alcazar

iTrader: (2)

Muahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha!

Their stupid religion won't let them go past the middle ages.

hodgy0_2

Well a couple of points

Watch this fantastic documentary , Bitter Lake by Adam Curtis

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p02gyz6b

[edited to add - Bitter lake is not an easy watch, it does contain humour but also some quite distressing scenes, but is well worth the investment of your time]

And my Grandfather who flew in the pathfinder squadron in WW2, was an airline captain for Iraqi airways in the 60,s and 70,s

He spent alot of time in Baghdad - it was a bustling city, modern for its time and he said full of the most hospitable, kind and generous people he had ever met

Oh and Beruit, used to be known as the Riviera of the middle east

So I don't think it is that simple

JTaylor

Agreed. But it's a deeply flawed ideology and people ought not be called names for thinking this.

Cruz and I disagree on our interpretation and understanding of the creation account and neither you nor I can know the deep recesses of his heart. What evidence do you have that...

What did they do that Jesus Christ commanded them to do?

We have and we created the vacuum for IS. Shame on us.

Yep.

Don't follow.

In what sense?

That man thinks he can disobey the teachings of Christ and expect a peaceful outcome is the real mystery. Turn the other cheek. Love thy neighbour. Judge not lest ye be judged.

hodgy0_2

for what?



read # 309 to 321

JTaylor

That Trump is and will be "ten times better" than Cruz.

Ok, done that. So what?

hodgy0_2

I think that anyone who proclaims this

“any president who doesn’t begin every day on his knees isn’t fit to be commander-in-chief of this nation.”

is a dangerous lunatic - and I would prefer Trump

http://www.rightwingwatch.org/post/c...f-this-nation/

he was introduced by Kevin Swanson

who proclaimed

“the sin of homosexuality … is worthy of death.”

http://www.rightwingwatch.org/post/i...-over-my-body/

as an aside all sound very "islamist" to me - but I accept you don't so lets not go there


nothing other than my stated irony, that the protest in Europe over refuges etc are used by the right wing wingnuts to validate a debunked modus operandi, when it was their very policies that enabled it

and than for humanity to move forward you have to learn the lessons of history

and I will end with a most prescient and beautiful quote from the amazing Carl Sagan

(if people don't know who he was, please read up on him, or just google "Carl Sagan quotes")


"“I have a foreboding of an America in my children's or grandchildren's time -- when the United States is a service and information economy; when nearly all the manufacturing industries have slipped away to other countries; when awesome technological powers are in the hands of a very few, and no one representing the public interest can even grasp the issues; when the people have lost the ability to set their own agendas or knowledgeably question those in authority; when, clutching our crystals and nervously consulting our horoscopes, our critical faculties in decline, unable to distinguish between what feels good and what's true, we slide, almost without noticing, back into superstition and darkness...

The dumbing down of American is most evident in the slow decay of substantive content in the enormously influential media, the 30 second sound bites (now down to 10 seconds or less), lowest common denominator programming, credulous presentations on pseudoscience and superstition, but especially a kind of celebration of ignorance”

Carl Sagan, The Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark

hodgy0_2

so for the absolute avoidance of doubt


humanity has progressed to where we are, by valuing evidence based rational thinking - and this is the very heart of Science - not belief or faith

which is why I did not even bother replying to Alcazar question on whether I "believed" in the EU free trade area

it is not a matter of belief - it is a simple fact

throughout history science has shone as a candle in the dark against Cruz (and seemingly the entire republican party) and {insert some mad ayatollah] and their ilk

the history of this period, when written in 100 years time will make little distinction between the two

JTaylor

I'd vote for a sound atheist over a questionable theist so we're on the same page regards your first point. On your second, does Christ proclaim homosexuality to be punishable by death? Perhaps Swanson ought to turn to Islam.

Love a bit of Sagan, have often quoted him myself.

hodgy0_2

I can only judge him on his words and deeds JT (as I do everyone)

he says he is a Christian

Good aids and bad aids - remember that :-)

JTaylor

Well Hitler was a vegetarian.

c_maguire

You two remind me of English Literature at school, being asked to write an essay on the meaning of some Wilfred Owen poem. It was a poem, nothing more, take it at face value, and either like it or not. Being told by the teacher that my forced interpretation of it was any less accurate than his bullsh@t interpretation was totally futile. If there was anything implied only Mr.Owen knew that. I sacked that cr@p in at the first opportunity.
You two are overthinking everything.
One person, one vote. They don't give a monkey's about what you are extrapolating. Their thinking is on the whole far more simplistic.

JTaylor

Prime choice of poet. Watching the remembrance service as we speak.

