mike pritchard wrote: >I see your point, but take issue with the reciprocity that you >imply. Normally the entity in the subject position of such a >sentence is the 'agent' of the action in the verb and the entity in >the object position is the 'recipient' of the action. Perhaps you >intended 'versus' to express two sides equally dedicated to the >destruction of the other, in which case you could have chosen to >place Islam in the recipient position, but you didn't. I find that >significant, especially in the light of your other remarks.
Well, yes, I do believe that Islam is at fault - is 'the bad guy' - although I also believe the West created the problem in the first place and therefore bears responsibility, which is why I believe we need to sort it out. >mike pritchard wrote: >can you explain (you are under no obligation to, of course) how Bush >can regard this man as a 'man of peace' when it is patently obvious >that he is a monster and a war criminal of long standing. Should the >west be lining up to support his terrorist campaigns against the >Palestine people and their terrorist actions? No, I can't explain why Bush called Sharon a man of peace, except that you can't fall out with everyone at once, I suppose, and Bush clearly prefers Sharon to Arafat, and I don't blame him. Both are old men willing to use young men and women to fight their ideological battles for them, both refuse to see the other's position, but Arafat is so deeply corrupted that it's hard to see how the Palestinians can ever move forward with him in power, and I suppose Bush feels more strongly about that than he does about Sharon's background and motives. > >mike pritchard wrote: >OK, but you referred to [the loss of civil liberties in America] as >almost an afterthought, or at least it sounded to me like a small >price to pay for Bush's 'measured and justified' responses. No, not an afterthought. It's just that we weren't talking about civil liberties. I do think it's a huge price, and an unnecessary price, to pay for September 11th, an excuse by government to do things they'd have wanted to do anyway but wouldn't have dared. The problem with a major terrorist attack is that it puts the terrorism and security experts in charge, makes them able to get their ideas taken seriously, and those people always want more and more security, because that's the nature of the beast. It takes a brave government to say no, we're not going to put security cameras on streets, because the first time there's a terrorist attack that MIGHT have been prevented by security cameras on streets, the public turns round and blames the government for the deaths. This is a general problem with keen-jerk politics, not Bush in particular. mike pritchard wrote: >And why is the west not dedicating itself to bringing down these >repressive regimes where they exist, namely Saudi Arabia, to name >just one country which carries out public executions and shares a >lot of the beliefs you mention in this paragraph? I agree about Saudi Arabia, and it wouldn't surprise me if America turned on them after the Iraqis have been dealt with, although not militarily. But for now, they're needed, not just for oil, but for political support in the Arab world and for their military bases. The Saudi ruling family has played a dangerous game for years - friends of the West on the one hand, financiers of Islamic and Arab terrorism on the other. It's hard to blame them as they're only trying to survive, but they're a British invention and shouldn't be there in the first place. >mike pritchard wrote: > >>Granted, there are individual Moslems who don't believe these >things should happen, just as there are individual Christians who >don't believe in the Virgin Birth. But Islam as practised by the >overwhelming majority of countries in which it's the ruling ideology >does not respect human rights at all.<< > >An absolutely astonishing remark; as condescending as anything I've >ever read anywhere, on any topic. I'm not being deliberately obtuse here - I honestly can't see why that remark is either condescending or astonishing. Name one country where Islam is the ruling ideology, in which human rights are respected, and particularly the rights of women. There may be one - I'm not saying there isn't - but I honestly can't think of it. >mike pritchard wrote: >The Arabs have been a great people for thousands of years. Without >them there would be very little civilised in the modern world. They >could be a great people again if they were not spending all their >time being starved, bombed, denied their human rights, robbed of >their land and being attacked by other 'great' religious orders. Agreed, except they also cause a lot of trouble themselves - e.g. the problems between Syria and Iraq.
