"Explosion" in Manchester

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-manchester-40007886

Just to be contrary I'm going to say I think this is an IRA splinter group.

Details to follow.

[AE Bravo]

The Arab-Islamic American Summit had actually concluded that if these events persist in the EU, certain EU states will be labeled a haven for terrorists. I think that is fair.

They have a serious terrorist problem. Sadly there don't seem to be any countermeasures on the EU states' part to address their growing culture of terrorism.

[Pannonian]

Suggestions that it's a nail bomb in the foyer, set off as concert goers were leaving. Shrapnel like wounds being treated. Younger audience demographic.

[Strike For The South]

New normal

[Shaka_Khan]

http://www.rollingstone.com/music/news/ariana-grande-concert-ends-in-emergency-after-explosions-w483720

Ariana Grande Concert Ends With Reported Explosions, 'Multiple Fatalities'

Greater Manchester Police confirm fatalities, others injured at Manchester Arena


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1yxTjg21Ebs

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k1G_OwBjWjk

[Greyblades]

Another lead brick added to the camel's back.

[Seamus Fermanagh]

Reuters noting 19 dead, 50+ injured. Prayers for them and for their families.

[Fragony]

Just another day, rip victims

[Crandar]

Rest in peace to the victims of this horrible attack.

Some interesting tweets of an account that has been deleted:
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DAeC9IxXkAAZBxg.jpg
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DAeC9I2XoAEEzTP.jpg

However, because I don't know the timezone, I am not sure if it's the perpetrator advertising himself or an ISIS fanboy minutes after the attack.

[KukriKhan]

21 50

[Fragony]

Deatholl rised. There must be someting not quite right with me I would like myself better if these things shocked me but I don't feel anything I simply don't care, maybe even gloating if I am to be honest with myself, that's twisted, I know. But I got that 'toldyouso' thingie

[Pannonian]

Two named victims so far. An 18 year old and an 8 year old, both girls. Considering the concert and footage I've seen of the audience, this is likely to be the demographic of the victims.

[Fragony]

Two named victims so far. An 18 year old and an 8 year old, both girls. Considering the concert and footage I've seen of the audience, this is likely to be the demographic of the victims.

Saw the pics and vids. I see a silver-lining these assholes don't know how to upset us anymore. This was really low, anything other than something really big is going to be meh

[Sarmatian]

But I got that 'toldyouso' thingie

Really? You figured out that a problem which underlying issues haven't been resolved is going to persist? You're a genius. You can safely predict that there's going to be more in the future. Bank a few more toldyousos.

[Shaka_Khan]

I feel sorry for the younger generation. They don't remember a time before 9-11 when they didn't have to worry about terrorism. They became desensitized. A young guy I know thought that this has always been happening.

[Fragony]

Really? You figured out that a problem which underlying issues haven't been resolved is going to persist? You're a genius. You can safely predict that there's going to be more in the future. Bank a few more toldyousos.

I am totally aware that I said something horrible, you don't need to point out how flawed my thoughts can be, I am smart enough to know that by myself, I don't need you for that kthx. At least I question my thoughts and can completily change my mind, that's more than most do

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

Two named victims so far. An 18 year old and an 8 year old, both girls. Considering the concert and footage I've seen of the audience, this is likely to be the demographic of the victims.

I hadn't considered that, really. There's a special place in hell for whoever did this.

[Montmorency]

I hadn't considered that, really. There's a special place in hell for whoever did this.

Isn't every place in Hell a special one? Seriously.

[Pannonian]

Another second gen, whose parents were refugees from Qaddafi.

[Fragony]

I hadn't considered that, really. There's a special place in hell for whoever did this.

Not in the mind of those who did this, heaven awaits

[Seamus Fermanagh]

Regrettably, guided munitions have no better track record at eradicating an idea than does any other weapon system. Were it so, this war would have been won years ago.


There is little that can be done to stop such atrocities by Western society. Consider some of the options...

1) Enact a security apparatus equivalent to the old "Sword and Shield" boys from the CCCP. At that level of police state pervasiveness, terrorism is more or less completely suppressed. Of course, you do have to punt pretty much all of Western Culture and ethics.

2) Conduct a war that systematically eliminates all potential sources of Muslim radicalization. This would look very much like a pogrom internally and would feature a massive Crusade against most, then all, of the Islamic world. This would work, though it would bankrupt the West AND do nearly as much damage culturally as option 1. NOTE: despite the best efforts of some modern states on analogous paths, actually wiping out an ethnos or fidos, has not occurred. Makes complete success unlikely here.

2b) This is halfway, militarily, between 2 & 3 with the military not 'crusading' against the Muslim world but destroying 2-4 of the biggest terror supporting states and then rebuilding their cultures from the ground up with 40+ year state-building occupation efforts. This is way expensive as well, though less so than 2) and also less culturally debilitating than 2). It does, however, take the longest of the "active" options.

3) Go on pretty much as we are, using some military strikes and a lot of police work/financial tracking/computer interdiction to undercut the largest support systems and players in the terrorist camp. Since this will, as it has, result I some civilian Muslim deaths on an ongoing basis, the radicalization factor cannot be eliminated by Western Action. This kind of thing becomes our expensive "new normal," as noted in a number of posts above.

4) Stop military strikes against Islamic nations unless attacked by the conventional forces of such a nation. Essentially this is a cheaper version of #3, since the military costs are drawn down. This probably yields a slight decrease in radicalization, but will undercut some of the efforts to strike at the terror support base. The ant--terror effort becomes more or less strictly a police effort in this approach.

5) Stop any efforts beyond normal policing to counter terrorism domestically and broadcast news of terror events to the same depth and extent associated with large traffic accidents in a metro area. No military efforts except direct defense as noted in 4) above. Domestic radicalization will decrease, particularly given limited media exposure, though casualties will increase in the short term. Devote the funds that would have be spent on the war on terror to domestic transportation and health system improvements which should net a greater increase in lives saved than those few lost to terror attacks.

6) Combine the domestic elements of 5) above with a withdrawal of all Western military forces from anywhere in the Middle East, North Africa, or Central Asia. In addition, all economic support for and military sales to Israel would cease. Allow all Muslim states to sort our internal affairs as they see fit and without influence from the West. This then gives China and the Russians good markets for their weapons, aiding their economies and minimizes cultural clashes between the West and Islam in areas traditionally viewed as Islamic. Should result in the absolute minimum levels possible of radicalization both domestically and from international sources. Involves the acceptance of a greatly decreased political role in affairs for a substantial portion of the World by the West. We'd have to concentrate our efforts elsewhere.

7) Your option? Please describe.


Which option do you think best?

**Regardless, in all of the options noted, the real cessation of the terrorist threat will come when the bulk of Islam actively begins to abhor, abjure, and oppose such tools for spreading the faith. The real long term solution can only come from there.

[Fragony]

There is nothing we can do about this beyond accepting that these things happen and don't get all that upset about it. The only really thing that would work is removing all muslims but only an idiot would want to do that. Not making it worse and REALLY thinking over immigration-policies thank you very much

[Beskar]

There is nothing we can do about this beyond accepting that these things happen and don't get all that upset about it. The only really thing that would work is removing all muslims but only an idiot would want to do that. Not making it worse and REALLY thinking over immigration-policies thank you very much

Removing all Muslims due to less than 1% having the potential of becoming radicals?

[Pannonian]

Removing all Muslims due to less than 1% having the potential of becoming radicals?

So is it a problem, and if so, how do you solve it? Education doesn't seem to be the solution, as it's the younger generation that's radicalising (compare with Pakistan, where each successive generation has become more extreme).

[Fragony]

Removing all Muslims due to less than 1% having the potential of becoming radicals?

Didn't I make it clear that I find that an idiotic idea, you must have missed that

[Sarmatian]

**Regardless, in all of the options noted, the real cessation of the terrorist threat will come when the bulk of Islam actively begins to abhor, abjure, and oppose such tools for spreading the faith. The real long term solution can only come from there.

The funny thing is, the bulk of Islam already does that, but you don't need the bulk of Islam to find two religious fanatics who are easy to brainwash and persuade them to drive a lorry into a crowd. It's never gonna be perfect. Like that guy who shot all those blacks in a church a year or so ago. No one can say that white males in USA are oppressed in any way, but that doesn't mean one idiot won't feel like that.

The last several attacks actually show that previous security measures did yield some results. Terrorist groups are finding it harder to send people from Muslim countries, they have to rely on unhappy second generation immigrants. It's easier now as European economies are still feeling the recession to a greater or lesser extent. If an individual is feeling let down by society, blaming "them others" and "going back to the ways of our forefathers" feels logical, as evident by the growing popularity of conservative parties across the western world.
They are avoiding airports and using more rudimentary (but arguably not less effective) methods to spread terror.

I do think that Muslim organizations, whether religious or civic, have been under utilized. They could be a great way of passing the message that terrorism is contrary to the Islamic principles. That could go a long way of getting those disgruntled, second generation Muslims to express their rage in a different way, even into something productive. You get extra funding but you have to actively support/organize anti terrorist campaigns on a regular basis.

It boils down to 3 main ways:
1) remove the incentive (unlikely, or at least unlikely to do it in a complete way)
2) cut off their funding
3) limit their recruiting possibilities

[Beskar]

Didn't I make it clear that I find that an idiotic idea, you must have missed that

My fault, I thought you were being sarcastic/ironic with the remark. :laugh4:

[Fragony]

Removing incentive what a joke, maybe they are simply hostile, it's a religion they don't need an incentive.

@the serb

[Fragony]

My fault, I thought you were being sarcastic/ironic with the remark. :laugh4:

solemn voice

I forgive you, I have this habit of being cryptic

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

Isn't every place in Hell a special one? Seriously.

In Dante's Inferno some are more special than others.

The point, of course, is that this bastard was especially bad.

[Pannonian]

Why are US sources releasing information ahead of UK police?

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

Why are US sources releasing information ahead of UK police?

Because they're not held to the same strict ethical and factual standards as our own press?

[Seamus Fermanagh]

Why are US sources releasing information ahead of UK police?

Because they won't be sued in English courts for accidentally misreporting something. Plus, they already know the culprit and have decided that the investigation won't be hampered by their reporting.

[Gilrandir]

No one can say that white males in USA are oppressed in any way, but that doesn't mean one idiot won't feel like that.

If an individual is feeling let down by society, blaming "them others" and "going back to the ways of our forefathers" feels logical.


The first passage contradicts the second.

[Pannonian]

The funny thing is, the bulk of Islam already does that, but you don't need the bulk of Islam to find two religious fanatics who are easy to brainwash and persuade them to drive a lorry into a crowd. It's never gonna be perfect. Like that guy who shot all those blacks in a church a year or so ago. No one can say that white males in USA are oppressed in any way, but that doesn't mean one idiot won't feel like that.

The last several attacks actually show that previous security measures did yield some results. Terrorist groups are finding it harder to send people from Muslim countries, they have to rely on unhappy second generation immigrants. It's easier now as European economies are still feeling the recession to a greater or lesser extent. If an individual is feeling let down by society, blaming "them others" and "going back to the ways of our forefathers" feels logical, as evident by the growing popularity of conservative parties across the western world.
They are avoiding airports and using more rudimentary (but arguably not less effective) methods to spread terror.

I do think that Muslim organizations, whether religious or civic, have been under utilized. They could be a great way of passing the message that terrorism is contrary to the Islamic principles. That could go a long way of getting those disgruntled, second generation Muslims to express their rage in a different way, even into something productive. You get extra funding but you have to actively support/organize anti terrorist campaigns on a regular basis.

It boils down to 3 main ways:
1) remove the incentive (unlikely, or at least unlikely to do it in a complete way)
2) cut off their funding
3) limit their recruiting possibilities

Going back to the way of their forefathers wouldn't be too bad. The first generation do what they can to fit in, and allow for the fact that they are guests in an alien country. It's the subsequent generation who were born here who turn to extremism. You can't really blame it on foreign policy making us deserving targets either. His parents were refugees from Qaddafi. After Qaddafi was removed, they returned to Libya, leaving him here. Then he goes and blows up a bunch of kids. He's not exactly underclass either, as he was at Salford University.

[Fragony]

It's an odd thing, maybe we should just not try making any sense out of it

[Pannonian]

Because they won't be sued in English courts for accidentally misreporting something. Plus, they already know the culprit and have decided that the investigation won't be hampered by their reporting.

