Opps....sorry...that was me, not Dan. I surely HAVE to get my own computer really really soon.
Lo

[This message has been edited by Dan Halberstein (edited July 30, 2006).]

[quote]Originally posted by Kevin Andrew Murphy:
Innocent symbols can also get tainted by association with political causes. Happens all the time. If someone, for example, has his friend killed by people displaying the Star of David, what is he supposed to think?

I dunno....would you hate each and every guy who stops off at the corner tavern and has a drink after work before getting on the bus and heading home if your friend was killed by a drunk driver? Personally, if my son innocently happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time and got shot in a drive-by gang shooting, I'd be adult enough (and smart enough) to be angry at the shooter himself, not his entire race/religion/creed. On the same note, if the drunk driver who hit my friend was displaying a Knights of Columbus sticker on his bumper, I'd not be pissed at the organization...I'd be pissed at the driver.



As for comparing teenage gang fights to battles between nation states, I think many teenage gang fights have better logic and reasoning behind them.

Yep, better logic and reasoning always takes place through chemicals. Obviously, according to your reasoning, driving by in your car and killing someone walking down the street over wearing his hat at the wrong angle is somehow considered to be much more intelligent and reasonable than defending yourself from someone who's consistantly and constantly lobbing rockets at your home or crossing your borders and killing and/or kidnapping your soldiers in the dead of the night.

And what about those gang wars that are fought over "turf" - "that's the corner where we run our ho's and sell our drugs, you go find another corner or we'll kill you and your mama."

Turf and territory - again, apparently you find that reasonable and logical to fight over.....if you're a street gang - but not so reasonable and logical if you're a country who's constantly having its borders infringed upon and its citizens terrorized.

Life is so confusing. That's why I don't wear hats or leave the house anymore.

Lo

So if someone with Lebanese license plates waving a Hezbollah flag kidnaps your soldiers, the proper response is...?

It's good to know that you're more focused and morally superior than the state of Israel. Pity you're not in charge of it right now.



[This message has been edited by Kevin Andrew Murphy (edited July 30, 2006).]

I'm sick of the Middle East.

You have to be a diplomatic genius to

1) keep up to date with the latest round of violence and doubletalk,

2) properly integrate your understanding of the latest round of violence and doubletalk with previous rounds of violence and doubletalk, while

3) not offending diametrically opposed sides in the debate, thereby drawing charges of

4) anti-Semitism, anti-Islamism, anti-Arabism, pro-oilism, rabid Americanism, pro-capitalism, unilaterialism, plus a complex of other isms that, once hurled, are a bitch to get out in the wash.

And apparently it signals a lack of seriousness to lift up from the nuances of the latest round of violence and double talk to point out that

One, an alleged holy land for three of the world's great religions is consistently more randomly dangerous than Southeast Washington, East Oakland, certain fun bits of Chicago and Philly, Compton and the Bronx.

Two, Israel and Lebanon, plus a gaggle of other Middle Eastern countries have been serving up mayhem or threats of mayhem for multiple decades now, so that

Three, the television footage has long since taken to looking exactly the same (Middle East violence is practically a television genre--bad sound from voiceover reporters, dusty white buildings with pops of gunfire coming out of them, and bursts of dust for bombs, plus assorted R-rated carnage), which

Four, numbs the world to the actual suffering, and suggests that

Five, it's never going to end--all sides involved hate each other deeply, have a litany of egregious acts committed against them to fuel their hate, and

Six, no one's admitting they have blood on their hands (YES, THEY DO, and there isn't enough bandwidth in the universe to sort through it properly), and everyone knows it, plus

Seven, all the spokesmen involved talk about ideology and/or policy and/or agreements for lack thereof, when

Eight, the rest of the world has long since figured out it's about some intractable complex featuring real estate, oil, and hatred, which

Nine, leads to perpetual, tiresome, hope-draining ironies: when the words we want peace are uttered, what's meant is almost invariably we want to win.

Beirut isn't being bombed. It's being bombed again. Israel isn't under attack. It's under attack again. People are dying, and bullshit is flying all over the place again--the U.S. "isn't evacuating" Lebanon "in any way, shape, or form," the "legitimate" Lebanese government has a group of ideologues FIRING ROCKETS from their turf, and spin doctors on all sides have everybody in a huff over whether--in terms of terminology--it's possible to kidnap soldiers.

However it resolves or doesn't, it's a reasonable bet that the Middle East will be Same Shit, Different Day in 2016, as it was in '96, '86, '76, '66...

I'm sick of it.




[This message has been edited by Ethan Anderson (edited July 30, 2006).]

....to get your soldiers back, of course. Moot point, however, because just a few days ago you said that soldiers couldn't be kidnapped.

That was me, Lo, by the way, that made that post which kept showing up under Dan's name because I was too stupid to change screen names both times I tried to post it. Which is why I won't respond to the "too bad you're not in charge" statement. I'm presuming you want him in charge and not me. http://www.ablemuse.com/erato/ubbhtml/smile.gif

Although it IS a common enough fact that women are notoriously more focused and morally superiour than are most men. < grin >

Lo (who finally got focused enough to figure out her own password and to quit using Dan's instead - thereby making people believe he said what she said when she was actually the one who really said it even though it looks like he did)

Surely one of the main points of Kevin's post was that ALL national flags, and the repulsive exclusiveness they so often symbolise, are something we need to get beyond if we're going to consider our species civilised (in any meaningful sense of that word anyway).

Dan cannot - cannot - be in charge of the state of Israel until he and Lo get separate computers. It's confusing enough as is. I think everybody would accept that as a given, and if we can all agree on that small point, maybe it's a start.

Alternately, blame everything on Mark Allinson. He started the thread. The advantages of blaming things on Mark are (a) he's accustomed to it, and reasonably gracious, and (b) Mark has no means of retaliation, no flag, no religion, no weaponry and only a single zealot.

(I'm sorry guys. I wish I could say something deeper and more helpful, but those crazy bastards - all of them, and a pox on all their houses, but particularly the leaders - make me sick. Once again, the simple desire for peace and co-existence on the part of the majorities of all the peoples of the Middle East is destroyed by a few willful and clever acts by religious and hate-filled nut-cases, and we spiral into insanity. And what makes it worse this time is that my nation - compromised, incompetent, and morally corrupt - does not, can not, provide the leadership needed to find a way out. I can either make jokes, or weep in anger and frustration, and I generally end up doing both.)







[This message has been edited by Michael Cantor (edited July 30, 2006).]

Life is a tragedy to those who feel but a comedy to those who think
Hugh Walpole 1717-1797

Michael, your concluding comment above is not facetious, it just reflects that saving grace which allows us to, somehow, to keep going in the face of, what is, just one more ludicous affront to civilisation.

Michael,
I have just woken up and heard the news on the radio. Your message made me cry for a second time this morning. I wish you ruled the world. Really I do. Thank you.
Janet

ALEXANDRIA - Dan Halberstein, Leader for Life of the (Con)Dominion of Danistan, has announced that he and the Lo Lo Rebellion, have come to a lasting peace.

"Lo (leader of the Lo Lo Rebels) recognizes my right to exist, based on my earning power and more endearing traits, of which she claims there are several," Halberstein said. "Lo's infrastructure needs have been addressed, and she enjoys an unequal but nevertheless benevolently dictated role in Dannish society."

"I got a new 'puter, I got a new 'puter," Lo said when asked to comment, moving her legs in what can only be described as "The Snoopy Dance."

Lo's desk will reside across a narrow cable-strewn valley from Dan's, in the area unofficially called East Danistan.