When was the last time Germany and Japan thought about bombing anyone????

They don't, because they're too busy making cars and TVs and getting rich.

I say we :

- Have a nice chat with Mr. Arafat and the other rational leaders of Middle Eastern countries. Talk him into letting us take over Palestine as calmly and peacefully as we possibly can. Tell him we are there to PERMANENTLY transform the Middle East into a peaceful and prosperous region of the world, because war sucks ass. Back up these words by our actions.

- On our way in, tell all Israeli soldiers to get the fuck out of ALL Palestinian territory, or risk us taking over THEIR country as well. They have completely mishandled the Palestinian situation for decades - I mean, who the fuck hoses down a rock-throwing crowd with MACHINE GUNS??? This is the 21st century, people, time to start acting like the civilized human beings we all think we are.

- Tell other nations that are UNHAPPY with our presence that we are here to enforce peace. Any violence against us, the Palestinians, or the Israelis will result in the responsible country being turned into glass.

- Set up a real government for the Palestinians, like we did for Germany and Japan. Give them public education. Give them science and math and reading and economics and critical thinking and all that other imperialistic American crap. Let them worship whoever they want, and say what they want, just so long as nobody's preaching a killing spree against someone else.

- Assist other willing Arabic nations in doing the same thing.

- Any national monuments that have meaning to more than one religion will be permanently administered by the UN, who will be responsible for maintaining peace and enacting rules necessary for the preservation of these monuments.

- Hang around for a few years until we're sure the new government is working well. Then leave.

- Make sure we keep a few military bases there just in case anyone in the area decides to act like little bitch0rs and take over someone else.

first of all, there is no palestinian state. the israeli's aren't in palestinian territory, they are policing their own. the IDF doesn't gun down mob's they take out terrorist cells in surgical strikes. remember, you cannot forget that it's the palestinians who are bombing civilians, NOT the IDF. and i don't think the populace would take too kindly to being invaded anyway.

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Originally posted by CatKnight:
first of all, there is no palestinian state.

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Which is why they're pissed off. Somebody screwed up a long time ago when they made just Israel, instead of Israel and Palestine.

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remember, you cannot forget that it's the palestinians who are bombing civilians, NOT the IDF.

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It's NOT the Palestinians. It's some crazy Saudi Arabian motherfucker who is using the Palestinian problem to further his own America-hating rhetoric. That's why I say we resolve the Palestine-Israel situation - the US / UN fucked up in the first place when they created Israel without protecting Palestine. We owe it to them to set things right. And if we pull it off, we knock out one of the foundations of anti-American sentiment. It's hard to hate someone who's helping you.

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i don't think the populace would take too kindly to being invaded anyway.

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Depends on how we did it. If we acted like the IDF does, rolling in with SWAT teams just to kill some people who are throwing rocks, they'd hate us. On the other hand, if we're flying Yasir Arafat around in a cool helicopter, handing out air conditioners to a few lucky winners, and generally bringing peace and prosperity to their home, they'd think we were the shiznit.

edit: CK, please don't take this as an anti-Jew / anti-Israel rant. We let BOTH sides down. We should've had a *very* strong military presence in the Middle East decades ago, not only to protect the international oil supply, but to maintain peace and stability for the people who produce the oil for us. Nobody likes war, except for a few power-mad individuals, and one of the responsibilities of being the Good and Freedom-Loving Superpower is to keep would-be villains in check.

This message has been edited by damien_s_lucifer on September 13, 2001 at 11:07 PM

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simultaneity is not absolute. So just because you think i'm wrong, from my frame of reference i'm right!

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Originally posted by damien_s_lucifer:
Ah. A tried, tested plan that we KNOW works.

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Just one major problem with your plan. Arabic culture is supremely different from both western and far-eastern culture. This plan assumes that the arabs would be open to the same kind of ideas as Japan (a far-eastern nation) and Germany (a western nation).

Second, get your facts straight before you post something like that. It seems everyone here except catknight is under the mistaken impression that Israel is the instigator in the Israel/Palestine conflict. Virtually every event in the history of the conflict can be traced to Palestinians commiting acts of war on Israelis. This is consistent with the mindset in the Arab world, the value of life is very little. Any place where a father would kill his own daughter for talking to an enemy soildier who was asking for directions to leave a village definitely does not share our western views on the sanctity of life. Israel, however, being a nation based on the Jewish faith where the value placed on life is similar to here in the west (because our code of ethics is actually a hand-me-down from them through christianity).

When coming up with solutions, one cannot generalize that the peoples involved will share our western view that productivity, education, and wealth are good things. In fact, the fact that the arabic world does not highly favor capitalism is very clear from the choice of targets in tuesday's attack: the symbols of capitalism.