It's not the press who are being forward with the information.

American officials have been criticised for leaking the identity of the Manchester bomber before British police officially named him. (https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2017/may/23/trump-administration-manchester-bomber-name-leak)


Thomas Sanderson, director of the transnational threats project at the Center for Strategic and International Studies thinktank in Washington, said the disclosures would be irritating to the British. “Suddenly you’ve got 10,000 reporters descending on the bomber’s house when maybe the police wanted to approach it more subtly,” he said.

Sanderson warned of ill judgment and lack of discipline in the White House. “This is a leaky administration. What does that mean for sharing information we need to going forward? The UK and Israel are probably our two biggest sources of intelligence. Now they’re thinking, ‘Is this going to cause us damage every time we share?’ Then you have to calculate every piece of information.”

[Fragony]

policor first

[Beskar]

Why are US sources releasing information ahead of UK police?

Manchester Attack: Home Secretary Amber Rudd condemns US for leaks of shared British intelligence.
Confidential details appeared in the US media apparently leaked by US intelligence.
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/home-secretary-us-intelligence-leaks-amber-rudd-irritating-donald-trump-russia-security-manchester-a7752511.html

[Beskar]

21 50

Final figures seem to be 22 killed and 59 injured. It is a tragedy indeed.

[InsaneApache]

As a Mancunian I feel this keenly......and then something comes along to make me smile...


He's not exactly underclass either, as he was at Salford University.

FFS have you ever been to Salford? :laugh4: Still nice to be cheered up on a day like today.

As for what to do......I found this from a blog site and it seems about the only way I can see for us to tackle this problem squarely.


Change our relationship with Saudi Arabia, the heart of Islamic darkness. It does not permit Christian evangelism on its territory. In contrast, as a civilised country, we permit all religions to be practised, but that does not mean we have to allow the Saudis to fund theirs. Currently there are more Wahhabi Korans in the UK than any other versions because Saudi Arabia provides them free of charge. Wahhabism is a particularly dangerous sect and motivates a disproportionate number of terrorists.

If this is thought likely to affect arms sales to that Kingdom, then perhaps we should form an Organisation of Weapons Exporting Countries to fulfil a similar function to that of OPEC in relation to oil.

It may be necessary, after appropriate research, to prevent other countries from funding mosques and madrassas in Britain. I see no problem with that either. I am sure local Muslim philanthropists will step into the breach.

We should ditch the doctrine of multiculturalism and make it a matter of immigration policy that new arrivals are welcome only on the basis that they agree to integrate into our society and live according to our values. There is no ethical problem, in my opinion, in stating definitively that Shariah Law is incompatible with those values. New immigrants should swear an affidavit on entry to confirm that they understand and accept this.

We should break the news to our Muslim communities that they and their families have come to live in a Christian culture. Most Brits may not be religious now but still our country is one formed by Christian values. Constitutionally, it is actually a kind of mild Christian theocracy as we have no separation of Church and State. The Church of England is Established and twenty-six of its bishops – the Lords Spiritual – are ex officio members of Parliament. In this quirky theocracy, the Theos is Jehovah, not Allah. Daft, in my personal opinion, as I very much believe in the separation of Church and State on the American or French model, but no less true for that.

We should deliver public services only in the official languages of the United Kingdom. When I lived in Poland, Russia and China I could not expect to deal with the authorities in English. They took the perfectly reasonable view that my weakness in their languages was my problem. To the extent I could not cope I found friends, colleagues or paid translators to help me. By dealing with immigrants in their own languages, we have encouraged them NOT to assimilate and have made it unnecessary for them to learn English. It is our fault, not theirs, that so many Muslim mothers live and raise their children dangerously outside our society's mainstream. I am sure most were initially astonished to find that our public sector is prepared to deal with them in their own languages at taxpayers' expense.

We should cut all other services (e.g. translators to sit with children in classes, chaperones to accompany ladies to medical appointments) that discourage integration. Of course we should be tolerant of the needs of learners to bring English speakers along to help them out until they are fluent. I am sure there would also be some doctors prepared to allow male members of Muslim ladies' families to accompany them to consultations. I would not make any doctor do so, however. The ladies in question chose to come to a country where such an approach is alien (and rather insulting to our doctors). No-one forced them to come. They could have stayed in their countries of origin and these issues would never have arisen.

We should provide English classes for refugees. They didn't choose to come and it's only decent to help them out. Economic migrants, like me in Poland, Russia and China, should pay for their own damned language lessons.

Finally we must recruit thousands of members of the police, the Special Branch and MI5 from among our Muslim citizens. We are so often assured that most of them are peace-loving and loyal that I cannot imagine this will be difficult. As a young lawyer in Nottingham I personally administered the Oath of Allegiance to many new Muslim citizens and kept a Koran at hand for the purpose. I am sure many of their families have suitably qualified members now.

It's nice to be back guys. :bow:

[Montmorency]

If you seek a policy of aggressive linguistic nationalism, then you must be prepared to endorse direct government funding of language-learning services - indeed well in excess of established funding. Meanwhile, "economic migrants" on limited occupational sojourns or specified contracts typically have little need to learn local languages for official purposes, and outside of some language of commerce and business it would only be detrimental to said commerce to demand it.

[Husar]

Change our relationship with Saudi Arabia, the heart of Islamic darkness.

Why? It's a perfectly non-suspicious country.
https://i.kinja-img.com/gawker-media/image/upload/s--QoHgTjVX--/c_scale,fl_progressive,q_80,w_800/g6vxop0oxyzgiqcn0qft.jpg

[Seamus Fermanagh]

It's not the press who are being forward with the information.

American officials have been criticised for leaking the identity of the Manchester bomber before British police officially named him. (https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2017/may/23/trump-administration-manchester-bomber-name-leak)

Oh well, our pols are worse than our newsies. Too many of them need to puff up their own importance by revealing they "know stuff." Are your lot any better?

[InsaneApache]

http://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/opinion/news-analysis/so-michelle-oneill-just-when-did-it-become-unacceptable-to-bomb-manchester-35748841.html

[Pannonian]

Oh well, our pols are worse than our newsies. Too many of them need to puff up their own importance by revealing they "know stuff." Are your lot any better?

Probably not. I was puzzled at the time why, when I searched for the killer's name, all the hits came from US news agencies.

[Fragony]

Final figures seem to be 22 killed and 59 injured. It is a tragedy indeed.

A planecrash is a tragedy this was murder.

alas, I thought I didn't care but I was wrong, I could barely buy my cigarettes because the newspapers are there as well. It was pretty noticable that I could hardly speak that picture of that girl kept haunting. Not sure why I post this.

[Fragony]

1-0 for manchester,vs ajax I hope this is comforting somewhat, I would lose on purpose probably it's not insignificant if manchester takes the title

[Greyblades]

Once brexit is put to bed the main election winner will be immigration lmits and muslim integration.

I will eat a taco dipping hat of the Org's choosing if I am wrong in this prediction.



I dont know if that joke is poorly placed, I found out my cousins were unaffected yesterday, so I am feeling rather emotionally drained right now.

[Fragony]

I am fooling myself into thinking I am numb, I could hardly not cry getting cigarrets this morning, newspapers are there with pictures. Got sympathy points, that's nice. I can be horrible without any remorse whatsoever but I couldn't order cigarettes because I couldn't pronounce them. I am kinda glad I'm like that still. What I said earlier in this thread isn't true, I wasn't lying at the time that I couldn't give a fuck but that kinda changed by now

[a completely inoffensive name]

strong and stable

[Greyblades]

Shut up.

[Pannonian]

Is it normal practice in the US to publish evidence at this stage of the investigation?

[Fragony]

Like usual, no lone wolf, several arrests of (alledgedly) involved

[a completely inoffensive name]

Shut up.

Are you saying you feel mad at how ignorant my statement was?


Is it normal practice in the US to publish evidence at this stage of the investigation?

No, usually our media publishes evidence before the investigation.

[Pannonian]

Are you saying you feel mad at how ignorant my statement was?

No, usually our media publishes evidence before the investigation.

On the first statement: how long did it take before posters started making jokes about the Boston bombing?

On the second statement: that's as glib as you get, given that evidence is by their nature revealed by investigation.

[a completely inoffensive name]

On the first statement: how long did it take before posters started making jokes about the Boston bombing?

On the second statement: that's as glib as you get, given that evidence is by their nature revealed by investigation.

A. My post wasn't a joke.
B. You don't get American media.

[Idaho]

... We should ditch the doctrine of multiculturalism and make it a matter of immigration policy that new arrivals are welcome only on the basis that they agree to integrate into our society and live according to our values. There is no ethical problem, in my opinion, in stating definitively that Shariah Law is incompatible with those values. New immigrants should swear an affidavit on entry to confirm that they understand and accept this.

We should break the news to our Muslim communities that they and their families have come to live in a Christian culture. Most Brits may not be religious now but still our country is one formed by Christian values. Constitutionally, it is actually a kind of mild Christian theocracy as we have no separation of Church and State. The Church of England is Established and twenty-six of its bishops – the Lords Spiritual – are ex officio members of Parliament. In this quirky theocracy, the Theos is Jehovah, not Allah. Daft, in my personal opinion, as I very much believe in the separation of Church and State on the American or French model, but no less true for that.
I agree with many of the things you've put. But am sceptical about this first paragraph and openly hostile to the second.

Immigrants would be happy to sign some bland statement. I don't think it would have any function. Have you ever been to the US and signed the form declaring that you aren't a terrorist and that you aren't intending to commit crimes? The vast majority are amused/insulted by having to sign, and I'm guessing the terrorists and criminals just sign.

As for Christianity - **** that. The vast majority of British people are not Christians. The church has been a moral and ethical drag on the nation and doesn't deserve any credit.

[Beskar]

They might have found another bomb at a College in Trafford.

Manchester bombing latest: Army bomb disposal team called to college in Trafford
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2017/05/25/manchester-arena-bombing-latest/


An army bomb disposal team is attending an incident at a college in Trafford, Greater Manchester Police said
The force said it was too early to say whether the alert is linked to its investigation into the Manchester bomb attack.
It said several roads were closed and officers were "currently assessing the situation".

Bomb unit sent to Manchester college
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-40043864


An army bomb disposal unit is at a college in Trafford, Greater Manchester Police says.
It is too early to say whether the alert is linked to its investigation into the Manchester bomb attack, the force said.
Several roads are closed and officers are "currently assessing the situation".
Meanwhile the threat level "will remain at critical and the public should remain vigilant", Theresa May has said.

[Fragony]

That is silly indeed it's useless. In case of the UK there's a top-down problem, police is afraid to do their job because of the policor-culture in the leadership. I don't know it is true but the police was supposedly warned at least 5 times, by the muslim community itself and they never did anything. We aren't ever going to get anywhere with people who are afraid to offend

[Gilrandir]

Have you ever been to the US and signed the form declaring that you aren't a terrorist and that you aren't intending to commit crimes? The vast majority are amused/insulted by having to sign, and I'm guessing the terrorists and criminals just sign.


Every 2 or 3 years I have to change my bank salary card. And every time they take picture of me holding a card in front of me. Looks very much like those guys in the movies do when they are detained by the police. But I haven't done anything illegal to be treated like a criminal. So humiliation comes in many disguises and one doesn't have to come to the US to feel it.

[Beskar]

They might have found another bomb at a College in Trafford.

Manchester bombing latest: Army bomb disposal team called to college in Trafford
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2017/05/25/manchester-arena-bombing-latest/



Bomb unit sent to Manchester college
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-40043864

Been updated:

A possible suspicious package has been declared safe after army bomb disposal experts were called to a street in Hulme, near Manchester city centre.
The scare followed Monday's bomb attack at Manchester Arena in which 22 people died and 64 were injured.
Several roads were closed during the incident. Cordons have now been lifted.
Meanwhile the threat level "will remain at critical and the public should remain vigilant", Prime Minister Theresa May has said.

[Fragony]

Really bad joke

[Pannonian]

It looks like it's a network and not a lone wolf, which makes the leaks to the media even more irresponsible, even beyond mere insensitivity.

[Fragony]

It looks like it's a network and not a lone wolf, which makes the leaks to the media even more irresponsible, even beyond mere insensitivity.

