Charlie Hebdo Atrocity

That's true, the terms are vague and ill-defined. Still, the more extreme political voices tend to self-identify as right or left, and to identify anyone who disagrees with them as the opposite and therefore automatically a bad thing.

 

F

From the camel's mouth. Do any so-called British Muslims really want to live like this?

Islamic State publishes list of punishments.
Do this - you die. Do that - you die. Do anything at all - you die. Think this - you die. Think that - you die. Think anything at all - you die. Engage brain - you die.

Blasphemy - death. Adultery - death. Theft - lose hand. Spying for the unbelievers -death. Terrorising people - exile: Islamic State publishes list of punishments | Daily Mail Online

 

Brilliantly put!

 

* In the run up to the 1992 Maastricht Treaty the europhobes predicted it would never be agreed - but they were wrong and it was agreed.
* When the EMS was set up, the europhobes predicted it wouldn't work - but they were wrong and it did work.
* In the run up to the 1999 launch of the Euro currency, the europhobes predicted it would never happen - but they were wrong and it did happen - and they predicted it would rapidly collapse - but they were wrong and it did not collapse.
* Ever since, the europhobes have predicted no countries would want to join the Euro - but they were wrong and countries have been queuing up to join ever since (latest being Lithuania this month) so there are 19 member states and a vast number of informal user states and pegged currencies.
* The first time there was a major economic crisis, the europhobes predicted that the Euro would collapse - but when the worldwide crisis hit, the Euro weathered the storm and they were wrong.

Could there possibly be a pattern here? Those who oppose the Euro for doctrinaire reasons have continually claimed to make "predictions" of doom which are not balanced forecasts based on facts or informed analyses of the situation, but are simply mischief-making. And it seems they are still doing it.

 

I have never condoned the murders. I have done the opposite. However, given the barbaric nature of many Muslim societies, I am not surprised there have been murders. I don't think anyone can be surprised.

 

We sit on our hands all the time. How many examples would you like?

 

if you don't want to pick a fight then you should not make such sweeping and insulting statements based on your on obvious ignorance .. without going into detail I can assure you I have been to many parts of the world for many different reasons and experienced many different cultures and level of wealth / poverty,, that is partly why I can see the little England attitude for exactly what it is ...

 

For poor countries the euro is great. Even so Greece will be forced to leave it soon

 

Amazing, 4 people don't believe we are not responsible for the Iraq war. That's the point of a democracy, it's a 2 way street.

Either that or 4 people don't agree that barbaric cultures which behead women, hand out 1000 lashes for having a blog, produces people with similarly barbaric natures. This is cultural hegemony, something which has been recognised since the late 19th century. It doesn't make it right, but ignoring it doesn't mean it doesn't exist.

 

And in business I have experienced the corruption that causes that poverty and that convinces me that a lot of the world has a great deal of catching up to do. We do not need to be infected by it. And the fact that it exists is the reason so many decent people are are queuing up to get into Britain - sadly, along with the criminals. Look at what happened when Cuba opened up its borders. Miami became the Cuban crime centre of the world. End of.

 

This relates only to a tranche of people all now aged 45 or so, not to the whole population. Still, the disparity between men and women as regards religion is an ever-interesting phenomenon. No-one actually knows the reason(s), so we are free to speculate. The notion that more women than men are naïve, credulous, and easily fooled will not go down well in some quarters, no doubt. But what alternative explanations are there?

 

Not picking on 749er - I have seen many people express the same sentiment.

What is meant by the question, "Why is anyone surprised that there are murders in such cases"? Is the presence or absence of surprise at such a turn of events in any way relevant to how we view them? Are the victims any less dead had we seen this coming? Are their lives any less worthwhile if we had seen it?

When people ask, "Are you really surprised?", are they secretly saying, "They got what's coming to them!" instead?
No, I refuse to believe that. Rather, I think they are saying, "They brought their fate upon themselves and should not have acted in such a way". Is that the case?

"Show a little respect!" - or you'll die, that's just how it is.
"Don't offend people!" - or you will be killed, that's how it works.

What is the message here?

Do we need laws that protect people from being offended? Do we need specific laws to protect the sensibilities of Muslims? Just Muslims? What of Sikhs? Christians? Scientologists? Jedi believers? Where is the line drawn, and why?

Or not laws - how about "common sense"? (Trick question, we've already established here that there's no such thing ) Common decency instead? Would anyone care to set down the rules for common decency?

Is there free speech or isn't there? Has it had its day?

