Ineth

Oh please. Spare me that conspiracy theory notion of capitalism as some kind of mythical cabal acting as a single entity. We have access to hundreds (thousands?) of competing news outlets. The idea that collectively, they give us less full and fair access to information about world events, than a centralized state-sponsored media would, is absolutely ludicrous.

The media should be independent of the government. Not independent of its audience's interests. Of course every country's media prioritizes reports about events in their part of the world. Media must be in big part independent of it's audience interests as well, or it will turn to biased bull****. Like that video, which I have linked yesterday, one or two pages ago. It's very challenging to do it correctly, so most of the media rather does not do it at all. Or you want to hear from media only stuff, to which you, as audience completely agree? I said "interests", not "ideology". I'd like the media I consume to strive for impartiality and fairness in any story they cover. But which stories are covered to which amount, naturally depends on the audiences' areas of interest. After all, you can't force people to read or view things they aren't that interested in and withhold coverage of events people are interested in. Not unless the government grants your media outlet a monopoly and suppresses other news sources. But I suppose that's exactly your and alum's ideal view of the media: State-sponsored "education" by the academic "elite", with the purpose of getting the backwards masses to "think correctly". Me, I view media as a service on the free market. Fairness and ethical journalistic standards are crucial for making this service valuable to me; total global comprehensiveness not nearly as much.

Maybe, but in any case it wasn't "in that area" (Asia).

The media should be independent of the government. Not independent of its audience's interests. Of course every country's media prioritizes reports about events in their part of the world. So they say. Though there's some sleigh of hand involved in making that argument. Thailand pretty much immediately surrendered to Japan in WW2, and then when Japan was loosing, switched sides and threw themselves at the feet of the USA instead. So while they weren't technically conquered, they weren't exactly independent either.

[Citation needed.] Or is this the inevitable part of the discussion where the anti-Western zealots descend into throwing around random accusations and expletives to see what sticks? PS: Reminds me of how Antizionists used to persistently accuse the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) of "systematically raping" Palestinian women as some kind of sick racist oppression power-play... without ever providing any evidence for that slander. But then one of those Antizionists did her doctoral thesis on that topic, subjecting it to actual research, and found that the IDF had actually one of the lowest rape rates of any army in the world - even though it is currently engaged in an armed conflict and most other armies are not. And so, without batting an eye, the Antizionists (including the one who did the research) effortlessly switched their narrative to "Not raping Palestinian women proves just how racist the IDF is!!!"

Do you really not see a difference between Not taking initiative to publicly mourn something, as long as no-one is asking you to.and Actively showing disrespect and spite for other people's mourning, like booing(!) a minute of silence.? Let's just disingenuously group both of those under "not caring enough" and equivocate away? PS: Also, it makes perfect sense for FIFA to a have a minute of silence when a major terrorist attack happened right next to its own soccer game, and the terrorists in fact tried to target that game's audience and players - while not having a minute of silence for every other unrelated tragedy around the world.

With all due respect Qistina, your last post reads like a parody. When taken at face value, your Nazi adoration and casual antisemitism makes you sound like you have a ridiculously distorted view of the Western world and its history, and have been socialized with very little awareness of the wrongfulness of stereotyping and vilifying minorities (like Jews) whom you probably know nothing about from personal experience. The funniest part, of course, is when you suggest that the Germans would consider beer "filth" that needs to be "cleaned out"...