It are never lone wolves these aren't hghschool shootngs, those casting the net know that

[Idaho]

That is silly indeed it's useless. In case of the UK there's a top-down problem, police is afraid to do their job because of the policor-culture in the leadership. I don't know it is true but the police was supposedly warned at least 5 times, by the muslim community itself and they never did anything. We aren't ever going to get anywhere with people who are afraid to offend

Against all better judgement, I answering a Fragony post :laugh4:

Police might, when pushed, blame all kinds of things for their crappy performance. In truth it's chasing meaningless targets, lack of support and funding and the fact they don't give a ***& about certain groups of people, that is to blame.
The poor teenage girls in Rotherham for example that officers were documented as referring to as "slags" when they tried to report abuse by a gang. Of course the big story to racists and other assorted ****wits is that "Asians" are preying on "our girls". Not that police failed to protect vulnerable children.

[InsaneApache]

Of course the big story to racists and other assorted ****wits is that "Asians" are preying on "our girls". Not that police failed to protect vulnerable children

Oh I'm glad that's cleared up then. Nothing to see here move along. Are you really that dense that you could bend light?

[Idaho]

Fred West and Jimmy Saville were from Pakistan were they? Or is it more true to say that as you are in a similar demographic, you have the same predilections?

Obviously I'm not saying you do. I'm saying that your correlations are poor.

[Fragony]

Against all better judgement, I answering a Fragony post :laugh4:

Police might, when pushed, blame all kinds of things for their crappy performance. In truth it's chasing meaningless targets, lack of support and funding and the fact they don't give a ***& about certain groups of people, that is to blame.
The poor teenage girls in Rotherham for example that officers were documented as referring to as "slags" when they tried to report abuse by a gang. Of course the big story to racists and other assorted ****wits is that "Asians" are preying on "our girls". Not that police failed to protect vulnerable children.

Poor judgement would be asssuming that I don't mean well

[InsaneApache]

Fred West and Jimmy Saville were from Pakistan were they? Or is it more true to say that as you are in a similar demographic, you have the same predilections?

Obviously I'm not saying you do. I'm saying that your correlations are poor.

Here we go more whataboutery from someone who should know better.

Which part of two wrongs don't make a right don't you understand?

Anyway lets stoke up flames a bit more...


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rket4xvu_ac

[Pannonian]

Tommy Robinson? Aren't there more articulate voices against Islamism than a former BNP man?

[Seamus Fermanagh]

Is it normal practice in the US to publish evidence at this stage of the investigation?

Officially no. We hew to the same standards as you lot, more or less. Unofficially, yep.

[Fragony]

What journalist wouldn't use leaked information, almost everything was already known in the blogosphere, so much faster. The infrmation wasn't even all that interesting for anyone

[InsaneApache]

Tommy Robinson? Aren't there more articulate voices against Islamism than a former BNP man?

A very brave man imo. The entire force of the state has been deployed to shut him up. I wonder why?

Then I gaze down at my sig.....

[Montmorency]

The man who bombed the concert was brave...

[Pannonian]

A very brave man imo. The entire force of the state has been deployed to shut him up. I wonder why?

Then I gaze down at my sig.....

I wonder why the BNP is so loathed by much of the UK's population.

[Seamus Fermanagh]

The man who bombed the concert was brave...

Suicide is not necessarily brave, nor is it, of course, necessarily a cowardice. On the other hand, he didn't try to breech a police barracks, did he?

[a completely inoffensive name]

The man who bombed the concert was brave...
FYI Bill Maher lost his job for saying almost exactly that.

[Montmorency]

FYI Bill Maher lost his job for saying almost exactly that.

When was that?

[Husar]

When was that?

I was curious, too.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rNMhNJDRnhU

Sounds like a complete overreaction since it's a completely valid point of view and not even really offensive unless the entire country is in rabid nationalism mode.

The Tommy Robinson video is funny: "I was in jail with him"... :laugh4: :rolleyes:

[AE Bravo]

The man who bombed the concert was brave...
His targets were little girls...

[Montmorency]

His targets were little girls...

The point being that virtue is not a function of bravery.

[AE Bravo]

Neither is handpicking easy targets.

If I hung myself in a prison cell or shot up a school, am I brave? No bravery in it unless you're an experienced suicide bomber. Obviously this guy wasn't a happy camper so there's really no bravery in what he did since it made no difference to his brainwashed brain. He looks like he never cracked a smile in his life. Dead on arrival.

“A coward dies a thousand times before his death, but the valiant taste of death but once."

[Montmorency]

So what is bravery about? To evince bravery, would it need to have been a happy, successful man nevertheless held accountable to his convictions? A used-up old man who can't bring the fight in any other capacity, like the old-school Turkish communists? Or is it a private, ephemeral feeling? I don't think it's a useful or germane consideration.

[Pannonian]

So what is bravery about? To evince bravery, would it need to have been a happy, successful man nevertheless held accountable to his convictions? A used-up old man who can't bring the fight in any other capacity, like the old-school Turkish communists? Or is it a private, ephemeral feeling? I don't think it's a useful or germane consideration.

Bravery has traditionally been associated with the warrior ethos. At what time in history has it been considered reasonable for a warrior to target victims such as these?

[Montmorency]

Bravery has traditionally been associated with the warrior ethos. At what time in history has it been considered reasonable for a warrior to target victims such as these?

Most, actually. Not as an element of combat but simply as a normal state of affairs, except for those occasions on which commanders enforced a standing order toward non-molestation.

But that isn't about bravery.

[Pannonian]

Most, actually. Not as an element of combat but simply as a normal state of affairs, except for those occasions on which commanders enforced a standing order toward non-molestation.

But that isn't about bravery.

Ancient civilisations tended to enslave children, not slaughter them. Even when slaughters occurred, such as in a sack, killing children wasn't regarded as brave. You certainly didn't have people sitting half a world away saying that such actions were brave. Brave involves facing off against other men. That's why cultures celebrate manhood and coming of age. It's another brave (note the word) to the collection.

[Husar]

At what time in history has it been considered reasonable for a warrior to target victims such as these?

HITLER!
No really, the whole thing with soldiers killing people behind the frontline and so on.

And then probably in the old testament, when God ordered the Israelites to wipe out their neighbors entirely and leave noone and nothing alive.
I would assume there are other examples I can't think of right now. Like the Spartans killing their own children for being weak or countless examples of warriors raiding villages, during which they probably killed a lot of innocent women and children etc.

It probably didn't hurt their honor a lot if it was for a good cause/benefitted their side. And this guy probably believed he was doing it for the good cause, too.

[Seamus Fermanagh]

Neither is handpicking easy targets.

If I hung myself in a prison cell or shot up a school, am I brave? No bravery in it unless you're an experienced suicide bomber. Obviously this guy wasn't a happy camper so there's really no bravery in what he did since it made no difference to his brainwashed brain. He looks like he never cracked a smile in his life. Dead on arrival.

“A coward dies a thousand times before his death, but the valiant taste of death but once."

Emphasis added.

I would think 'double silver' experience chevrons a bit hard to come by...

[Pannonian]

HITLER!
No really, the whole thing with soldiers killing people behind the frontline and so on.

And then probably in the old testament, when God ordered the Israelites to wipe out their neighbors entirely and leave noone and nothing alive.
I would assume there are other examples I can't think of right now. Like the Spartans killing their own children for being weak or countless examples of warriors raiding villages, during which they probably killed a lot of innocent women and children etc.

It probably didn't hurt their honor a lot if it was for a good cause/benefitted their side. And this guy probably believed he was doing it for the good cause, too.

Raids with the purpose of killing women and children don't rate the term "civilisation". From agriculture onwards, having additional hands, especially non-threatening ones, helps whatever the equivalent is of the economy. Even nomadic cultures adopt captive children into their tribe. The only logical example might be a hunter gatherer tribe scratching out an existence in hard circumstances. Tell me, in which way does the UK resemble these?

If we go by your arguments and look for the most primitive cultures around that practice killing women and children, then the reciprocal answer would be to eliminate the threat to us in the same way. Not that you'd really condone that of course, except to snipe at us from a distance like you always do.

[Montmorency]

Ancient civilisations tended to enslave children, not slaughter them. Even when slaughters occurred, such as in a sack, killing children wasn't regarded as brave. You certainly didn't have people sitting half a world away saying that such actions were brave. Brave involves facing off against other men. That's why cultures celebrate manhood and coming of age. It's another brave (note the word) to the collection.

I'm speaking particularly of individual interpersonal violence, rather than the policies or behaviors of martial congregations. Impunity was the rule of cultures up to the 20th century, and men killed whomever they pleased as long as they could get away with it.

But again, this isn't relevant to the subject of bravery.

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

I'm speaking particularly of individual interpersonal violence, rather than the policies or behaviors of martial congregations. Impunity was the rule of cultures up to the 20th century, and men killed whomever they pleased as long as they could get away with it.

But again, this isn't relevant to the subject of bravery.

Evidence of bravery is usually preceded by someone more important than you shouting "shieldwall" or "present arms" or even just "brace for impact."

Bravery requires an opponent, even if the opponent is Mother Nature herself and not another human being.

This "man" had no opponent except his own conscience.

[Greyblades]

There's a sick irony in an ideology that facilitated assimilation, removing the need for the extermination of children, is now inspiring such barbarity.

[AE Bravo]

Emphasis added.

I would think 'double silver' experience chevrons a bit hard to come by...
Was a joke. Sarcasm not at Husar level.

[Montmorency]

Evidence of bravery is usually preceded by someone more important than you shouting "shieldwall" or "present arms" or even just "brace for impact."

Bravery requires an opponent, even if the opponent is Mother Nature herself and not another human being.

This "man" had no opponent except his own conscience.

I would disagree that he had no opponent, and I'm unsure about tying bravery to opposition. But ultimately I'm not interesting in delving into virtue ethics.

My main point is that we should avoid settling into the Platonic position that bravery is equivalent to, or derives from, "correct opinion".

[AE Bravo]

So you agree that it is a radical opinion of bravery then.

[Seamus Fermanagh]

Raids with the purpose of killing women and children don't rate the term "civilisation". From agriculture onwards, having additional hands, especially non-threatening ones, helps whatever the equivalent is of the economy. Even nomadic cultures adopt captive children into their tribe. The only logical example might be a hunter gatherer tribe scratching out an existence in hard circumstances. Tell me, in which way does the UK resemble these?

If we go by your arguments and look for the most primitive cultures around that practice killing women and children, then the reciprocal answer would be to eliminate the threat to us in the same way. Not that you'd really condone that of course, except to snipe at us from a distance like you always do.

Primitive cultures do not wage total war. As you rightly point up, economic demands mitigate strongly against this.

Civilized cultures wage total war. In part, this is because the surfeit of resources allow it. In part, this is because war is not just for economic gain, but also for political intimidation and pride. Primitive cultures do not have the spare resources to kill in job lots to appear badass. For that you need kultur.

[Gilrandir]

HITLER!


Hitler was a warrior?

[Husar]

Raids with the purpose of killing women and children don't rate the term "civilisation". From agriculture onwards, having additional hands, especially non-threatening ones, helps whatever the equivalent is of the economy. Even nomadic cultures adopt captive children into their tribe. The only logical example might be a hunter gatherer tribe scratching out an existence in hard circumstances. Tell me, in which way does the UK resemble these?

If we go by your arguments and look for the most primitive cultures around that practice killing women and children, then the reciprocal answer would be to eliminate the threat to us in the same way. Not that you'd really condone that of course, except to snipe at us from a distance like you always do.

Moving goalposts, where is the civilization coming from after you just talked about traditional warrior ethos? I also wouldn't say your idea of warrior culture fits with "civilization", but at that point it just becomes a matter of opinion/definition.
Not sure why you mention agriculture, did the Nazis not have any or was there no civilization in Germany at the time? :rolleyes:

[Pannonian]

Moving goalposts, where is the civilization coming from after you just talked about traditional warrior ethos? I also wouldn't say your idea of warrior culture fits with "civilization", but at that point it just becomes a matter of opinion/definition.
Not sure why you mention agriculture, did the Nazis not have any or was there no civilization in Germany at the time? :rolleyes:

Since when have we used Nazi Germany as the touchstone of civilisation? Does anyone worthwhile hold that up as an exemplar of human civilisation?

