At least women's rights group have a say. Under Saddam you wouldn't even hear about this story, let alone a woman rights group coming out.Hurricane2k9 wrote:
I thought the whole point of blowing that country to bits and installing a new government was to STOP that sort of stuff.
Anyway, I'm not sure if we deserve it or not. I will say that we seem to be the only species that actively performs actions that are detrimental to our existence and are more barbaric than what many other animals do. You don't hear of packs of wolves killing another pack of wolves over their beliefs.
Dude you get this shit in the USA, UK... everywhere.Hurricane2k9 wrote:
I thought the whole point of blowing that country to bits and installing a new government was to STOP that sort of stuff.
Generally speaking, western countries take circumstances into consideration.Mekstizzle wrote:
Dude you get this shit in the USA, UK... everywhere.Hurricane2k9 wrote:
I thought the whole point of blowing that country to bits and installing a new government was to STOP that sort of stuff.
I disagree. Our system does work with regard to personal rights. We do have religious fundamentalists, but our doctrine of government prevents them from going too far. By contrast, religion is the law of the land over there.Diesel_dyk wrote:
Yeah, we will force democracy on them and it will take root and individual rights will flourish because democracy will win out over religious fundamentalist beliefs. /sarcasm
It doesn't work here in the US, so why did they think it would ever work there.
Anyway, it is one thing this for a family to go after the girl, and its something else for the govt to imprison the victim. The former is stupid and the later is abominable.
Humans are only as good as their culture allows them to be. Some cultures are more evolved than others. The Middle East, as a whole, is behind the West in terms of cultural advancement, so these sorts of issues arise.CC-Marley wrote:
Guys the story really only got me thinking. Not meant to be about Iraq. I mean look at all the bad shit we do as the human race.
Are you kidding? I've never heard of victims of sex trafficking and rape being charged with prostitution in the US or the UK. Only backwards-ass countries do that shit.Mekstizzle wrote:
Dude you get this shit in the USA, UK... everywhere.Hurricane2k9 wrote:
I thought the whole point of blowing that country to bits and installing a new government was to STOP that sort of stuff.
I dunno. I'll bet there's plenty of times trafficked people in these countries have been slapped by the law for prostituting. Obviously our legal systems are better and less likely to do such things, but I wouldn't totally rule it out. Just that you're probably less likely to hear it in the press over here. People don't really talk much about prostitutes or sex trafficking much in the media over here.Hurricane2k9 wrote:
Are you kidding? I've never heard of victims of sex trafficking and rape being charged with prostitution in the US or the UK. Only backwards-ass countries do that shit.Mekstizzle wrote:
Dude you get this shit in the USA, UK... everywhere.Hurricane2k9 wrote:
I thought the whole point of blowing that country to bits and installing a new government was to STOP that sort of stuff.
Last edited by Mekstizzle (2010-05-08 10:35:47)
craigslistHurricane2k9 wrote:
Are you kidding? I've never heard of victims of sex trafficking and rape being charged with prostitution in the US or the UK. Only backwards-ass countries do that shit.Mekstizzle wrote:
Dude you get this shit in the USA, UK... everywhere.Hurricane2k9 wrote:
I thought the whole point of blowing that country to bits and installing a new government was to STOP that sort of stuff.
I'm sure there are times where a sex slave gets charged at first, but during the investigation, it should quickly come to light whether or not coercion toward the sex acts happened. We make a pretty clear distinction between sex trafficking and prostitution in our system. I would assume the same is true for the U.K.Mekstizzle wrote:
I dunno. I'll bet there's plenty of times trafficked people in these countries have been slapped by the law for prostituting. Obviously our legal systems are better and less likely to do such things, but I wouldn't totally rule it out. Just that you're probably less likely to hear it in the press over here. People don't really talk much about prostitutes or sex trafficking much in the media over here.
Passport forgery is certainly prosecutable here, but I would think most juries and judges here would waive the sentencing for a person in a situation like the one described in the article. If I'm not mistaken, trial by jury works a little differently in Iraq, and judges have a lot more power in the Iraqi system.Mekstizzle wrote:
Then there's the other charges the article mentions like passport forgery... yeah it's all messed up, but to think you can't see this shit happening in other countries is basic superiority or holier than thou complex. Granted, things are much better here, but alot of stupid shit still happens in the so called better countries too.
