SubJeff on 25/9/2013 at 11:07

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Of course it would be ideal if there was no violence at all!

But sadly there is. I know that the terrorists feel they have legitimate reasons for doing what they do and I've also no doubt that drone strikes and the like, when they kill civilians, galvanise some people and turn them into haters who may become terrorists.

This s a complex issue and I'm not hoping to come up with a solution because I don't think I ever can.

I started the thread because I find it odd/interesting that there is a powerful religious element to much (not all) of the violent unrest in the world at the moment. People say religion is the cause of all wars and that's clearly nonsense. But at the moment it seems to be tied up in a whole lot of violent business.

Gryzemuis on 25/9/2013 at 11:42

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It's good that we agree here. :)
Thinking about what I wrote, it's maybe about what Faetal wrote. The western media portray muslims (and especially fighting muslims) as weird nutcases wielding guns and shooting in the air. We forget that even the most fanatical extremist does have his reasons for why he fights.


I think it's the nature of religion.
Maybe religion is not the direct cause, but it sure as hell is being used as justification.

The last couple of centuries (1500s - 1900s) Christianity has engulfed the world. With violence. Colonialism. European countries took control over the world population. Killing zillions. Enslaving them. Genocide (e.g. the native Americans). Robbing their wealth. All not because of religion. But because of greed. But how did they justify their terrible actions ? They justified it with religion. Christians were the true people. Everybody else were savages. Hardly distinguishable from beasts. The bible said so. So it was alright to treat them like beasts.

What I want to say is: people feel violence is acceptable when religion gives them justification. Gives them an excuse. It doesn't seem to matter whether it's Christianity, Islam or Judaism. I always thought only Buddism was free of violence. Well, (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/burmamyanmar/10265942/Buddhists-burn-Muslim-homes-and-shops-in-Burma.html) I was (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Persecution_of_Muslims_in_Burma#2012_Rakhine_State_violence.2Friots) wrong there too.

faetal on 25/9/2013 at 17:50

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Most of you have missed my point. My point is that for the US to decide that civilian casualties is just an unavoidable side-effect of war, then they assume some things:

1) The war must happen. As in, is necessary to the point that they're willing to kill innocents to get it done.

2) The lives of civilians of other countries don't really matter. Since neither Iraq or Afghanistan were self-defence and seem more agenda-orientated - those lives are basically written off as the cost of operating the way they want to.

I like that e.g. DDL accepts that there is remorse just because that's the official line. I'm sure there is none at all, since they know full well that operating the way they do guarantees civilian casualties. The remorse is just there as a latch for people to grab on to when they can't bear the weight of their country essentially behaving like psychopaths on the global stage. This whole viewpoint begins by dehumanising the occupants of other countries, including those who fight back. We assume that they are evil, wild, deranged, fanatical because otherwise, how could they possibly do what they do? We don't for a second think to blame the bellicose nature of our own country's foreign policy. It's like we're happy to sit back and pay our taxes so that our leaders can use high explosives to write FUCK YOU into the psyche of foreign countries, simply because our politicians have said some things on the news designed to justify it. But then we get all incredulous when these people get desperate enough to risk their own lives, often lose their own lives to make a dent somewhere and all we can do is howl with incredulity that they broke some RULE of war. Like these people with home made explosives and second hand, soviet bloc weaponry should stand against the technologically superior armed forces, or they should just never fight back, or just let themselves die, otherwise they are evil, fanatical terrorists.

Very few of the people here know how fucking terrifying it is to have US drones attack. Having to call children inside whenever you hear something strange in the air in case they get gunned down for moving too quickly in the wrong place - having to avoid hanging around outside in groups in case you are mistaken for militants. It doesn't matter about intent - it matters that the lives of these people are considered "expendable" and I'm sorry but LittleFlower is right - if the war on drugs was netting a 5% false positive rate for deaths, then it absolutely would be called off or scaled back. But the fact is that the media portrays people in the middle east as essentially different from regular people, because of their odd language, food, religion, governments, precisely so we don't have any inherent feel for them as being just like us. That way, when our tax money is being used to kill them more or less randomly (holy fuck, we thought that group of kids were terrorists lol - sorry, terrible, unfortunate, collateral damage *sad face*) in other countries who were not threatening us in any way, we can feel slightly better that they're not real people, they're crazy middle-eastern types, who probably cheered on 9/11 and therefore are not worth as much as nice, white folk who party at the weekends and love freedom*

* - Our freedom of course being to vote in the lesser of two evils in the hope we don't get so badly fucked this time

Pyrian on 25/9/2013 at 21:52

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Isn't that what you're telling them to do? We're very much on the "launching rockets, invading streets, and dominating airspace" side of the equation. We take a handful of explosions now and then, but nobody's invading our streets or dominating our airspace, nor was there any realistic threat thereof.

The people we call terrorists routinely target military installations, personnel, and convoys with IED's and the like. The most famous attacks on U.S. soil were not simply civilian targets, but economic ones - international trade in particular.

Of course it was. Often, and vociferously. To this day, a deep South politician will cite Jesus for pretty much anything. That wasn't any less true then - probably more.

june gloom on 25/9/2013 at 22:58

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This is very true. Some justifications cite specific mentions of slavery throughout the Bible, but one justification actually uses Noah's son Ham. Ham has been interpreted as the ancestor of black Africans, and Noah's curse ("A servant of servants shall he be unto his brethren") is seen as justification for slavery. There was a lot of religious justification for slavery in the American South, same as there remains a lot of religious justification for homophobia today. The South has traditionally been very, very conservative Christian -- it's why folks like Fred Phelps get a pass, and people seen as "strange" (for something as simple as dying your hair a different color, even a natural one) can be ostracized. It's been this way since there was a South.