British Legion Poppies

Gavin

booty bass intellectual
AAAARGGHHH, will you PLEASE stop dogmatically repeating over and over and over again the doctrine that the 'Insurgency' is primarily an armed uprising against the American occupation and realise that most of its victims are themselves IRAQIS, and most of them civilians. Can you please do this? Is it really that hard?
Fucksake.

This is where I don't bother reposting the graph of insurgent attacks for the third time clearly showing that 75% of reported attacks are still against the occupation forces. Fucksake.
 

Gavin

booty bass intellectual
Well what are YOU doing about any of this? I mean YOU, personally? Chained yourself to any railings lately? Gone on a hunger strike?

Still so hung up on individual responsibility, eh? Mostly I'm getting fucked up and lying in bed awake at night. VIVA DEMOCRACYZ
 

zhao

there are no accidents
most of its (the Insurgency's) victims are themselves IRAQIS, and most of them civilians.

and what exactly is the point you want to make with this?

do you think Afghans needed to be saved from the Taliban (themselves) by American Liberators too?
 

Mr. Tea

Let's Talk About Ceps
This is where I don't bother reposting the graph of insurgent attacks for the third time clearly showing that 75% of reported attacks are still against the occupation forces. Fucksake.

That may well be true, if you're talking about the number of attacks: I'm talking about the number of victims. On the basis that an armoured personal carrier is less vulnerable to explosives than, say, a marketplace full of women or a bunch of kids on a school bus, i.e. one or two injured marines vs. 50 people lying in bits on the ground...

Edit: from Wiki - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iraq_Body_Count_project
Who did the killing?

* 37%. US-led forces killed 37% of civilian victims.
* 9%. Anti-occupation forces/insurgents killed 9% of civilian victims.
* 36%. Post-invasion criminal violence accounted for 36% of all deaths.
* 11%. Unknown agents (11%).

So more or less equal numbers of deaths due to Coallition military action and crime, with almost a tenth of Iraqi civilian deaths due to the Insurgence.

and what exactly is the point you want to make with this?
My point, which I'd have thought was pretty obvious, was that it's idiotic to blind yourself to the brutal sectarian civil war raging in Iraq at the moment (which of course would not be happening now if the invasion hadn't happened - there'd 'merely' be Saddam's horrific tyranny instead) and kid yourself that all military action being taken by Iraqis is directed at the occupying troops, and therefore to be cheered on, let alone that much of isn't 'military action' at all but terrorism aimed at members of rival religious/ethnic/political groups.
 
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vimothy

yurp
This is where I don't bother reposting the graph of insurgent attacks for the third time clearly showing that 75% of reported attacks are still against the occupation forces. Fucksake.

You're right about that -- this is where you post a graph of insurgent attacks showing the distribution of casualties.
 
N

nomadologist

Guest
What does the distribution of casualties proove except that America is ultimately responsible for a lot of death?
 

Gavin

booty bass intellectual
* 37%. US-led forces killed 37% of civilian victims.
* 9%. Anti-occupation forces/insurgents killed 9% of civilian victims.
DID YOU READ WHAT YOU JUST POSTED? The U.S. has killed FOUR TIMES as many civilians as the terrorists have!

My only point (here) was that COALITION INVASION = MASSIVE VIOLENCE. Of course there are more civilian casualties, they don't get body armor, hummers, air strikes, backup or a giant fortified compound in the center of Baghdad. Coalition soldiers are still overwhelmingly the source and target of the violence in Iraq.

What happened in Basra when the British left? Mass chaos, violence, looting? NO IT GOT LESS VIOLENT.
 
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N

nomadologist

Guest
Not to mention that the U.S. has a terrible record when it comes to nation rebuilding if you look at Korea, Vietnam, and the Gulf War.
 

Gavin

booty bass intellectual
My point, which I'd have thought was pretty obvious, was that it's idiotic to blind yourself to the brutal sectarian civil war raging in Iraq at the moment (which of course would not be happening now if the invasion hadn't happened - there'd 'merely' be Saddam's horrific tyranny instead) and kid yourself that all military action being taken by Iraqis is directed at the occupying troops, and therefore to be cheered on, let alone that much of isn't 'military action' at all but terrorism aimed at members of rival religious/ethnic/political groups.