--- Moved from here into is own thread, by request. --- "land theft and ethnic cleansing in Palestine" You can't seriously believe that this is a fair description of the Israel-Palestine conflict. PS: The only event in modern history in the region of Palestine which actually fits the definition of "ethnic cleansing", was when the Kingdom of Jordan - having annexed the Westbank and East Jerusalem in 1948 - expelled all (!) Jewish inhabitants from those territories per official decree and destroyed the Synagogues and Jewish buildings. (Before that, East Jerusalem was known as the "Jewish Quarter" and had been predominantly Jewish for many centuries - since long before Zionism. That Antizionists now histrionically call for recognition of East Jerusalem as "the capital of the Palestinian state" and slur Jews who have returned to the Jewish Quarter as "settlers", is just one of the many absurdities in this conflict.) "if Arabs would declare an Islamic State in New York, declare race laws" is a ridiculous comparison. A more sensible one would be to imagine an alternative timeline where:: The USA fought on the wrong side of a world war lost, ceasing to exist as a country in its known form and re-establishing itself as a much smaller country around Washington, while leaving the remaining territories - which are very sparsely populated in this timeline - under the oversight of the UN with the objective to establish new countries there. --> cf. the downfall of the Ottoman Empire after WW1 Ethnic Mexicans for some reason don't have Mexico in this hypothetical timeline, but used to have a country in nowadays' South Texas, and have been longing to return there for a long time. So they started a movement to immigrate there while the US still existed. Some even dreamed of establishing a Mexican country there again someday - but for now they were contend to just live there under US rule. --> cf. the start of Zionism Imagine, further, that these Mexicans immigrated legally into Southern Texas, and legally bought land (or cultivated unclaimed desert land) there in accordance with US law - and then after the fall of the US, in accordance with the laws of the UN Mandate for South Texas. --> cf. Palestinian Jews However, racial tensions arise. While South Texas was mostly empty before the Mexicans started immigrating, the few inhabited communities that did exist, were mostly, ...say, German Americans. They were all the descendants of immigrants of previous centuries, who - just like the Mexicans now - had legally immigrated from elsewhere in accordance with US laws. --> cf. Palestinian Arabs When the UN allows multiple new ethnic German countries to be established in North and East Texas, the German Americans in South Texas want the same for their region, and the idea of Pan-German Nationalism for the whole region gains traction. Of course, this requires getting rid of the ethnic Mexicans. --> cf. Pan-Arab Nationalism The Mexican Americans, in turn, also want to fulfill their dream of their own state. However, in contrast with their German neighbors, they don't demand exclusivity in the region - even a small state would be fine with them, as long as they can live in peace. However, agreeing on borders becomes difficult. Because while South Texas used to be mostly empty and underdeveloped before all of this, it is not anymore now, a few decades after the fall of the US. The many Mexican immigrants had caused an economic boom and established an infrastructure of roads and hospitals etc. that was far superior to the surrounding regions, which had in turn caused many German Americans from surrounding regions to migrate to South Texas as well. The German Americans declare themselves the legitimate people of South Texas, and start to label the Mexican Americans as "intruders". They claim that they "were there first", which is however only true on average - the detailed demographics are complicated:The oldest family lines in the region are in fact ethnic Mexicans. --> cf. Old Jews About half the ethnic Germans immigrated 100 to 500 years ago. --> cf. pre-Zionist Palestinian Arabs Most of the ethnic Mexicans immigrated during the last 60 years. --> cf. Zionist Jews The other half of the ethnic Germans immigrated during the last 30 years. --> cf. the many Arab immigrants from Egypt etc. who are now also part of the "Palestinians" Racial violence erupts, incl. terrorist attacks. But there is a difference: The attacks on Mexicans are officially supported and coordinated by the highest leaders of the German community, while attacks on Germans are carried out by fringe radical groups on the Mexican side and not supported by the Mexican community leaders. When the UN realizes that getting them all to live together peacefully is not going to happen, it comes up with a partition plan. The ethnic Mexicans accept it, and declare their new state on their allocated territory. --> Israel The leaders of the ethnic Germans, however, cling to their racist fantasy of getting the entire region exclusively for themselves (something which was never the case before) and wanting all South Texas to become a German nation state (something which never existed there before). So, together with all of the surrounding German nations, they declare war against the new Mexican state. The goal: Total extermination. To the world's surprise, the Mexicans win the war. --> The Israeli "War of Independence" The Mexican State follows up on its victory by closing its borders. Ethnic Germans residing inside that territory at the time when the war ended, are allowed to stay and get full citizenship. However, those who had lived there previously but had fled the turmoil of the war, are not allowed back in. --> The "Nakba" On the other side of the border, all ethnic Mexicans are expelled. The surrounding German countries also force most of their Jewish inhabitants out. --> The Jewish refugees displaced by the same war, which don't have a catchy name like "Nakba" but were actually greater in number. The Mexicans refugees find new homes - many in the new Mexican state, others in other parts of the world. The German refugees, however, are put in refugee camps by their leaders, and the surrounding German states refuse to give them citizenship and allow them to find new homes. Even German refugees who, prior to the war, had lived in areas now under German control, are prohibited from returning there. They are held in limbo as political bargaining chips by said nations in their continued quest to try to defeat the Mexican state. A few decades later, after yet another failed attempt to defeat the Mexican state militarily, the German Americans of South Texas start to embark on a new strategy of getting the world to believe their narrative of "Germans-Americans = legitimate natives, Mexican-Americans = foreign intruders": They re-brand themselves as a new ethnicity, separate from the surrounding German nations, and start to refer to themselves as "The Southtexans". That's right, they're now using what was previously a neutral name for the region, as the name for their ethnicity. The Mexicans think such semantic games are silly and do not need much attention. After all, who would be fooled by that? ...Boy o boy were they wrong: Fast forward another few decades, and now we have tens of millions of college students and left-wing MPs and Internet commenters all around the world, who have swallowed the Anti-Mexican narrative hook like and sinker: The region is called South Texas, so "obviously" it belongs to the Southtexans by right! The Mexicans are "obviously" foreign invaders and "land thieves"! --> Modern Antizionism And so it comes that hordes of Antizionists in the Western World, believe that they are advancing Peace and Justice™ by willingly participating in the (now a century old) quest to bring about the racist fantasy of a Jew-free Middle East and a "Palestinian state" that encompasses the entire geographic region of Palestine minus the part now inhabited by the Kingdom of Jordan (even though such a state has never existed before and has no moral or legal justification for "needing" to exist).