[Fragony]

Since when have we used Nazi Germany as the touchstone of civilisation? Does anyone worthwhile hold that up as an exemplar of human civilisation?

The scary thing is that you actually could in a twisted way if you think of it. With some clever wording you can probably get away with calling nazi-Germany exemplar of human civilisation. If you just forget all the horrible things that were done just for argument's sake, why wouldn't it be

not an opinion, just a musing

[Pannonian]

The scary thing is that you actually could in a twisted way if you think of it. With some clever wording you can probably get away with calling nazi-Germany exemplar of human civilisation. If you just forget all the horrible things that were done just for argument's sake, why wouldn't it be

not an opinion, just a musing

If you are Husar or his ilk, Nazi Germany is the exemplar that proves that Britain and America are in the wrong and therefore deserve everything bad that can happen to them.

[Idaho]

Here we go more whataboutery from someone who should know better.

Which part of two wrongs don't make a right don't you understand?

Anyway lets stoke up flames a bit more...


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rket4xvu_ac

Tommy Robinson? Jesus. You've scraped clean through the bottom of the barrel and into the dirt floor beneath. The man is an unspeakable racist piece of ****.

[Idaho]

The scary thing is that you actually could in a twisted way if you think of it. With some clever wording you can probably get away with calling nazi-Germany exemplar of human civilisation. If you just forget all the horrible things that were done just for argument's sake, why wouldn't it be

not an opinion, just a musing

The 'musings' of the people like Tommy Robinson become the musings of people like the Nazis. And they organised a final solution (in the words of Katie Hopkins) to all the problems of society.

75 odd years ago the letters from the half of my family still in Poland stopped.

[Husar]

Since when have we used Nazi Germany as the touchstone of civilisation? Does anyone worthwhile hold that up as an exemplar of human civilisation?

I'm not the one saying the goal of our civilization should be to cleanse us of muslims.
And one doesn't have to be the touchstone of civilization in order to have it, you keep moving the goalposts.


If you are Husar or his ilk, Nazi Germany is the exemplar that proves that Britain and America are in the wrong and therefore deserve everything bad that can happen to them.

Exactly, if I were on cocaine, I'd intereprete my posts like that, too.

[Fragony]

If you are Husar or his ilk, Nazi Germany is the exemplar that proves that Britain and America are in the wrong and therefore deserve everything bad that can happen to them.

Husar isn't like that. As for me, I see it as an example of how bad things can go very very fast. War was inevitable but I find the cleansings puzzling. I wish I could say I am not capable of doing something that horrble but am probably stupid thinking that. Thing is, a very advanced society like Germany (and many more) did something truly horrific. So scaringly calculating, it scares me because I don't understand, how can rational people do that, how can they explain it to themselves. Advanced societies? People just don't understand themselve no matter what where and when

[Pannonian]

I say.


Bravery has traditionally been associated with the warrior ethos. At what time in history has it been considered reasonable for a warrior to target victims such as these?

Husar says I say.


I'm not the one saying the goal of our civilization should be to cleanse us of muslims.
And one doesn't have to be the touchstone of civilization in order to have it, you keep moving the goalposts.

[Pannonian]

Husar isn't like that. As for me, I see it as an example of how bad things can go very very fast. War was inevitable but I find the cleansings puzzling. I wish I could say I am not capable of doing something that horrble but am probably stupid thinking that. Thing is, a very advanced society like Germany (and many more) did something truly horrific. So scaringly calculating, it scares me because I don't understand it

And I deem Nazi Germany, and certainly those parts that participated in the Final Solution, to be murderers and barbarians. Whatever else they may have had, they crossed the line when they deliberately killed women and children. I'm not alone in thinking that either, as the Einsatzgruppen had high suicide rates and the higher ups had to dream up ways of further dehumanising the victims.

[Fragony]

And I deem Nazi Germany, and certainly those parts that participated in the Final Solution, to be murderers and barbarians. Whatever else they may have had, they crossed the line when they deliberately killed women and children. I'm not alone in thinking that either, as the Einsatzgruppen had high suicide rates and the higher ups had to dream up ways of further dehumanising the victims.

I think certain mechanics can can come into play, they call it diffusion of responsibility. When told what to do it's simply not about you anymore, you are not really responsible for horrible things you do, bit of a shield. Can you honestly say you wouldn't kill women and children because I can't say I wouldn't if I would be in the firing-squad with the task of doing it. Sure it would haunt me but I think I would do it, secretly hoping I wouldn't but I expect that is bullshit and would shoot them. Knowing that I could probably do incredibly horrible things I find it really hard to condemn those that do. Manchester attack is a different matter for me, that I really don't get there was no need at all to do that, loose from comments

[Greyblades]

The scary thing is that you actually could in a twisted way if you think of it. With some clever wording you can probably get away with calling nazi-Germany exemplar of human civilisation. If you just forget all the horrible things that were done just for argument's sake, why wouldn't it be

not an opinion, just a musing

Hell, if you revert to the morality of the pre enlightenment you could easily call nazi germany an exemplar of human civilization without any fancy wordplay or having a selective memory at all!

Would certainly explain why Mein Kampf is a best seller in the middle east.

[Seamus Fermanagh]

Hitler was a warrior?

He was a soldier. Served in front line combat in WW1 as a "runner." This was easy duty between things as you hung around the regimental headquarters bunker in the 2nd or 3rd line. However, the job was to run messages and orders forward during attacks etc. in case wired communication broke down, as it often did.

[Fragony]

Hell, if you revert to the morality of the pre enlightenment you could easily call nazi germany an exemplar of human civilization without any fancy wordplay or having a selective memory at all!

Would certainly explain why Mein Kampf is a best seller in the middle east.

I am saying that an exemplar civilisation can go completily wrong, no matter what

[Husar]

I say.

Husar says I say.

I can only assume then, that the Pannonian posting in the UK election thread is your second personality or somesuch:


I see no point in fighting an ideological war with bombs and bullets, or with ideology. I see no point in fighting the war at all, or engaging with these barbarians in any way beyond what is necessary. I think their ideology is barbaric, but they're free to have it in their own country. They use the argument of self determination (despite your trying to weasel out of that principle when I pressed you on it), but their claim is reciprocal. They want us out of their country, the reciprocation is that they should get out of our country. Since we can't get them out due to international laws, we should keep them out instead, which is within our rights as a state.

emphasis mine

[Pannonian]

I can only assume then, that the Pannonian posting in the UK election thread is your second personality or somesuch:

emphasis mine

Carefully bolded to miss the point. I'll quote the two relevant sentences again, and explain them to you.

1. They want us out of their country, the reciprocation is that they should get out of our country.
The first part is what they want. Followed by what the reciprocal would mean.

2. Since we can't get them out due to international laws, we should keep them out instead, which is within our rights as a state.
Here, I explain that the reciprocal is not possible. I then forward something which is within our rights as a state.

[Strike For The South]

Earlier this week the press begrudgingly gave president Trump kudos for referring to the terrorists as losers. There is a feeling among the media class (perhaps the public at large) that the best way to describe these people is with belittling, dismissive language. As if not giving them "honor" of an even footing. I can't say for certain, but I don't think a man who plants nail bombs at a teeny booper concert is overly concerned with what the western media thinks of him.

These men are very committed and the western media parsing the meaning of the words brave and cowardly doesn't really sway that level of commitment. It is a pointless, navel gazing exercise.

Europe needs to figure out if they really want immigrants or not. It's one thing to say you do, praise all the kebab shops, and then fuck up the end game. France is something like 20% non-French and you would never know it by looking at their media or politicians. Combine that with their tyrannical policy of laicite, a sluggish economy, and you got yourself a discontentment stew brewing.

The French will of course never admit this. They are all Frenchmen, eyeroll.jpg. Their problems are the problems of Europe as a whole however. They are told they need immigrants to infuse life into the welfare state, they bring in the immigrants, the immigrants use the welfare state because they can not find a job, faith in the welfare state erodes because of perceived unfairness. So who benefits from this? It's certainly not the immigrants or the natives.

I would venture to say its the capitalists who strive to keep wages stagnate and the working class divided. The same thing happens here in America. Mexicans are paid a half sum in cash with no benefits and then when the work is done, they conveniently get caught in an ICE raid. Nothing ever happens to the businesses or farms that use the labor. How strange. This of course is another topic.

[Pannonian]

Earlier this week the press begrudgingly gave president Trump kudos for referring to the terrorists as losers. There is a feeling among the media class (perhaps the public at large) that the best way to describe these people is with belittling, dismissive language. As if not giving them "honor" of an even footing. I can't say for certain, but I don't think a man who plants nail bombs at a teeny booper concert is overly concerned with what the western media thinks of him.

These men are very committed and the western media parsing the meaning of the words brave and cowardly doesn't really sway that level of commitment. It is a pointless, navel gazing exercise.

Europe needs to figure out if they really want immigrants or not. It's one thing to say you do, praise all the kebab shops, and then fuck up the end game. France is something like 20% non-French and you would never know it by looking at their media or politicians. Combine that with their tyrannical policy of laicite, a sluggish economy, and you got yourself a discontentment stew brewing.

The French will of course never admit this. They are all Frenchmen, eyeroll.jpg. Their problems are the problems of Europe as a whole however. They are told they need immigrants to infuse life into the welfare state, they bring in the immigrants, the immigrants use the welfare state because they can not find a job, faith in the welfare state erodes because of perceived unfairness. So who benefits from this? It's certainly not the immigrants or the natives.

I would venture to say its the capitalists who strive to keep wages stagnate and the working class divided. The same thing happens here in America. Mexicans are paid a half sum in cash with no benefits and then when the work is done, they conveniently get caught in an ICE raid. Nothing ever happens to the businesses or farms that use the labor. How strange. This of course is another topic.

For the UK at least, there was a potential soft landing solution to economic problems, giving us some leeway to ease in some longer lasting solutions. If we need young workers from abroad, there was a plentiful supply from eastern Europe, who are pretty close to us in outlook. Post-Brexit, that's no longer open, and as the government has indicated, we still need young workers from abroad. The talk is about the Commonwealth, but in practice this doesn't mean the secular dominions like Australia and Canada (the "white" colonies), but the increasingly religious subcontinent. We're going to be importing young Indians and Pakistanis, which wouldn't have been a problem in past decades, but at a time when younger generations are increasingly turning to religious radicalism. Not clever.

[Fragony]

Hell, if you revert to the morality of the pre enlightenment you could easily call nazi germany an exemplar of human civilization without any fancy wordplay or having a selective memory at all!

Would certainly explain why Mein Kampf is a best seller in the middle east.

My morals are my own and I think I am a really nice person, even if I did some bad things myself but that was my job. The job was protecting the girls, and I am no idiot I knew fully well that it's shady. I beat people up, even used a knive a few times, even pretty badly open faces and all that. I also worked for something I really dispise, as a muscle for hire I still did it and ignored what I knew was wrong. I even participated sometimes in orgies. Yet I always knew something was of, even if it all looked good. I knew it sometimes wasn't, fully. You get into a sort of denial on what is happening right in front of you, you hurt people and it makes total sense to do that at the moment. Because I know my own flaws I give others some slack. Even if you are a really nice person you can become horrible. I don't feel sorry for the beatings or the stabbings, morality is strange, at the time it felt right. Right now I feel that I was always wrong getting in that business. I wouldn't lie saying that it destroyed a part of me

Civilisation, think again. It doesn't matter how civilised a cisilision is, cruelty will exist,as will indifferdnce to it

[Greyblades]

For the UK at least, there was a potential soft landing solution to economic problems, giving us some leeway to ease in some longer lasting solutions. If we need young workers from abroad, there was a plentiful supply from eastern Europe, who are pretty close to us in outlook. Post-Brexit, that's no longer open, and as the government has indicated, we still need young workers from abroad. The talk is about the Commonwealth, but in practice this doesn't mean the secular dominions like Australia and Canada (the "white" colonies), but the increasingly religious subcontinent. We're going to be importing young Indians and Pakistanis, which wouldn't have been a problem in past decades, but at a time when younger generations are increasingly turning to religious radicalism. Not clever.

I question the idea that we need to import foreign workers at all when we have such an issue with unemployment and idle labour on zero hours. If anything we should be retraining our own people to fulfill the needed roles and only importing labour in temporary placeholders.

