: Message edited by: fable ]

[at99]

I think this thread is becoming better.

Just give me some deatiled facts and dont attack me personally.

[ 11-20-2001: Message edited by: at99 ]

[fable]

Originally posted by at99:
Where's the arguments to say that life in mid-eastern countries is as free as the west.

Who spoke of freedom? I was asking how much you knew about the cultures in question--and you still haven't answered my question. It would make it a lot easier for me to reply to some of your remarks if I knew I could point to specific sets of facts you've already encountered--say, about Arabic historical developments in music, for instance. That might help point out to you how much of Euro-American culture's musical foundation is owed to the Arabic nations of the MidEast.

But as it is, you haven't yet given me a reply.

Do these countries produce as much as west in terms of technology, scientists, sports, atrs, finance etc.

There isn't a system anywhere that compares cultures on the basis of production. If cultural production determined the value of a nation, Nazi Germany was a far superior culture to Finland, which hid all its Jews throughout World War II and refused to give a single one up to the Holocaust.

International success with sports or entertainment figures has, again, never been a measure of a culture's worth. Soviet Russia produced an enormous amount of Gold medal Olympics winners. It took the International Chess Championships for roughly forty years. Its musicians and scientists were the envy of everybody. But the nation's people lived in a climate of constricted fear, knowing that a slip of the tongue could mean disparment from the Communist Party, loss of job, maybe even deportation to a gulag--a Soviet-style concentration camp, usually in Siberia. Arguably, the USSR, for all its exportable production, was a failure in developing reasonable standards of happiness among its people, or meeting them.

Production doesn't cut it, then, as a measurement of national or cultural quality. But if you want to discuss the modern contribution by Arabic authors to world literature (they win plenty of international prizes each year), we can look at the enormous respect Arabic culture has had for the oral and printed work since recorded history began in that part of the world.