Living in the Ghetto

[zachsan]

.... anyway, what you're saying is that they really hate us. but we can't just drop a bomb on them for hating us. that will just make a lot more of them hate us, and it's strange that i find myself having to say this, but we can't just kill all of them. we need to sway their opinion.

[mortal]

I thought before you said we couldn't sway their opinion. That they just want to win a holy war. If that is the case then i see know other solution.

[zachsan]

alright, sorry if i was unclear.

we can't sway the opinion of the terrorists. them, we need to kill.

the terrorists are religious zealots who want us dead. the common population is regular people that are religious, but hungry and scared. they don't want to kill us; they want to eat, have children, serve allah and die happy.

the terrorists, however, can't survive without the support of the common population. the common population is not composed of terrorists. they help the terrorists, because they're led to believe that this is the way out of their miserable conditions. it's not, and we know that. they don't. we just need to show them that.

if we can show them that, we can cut off the support that the actual zealots are receiving, and then, they'll be easy pickings. if we, however, teach them the opposite lesson - that all americans want to do is kill them and take over - then they will inevitably continue to lend their support to, or even increase their support of, the zealots.

so, in other words, we need to know who our enemy is and isn't. if we can get a leader smart enough to do that, and brave enough to take the appropriate action, there could actually be a forseeable end to this threat.

on a side note, i don't think that's bush or kerry.

[zachsan]

as far as "no other option"... let's say everything i just said is completely false. every last person who lives in the middle east is directly a terrorist and wants us all dead.

even if that were the case, and it's not, america would never participate in what amounts to genocide of an entire region. americans would not tolerate it, and neither would the rest of the world. honestly man, while i agree with a few things that you've written in the past, that kind of suggestion makes it hard to take what you're saying seriously.

[mortal]

After all the crap I've read on this thread it is hard for me to take anything anyone on here says seriously. Except Doc of course. He seems to be the only one who isn't a treehugging hippy.

[mortal]

Zachsan

I do admit that was a good last post.


lol What things have I said that you agree with? I didn't know we agreed on anything. lo

You should be a diplomat. You really are good at pretneding to be on both sides.

[zachsan]

heh, i don't know, i'm sure there was something.

i'm pretty much just on my own side... but i don't think it's so uncommon to think that once you start something, whether or not it was a good idea in hindsight, you might as well see it through to the end.

[dogchow108]

goddamn, how did i miss this conversation?!

i literally dont even know where to start

[mortal]

Lolo

[daodejing]

I hug trees from time to time, but I also beat them with fists and solid iron staves until they bleed sap. And then I bow to them and bless their health and strength, and thank them for allowing me to strengthen myself by beating on them.

Death, life, war, peace, whatever the ****. Forget dichotomy, remember your divinity. We are God, and some of the oppressed peoples of the world are doing their best to remind the U.S. government of that. That doesn't make it right or wrong, **** if I were palestinian by birth sacrificing my life to blow up ariel sharon and a large military fortification would seem like a damnably attractive idea, especially if someone was telling me it would secure my way into paradise.

Our anger will destroy as surely as our love can liberate us. Our anger can liberate us as surely as our love will destroy us. Death and birth are bull****. We are being born and dying every moment as individuals on a cellular level.

Mortal, you seem quite angry. So much so that you're anger angers me. It's not that anger is unjustified, just that its unreasonable in my current paradigm. If civilians in the middle east are "animals", then by biologically and ethically speaking, your mother is an "animal". If you agree that this gives me the right to drop bombs on your mom's house and dance on her grave then I agree with all you've posted in this thread. But I doubt you can agree to that as much as I doubt I could agree to that.

If you really beleived what you're saying, you'd be enrolled in the marine corp by now.

My point is that there is no point. Our anger can undo us as quickly as our penitence or our our pleasure.

Remember the middle path. Those who walk the extremes while living in the ghetto are those who die young. There's nothing wrong with dying young, but I shall strive to walk upon this path which has no name. Walk whatever path you will, but I beg you, let go of your rage.

[zachsan]

that's like asking me to let go of my jack daniels.

[mortal]

I guess being at the trade center during the first bombing and working on the 79th floor during 9/11 has left me justifiably bitter and jaded. So I lash out at the ridiculus posts I have been reading.

As far as joining the marines. That is not what I want to do with my life. By personal choice. It doesn't mean I don't have the right to feel the way I do.

If people are dancing in the street when my friends are dying. Then they are not innocent and they should die.
I'm sorry if that pisses you off. Just how I feel.

[zachsan]

'cuz i mean, there's no way i'm letting go of my jack daniels.

[dogchow108]

Originally posted by daodejing
We are God, and some of the oppressed peoples of the world are doing their best to remind the U.S. government of that.

goddamnit, there it is again making it sound like the US government is the enemy of the opressed people of the world. what about the creators and maintainers as such of the opressed people of the world? what about the people who kill on sight, mutilate and blackmail the opressed who dont want to be opressed?

BTW, Dao, in the same logic if you really believed what YOU say you'd be living naked in the wilderness, not posting on the information superhighway.

[doc]

This whole thing started out as a thread on living in a ghetto.

LOL.

Did you know that Christopher Reeve shaves his head now?