[Husar]

Carefully bolded to miss the point. I'll quote the two relevant sentences again, and explain them to you.

1. They want us out of their country, the reciprocation is that they should get out of our country.
The first part is what they want. Followed by what the reciprocal would mean.

That's the reciprocal you want, it's not an unalterable given or a law of physics that it has to be this way.
There is no misunderstanding here.
That you can't have your wish due to international law is irrelevant to the fact that you wish you could.

[Fragony]

I question the idea that we need to import foreign workers at all when we have such an issue with unemployment and idle labour on zero hours. If anything we should be retraining our own people to fulfill the needed roles and only importing labour in temporary placeholders.

Think again https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_von_Coudenhove-Kalergi

Merkel won the Kalergi price for her birdcall. This is not just an immigration-crisis it's policy. Germany even insisted that we need new blood to prevent inbreeding, feel free to look it up 'Schlaube' said it, minister of foreign afairs, you will know that I'm not kidding. Odd. the people who they are hauling in are inbred mostly.

Whatever the fuck is the intention, I don't know. Germany fucks everything up again.

Be glad that you left in time before it gets worse

[AE Bravo]

Would certainly explain why Mein Kampf is a best seller in the middle east.
Of course there's no way that is because of academic purposes like European countries...

On a side note, I don't think much of Trump calling bombers "losers." Playground insults won't hurt their feelings.

[Husar]

What people seem to forget is that the Western wealth is largely based on globalism. If China decided that selling its rare earths to the West is not in the best interest of its people and it should rather employ its own people to engineer and build semiconductor chips, then we'll all be stuck with Chinese-engineered and -manufactured smartphones and computers after a while or they won't even sell them to us and we can revert to the days of paper-based industry while China digitalizes away.

http://www.mining.com/rare-earths-battling-chinas-monopoly-after-molycorps-debacle/

Sounds like a great idea, that train of thought. I'm sure we'd all be better off if nations just kept to themselves and only took care of their own.
Additional advantage, we wouldn't be here arguing about it once our computers or internet infrastructure broke down. :2thumbsup:

[Fragony]

Of course there's no way that is because of academic purposes like European countries...


There must be many academies than, a quik calculation comes down to at least more than a thousand versions of Mein Kampf per student. I own a copy as well, second print pretty valauble. But educational purpuso, about what, there is nothing to learn from it it's gibberish. Maybe it's so popular because Hitler hated jews and blamed them for, well just about everything. Should sound familiar Tried reading it but my German isn't so good.

[AE Bravo]

I'll give you that it might be a bestseller in Turkey, but the fact that the online version is popular doesn't really mean anything. There's a difference between curiosity/reference and admiration. He is possibly the most famous person in human history.

[Montmorency]

I'll give you that it might be a bestseller in Turkey, but the fact that the online version is popular doesn't really mean anything. There's a difference between curiosity/reference and admiration. He is possibly the most famous person in human history.

Not a good accounting, but you might wonder how it connects to the various nationalisms of the region. Aside from the Jew-hating, how much sympathy do (and have) Arabs had for the brand of authoritarian nationalist philosophy that Hitler outlined, especially with respect to local conditions.

[Fragony]

I'll give you that it might be a bestseller in Turkey, but the fact that the online version is popular doesn't really mean anything. There's a difference between curiosity/reference and admiration. He is possibly the most famous person in human history.


Not so sure it doesn't says anything, especially not in Turkey now as things are going there as they are going. For me it's just a cool thing to have shelved just for the sake of having it. There are things to watch carefully, not that stuid book and what's in it but that Erdokhan is a dangerous man,so are his fans here

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

OK, let's talk for a moment about Nazi "barbarism".

Nazi Germany was a highly advanced, ordered, cultured, and in some ways "progressive" society. Nazi Scientists identified the "Jews" as a distinct race within Germany who refused to integrate into the Reich, confirming their Leader's suspicion about these people. Nazi engineers and planners then came up with a typically German (logical and efficient) way of solving this problem.

That solution which we call "The Holocaust" was, in fact, mechanised culling of a type actually far more humane than methods we use for pest control in the modern day - see discussion of the downsides of shooting foxes.

The point is, and this is essential, is that only a Civilised Nation could have done what the Nazi's did, both morally as well as technologically a pre-Enlightenment society would have been incapable of such "barbarity" because, at the end, the Nazi's were actually the polar opposite of barbarians.

[Montmorency]

OK, let's talk for a moment about Nazi "barbarism".

Nazi Germany was a highly advanced, ordered, cultured, and in some ways "progressive" society. Nazi Scientists identified the "Jews" as a distinct race within Germany who refused to integrate into the Reich, confirming their Leader's suspicion about these people. Nazi engineers and planners then came up with a typically German (logical and efficient) way of solving this problem.

That solution which we call "The Holocaust" was, in fact, mechanised culling of a type actually far more humane than methods we use for pest control in the modern day - see discussion of the downsides of shooting foxes.

The point is, and this is essential, is that only a Civilised Nation could have done what the Nazi's did, both morally as well as technologically a pre-Enlightenment society would have been incapable of such "barbarity" because, at the end, the Nazi's were actually the polar opposite of barbarians.

While focusing on the killing process, you seem to forget the violence, torture, forced labor, and protraction that precede it. And given the drain it took on the German war economy, and the ultimate failure of existing camps to liquidate their occupants, I would argue against their efficiency (though to be fair saboteurs and resistors at all levels were part of this picture)

So what's barbarism? Does Japanese vivisection and biowarfare testing not count either? Be sure to distinguish between characteristics of an act itself, and the circumstances in which it appears. Is it just a Hellenic "not-us", or the Renaissance equivalent in "Gothic"? Is it specific to a particular time-period, or the size of the state apparatus?

[Seamus Fermanagh]

OK, let's talk for a moment about Nazi "barbarism".

Nazi Germany was a highly advanced, ordered, cultured, and in some ways "progressive" society. Nazi Scientists identified the "Jews" as a distinct race within Germany who refused to integrate into the Reich, confirming their Leader's suspicion about these people. Nazi engineers and planners then came up with a typically German (logical and efficient) way of solving this problem.

That solution which we call "The Holocaust" was, in fact, mechanised culling of a type actually far more humane than methods we use for pest control in the modern day - see discussion of the downsides of shooting foxes.

The point is, and this is essential, is that only a Civilised Nation could have done what the Nazi's did, both morally as well as technologically a pre-Enlightenment society would have been incapable of such "barbarity" because, at the end, the Nazi's were actually the polar opposite of barbarians.

I said much the same a few posts back.

[Montmorency]

I said much the same a few posts back.

While I'm at disagreeing, I have to disagree that you said much the same a few posts back.

You linked "total war" to the size and organization of a country, but when PVC deals with "barbarism" he seems to imply, among other things, that the German system was somehow more humane than past analogs, or maybe he took the weak tautological position that Nazi actions were not barbaric because the Nazis were not barbarians and only barbarians can do barbaric things.

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

While focusing on the killing process, you seem to forget the violence, torture, forced labor, and protraction that precede it. And given the drain it took on the German war economy, and the ultimate failure of existing camps to liquidate their occupants, I would argue against their efficiency (though to be fair saboteurs and resistors at all levels were part of this picture)

So what's barbarism? Does Japanese vivisection and biowarfare testing not count either? Be sure to distinguish between characteristics of an act itself, and the circumstances in which it appears. Is it just a Hellenic "not-us", or the Renaissance equivalent in "Gothic"? Is it specific to a particular time-period, or the size of the state apparatus?


While I'm at disagreeing, I have to disagree that you said much the same a few posts back.

You linked "total war" to the size and organization of a country, but when PVC deals with "barbarism" he seems to imply, among other things, that the German system was somehow more humane than past analogs, or maybe he took the weak tautological position that Nazi actions were not barbaric because the Nazis were not barbarians and only barbarians can do barbaric things.

Congratulations on completely missing the point.

The Japanese, like the Germans, were civilised people - they were the polar opposite of barbarians.

Ever heard the old adage that if you go too far one way you end up right back at the beginning.

Barbarians are, per definition not rational, they do not make rational decisions. The Nazi's made exclusively rational decisions, devoid of any morals or compassion.

You have fallen into the trap of equating barbarism with evil and civilisation with goodness. I was trying to break you out that narrow view with rhetoric, but I see you failed to grasp the point.

[Montmorency]

Barbarians are, per definition not rational, they do not make rational decisions. The Nazi's made exclusively rational decisions, devoid of any morals or compassion.

That's a poor definition of barbarism, I'm afraid. Nazi's made the decision to exterminate on the moral basis of Nazi ideology's racial order and principles of German security and prosperity. Not just because it would be economically beneficial somehow, but because that was the morally correct order of things to enforce.

You would do nothing but abrogate barbarism. Why couldn't a "civilized" society be both civilized and barbaric? Why would they be opposites, if you feel that taking them as opposites is a narrow rhetorical view?

Thumbs down.

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

Bar, bar, bar.

It is the bleating the sheep, as opposed tot he rational discourse of men.

So, like it or not, it is the correct definition.

You are attempting to re-purpose barbarians for your own rhetorical benefit rather than face up to the reality that Nazisim is one logical progression of the Enlightenment.

The Nazi order was not "moral" in the mundane sense, the order was determined by the Nazi understanding of biological science, specifically the heritability of traits. The Nazi's looked at Germany and dertmined that it was both advanced AND ordered, they then looked at their near relatives the Anglo-Saxons, and the Dutch and saw more or less the same. The further a people diverged from Aryanism, however, the lower down the socio-economic order their society was.

You must remember that this was a widely accepted scientific view at the time, that white people were "more evolved" than other races, it was the basis for Segregation in the US Army - for example.

All the Nazi's did was take this to a logical conclusion bereft of any moral constraints - i.e. if Aryans are better than other people then application of Darwinian principles allows for the extermination of other competing populations.

[Montmorency]

Bar, bar, bar.

It is the bleating the sheep, as opposed tot he rational discourse of men.

So, like it or not, it is the correct definition.

You are attempting to re-purpose barbarians for your own rhetorical benefit rather than face up to the reality that Nazisim is one logical progression of the Enlightenment.

You did not read me correctly, if you saw anywhere that I denied the roots of Nazism in the Enlightenment. I thank you for clarifying that you use it in the Greek sense, but you have not grasped the real substance of the Greek sense, which was as I said, "not-us". A face-value application from within the original stance leaves us with no barbarians to speak of.


The Nazi order was not "moral" in the mundane sense, the order was determined by the Nazi understanding of biological science, specifically the heritability of traits. The Nazi's looked at Germany and dertmined that it was both advanced AND ordered, they then looked at their near relatives the Anglo-Saxons, and the Dutch and saw more or less the same. The further a people diverged from Aryanism, however, the lower down the socio-economic order their society was.

You must remember that this was a widely accepted scientific view at the time, that white people were "more evolved" than other races, it was the basis for Segregation in the US Army - for example.

All the Nazi's did was take this to a logical conclusion bereft of any moral constraints - i.e. if Aryans are better than other people then application of Darwinian principles allows for the extermination of other competing populations.

You are wrong to take Nazi philosophy as amoral, when Hitler specifically advanced exclusion and extermination as moral over other means of dealing with the problems he identified. Cooperation and co-existence wouldn't simply be un-optimal in this understanding, but wrong and a disgrace to the German people. Soviet Communism was more interested in "rational application" than Nazism, which primarily dealt with the moral order of human existence.

[Strike For The South]

The majority of holocaust victims were not killed in an orderly fashion. Most were simply shot, starved, or burned in the pale.

[Idaho]

OK, let's talk for a moment about Nazi "barbarism".

Nazi Germany was a highly advanced, ordered, cultured, and in some ways "progressive" society. Nazi Scientists identified the "Jews" as a distinct race within Germany who refused to integrate into the Reich, confirming their Leader's suspicion about these people. Nazi engineers and planners then came up with a typically German (logical and efficient) way of solving this problem.

That solution which we call "The Holocaust" was, in fact, mechanised culling of a type actually far more humane than methods we use for pest control in the modern day - see discussion of the downsides of shooting foxes.