On your point, I hear you. I think Hodgy and I are looking at the different schools of thought rather than the processes of the average voter. Nonetheless, I still assert that the pointy fingered liberal lefties of the type I described earlier must shoulder some blame for Brexit and Trump. The thinking may well be simplistic, but the block protest vote of the man in the street has shaken the establishment and the demagogues have won.

hodgy0_2

dulce et decorum est (pro patria mori)

well you did not have a "forced" interpretation, you had an interpretation

your teacher let you down

get a refund :-)

hodgy0_2

and I do, no one is innocent in this

I read a great (challenging piece) in the Guardian today by a guy called Richard Ford (never heard of him)

he made me think - which is always good

I will see if I can dig it out - only a short read

hodgy0_2

here you go

"Richard Ford: Blame me. I voted for Hillary, and I got America all wrong"


https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/...s-richard-ford


good read

JTaylor

Thanks, will have a read.

hodgy0_2

btw - you used the term "Cultural Marxist" earlier in this thread

can you define what you mean by that

JTaylor

I can't be bothered at the moment. Will reply tomorrow.

hodgy0_2

no problem - its late

and I am 3 sheets to the wind :-)

JTaylor

Ha. I've had a pint of Black Dragon (Welsh cider), bloomin' lovely!

hodgy0_2

I know its late, but just rereading the thread JT is saw this - my reply


agreed, this is the "broken clock" fallacy

http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Stopped_clock

in fact first on the list is Adolf Hitler (Adolf geddit!!)

"Adolf Hitler's promotion of anti-smoking research and strong support for animal rights, though the latter was mostly a vehicle for his virulent anti-Semitism.[5][6] "

JTaylor

From this very thread:

https://www.scoobynet.com/1042637-wi...l#post11892985

Spooky, eh?

JTaylor

Had a read, didn't enjoy the staccato form, but heard what the writer had to say.

JTaylor

Well, it's all a bit conspiratorial so no doubt will be met with derision by your good self. In short it's an attack on Western societal 'norms' as they have been perceived over the last couple of generations. Think atheism, feminism, multiculturalism, political correctness, the promotion of LGBT culture, environmentalism etc. Came out (according to the theorists) of the Frankfurt School and has infiltrated the institutions with perhaps the biggest being the EU. Now take your average Brexit and Trump voter (your man on the street and on the terraces and with their nose in the Mail) and you'll have large numbers who (whether they realise it or not) fall in to the bracket of paleoconservatism which is generally seen as the antithesis of cultural Marxism.

As for me, well I sympathise with both sides of the argument and think we have it right when we walk the middle ground. If somebody's a casual racist they need educating not berating and the person doing the berating needs educating, too.

My own philosophy is borrowed from Hegel and advocates the dialectic method; as I've opined on these boards more than once - truth springs from argument amongst friends. One doesn't make friends by finger wagging and name calling, that creates enemies and those enemies, devoid of avenues to express their anger, vote for demagogues who've spotted their opportunity.

Turbohot

Absolutely right.

Some emerging truths can be so harsh that they may effect the friendship.

To be friends with people, you have to have similar, if not the same mindset with those 'friend-able' acquaintances. Otherwise, you're friends for the name's sake with people that are very different to you in their mindset. By doing so, you are dishonest to yourself and others- to be frank.

Friendship is a very valuable term. Too lightly and wrongly used these days. People you have half the grounds matching are your distant 'friends', if you persist. Otherwise, they're just acquaintances.

JTaylor

Most of my favourite people disagree with me on fundamental points. I can think of very little that is more boring than agreeable company.

Turbohot

Me, too.

I really don't know how they tolerate me sometimes tbh. They say that they like my honesty, if not flippancy; no matter how harsh. They know that I simply can't agree on everything and 'blind follow'. I just can't do it.
I don't expect them to do that, either.

My real friends I can count on my finger tips. We also have disagreements, of course we do! But in the very core, we do share something in common- our open and generous stance to all n' sundry.

I have many favourite people, whose certain aspects I like. But if on a dinner table, they disclose that they class themselves and the likes as 'exclusive', despite being educated, then I won't have dinner with them again. I simply can't be their 'friend'. It's not the quantity, it's the quality of the friends that matters to me. People with kind and warm heart, not the ones with pompous intellect and materials. It's not about what someone looks like, what they wear, whether they live in Taj Mahal or whether they eat on a silver plate. I don't care about that. It's the generosity of my friends' heart that matters to me; even if they're p1$$ poor and live in a card board box!

Many of my real friends are non-pretentious beings with big hearts. That's all that matters to me.

JTaylor

Amen! The meek shall inherit the earth, Swati!

Turbohot

Meek is a disempowering and a weak term, James; unless you mean 'humble' by that. So, yes, people with some humility and 'down to earth' attitude in life may inherit the earth, although I don't think they're driven by any super-charged ambition to do so. They do have the drive, but not the 'cut-throat' one. Nice people.

JTaylor

Meek in the biblical sense means 'power under control'.

See the first of these links:

https://www.scoobynet.com/non-scooby...ership-is.html