I am not trying to generalize all Arabs or say that the Arabic way is bad, just that they think differently from the way we think because of the way they are raised from the day they're born. If you want to know a little more about the differences between Western and Middle-eastern thought, read a few books like Not Without My Daughter. Though frequently tainted with western condemnation of the differences middle-eastern culture, those differences nonetheless exist and need to be carefully weighed in any solution.

Please read what I wrote carefully and think about it before you shoot off about my "racist" remarks because they are intended to be nothing of the sort.

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Old farts never die, they just get blown away.

It was racist then, and it's racist now.

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Originally posted by damien_s_lucifer:
HellRaiser, you have just raised the EXACT SAME ARGUMENT used against the Germans and the Japanese in World War II - "they're totally different from us. They're barely even human."

It was racist then, and it's racist now.

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Except that it wasn't true then and it is now. Both pre-war and post-war Japan and Germany were countries that shared western ideals in terms of placing value on education and productivity. Most of the middle east does not, else they'd produce more than oil and agricultural goods for world trade. I'd love to be proven wrong on this point, so maybe Bush should propose this solution. I somehow have grave reservations based on what I understand of Arabic thought. And That statement is not racist. It is demonstrable that different groups of people with different cultural backgrounds think in different ways. This can even be demonstrated in choice of words in statements. I don't have any examples right now, but if I wanted to, I could dig out some history books and pull hundreds of examples from past literature. Okay here's one: in some tribal societies, there is no word for Mine posessive, and in those societies, the concept of ownership is non-existant, everything belongs to everyone in the village, so there are no fights over who owns what. If someone needs it, since it is village property he can use it, and if someone else needs it more, he gets priority. I got that one straight off of PBS, so take it with a grain of salt if you want.

I do have first-hand experience with some of the differences between Arabic and western thought: one of my friends is an Albanian woman who married an Arab immigrant. Many of the things she has told me and that I have observed about him in relation to the general way in which most people of western descent that I know think bear up what I stated in my previous post. Of course I know that if you know one you don't know them all, and I am leaving room for many Arabic people to not share these characteristics, but consider this: saying that Marxists and Capitalists have different views on how society should work is true and not racist.

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Old farts never die, they just get blown away.

Throw me any Arab atrocity to prove how "different" their mindset is, and I'll throw back the same atrocity happening in the Western world.

Give me an example of how community-oriented the Arabs are, and I'll give you an example of big groups of Americans doing crazy shit for God and Country.

We could go around in circles forever, or you could realize that there are some aspects of being a human being that is encoded in your genes, and those aspects cut across ALL races and cultures and economic beliefs.

It's called "human nature." Perhaps you've heard of it?

This message has been edited by damien_s_lucifer on September 15, 2001 at 02:44 AM

quote:

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Originally posted by CatKnight:
first of all, there is no palestinian state.
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Which is why they're pissed off. Somebody screwed up a long time ago when they made just Israel, instead of Israel and Palestine.

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actually, Israel offered the Palestinians their own state, with a lot of territory that included Jerusalem. However, Arafat DENIED THE OFFER. They aren't mad because they didn't get their state. They just want all jews and americans dead.

Most western cultures, which have descended in some form from the spread of the roman empire and later the roman catholic church, share for the most part a set of values which include a high respect for human life, and pursuit of individual sucess, thus favoring education and productivity as well (among other values that don't have a bearing on this).

The culture of Japan and many far-east cultures value honor, and community sucess and unity, although their culture has easily absorbed many of the ideals of western culture.

The culture of most middle-eastern nation/states (aside from Israel due to similarities between the jewish ethical code and christian ethical code) places a high value on religious participation, and for the most part has shown a resentment towards any western influence. The value placed on life is not as much as it is in the US, although the family is a strong unit when it comes to interference from the outside. Women are regarded in many areas as property, and are treated as such, though this idea is changing in some of the areas that have the least resistance to western cultural influences.

I will say one more thing about your first post: Mr Arafat may be one of the more rational leaders in middle-eastern nation/states but he has shown time and time again an unwillingness to make any compromise in negotiations with Israel under the auspices of the US. This too is consistant with what I know of middle-eastern culture and supports the culture-centric view of human values.

This is not to say that there is immense variation within a culture in terms of individual values, but in terms of societal values as a whole, cultures are often different from each other. I am not trying to say that one culture is better than the other, because I'm sure that even though I personally like US culture more than many other cultures, I'm sure that Middle-eastern people often think of their culture as being superior to other cultures, else they would probably be taking more steps to get in line with the western world.

Human nature is human nature, and unfortunately has its extremes as well. When you combine extremes in human nature with certain cultural values, they can become extremist views, particularly in a culture in which religiosity is a strong value.

We all know that in history, the majority of wars have been made for one of two/three reasons: religious differences/cultural differences, or protecting the interests of a nation/state; and usually in that order.

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Old farts never die, they just get blown away.

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Originally posted by damien_s_lucifer:
Wrong. Wars are almost always fought on economic grounds - they are fought over resources, not religion.