The point is, and this is essential, is that only a Civilised Nation could have done what the Nazi's did, both morally as well as technologically a pre-Enlightenment society would have been incapable of such "barbarity" because, at the end, the Nazi's were actually the polar opposite of barbarians.

I understand that you are attempting to make a subtle point of culture and definition. However it's totally misguided in this case in both subject matter and historical reality. You urgently need to read more about the eastern front and the genocide.

The idea that barbarism refers only to a particular "style" of cruelty, horror and brutality is a dead end argument in this context, and hints at a coldness and lack of humanity that you need to look into.

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

I understand that you are attempting to make a subtle point of culture and definition. However it's totally misguided in this case in both subject matter and historical reality. You urgently need to read more about the eastern front and the genocide.

The idea that barbarism refers only to a particular "style" of cruelty, horror and brutality is a dead end argument in this context, and hints at a coldness and lack of humanity that you need to look into.

Being able to separate one's emotions from one's intellect is not evidence of a lack of humanity unless you start to think about acting on the conclusion.

The point here is not all that subtle.

To define the Nazi's as "barbarians" is to distance ourselves from the Nazi mode of thought, to declare that what they thought and what they did is unintelligible to us. The truth of the matter is exactly the opposite, the Nazi mode of thought is entirely intelligible to us. The same logical process that led the Nazi's to kill over six million people in Death Camps and Labour Camps is at work today, you can see it in the way the EU has dealt with the debt crisis in Southern Europe and you can see it in the calls to deport all Muslims from the UK.

Since the end of the Second World War we have worked very hard at not empathising with Nazi's, I don't mean the leadership, I mean the rank and file. By labelling the Nazis "barbarians" we are saying "we could not do that".

That's a lie - and a dangerous one.

[Husar]

No, the Nazi killing of jews was not a moral decision because "it was the right thing to do", that view forgets several things and you hurt your credibility when you write"Nazi's" as a plural form, resist the dark side of bad grammar!
Nitpicking aside, the Nazis had this idea that the jews were some kind of closed cabal that was trying to subjugate the entire world. There were the Jewish Bolsheviks and the Jewish Capitalists and they were all out to get the Good Aryans back into their world order. Therefore every jew in German-occupied territory was an enemy spy on top of being a subhuman with a lower set of morals and a greater capacity for evil. Their mere existence was therefore seen as a threat to national security and their murder a vital part of the war effort. From that point of view, the killing spree did not hurt the war effort, it helped the war effort by removing enemy agents from within.

The definition PVC uses for barbarism is the widespread one, just compare it to a game like Civilization V, which uses exactly the same definition, where barbarians are distinct from civilized societies. There might be academics who would like to use a different definition but that doesn't count here, cannot be expected to be common knowledge and most of all, doesn't invalidate the point as the definition PVC used is not wrong just because it differs from another one.

What makes this topic further exciting is that I sense a big deal of sarcasm in PVC's posts that seems to have gone by completely unnoticed. Perhaps much like my sarcasm, which might also explain why I sense it. He keeps making quips about how enlightenment and progressivism led the Nazis to do what they did, given his more catholic traditional background, I would say that's an excellent trap.........wait, the EU, seriously? Now you really ruined that and it was so promising... :no: Remove that and leave the calls to remove muslims, because that actually fits.

[Gilrandir]

He was a soldier. Served in front line combat in WW1 as a "runner." This was easy duty between things as you hung around the regimental headquarters bunker in the 2nd or 3rd line. However, the job was to run messages and orders forward during attacks etc. in case wired communication broke down, as it often did.

I know that. But the argument was about murdering women and children by Einsatzgruppen during WWII and how it was incompatible with a warrior's ethic code. At that time Hitler was not a warrior, nor a soldier. So in fact, he didn't kill a single person, just gave orders to do it.




Barbarians are, per definition not rational, they do not make rational decisions.



I believe they do make decisions which are rational FROM THEIR POINT OF VIEW. It is the fault of un-barbarians if they can't see the logics of such decisions. And I think barbarians are of the same opinion of the decisions made by un-barbarians.

[Husar]

But the argument was about murdering women and children by Einsatzgruppen during WWII and how it was incompatible with a warrior's ethic code.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Indian_massacres


French troops and Indian allies killed around 1,000 Fox Indians men, women and children in a five-day massacre near the head of the Detroit River.
[...]
Natchez Indians attacked French settlements near present-day Natchez, Mississippi, killing more than 200 French colonists.
[...]
Soldiers under General Henry Atkinson and armed volunteers killed around 150 Indian men, women and children near present-day Victory, Wisconsin.
[...]
The 12 leaders of a Comanche delegation (65 people including 35 women and children) were shot in San Antonio, Texas, while trying to escape the local jail. 23 others including 5 women and children were killed in or around the city.
[...]
Indians massacred eighteen members and relatives of the Killough family in Texas.
[...]
A hunting party of 26 friendly Wichita and Caddo Indians was massacred by Texas Rangers under Captain Samuel Highsmithe, in a valley south of Brazos River. 25 men and boys were killed, and only one child managed to escape.
[...]
Members of the U.S. 7th Cavalry attacked and killed between 130 and 250 Sioux men, women and children at Wounded Knee, South Dakota.
http://hawaii.edu/powerkills/DBG.CHAP3.HTM

Even the Hebrews, according the Bible, put to the sword those they conquered. It was the Assyrians, however, whose reputation for such savagery would be transmitted down the ages. They would reward their soldiers for every severed head they brought in from the field, whether enemy fighters or not. They would decapitate or club to death captured soldiers; they would slice off the ears, noses, hands and feet of nobles, throw them from high towers, flay them and their children to death, or roast them over a slow fire. Consider what one historian writes about the capture of Damascus by King Sargon of Assyria.
[...]
So in revenge for an arrow from Nishapur's walls that killed Jinghiz Khan's son-in-law in 1221, when the city was finally captured the Mongol Tolui massacred its unarmed inhabitants.3 So this ancient capital of Khorassan in Persia was then a "scene of a carnival of blood scarcely surpassed even in Mongol annals. . . . Separate piles of heads of men, women, and children were built into pyramids; and even cats and dogs were killed in the streets."4 So an utterly fantastic 1,747,000 human beings reportedly were slaughtered, a number exceeding the contemporary population of Hawaii, Rhode Island, or New Hampshire; a number that is around a third of the total Jews murdered by Hitler.5 This possible world record massacre is only a fugitive datum, unrecorded in most histories.
[...]
In massacre and generalized killing, other nations made their own very bloody contributions to our history. When the Ottoman Mohammed II sieged and finally took Constantinople in 1452, he massacred thousands.48
[...]
In destroying whole populations and in the pursuit and accomplishment of mass murder, Europeans were no better. In 1527 the army of Tirolese condottiere Frunsberg and Charles, Duke of Bourbin, captured and sacked Rome. Historians record that at a minimum 2,000 corpses were thrown into the Tiber river and 9,800 dead were buried;50 many more were killed. During the Thirty Years War the Count of Tilly and Count zu Pappenheim may have massacred as many as 30,000 inhabitants of Magdeburg when the city fell to them after a six-month siege.51 Magdeburg was only one of numerous massacres of this very destructive war. But probably more common folk died when towns and farms in the path of invading or marauding armies were pillaged and families killed. Moreover, many died from famine and disease caused by passing armies. The German Empire alone may have lost more than 7,500,000 people in the war,52 most doubtless perishing from such causes. The population of Bohemia was been reduced from around 4,000,000 people to possibly no more than 800,000.53 Putting a number of such figures together I estimate that in this war alone from 2,000,000 to over 11,000,000 people were probably murdered.54 That aside from combat and nondemocidal famine and disease.55

Really? Warrior ethics? :rolleyes:

[Montmorency]

No, the Nazi killing of jews was not a moral decision because "it was the right thing to do", that view forgets several things and you hurt your credibility when you write"Nazi's" as a plural form, resist the dark side of bad grammar!
Nitpicking aside, the Nazis had this idea that the jews were some kind of closed cabal that was trying to subjugate the entire world. There were the Jewish Bolsheviks and the Jewish Capitalists and they were all out to get the Good Aryans back into their world order. Therefore every jew in German-occupied territory was an enemy spy on top of being a subhuman with a lower set of morals and a greater capacity for evil. Their mere existence was therefore seen as a threat to national security and their murder a vital part of the war effort. From that point of view, the killing spree did not hurt the war effort, it helped the war effort by removing enemy agents from within.

The definition PVC uses for barbarism is the widespread one, just compare it to a game like Civilization V, which uses exactly the same definition, where barbarians are distinct from civilized societies. There might be academics who would like to use a different definition but that doesn't count here, cannot be expected to be common knowledge and most of all, doesn't invalidate the point as the definition PVC used is not wrong just because it differs from another one.

What makes this topic further exciting is that I sense a big deal of sarcasm in PVC's posts that seems to have gone by completely unnoticed. Perhaps much like my sarcasm, which might also explain why I sense it. He keeps making quips about how enlightenment and progressivism led the Nazis to do what they did, given his more catholic traditional background, I would say that's an excellent trap.........wait, the EU, seriously? Now you really ruined that and it was so promising... :no: Remove that and leave the calls to remove muslims, because that actually fits.

Hitler felt that the "secular decay" of post-Reformation Europe - and to some extent the broad history of Christian doctrine - was a Jewish contrivance and so he sought to return to the pure "ancient law". The Jews and other races, besides creating a material threat to the future of the Aryan race, embodied a simply incorrect and debased moral philosophy. And that's what had to be replaced in the Nazis' view. You can't separate these issues, and you can only confuse yourself about Nazism if you try to. National Socialism was a sprawling and pervasive school of thought that had something to say about almost everything, and it largely replaced or superseded other ways of thinking in the minds of commoners and scholars alike, 1933-45.

As for barbarism, I have agreed with PVC that calling Nazi or other regimes we don't like "barbaric" is a form of rhetorical distancing, while emphasizing how using the original Greek sense of barbarian on its face undermines his position. The fundamental premise of "barbarian" or "barbarism", as I've said, is no more than rhetorical distancing. This was true for the ancient context, it was true for the Anglo-centric 19th century application that saw a hierarchy between savagery, barbarism, and civilization, and it's true for the contemporary usage. The main distinction for the contemporary usage is that it does not identify barbarians as being straightforwardly inferior, but as violating some concept of international norms of behavior. You all know that the language of transnational human rights has become paradigmatic since WW2; it's all part-and-parcel.

I haven't played Civilization, but I imagine there are some specific mechanical differences between "barbaric" and "civilized" cultures that don't quite relate to barbarism as we've been discussing it here - because Civilization is a videogame and so isn't interested in definitions but in applications. In Civ4 (http://civilization.wikia.com/wiki/Barbarian_(Civ4)), barbarians are mostly stereotypical content like Germanic, Celtic, and nomadic tribes, as well as some non-playable civs such as Etruscans, Hittites and Assyrians. That doesn't impinge on this thread.

[Husar]

Hitler felt that the "secular decay" of post-Reformation Europe - and to some extent the broad history of Christian doctrine - was a Jewish contrivance and so he sought to return to the pure "ancient law". The Jews and other races, besides creating a material threat to the future of the Aryan race, embodied a simply incorrect and debased moral philosophy. And that's what had to be replaced in the Nazis' view. You can't separate these issues, and you can only confuse yourself about Nazism if you try to.

I didn't want to, I just saw your point that the mass-killing was hurting the war effort as slightly wrong from the Nazis' point of view, since in their view, the people they killed were fifth columnists.

On the barbarism there are obviously multiple definitions:

https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/barbarism

Definition of barbarism
1
a : a barbarian or barbarous social or intellectual condition : backwardness
b : the practice or display of barbarian acts, attitudes, or ideas
2
: an idea, act, or expression that in form or use offends against contemporary standards of good taste or acceptability

PVC used definition one (a) and you seem to use definition two, doesn't make either of you wrong, does it? :shrug:

[Montmorency]

I didn't want to, I just saw your point that the mass-killing was hurting the war effort as slightly wrong from the Nazis' point of view,

In that post, I was responding to the efficiency of the process itself, not what the Nazis' feelings on it or its necessity were. It was a drain in the sense that it was more inefficient than it could have been in many places and times, at least towards the sole objective of eliminating demographics or captives belonging to those demographics.


PVC used definition one (a) and you seem to use definition two, doesn't make either of you wrong, does it?