Nation building is supposed to result in improving a country beyond its previous state. It's supposed to result in creating a just government with reasonably progressive laws.Mekstizzle wrote:
Especially when you talk about how we blew their country up to stop them doing this. I mean shit, you can't get a more arrogant god complex soapbox statement than that.
In our system we have people who exercise their personal freedom of religion to attempt to defeat all of the other individual rights. My point was that we were supposed to be bringing them democracy and individualism and did we really think that we could change their mindset. We can't even get the individual religious nuts in this country to accept the fact that how a person lives their life is an individual's right. And so the thing that seperates us from them is that our govt and our judiciary stand a little more on the side of secularism and individual freedom, while their system is even more prevaded with religous fundamentalism. The difference is one of shades not one of kind. The battle to beat back the religous fundamentalist here in the US is always on going because they don't accept the American value of individualism. I've heard more than once from religious nutbag the anti-individualism cry that "doing what you want is the work of the devil." Can we really expect anything less over there than the battle that we have to engage in here to secure all of our individual freedoms.Turquoise wrote:
I disagree. Our system does work with regard to personal rights. We do have religious fundamentalists, but our doctrine of government prevents them from going too far. By contrast, religion is the law of the land over there.Diesel_dyk wrote:
Yeah, we will force democracy on them and it will take root and individual rights will flourish because democracy will win out over religious fundamentalist beliefs. /sarcasm
It doesn't work here in the US, so why did they think it would ever work there.
Anyway, it is one thing this for a family to go after the girl, and its something else for the govt to imprison the victim. The former is stupid and the later is abominable.
Our problem has more to do with corporate and lobbyist influences, but that's another discussion.
Well, you and I see things a little differently. I used to feel that way, but I see more than just religious fundamentalism as the problem.Diesel_dyk wrote:
In our system we have people who exercise their personal freedom of religion to attempt to defeat all of the other individual rights. My point was that we were supposed to be bringing them democracy and individualism and did we really think that we could change their mindset. We can't even get the individual religious nuts in this country to accept the fact that how a person lives their life is an individual's right. And so the thing that seperates us from them is that our govt and our judiciary stand a little more on the side of secularism and individual freedom, while their system is even more prevaded with religous fundamentalism. The difference is one of shades not one of kind. The battle to beat back the religous fundamentalist here in the US is always on going because they don't accept the American value of individualism. I've heard more than once from religious nutbag the anti-individualism cry that "doing what you want is the work of the devil." Can we really expect anything less over there than the battle that we have to engage in here to secure all of our individual freedoms.
I agree, but that's part of why we gradually end up fighting nations run by religious nutjobs (much of the Middle East).Diesel_dyk wrote:
As far as the OP's question. If we as a species lose out to the religous fundamentalist (including the ones here in the US) then we deserve nothing less than armageddon and anhillation.... and the reason the species should die, for the most part, is because that's what the end timers want to have happen and losing that battle should have consequences.
I don't see much difference to disagree with. I didn't address the leftist/apologist argument you raised, but that's a good point. where you have people making decisions for others, ie. leftists cutting exceptions, creating "cultural" exceptions out of individual rights to allow for the oppression of an individual by a supposedly oppressed minority, then that is setting up a form of paternalism outside of constitutional protections. So you are right that that is just as bad as having a fundamentalist religious group trying to get laws passed that override individual freedoms.Turquoise wrote:
Well, you and I see things a little differently. I used to feel that way, but I see more than just religious fundamentalism as the problem.
There is an equivalent anti-individualist mindset among the left as well. You have politically correct multiculturalists that are so morally relativist that they tolerate antidemocratic behaviors from immigrant cultures. For example, some on the left are open to allowing the development of Sharia court systems among Muslim communities. On the surface, this seems like a harmless enough thing, but when you dig deeper, you realize that most Muslims who come here do it to embrace the freedoms we have along with our economic opportunities, and they want to leave the theocratic shit behind. Unfortunately, a few of the ones who come here want to bring the theocracy with them.