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Someone probably failed Western Civilization I. Just kidding of course. I probably should have made clear that when I stated national interests, these include economic resources. However in many wars, there is a lot more underlying the hostility than who controls what.

Many of the great wars through history were conquests fought in the name of the gods, and those that weren't were usually fought to protect national interests, which include but are not limited to control of vital resources. Wars fought only over resources are a thing of recent history for the most part, and fall under the catagory of national interests.

Ancient rome for instance, fought not to gain resources, but to increase the glory of rome.

The crusades were fought in the name of Christianity.

The Revolutionary war was fought over independence, and the growing national interests of an emerging nation/state.

The American Civil war was fought over religious principles/cultural differences between the north and south.

The World Wars were fought not to control resources, but to protect the interests of freedom.

Military actions like Desert Storm and Vietnam, were, agreed, fought over resources.

As for many in the middle east being traders and merchants, thats very true. Neither of these occupations involve production though, merely the handling of goods produced by others. I believe I mentioned that there is a lot of individualism within every culture, but that the society as a whole can have a very different mindset. I believe that was stated in an earlier post in this thread .

And the idea of debate is to be rational, and have rational arguments, so it helps to keep a cool head. I usually don't take debates seriously, though the matters this country is facing right now are serious to the extreme. It takes a lot of willpower to be rational at a time like this, when gut instinct is screaming, kill, kill, kill! Kudos to you for remaining rational as well.

I am as you probably guessed against the idea of the US getting any more involved with politics in the middle east than it already is, because I think we've meddled enough. I'm all for counter-terrorist strikes, and I hope they leave a lasting impression that the world will not stand to have its citizens made into targets for terrorist acts. But I hope its done in such a way as to be perceived by the middle east as an attack on terrorism and those who support it, not on the people of the middle east.

Here's an idea: convince Bush to propose this plan to the leaders of the Middle East. If it works, and in 10 years things are as you predicted, despite my *racist* predictions based on my views of cultural influence, I will set up a scholarship in your name in an amount I can afford based on my income at the time, for college students majoring in a field relating to applied sociology, and the requirement for awarding the scholarship will be they have to write the best essay on cultural values and how they influence peoples willingness to accept new ideas. If it doesn't work, and falls through for the reasons I proposed in my dire predictions, you set up a scholarship in my name for students entering a field of political science, and the requirement for the scholarship be an essay on United States foreign policy between 2000 and 2010. If the plan never gets proposed, or falls through for other reasons, neither of us is under obligation to set up a scholarship.

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Old farts never die, they just get blown away.

quote:

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Originally posted by Hellraiser:
We all know that in history, the majority of wars have been made for one of two/three reasons: religious differences/cultural differences, or protecting the interests of a nation/state; and usually in that order.

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Wrong. Wars are almost always fought on economic grounds - they are fought over resources, not religion. Religion is simply what allows you to easily explain that "yes, your friends and neighbors and even you might die. But hey, no problem! You will be rewarded greatly by your God!"

And the fact that the Middle East has been a major trade route for several thousand years pretty much renders any philosophical discussion of Nature vs. Nurture a moot point. Walk through the bazaar of any city down there and you will see more merchants than you'd believe. Trust me, individualism is alive and well in Arabia.

p.s. good debating style - esp. keeping a cool head. Not too many people in here can do that. Keep up the good work.

This message has been edited by damien_s_lucifer on September 16, 2001 at 12:22 AM

I agree with a few of your points.

1. The Israelis should leave what is currently Palestinian territory. Like CK pointed out, they're already out, but they should just hand the PA what they have and tell them to make a state out of it.

Of course, this wouldn't please the Palestinians much, as that doesn't include East Jerusalem, but it's not a horrible compromise because of (2).

2. The UN should administer any monuments. I've got no problems with a fair-minded UN force making sure there are no issues on Temple Mount or at the Western Wall or whatever. An American force would be better, as the Israelis have had some bad experiences with UN observers, but sure, the UN would be OK.

I'd also post the observers at the settlements, too, as those are another point where things could flare up.

3. I think the Israelis would pay for the bases themselves if the US offered to put some on Israeli soil. All that solidarity stuff you saw this past week was not just for show. The Israelis genuinely like the Americans, for whatever reason.

You do make some hideously inaccurate points about Israeli soldiers hosing down crowds with machine guns, mainly that that _never happened_, and you do ignore the fact that the Palestinians have more than a few light arms (a PA senior official claimed 150k of them, but I doubt it), but, what the hell, more people than you got snookered by that sort of thing.

I agree that people with money don't usually want to go to war. However, you miss one little point: Mr. Bin Laden is loaded with cash. He's waging a war against the US. Hmm.

What no one has mentioned is that the Israelis have defended our own interests time and time again during the Cold War. Did you really want to see the USSR gain complete influence over that slightly important region? Maybe it's just me being American, but I feel like we owe them some slack.

-Erwos