No no, PVC wasn't hewing to either of those definitions. Read again with that in mind.

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

No, the Nazi killing of jews was not a moral decision because "it was the right thing to do", that view forgets several things and you hurt your credibility when you write"Nazi's" as a plural form, resist the dark side of bad grammar!
Nitpicking aside, the Nazis had this idea that the jews were some kind of closed cabal that was trying to subjugate the entire world. There were the Jewish Bolsheviks and the Jewish Capitalists and they were all out to get the Good Aryans back into their world order. Therefore every jew in German-occupied territory was an enemy spy on top of being a subhuman with a lower set of morals and a greater capacity for evil. Their mere existence was therefore seen as a threat to national security and their murder a vital part of the war effort. From that point of view, the killing spree did not hurt the war effort, it helped the war effort by removing enemy agents from within.

The definition PVC uses for barbarism is the widespread one, just compare it to a game like Civilization V, which uses exactly the same definition, where barbarians are distinct from civilized societies. There might be academics who would like to use a different definition but that doesn't count here, cannot be expected to be common knowledge and most of all, doesn't invalidate the point as the definition PVC used is not wrong just because it differs from another one.

What makes this topic further exciting is that I sense a big deal of sarcasm in PVC's posts that seems to have gone by completely unnoticed. Perhaps much like my sarcasm, which might also explain why I sense it. He keeps making quips about how enlightenment and progressivism led the Nazis to do what they did, given his more catholic traditional background, I would say that's an excellent trap.........wait, the EU, seriously? Now you really ruined that and it was so promising... :no: Remove that and leave the calls to remove muslims, because that actually fits.

I would not say I was being sarcastic, but I find it ironic that the Nazis can be used to argue that scientific progress can be linked to moral decay. Overall though, the point is that Nazi Germany is not that divorced from either the other civilisations around at the time, or our modern world.

The Nazis are not sufficiently "other" to qualify as barbarians when compared to modern Western Civilisation because their motives and actions are entirely intelligible if you just accept a few basic fundamental "truths" that we are, in fact, going to reject out of hand.

As regards comparison to the EU - the point there was that a lot of what the Eurozone has done is attempted to apply a purely mechanical solution to an economic problem as though all problem have mechanical solutions, a view which springs entirely from Enlightenment thought. It is also a view I consider fundamentally flawed, but then I believe in an omnipotent deity, and I'm willing to countenance piskies, and ghosts.

Note 1. I naturally refer to "Nazi's" in plural because NAZI is an acronym. However, it would be churlish to dissagree with an educated German on the subject, so I won't.

Note 2. If you have correctly read my point but miss-identified my my irony as sarcasm then perhaps we have struck upon the precise boundary between wry British irony and dry German Sarcasm. Might we call it the "Husar-Philippus Demarcation Point"? Perhaps a Nobel Peace Prize is due to us in the future for this contribution to international harmony and understanding?


I believe they do make decisions which are rational FROM THEIR POINT OF VIEW. It is the fault of un-barbarians if they can't see the logics of such decisions. And I think barbarians are of the same opinion of the decisions made by un-barbarians.

Yes, you're absolutely right, everybody is a barbarian to somebody, quisque barbarus est alio.


No no, PVC wasn't hewing to either of those definitions. Read again with that in mind.

No, no. I would say Husar is more or less right - although I'm using definition 1.b to an extent too. Perception of barkwardness vs our "advanced" civilisation is definitely key here - though.

[Husar]

Note 1. I naturally refer to "Nazi's" in plural because NAZI is an acronym. However, it would be churlish to dissagree with an educated German on the subject, so I won't.

That was mostly in reply to Monty, but the apostrophe only belongs there in the genitive form either way. "Nazis" is the plural and "Nazi's gun" means the gun belongs to one Nazi. If the gun belongs to more than one Nazi, it is "Nazis' gun". I'm not aware that or could think of why it would be different with acronyms since an acronym is just a shorter placeholder for the full word or phrase. So you might wite "national socialists" or "Nazis", "national socialist's" or "Nazi's" and so on. Of course technically speaking a Nazi is a "Nationalsozialist" and in German the plural would be "Nationalsozialisten" while the genitive would be "Nationalsozialisten". ~D
Of course with the article it makes more sense: plural: "die Nationalsozialisten", genitive: "des Nationalsozialisten".
I won't blame you for using the plural and genitive of the English word though. :clown:


Note 2. If you have correctly read my point but miss-identified my my irony as sarcasm then perhaps we have struck upon the precise boundary between wry British irony and dry German Sarcasm. Might we call it the "Husar-Philippus Demarcation Point"? Perhaps a Nobel Peace Prize is due to us in the future for this contribution to international harmony and understanding?

It's late and I can't decide whether irony and sarcasm are different enough to warrant that, but we should accept the prize. :2thumbsup:

[Gilrandir]

Really? Warrior ethics? :rolleyes:

It was not MY claim:

Bravery has traditionally been associated with the warrior ethos. At what time in history has it been considered reasonable for a warrior to target victims such as these?

You somehow didn't respond to this statement by Pannonian, but react to my reminding the initial premise (not neccessarily accurate) of the discussion. So address the claim-maker. Yet it doesn't cancel what I said about Hitler's position (as one not of a warrior) in WWII.

Although, in Pannonian's defense, being accepted as a code doesn't mean being always followed. Like doctors take Hippocratic oath, but one can find plethora of examples when they break it. The same of knighthood principles. All of the codes are more like a paragon to look up to.


I'm not aware that or could think of why it would be different with acronyms since an acronym is just a shorter placeholder for the full word or phrase. So you might wite "national socialists" or "Nazis", "national socialist's" or "Nazi's" and so on.

You are both wrong. "Nazi" is not an acronym, it is a clipping (abbreviation).

An acronym is an abbreviation of several words in such a way that the abbreviation itself forms a pronounceable word.
http://whatis.techtarget.com/definition/acronym

[Husar]

It was not MY claim:


You somehow didn't respond to this statement by Pannonian, but react to my reminding the initial premise (not neccessarily accurate) of the discussion. So address the claim-maker. Yet it doesn't cancel what I said about Hitler's position (as one not of a warrior) in WWII.

Although, in Pannonian's defense, being accepted as a code doesn't mean being always followed. Like doctors take Hippocratic oath, but one can find plethora of examples when they break it. The same of knighthood principles. All of the codes are more like a paragon to look up to.

I know it wasn't your claim, I already replied to it in a previous post (https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showthread.php?152706-Explosion-in-Manchester&p=2053748745&viewfull=1#post2053748745), so you're wrong about me not responding to his statement.
Your reminder came without a critical thought apparently and I had not previously brought up any hard evidence against it. I replied to your bringing it up again to kill it with fire before anyone would seriously consider it again now that you brought it up again. Don't put wrong arguments into focus again uncritically if you don't want me to strike them down right away. ~;)

As for the exception proving the rule, maybe you missed the part where I posted many very striking examples that would make it hard to call them all exceptions. When entire armies slaughter entire cities, you have to explain to me how that is a warrior making an exception to the rule. Is the warrior ethics code written down anywhere anyway? Do warriors sign it or swear an oath to it worldwide? If not, then it is merely a code by implication and with so many examples against it, I would wonder why someone would imply it in the first place. I would say it's a romanticizing of warriors for the purpose of a political argument.


You are both wrong. "Nazi" is not an acronym, it is a clipping (abbreviation).

An acronym is an abbreviation of several words in such a way that the abbreviation itself forms a pronounceable word.
http://whatis.techtarget.com/definition/acronym

Yes, in my defense, it was late, I was tired, and I had a feeling you would come and correct any leftover mistakes (and I did say "wordor phrase). :sweatdrop:

[Gilrandir]

I know it wasn't your claim, I already replied to it in a previous post, so you're wrong about me not responding to his statement.

My bad. And yours as well. Do you expect anyone to pay attention to the text after the initial word in such a big font?~;)



As for the exception proving the rule, maybe you missed the part where I posted many very striking examples that would make it hard to call them all exceptions. When entire armies slaughter entire cities, you have to explain to me how that is a warrior making an exception to the rule.

If you look at my post again, you would see I NEVER used the word "exception". I said "the code isn't always followed". To put it in other words, cases of breaking it are quite numerous. They can in no way be qualified as an exception, but rather a sad practice.



Is the warrior ethics code written down anywhere anyway? Do warriors sign it or swear an oath to it worldwide? If not, then it is merely a code by implication and with so many examples against it, I would wonder why someone would imply it in the first place. I would say it's a romanticizing of warriors for the purpose of a political argument.

I agree. But I have an impression (perhaps a romantic one too) that in modern world oaths (written or unwritten, sworn or conventionally recognized) weigh less than they used to be. Just the words to be disregarded or forsworn (the pun intended) at a propitious moment. The same about treaties and agreements.



Yes, in my defense, it was late, I was tired, and I had a feeling you would come and correct any leftover mistakes (and I did say "wordor phrase). :sweatdrop:

Have you forgotten the Backroom code never to post tired, God forbid late?:laugh4:

[Husar]

My bad. And yours as well. Do you expect anyone to pay attention to the text after the initial word in such a big font?~;):

:laugh4:
Yes, and also, yes... :dizzy2: :laugh4:


If you look at my post again, you would see I NEVER used the word "exception". I said "the code isn't always followed". To put it in other words, cases of breaking it are quite numerous. They can in no way be qualified as an exception, but rather a sad practice.

I went one step beyond what you said, in that if there is a code, then these cases would have to be exceptions. I wasn't saying you said that, I commented on the logical conclusion of what you said "in Pannonian's defense". :sweatdrop:
The difference is that the knighthood ideals and the Hippocratic oath are written down and the members of the relevant organizations claim to adhere to them. I've never seen a warrior cite some well-known warrior code of ethics or claim to adhere to one. So if there were such a code, like the "honor among thieves", it would have to show through it being practiced in an overwhelming number of cases, as though it were one of the essences of the "warrior trade". I don't think that is the case (and you seem to agree there), so there is no such code.


I agree. But I have an impression (perhaps a romantic one too) that in modern world oaths (written or unwritten, sworn or conventionally recognized) weigh less than they used to be. Just the words to be disregarded or forsworn (the pun intended) at a propitious moment. The same about treaties and agreements.

This might be correct, but we have a saying here that goes: "Worte sind Schall und Rauch." - "Words are sound and smoke."
Implying that things can easily be said and there is no inherent persistence.


Have you forgotten the Backroom code never to post tired, God forbid late?:laugh4:

It is only implied through practice, so I'm trying to break it out of existence! ~;)

[Gilrandir]

The difference is that the knighthood ideals and the Hippocratic oath are written down and the members of the relevant organizations claim to adhere to them. I've never seen a warrior cite some well-known warrior code of ethics or claim to adhere to one.

I may be mistaken, but what Pannonian meant was rather close to the knighthood oath:

Be loyal of hand and of mouth, seeking to serve every man as best ye may.
Seek ye the fellowship of good men, hearken unto their words and remember them.
Be humble and courteous wherever thou goest, not talking much, neither being dumb altogether.
Allow no women or child to suffer by thy default, so that if ye may lift thy hand to assist one, do so. If thou must draw thy sword to defend them, do so unto thy own death.
If thou come into fellowship with boys or men who speak in a disrespectful manner of any women or maiden, let them know in gracious words that this displeases thou and thy Lord, then depart their company forthwith.
Thou art to defend and protect those who seek to worship in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and promote faith in Him throughout this earth He has made.

http://www.knightforhire.com/oath_of_the_knight.htm

So, loosely speaking, it can be thought to be ETHICALLY binding all warriors. But of course they never took it. Though the society presumes they should abide by it.

[Fragony]

Why do you all assume there is a reason, is there anything reasonablebabout it. Killing young girls. Cwn't you see the weakness? Cruelty will only get you so far, and they know that as they are getting increasingl cruel. happy maelsröm IS you are soscrewed

[Husar]

I may be mistaken, but what Pannonian meant was rather close to the knighthood oath

Except that such a thing didn't really seem to exist. :shrug:
And one wouldn't say a knight wasn't a knight if he didn't follow the knighthood code to the letter, right?