Here is your point that you always make: Yes, Gavin MAY BE right, but he is BLINDING himself to Tea's fair-n-balanced position-of-no-position. You don't even say that, actually. It WOULD BE idiotic IF I were to blind myself to your brilliant regurgitation of nonsequiter mainstream media platitudes "sectarian strife blah blah blah back to you Katie." The point you make every time. When in fact I know everything you said, I haven't blinded myself at all, it's just that it DOESN'T FUCKING MATTER because IT SAYS NOTHING, IT MAKES NO POINT WHATSOEVER. Sort of like 98% of the banal crap you post here. Oh and then baselessly accuse me of CHEERING ON THE VIOLENCE for good measure, because you can't actually respond to what I ACTUALLY POSTED you pathetic piece of shit. And then when it gets too hot, you can "moderate" Vimothy to prove how fucking level-headed and fair-n-balanced you are. Thanks for making such wonderful thought-provoking commentary. You truly are an asset to the board.
 
N

nomadologist

Guest
What's hilarious is the moral argument they're making for the war (and the "point" that was made about slavery") is Ethics 101 level fallacious.

Just because there were Africans complicit in the slave trade, it does not JUSTIFY Western involvement in the slave trade. The only purpose that "remembering" African involvement serves rhetorically is to take some of the heat off the Westerners involved. It does not assuage Western guilt. Not one iota.
 

Slothrop

Tight but Polite
What's hilarious is the moral argument they're making for the war
Just to clarify - the point is not being made for the war in general - by me at least. I think - I don't see how a sane person could not think - that the war in Iraq has been a fucking disaster, a humanitarian tragedy and a moral outrage. I was against it when it started and right now I want to see the killing of innocent Iraqis end. The moral argument being made is for considering carefully what is going to stop people getting killed rather than just saying "coalition action caused all this killing (which it did) therefore coalition action is directly responsible for all this killing (which it isn't) therefore if we pull out coalition troops, everyone will kiss and make up, society will un-beak down and the people of iraq will lead happy and peaceful lives." Maybe pulling out troops immediately would be the best course of action in the long term, but apparenty trying to discuss the situation in enough depth to figure that out is just a distraction from shouting about it.
Just because there were Africans complicit in the slave trade, it does not JUSTIFY Western involvement in the slave trade. The only purpose that "remembering" African involvement serves rhetorically is to take some of the heat off the Westerners involved. It does not assuage Western guilt. Not one iota.
Did I mention that this doesn't absolve white european slave traders, slave owners and the whole web of people profiting from and driving the trade from being basically responsible for the atlantic slave trade?

The purpose it serves is not scrubbing out details of history just to make our points clearer.
 

Mr BoShambles

jambiguous
Just because there were Africans complicit in the slave trade, it does not JUSTIFY Western involvement in the slave trade. The only purpose that "remembering" African involvement serves rhetorically is to take some of the heat off the Westerners involved. It does not assuage Western guilt. Not one iota.

Do we need to assuage Western guilt? Do you feel personal guilt for the actions of your great great great etc grandfather or whatever? The world a few hundred years ago was a pretty brutal place (as perhaps it is today). Western colonial exploits were often barbaric but equally by modern standards so was the rule of many 'native' elites. Colonial rule was a highly differentiated procees across time and space and to say it was entirely malign or benign is simply wrong-headed. The history of humanity is one of conquer and assimilate, conquer and so on. Nothing in the evolution of mankind is pure; and the Western nations were engaging in nothing historically new when they excercised their new found power as widely as possible from the Sixteenth Century onwards. If Europe had not flourished then would the world have continued as it was? I think this is highly unlikely; if Europe had not aspired to dominance then some other region would - the Islamic world pushing on its borders is a good example.

Why do you raise this issue of 'Western' guilt? If like me, and the vast majority of people, you feel deeply uncomfortable with the poverty and suffering of people in many of the ex colonial territories, then surely your over-riding concern should be considering how these independent nations can be helped to prosper. If you feel the need to assuage your own guilt then, well, do it quietly somewhere private. The people of the developing world do not need our pity (or our guilt); what they may need is constructive assistance towards building a prosperous future. But that is for them - i.e. internally within the own dynamics of their society - to decide.
 

zhao

there are no accidents
we do have to remember that the African Islamic Moors which ruled Spain for 500+ years back in the day (somewhere around 800-1300?) kept blonde and blue eyed european slaves.

seeing europeans as sole perpetrators in history is wrong.