It was only a matter of time before our die-hard Antizionists would turn up ITT and blame Israel for everything... "30 years ago, political Islamism was not on the map" The greater Islamist movement emerged pretty naturally as the "successor" of the Pan-Arab Nationalism movement, which disintegrated in the 1960s. This history is closely intertwined with the transition from medieval Sharia societies to modern nation states, and would have likely played out very similarly even if Israel did not exist and the USA did not meddle. "fight back to protect their rights" ISIS does not 'fight back' against anything, nor does is fight to protect anyone's rights. It fights to establish a Caliphate and enslave the people of Syria and Iraq under the rule of this Caliphate. They consider this to be their religious duty, and believe that it will play a vital part in the impending apocalypse. ---rest of the post has been moved to its own thread---

That's a parody, not an actual ISIS sympathizer. It makes a good point though, and deserves to be quoted here: "We did this because our holy texts exhort us to to do it." "No you didn't." "Wait, what? Yes we did..." "No, this has nothing to do with religion. You guys are just using religion as a front for social and geopolitical reasons." "WHAT!? Did you even read our official statement? We give explicit Quranic justification. This is jihad, a holy crusade against pagans, blasphemers, and disbelievers." "No, this is definitely not a Muslim thing. You guys are not true Muslims, and you defame a great religion by saying so." "Huh!? Who are you to tell us we're not true Muslims!? Islam is literally at the core of everything we do, and we have implemented the truest most literal and honest interpretation of its founding texts. It is our very reason for being." "Nope. We created you. We installed a social and economic system that alienates and disenfranchises you, and that's why you did this. We're sorry." "What? Why are you apologizing? We just slaughtered you mercilessly in the streets. We targeted unwitting civilians - disenfranchisement doesn't even enter into it!" "Listen, it's our fault. We don't blame you for feeling unwelcome and lashing out." "Seriously, stop taking credit for this! We worked really hard to pull this off, and we're not going to let you take it away from us." "No, we nourished your extremism. We accept full blame." "OMG, how many people do we have to kill around here to finally get our message across?"