Why do you all assume there is a reason, is there anything reasonablebabout it. Killing young girls. Cwn't you see the weakness? Cruelty will only get you so far, and they know that as they are getting increasingl cruel. happy maelsröm IS you are soscrewed

Well, if there is a reason, it could be useful to know it as it may help stop this madness, no?

[Fragony]

Except that such a thing didn't really seem to exist. :shrug:
And one wouldn't say a knight wasn't a knight if he didn't follow the knighthood code to the letter, right?



Well, if there is a reason, it could be useful to know it as it may help stop this madness, no?

There is, your own Schauble said it, immigration is necesary to prevent inbreeding. The plan is working fine, something as pathetic as the childless mutti I'd use in my evil scheme

[Seamus Fermanagh]

I may be mistaken, but what Pannonian meant was rather close to the knighthood oath:

Be loyal of hand and of mouth, seeking to serve every man as best ye may.
Seek ye the fellowship of good men, hearken unto their words and remember them.
Be humble and courteous wherever thou goest, not talking much, neither being dumb altogether.
Allow no women or child to suffer by thy default, so that if ye may lift thy hand to assist one, do so. If thou must draw thy sword to defend them, do so unto thy own death.
If thou come into fellowship with boys or men who speak in a disrespectful manner of any women or maiden, let them know in gracious words that this displeases thou and thy Lord, then depart their company forthwith.
Thou art to defend and protect those who seek to worship in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and promote faith in Him throughout this earth He has made.

http://www.knightforhire.com/oath_of_the_knight.htm

So, loosely speaking, it can be thought to be ETHICALLY binding all warriors. But of course they never took it. Though the society presumes they should abide by it.

That code has been held in abeyance for some time. It was promulgated in an era when protecting the womenfolk (a quarter of whom would die fulfilling their biological function) and children (as many as half of whom would succumb to disease etc. prior to attaining breeding age) was an absolute cultural/societal necessity. Even then, it was honored too often in the breach.

Modern cultures, with their robust capabilities and vastly improved survivability chances due to medical health practice, no longer have a "protect them or it all falls apart" motivation for such an ethical standard in warfare. We honor it (too our credit) as a tradition that the strong should not exploit but should protect those weaker than themselves.

However, in a strictly logical sense (setting aside sentiment and morality for those not identified as 'us.'), attacking the women and children is just as effective as any other choice in a long term struggle. Those will become and/or will breed the opponents of the future, so if there is no reasonable likelihood of absorbing them into the 'us' and making them your own, then killing them is every bit as valid as killing the opposing warriors -- and tactically much easier. Nits grow into lice, so squash them now.


In this, ideology is the driving force. Islamist extremism labels us as the enemy (not without some justification, to be fair). Though ideologically driven, they are not irrational enough to presume that capabilities are close enough for a conventional victory OR a victory in the short term. Ideologically, to the extremist, we who are not of the Umma are ALL valid targets in a war that can only be won through generating an attrition cost that we are unwilling to support. It is their only conceivable route to victory in this conflict. The other choice would be to negotiate, and negotiation requires compromise -- which is impossible as one cannot compromise core truths that define your own identity.


THAT is why there is a binary solution set here. Islam must altar itself to change that outlook in much the same manner as Christianity moved away from violence as a tool for religious faith. Today, violent Christianity is almost unheard of and is actively opposed by the mainstream. It is highly marginalized. That same degree of marginalization has yet to occur in Islam, though any fair minded person must note that the VAST majority of Muslims have no interest in terrorism as a tool for defending or spreading the faith.
The other choice in the binary set is extirpation, with all of the horror such would entail.

How does Islam come to embrace the Enlightenment to the degree that Western Christianity has done so and thereby properly relegate religion to the spiritual and moral/ethical spheres of life? Will not be easy as the current dominant forms of government in much of the Islamic world (Monarchy, Dictatorship, and Warlordism) have little to no interest in an enlightened population.

[Montmorency]

That code has been held in abeyance for some time. It was promulgated in an era when protecting the womenfolk (a quarter of whom would die fulfilling their biological function) and children (as many as half of whom would succumb to disease etc. prior to attaining breeding age) was an absolute cultural/societal necessity. Even then, it was honored too often in the breach.

The chivalric ethos, it should be noted, is largely an invention of High Medieval court literature.



How does Islam come to embrace the Enlightenment to the degree that Western Christianity has done so and thereby properly relegate religion to the spiritual and moral/ethical spheres of life? Will not be easy as the current dominant forms of government in much of the Islamic world (Monarchy, Dictatorship, and Warlordism) have little to no interest in an enlightened population.

We've discussed the topic of Enlightenment w/respect to Islam, but as I mentioned then, applying a direct analogy creates a misleading expectation. Keep in mind that much of the Reformation and Enlightenment was borne of material struggles between monarchs and aristocrats against the worldly power of the ecclesiarchs - before it became a bourgeois and intellectual exercise. The Islamic world is undergoing an Enlightenment analogue, but it isn't one we find congenial because it aims to detract from petty secular power in service of manifest theological ideals. It is an evolution from the old despotism infused with religious elements, just not the direction we can easily tolerate.

[Montmorency]

Let me continue the tangent on crimes against humanity in war, for the reader's interest. The Franco-Prussian War, as in a number of other ways, strikes a familiar figure here.

Aside from the capitulated French government calling in the military to massacre Parisian Communards in 1871, while the German occupation watched from the city boundaries, there is the infamous Siege of Strasbourg from the war's outset. Source is the introduction to the eponymous book by Rachel Chrastil:


Strasbourg lay at the heart of the conflict. When German forces entered French territory in August, Strasbourg was the first major city they targeted. For six weeks, from August 15 to September 27, the armies of Prussia and Baden
bombarded Strasbourg. German bombs killed three hundred citizens, wounded three thousand more, and caused enormous damage to public and private buildings, including the cathedral roof and the irreplaceable libraries
housed in the New Church. The siege exhibited the important issues raised during the Franco-Prussian War in microcosm: the targeting of civilians, the destruction of cultural sites, the revolution in the midst of war,
and the sacrifice of one’s own civilians for the cause. The siege alone did not determine the outcome of the Franco-Prussian War, of course, but the symbolism of Strasbourg elevated its importance in the minds of French and German alike.
The loss of Strasbourg, along with the rest of the region of Alsace and most of neighboring Lorraine, was one of the most important consequences of the war.


Despite this long history of war, the crisis that the inhabitants of Strasbourg faced in the summer of 1870 came as a shock. By the second half of the nineteenth century, Europeans’ tolerance for violence in everyday life was declining[...] With this decreased tolerance for civilian violence came the belief that civilians should no longer be the victims of wartime violence.

By the nineteenth century, many Europeans had come to view war as an exceptional experience in which civilians took little part. War, many believed, ought to be circumscribed. Military personnel alone had the duty to put themselves in harm’s way...

It was nearly impossible to maintain the distinction between soldiers and civilians in war, and especially difficult when an army tried to capture an entire city. To complicate matters, some civilians believed that they had the right to take up
arms to defend themselves from invasion; military leaders could not agree upon the proper response to such actions. All in all, the sharp line that many civilians believed to exist between themselves and soldiers proved less durable than they had hoped. Bertrand Taithe tells us that in the nineteenth century, “the boundary between the military and the civilian sphere—in effect, between the social orders of war and of peace—became more blurred and porous than ever before.”

In northern and eastern France, civilians felt the terror of occupation and died as hostages. The Prussians burned the entire village of Fontenoy in retaliation for partisan resistance. Paris came under siege for four months of cold and scarcity.
But in many areas of France, and in all of Germany, civilians went about their business and did not suffer from rationing, hunger, or systemized murder. The French finally surrendered on January 28, 1871. The Franco-Prussian War clearly did not share all the characteristics of the wars of the twentieth century, but it shaped the experiences and attitudes that made those catastrophes possible. It was one of the first conflicts in which both sides had signed the Geneva Convention and in which both sides failed to live up to it. When the Prussians targeted civilian noncombatants in the bombardment of Strasbourg, they made possible Dresden, Leningrad, Sarajevo, and Gaza. When civilians accused Prussia of breaking the “laws of war,” they anticipated war crimes trials at Nuremberg and The Hague. When bombs destroyed libraries and set the cathedral on fire, they prefigured the destruction of cultural heritage in Leuven, Rheims, and Baghdad. And when Swiss humanitarians intervened on behalf of besieged civilians, but unwittingly helped Prussia conquer Strasbourg, they paved the way for the ambiguous successes of the Red Cross and Doctors Without Borders.


Strasbourg’s civilian men often claimed that women and children were the primary victims of the Prussian bombardment. But they were wrong. Prussian bombs killed far more civilian men than women.
This error fit with the dominant gender paradigm. Just as nineteenth-century women faced exclusion from politics and increasingly from economic life, they also were no longer supposed to be touched by war.
Men were supposed to protect and provide for their wives and children. Civilization itself, it seemed, depended upon shielding women and children from wartime violence.


In the midst of these difficulties, a group of Swiss dignitaries proposed a new response: humanitarianism. Humanitarianism was a particular expression of human sympathy characterized by an emphasis on aiding victims,
the physical movement of humanitarians to the site of suffering, and the belief that concrete action could alter the status quo and confer transcendence. Many factors contributed to the development of humanitarianism, including
Enlightenment projects of social betterment, ethical imperatives to help strangers, and the valorization of sympathy, along with mass media, rapid transportation, and advanced fundraising techniques. In the 1850s and 1860s,
during the Crimean War and the U.S. Civil War, a few Europeans and Americans began to apply humanitarian aid to soldiers. Prior to 1870, however, wartime humanitarian aid had not been extended to civilians.

[Gilrandir]

Except that such a thing didn't really seem to exist. :shrug:

Only a few posts back you claimed the opposite:


The difference is that the knighthood ideals and the Hippocratic oath are written down and the members of the relevant organizations claim to adhere to them.





And one wouldn't say a knight wasn't a knight if he didn't follow the knighthood code to the letter, right?


I doubt if there was a procedure of deknightization for the breach of the code. They had other means to teach the perpetrators the meaning of the letters in the code if needs be.



Islam must altar itself to change that outlook in much the same manner as Christianity moved away from violence as a tool for religious faith.

"Altar" as in "put oneself/somebody on the altar to sacrifice ones life"?

[Seamus Fermanagh]

..."Altar" as in "put oneself/somebody on the altar to sacrifice ones life"?

That was a typo. Metaphorically, though, there is a connection as what I think Islam needs to do is sacrifice its previous self definition and replace it with something that reflects the Enlightenment concepts (and of course they would manifest this differently as their history is not that of the West, as was noted above correctly). It took hundreds of years from Bernard of Clairveaux's Crusade speech for the church to fall away from the use of force as a tool for evangelism. But it has been thoroughly eschewn.

[Fragony]

Accidently made a great typo, I would have pretended it was intentional and look clever and cryptic and confusing

[Husar]

Only a few posts back you claimed the opposite:

I didn't I was talking about "what Pannonian meant" aka the warrior code. He may have meant something close to the knighthood oath, but such a thing does not have to exist just because the knighthood oath existed...

[Gilrandir]

I didn't I was talking about "what Pannonian meant" aka the warrior code. He may have meant something close to the knighthood oath, but such a thing does not have to exist just because the knighthood oath existed...

I'm not sure myself whether the latter existed and if it did whether it was in the form I linked. Perhaps it was a romantic introduction of later age writers. Or it was changed to look romantic.

[Husar]

I'm not sure myself whether the latter existed and if it did whether it was in the form I linked. Perhaps it was a romantic introduction of later age writers. Or it was changed to look romantic.

Well, given that knights were noblemen and noblemen were supposed to be better humans than peasants and the whole nobility was backed by religious logic and so on, it would be relatively safe to assume that they did have some more or less official moral code, whether they stuck to it or not.
Warriors on the other hand exist(ed) all over the world, in hundreds or thousands of different cultures, religions and tribes and to assume they all had some moral code that could now be used to decide whether a guy is a warrior or not seems a bit like a stretch. Supposedly pictish warriors would sometimes throw themselves into roman spears so their buddies could kill the Roman, so if that's true even the suicide aspect would not be a part that wasn't done by warriors before.
And just because one can say ISIS terrorists are warriors and have a kind of bravery, that doesn't make them any more noble or less despicable anyway. The assumption that the label of warrior would imply some kind of virtue seems quite off to me.