Again, this is not directed at 749er.

 

i am so glad it was you that said that and not me. doesn't mean i wasn't thinking it sshh. :smile:

 

I wholeheartedly agree. And isn't it strange how those who proudly wear their dogmatic - and some would say - ignorant views as a badge of honour (mentioning no names) seem to take great pleasure in insulting others by calling them ignorant?

 

This is perhaps the most laughable comment on this whole thread. It is so laughable that a large part of me suspects that it was written to be laughed at. I now have this image of TTonup as Rik in the Young Ones. It's got to be its own satire - which is very appropriate considering the nature of this thread. So I suppose that if that is the case, I shouldn't be falling into the trap of replying to it to further TTonup's amusement. Still, on the off-chance that it was in fact meant to be serious:

"we rob and steal the oil from mostly muslim countries"
"We" (that's you, then, as you fill up your Ducati - er.. spot the hypocrisy there?) don't steal anything. We pay for it. The oil-owning Arabs were a bunch of tribes living in the desert and herding goats before the West showed up, found their oil for them, and suggested they'd like to buy it. They took it upon themselves to create the companies and supply all the engineering and geological expertise to make that happen. The market they had for it came from their own inventions. Apart from lighting the odd oil lamp, the Arabs had no use for it.

Far from being left penniless, the Arabs used their considerable new-found wealth to buy up large bits of West London, football teams and foreign companies. They then lived in luxury doing not a stroke of work if they could avoid it, whilst they imported foreign labour from third world countries (often, if not overwhelmingly, Muslim) whom they paid a pittance to do all their work for them. They came to the West on shopping sprees (seeing as they didn't make anything much) and to drink alcohol and go to night clubs.
What they didn't do was use their wealth to create world-class universities, unless it was to study a mediaeval text - for that there has always been plenty of resources.

The obscene wealth they now enjoyed was ripped off by despotic rulers to build palaces, and buy lots of weapons (often from the West) to subjugate their peoples to ensure the continuity of their comfortable position. None of this would be possible if the West were "stealing their oil" instead of buying it.

"we over tax it to a position where it is among the most expensive in the world,, we then spend the tax on guns to protect ourselves from those that we have stolen from"
No mate, I think you'll find that most of the tax goes on the roads you ride on, your free compulsory education (doesn't look as if it was money well spent), the NHS, and the entire infrastructure of the country you are unhappy to call home. What this tax has to do with the matter under discussion eludes me (unless you think in your conspiracist-theory mind that petrol tax is spent exclusively on armaments).

While many countries in Asia have pulled themselves out of the paddy-fields by keeping their heads down and working, in most Muslim countries (with the exception of Malaysia, probably) the population has chosen to adopt a simplistic mindset of the victimised. Whilst they may find fault with their despotic rulers, it's a whole lot safer to take to the streets and blame the West for their misery, as that way they won't be locked up in a hellhole and tortured by said despots. It's something that suits the despots in any case - keeps the local population in line.

The oil-rich nations are squandering a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. Soon the world will move on from oil and they will sink without trace unless they invest this wealth in something that has some future. Even today with the oil price now less than $50 a barrel, this is already beginning to happen. They choose to stand still, but the world does not. Shiny shopping malls are not going to secure their future. They really do have their head in the sand...

Still, just keep reading the internet for your world view. Don't bother reading any history or books and you can carry on living in your deluded bubble. To start to be at peace with yourself, I think the Ducati has got to go.

 

Good point. Saudi and the other Arabian countries could have invested their wealth in facilities to manufacture cars, or planes, or ships, or computers, or vaccines. They could have invested it universities to nurture a generation of scientists, engineers, and thinkers. But actually they have done none of this. They have pissed the money away on trinkets and oppression instead. Heads in the sand indeed.

 

The fact that the journalists knew there was inherent danger in what they were doing is irrelevant as they were behaving in a way entirely in keeping with the laws and manner of France. Imagine that instead of taking offence at pictures of the PM it was for example the sight of a woman riding a motorcycle or an advert on TV selling bacon or the fact that some shops sell alcohol that is enough to cause so much offence as to incite muslims to murder. What would you say then ? Surely you would not suggest quitting biking for those oh so sensitive souls.
Most if not all of us do something that is against Islam, just because they have not started shooting us for it yet does not mean we should sit back and wait till we are in their sights.
I`m not sure I have the balls to put my life in danger in the way those journalists did but I have huge respect and admiration for those that do.