Yes, if these Mosques are allowing Hate Speech then you need to close them down...harsh but fair No, it's a terrible idea. If individuals associated with those mosques were actively helping (e.g. financing / recruiting for) terrorist organizations, and the police knew about it, then the police can (and would) already arrest those individuals. So that's not what this is about. The "speech of hate" part suggests that what the people in those mosques are doing is not in fact participating in terror networks, but merely expressing opinions. Opinions which the majority of society might consider offensive and disgusting, but which must nonetheless be protected as free speech.

I think Baro is expressing a prediction, not a hope...

I was there, and loved that there was nowhere any garbage lying around. I seriously wish, that something like that, would be enforced in my country and in many EU countries, which I've visited as well... Do these count? Defeated the Nazis and Imperial Japan --> Germany and Japan became modern liberal democracies and allies. Defended South Korea from Communism --> South Korea became a modern liberal democracy and ally. (Look at North Korea to get an impression of what it would have otherwise become.) Deterred China from invading Taiwan --> Taiwan became a modern liberal democracy and ally. Put a stop to Soviet expansionism and supported democracy/freedom movements in the Eastern Block --> The Soviet Union is gone and countries like Poland and the Czech Republic have become modern liberal democracies and allies.

Apparently the attackers had even more horrific plans for the soccer stadium, but were foiled by the security guards: "At least one of the attackers outside France’s national soccer stadium had a ticket to the game and attempted to enter the 80,000-person venue [...]. The attacker was discovered wearing an explosives vest when he was frisked at the entrance to the stadium about 15 minutes into the game. [...] While attempting to back away from security, [...] the attacker detonated the vest."

Ah. I didn't look at the different dates of the tweets...

Wait, what do 4chan and American guns have to do with anything?

Assigning "responsibility" for an action not to the human actors but to an abstract concept, is IMO too polemical and does not help clarity. It's undeniable that radical Islam (as a worldview/tradition with millions1 of followers) is very relevant to these terror acts and to understanding/preventing them, and the "Nothing to do with Islam because [No True Scotsman]!!" knee-jerk response from the political left just seems trite at this point. But lets not use that as an excuse to get carried away. Responsibility lies with the individuals who planned and carried out the attack. --- 1) Note that I did not say "billion".

Depends on your definition of "came from". The medieval Christian church cultivated the first tradition of large-scale Jew hatred, but that does not mean that there's a causal link from it to every later tradition of Jew hatred. The Islamic world, for example, (re-)discovered it all on their own. In both cases (Christianity and Islam) it seems to have emerged in a similar fashion: Both of those religions tried to initially latch on to Judaism and "extend" / "complete" / "replace" it, but the Jews had no interest in them and kept doing their own thing - which left the followers of those "new" religions vindictive. The Nazi's hatred of Jews, was a different beast though. The religion-based medieval Jew hatred had started to slowly die down in Western Europe ever since the Age of Enlightenment, and wasn't an active threat anymore by the 20th century. However, during the second half of the 19th century, a new form of antisemitism had arisen: One that despised Jews as an ethnicity or social group, rather than a religion. The inventors of this new Jew hatred, and btw. also the ones who introduced the term "antisemitic" (meant as a joking euphemism), were the Socialists of that time. Due to historical reasons reaching back to Medieval laws, Jews were disproportionately represented among bankers and similar professions in Europe, so for propaganda purposes the Socialists chose to portray Jews as the "face" of their boogeyman Capitalism. In history class you've likely seen some nasty Nazi propaganda posters of the "dirty big-nosed Jew grabbing bags of money" type. The Nazis did not invent them, they plagiarized them from almost-identically looking Socialist propaganda posters of prior decades. Remember that the Nazi party literally emerged from the fringe Socialist milieu - it did not get its name by mistake. Obviously, the fact the traditional Christian type of Jew hatred was still lingering dormant among the population, made things easier for the Nazis. But to claim that antisemitism in its National Socialist (and Islamist) manifestation "came from" Christianity, is a little too simplistic.