So, in the name of political correctness, some on the left are willing to cut back on freedoms to supposedly "tolerate" these very intolerant mindsets that sometimes enter our culture.
I would argue that true individualists are not morally relativist. Their morals are based on constitutional freedoms, which cannot be compromised for the sake of any other culture. This is the sort of thing that neither the religious nuts on the right nor the politically correct douchebags on the left understand.
That being said, I really don't think we're comparable to the Middle East, because our religious nuts are still far less powerful in our culture and government than they are over there. Yes, we do have to keep them at bay, but our system thankfully makes that far easier than it is in a place like Iraq, where the system is still somewhat based on religion to begin with.
Our struggle simply isn't comparable to theirs, because it's on a difference of magnitudes. We are a free country. Iraq is only peripherally free.
In summary, I would still agree with you that trying to change a country like Iraq into being free and remotely progressive is futile. This is why I'm generally against nation building. I think we should avoid war at all costs, but when we engage in it, we should be willing to completely and utterly obliterate our enemies.
Well, I generally agree, although I believe the defense of said freedoms constitutes a morality unto itself. The thing is, what our morals should be are Constitutionally based. It's a paradoxical belief system that allows others freedoms but is vigilant in keeping people from crossing certain lines.Diesel_dyk wrote:
The only point of disagreement might be on the moral relativism. I understand your point about the leftist. But I guess I would say that the problem is paternalism more than moral relativism. In order to have individualiam, people do have to be willing to accept the fact that other people are going to be different, behave differently, believe differently and that its really none of anyones business how someone else lives. In other words they have to be following some sort of moral relativism. Its when someone becomes paternalistic that's the problem. likewise on the religous fundamentalist side, if you want to believe a certain way, go right a head, but when you start thinking that that is how everyone else should live and start trying to coerce other people, then that is paternalism trying to override individual freedoms.
Good points... Well, I think what we should fear most isn't so much fundamentalist Protestantism at this point. I think fundamentalist Catholicism may see a resurgence given current demographic trends. Most of Latin America isn't fundamentalist in its religious beliefs, but it's still somewhat more common throughout that region than fundamentalist Protestantism is here.Diesel_dyk wrote:
Anyway, paternalistic champagne socialists are the worst except when compared to religious findamentalists. IMO those two groups do have more than a few things in common.
So I don't see a whole lot of difference between what you said and what I said. You say its a difference of magnitude, I said its a difference of degree.
is it possible for them to look like us? i think yes.
is it possible for us to look like them? i think yes and this outcome would probably more be likely than the other one. Religious nut jobs are like termites eating at the foundation of democracies and individual rights, and you know what they say, if you find one, then you know you've got a lot more.
Well, my usage of magnitude was supposed to imply a much greater sense of degree. Admittedly, it's not the most grammatically correct distinction, but... lolFlaming_Maniac wrote:
Ethics and survival have no place in the same conversation. Their juxtaposition makes no sense because there are there is nothing ethical in being dead.
also
"You say its a difference of magnitude, I said its a difference of degree. "
was amusing
That's a very limited context of survival. For example, I could argue the opposite with things like the Battle of the Alamo.Flaming_Maniac wrote:
Social ethics go out the window when survival in question. e.g. Donner Party.
Maybe. Tribes do better together, but what can be said of a tribe of 10 can't be said of a tribe of 6,000,000,000. We could nuke each other to death, and that would be a direct result of society. Forgo social ethics, forgo society, we don't kill ourselves.Turquoise wrote:
That's a very limited context of survival. For example, I could argue the opposite with things like the Battle of the Alamo.Flaming_Maniac wrote:
Social ethics go out the window when survival in question. e.g. Donner Party.
Situations do dictate behavior to a degree; however, the results of this don't necessarily negate social ethics.
Perhaps, the most accurate way I can put it is... The outcome of a struggle for survival is more likely to be positive if the actions taken keep social ethics intact.
Which makes it, as far as radioactivity goes, pretty much harmless.The water, soil and air in large areas of Iraq, including Baghdad, are contaminated with depleted uranium that has a radioactive half-life of 4.5 billion years.
Last edited by Spark (2010-05-08 23:41:52)