BUT. and there are a LOT of buts.

one of them is -- this in no way absolves any europeans of the heinous crimes committed in the last few centuries and today, or their refusal to take responsibility for their actions which leads to further atrocities.
 

Gavin

booty bass intellectual
The people of the developing world do not need our pity (or our guilt); what they may need is constructive assistance towards building a prosperous future. But that is for them - i.e. internally within the own dynamics of their society - to decide.

Yes they need our high interest loans and our restructuring of their economies and our training of their dictators and our weapons we sell to them and our drug trade and our rock stars holding concerts in their name and our humanitarian interventions with our NGOs providing ample ideological support so they can all just somehow get poorer, but don't worry they're developing, they're just a little slow. Actually they need us to fuck off, the people of Iraq have spoken and said as much, but we can pretend that we didn't hear, and that they're just being hotheaded Arabs all ululating n shit (I saw it on TV), and anyway we are just waiting to make sure we don't do anything rash like tell hired killers to go home because that might kill more people than we already do all the time.
 

Gavin

booty bass intellectual
What IS the point of bringing up black-on-black slavery? There was nothing in my post about whites-are-evil, blacks-are-good, that wasn't the point, so there's no need to fair-n-balance it out.
 

Mr BoShambles

jambiguous
Yes they need our high interest loans and our restructuring of their economies and our training of their dictators and our weapons we sell to them and our drug trade and our rock stars holding concerts in their name and our humanitarian interventions with our NGOs providing ample ideological support so they can all just somehow get poorer, but don't worry they're developing, they're just a little slow. Actually they need us to fuck off, the people of Iraq have spoken and said as much, but we can pretend that we didn't hear, and that they're just being hotheaded Arabs all ululating n shit (I saw it on TV), and anyway we are just waiting to make sure we don't do anything rash like tell hired killers to go home because that might kill more people than we already do all the time.

As I said Gavin:

what they may need is constructive assistance towards building a prosperous future. But that is for them - i.e. internally within the own dynamics of their society - to decide.

You seem to have a very dangerous one-sided view of the world = the 'West' is exploitative and inherently bad and the developing world is righteous but oppressed. Anyhow, I'm not pretending, I just honestly can't remember this critical moment you allude to when the people of Iraq spoke with one voice and said 'fuck off'. IMHO the intervention was just in objective: oust a man/regime which (previous 'Western support or not) had systematically denied individual freedom and priviledged one group over others leading to calculated mass murder of innocent people. Consideration for the long-term outcome in Iraq was clearly ill-advised but does this undermine the objective? I don't think so but stooopid all the same given the undeniably positive effects that well thought out 'Western' intervention can play now and in the future.
 

Mr BoShambles

jambiguous
Yes they need our high interest loans and our restructuring of their economies

Usury is not an exclusive 'Western' practice you know and can the loans really be considered high interest when much of the debt is cancelled anyway. And given huge quantities of the money is pocketed by self-serving elites perhaps we should stop giving this 'aid' anyway?

and our training of their dictators and our weapons we sell to them and our drug trade

there is no doubt that the 'West' has supported brutal dicatorships in the past and continues to do so. But surely the systematic cutting of support to such regimes should be encouraged not poo-pood. And as for 'our drug trade' WTF are you talking about? Supply and demand mate. We didn't invent drugs nor the drugs trade. If you can make more from producing 'illicit' crops than standard ones then its a rational choice. Surely its the prohibitive laws that cause the problems?
 
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turtles

in the sea
Anyhow, I'm not pretending, I just honestly can't remember this critical moment you allude to when the people of Iraq spoke with one voice and said 'fuck off'. IMHO the intervention was just in objective: oust a man/regime which (previous 'Western support or not) had systematically denied individual freedom and priviledged one group over others leading to calculated mass murder of innocent people. Consideration for the long-term outcome in Iraq was clearly ill-advised but does this undermine the objective? I don't think so but stooopid all the same given the undeniably positive effects that well thought out 'Western' intervention can play now and in the future.

lol u uninformed. and the rest of your post is pretty shocking too.
 
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