Really, your first response is to wildly equivocate? Which Western country has persecution against Muslims that comes anywhere close to the same ballpark as the persecution against the local Christian minorities in the countries at the top of the Open Doors watch-list? Could you imagine a Sweden or Australia where, when you're discovered to have expressed disbelief in Christianity or that you own a holy book other than the Bible, you are publicly beaten while the police watch, or loose your Citizenship and are thrown out of the country, or disappear into a torture prison? If a watch-list of countries with religious persecution against Muslims was made by the same standards as that Open Doors list, then: The top spots would all be filled with Sunni countries persecuting Shiites and the other way around. Countries like North Korea and China which are hostile to all religions, would of course also make the list. So might Burma, Srilanka and Thailand, due to pogroms and government-sanctioned human rights abuses. Western countries would at best get an honorable mention, for isolated incidents of anti-Muslim violence by radicals which are however universally condemned within those societies and efficiently prosecuted by the authorities. (And Switzerland would get a minor mention for its ban on building minarets on top of mosques.) Yes, so goes the mantra of cultural relativism. I for one believe in universal human rights. Every human being deserves freedom of conscious/religion and freedom of speech. Yeah that was Malaysia I think. Indonesia is a little more complicated - while Islamic-motivated persecution of religious minorities definitely exists there, and sometimes even in very severe forms, it is AFAIK much more localized to certain areas of the country, and not backed by national government institutions.

The Maldives, where the level of persecution against the Christian minority is rated1 "Extreme" - at rank #11 among all countries of the world, before Saudi Arabia? As for Malaysia, it ranks "only" #37 on that watchlist, but my own visit there a few years ago gave me the impression of a repressive society where Islam is not just the majority religion of the population, but de-facto the state religion - being unapologetically and unfairly backed by government bureaucracy, law enforcement, and legal system. Christian churches seemed to be tolerated as long as they sticked to themselves, but lived in fear of random police raids against their congregations for allegations like "subverting Islam" or "encouraging apostacy from Islam". Atheist/agnostic groups consisting of ethnic Malays (rather than foreigners) did not seem to be present at all in the public sphere, though likely existed in secret. Foreigners seemed to have more leeway, but ethnic Malays from Muslim families seemed to have little choice but to officially stay "Muslim", because apostasy meant having to live with severe discrimination and acts of retaliation from any neighbors, employers, public servants, police officers, judges, etc. they'd come in contact with for the rest of their lives. Some of the conversations with people there, even casual ones, left me with newfound appreciation for the level of religious freedom and freedom of speech that exists in the West. Of course it's possible that the people I met and information I absorbed, was unrepresentative or I misinterpreted it etc., and of course my visit to the country lasted only three weeks. But hey, you said we should base our opinion of the tolerance of Muslim societies on our own visits rather than Fox News, so here you go... -------- 1) By Open Doors, the most well-known NGO for cataloging global religious persecution of Christians. Themselves a Christian organization, but I consider it reliable.

Fair enough.

"I rarely had the opportunity to bring up other kinds of issues, like gameplay balance, maps, and combat, because there were so many other problems with sexism in game design and so few other people pointing them out." Soooo... basically she didn't do the work she was hired for, but instead used her job as a platform for full-time SJWing? And when this made her unpopular with both male and female co-workers and thus negatively affected her career, she concluded that she's being persecuted for her gender as part of an industry-wide conspiracy? Sounds like a radfem alright. "the worst part about it was the gaslighting that happened with me when I tried to point out the problem. [...] When I held firm and kept insisting that such a scene was a problem, I was told it wasn’t, and that I was wrong." Yes, how dare the coworkers disagree with her assessments! Don't they know that when a SJW judges something to be "problematic", that verdict is indisputable and the only valid response is to duck and apologize? Disagreement is violence!

It seems the only group more melodramatic than the SJWs is the anti-SJWs. Apparently the intended tongue-in-cheek tone of my Communism reference was lost in translation... I look mostly with amusement at the Ivy League student SJWs and their heroic struggle to become even more sheltered from reality as they already are... I don't think they pose a real danger to democracy or society as a whole. They probably will find ways to professionally annoy and pester people for the rest of their lives though - or as Popehat puts it: We'll just have to put up with them.

For Fighter, Paladin, and Monk you can safely dump INT. But not for the Barbarian. He needs INT to develop his full potential.