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  1. As simply as I can put it, bigotry means an intolerance of other people's opinions, and an obstinate refusal to entertain information that tends to contradict one's opinions. At an extreme and as a persistent habit of mind. Obstinate intolerance of The Other. Obstinate 'dark' emotions dominate reason. Fixity. Stuck-ness A mind closed to rational argument A tendency to let prejudice guide decisions Intolerance. Refusal to entertain the notion that one might be prejudiced in some matter. I try to pay my rent here,. Thanks for the follow-up, Adam.
  2. Me on the word bigotry and what I think it ,means, or what I intend it to mean when I use it:
  3. I had written a couple of days ago: In the paragraph above we have several actors or groups of actors all splooged into a blob: All the doors opened (passive construction, implied actor), the access started shutting off (passive construction, implied actors). This is not persuasive or even descriptive. I wish you would de-blob some of your remarks when appropriate. I wish you would not invoke Demonic Urges and Forces to explain those not convinced or persuaded by your Trump promotion. On 3/19/2016 at 10:56 AM, Michael Stuart Kelly said: On 3/19/2016 at 10:05 AM, william.scherk said: My point was that the events are better explained in the relationship between Carly and her voters. She didn't get enough votes from voters. As for the 'steady stream of Trump bashing,' I gotta ask -- is there a category or conceptual label you can use to describe or denote a person who does not support Trump? I get Trump Haters, Bashers, Anti-Trump, and a new adjective in the mix, Trump despisers. [...] Is there a term to use to denote a not-demonic group of non Trump Supporters? Sure. Anti-Trump people. Those against Trump. And so on. I don't demonize someone who criticizes Trump just for criticizing him. There are lots of people who can't stand Trump as is their right. And some of them make great points. Quote Believe me, the establishment Republicrats knew exactly what I am talking about when they punked Carly off. Those who call Trump a bigot are making the same error. Believe me, that bigot charge will not take with Trump except among Trump haters. If you don't believe me, just watch. My point is that this growing mass of Trump supporters is not made up of bigots (as those making the charge eventually conclude). The truth is these people are no longer listening to those who yell, "Bigot!" Why? Quote How many times and how many people have to appear on air saying they have known Trump for years and he is no bigot? How many times do people have to point to Trump's businesses and show that no bigotry is to be found? How many people from all minority classes have to come out in support of Trump and say he is no bigot? Quote Now I have a question for you. Is there any category of Trump supporter you can imagine where they are not mentally or morally suboptimal in some manner? Quote Among all the many theories out there from Trump critics about what moves Trump supporters, I have yet to see one. It's not disagreement. It's failure to even consider the possibility that Trump supporters have correct functioning brains. Does that attribution of inherent inferiority count as demonization
  4. We have moved on from William's lack of empathy for 'Hitler Lover' culture. I see pernicious nonsense in Holocaust revisionism, and so do you, I imagine. I haven't yet read any empathetic wisdom on a sub-culture that responds to such as Wise's documentary. I deleted the post because it read too crabby and reactive. I sent it to you backstage with a cover. Feel free to take a quote or two for the list, if you like. Right. I investigated the documentary -- trying to answer the question of where all the varied types of footage came from. I wanted to know if Wise had shot any of the footage in the docco. He did not. There are no credits for a camera operator or DoP, and no claim of original material (beyond the narration -- and the perhaps the music, though I have read that several of the takedowns were predicated on musical copyright violations). I asked Wise on Twitter where the music came from and I will report back. I did dispute 'touting' of the production values. I don't see good production values ... which could be credited directly to the filmmaker himself. The psychological assessments, those are fun, but do not advance resolution of any quality dispute. Simply asking someone to clarify what particular production values they saw which could be ascribed to Wise ... maybe this a peremptory demand, maybe it is hate-filled and irrational, maybe it is a temper tantrum. Maybe not. Look at it this way -- I am not the only one reading this thread exchange. Maybe one of those folks is puzzled also. That person might ask themselves, "What does Michael see that I don't see?" That person might put that question in this thread ... is it a temper tantrum to seek clarification? I think not. If you are starting to doubt that any of the docco content was actually shot by the director, I am pleased. The dispute begins to dissolve. The words I used were cognates to 'borrowed.' I don't think I was wrong. One could say "used without permission." The facts are the same. Burning Hatred: Well, if you looked at the credits reel I linked to above (click the image), you can see how I came to the conclusion that Wise is a wholesale 'borrower' of other people's products. If he has been too sloppy to seek permissions to use other people's work to profit himself and his company, then it is no surprise he faces multiple and continuing DCMA challenges. And if you do finally see my clear if hate-filled initial points ... we both 'win.' Reality wins. Reason wins. Cake for everybody! That is more promising. How much is new in this video series? How much is effective outside the community that eats this shit up? How does it rate against the hundreds and thousands of Holocaust denial videos already on the market? What makes this one stand out and give you the heebie-jeebies and foresee a rise of a new Hitler or the vague portent of 'bad things to come'? I will find that a very interesting excursion in analysis. What makes this relatively-recent stab at propaganda have greater impact than other Nazi-loving bullshit? About the 'top-notch' production values you spied in the trailer earlier-- I just didn't see them. And it looks like you are coming around to my point of view. For those who haven't made up their minds on who love/hates who, who is irrational about The Joo and Poor Misunderstood Hitler, or who is consumed by bigotry and bias, have a gander at Wise's Twitter feed. Here is a sample: Anyhow, Least said, soonest mended. Leading questions, demands, and temper tantrums, psychological assessments ... these fall by the wayside.
  5. That is not a good sign. I disagree. ISIS makes better videos in terms of production values ... Well, we shall see. The "Hitler Was A Good Guy" propaganda has been gushing out of pipes for some time. Seriously? I don't think so. It is not too impressive to these eyes. Top notch? Wow. I got not much brain time for Dennis Wise. He is a 'revisionist' and a nut on the subject of the Joo. He thinks the Holocaust was 'exaggerated' or justified, and the entire oeuvre of this dude is to make Hitler look good. Read some of his interviews. Read some of the reviews which don't celebrate bigotry and Joo Hate but find fault in his reasoning and argument. Read some of the critical commentary on his work. Read some of the material on his site ... While Churchill and FDR are presented as Saints and even Stalin was proclaimed to be a great man, Germany’s leader and the Germans themselves have been presented as the devil incarnate. We have been told over and over for the last seventy years many different things about Hitler, all bad and many ridiculous. Many books and claims have been made about the man and many contradict each other, but as long as they portray Hitler as evil they get a good reception by the media. We’re told he was a lowly corporal, a house painter, a homosexual and at the same time a murderer of homosexuals. Then contradicting the house painter claim, they say he was a failed art student, he was so evil that he was incapable of painting a human figure with the proper dimensions. In truth Hitler was an aspiring art student that was competent, but not good enough to get into the art school in Vienna. He was not a coward as we are often told, but a war hero winning the Iron Cross first and second class, he was gassed at the end of the war and suffered the terrible pain that went with that. He was a heterosexual that had sexual relations and married the love of his life before they both committed suicide to avoid being tortured and murdered by the victorious allies. He presided over the most remarkable economic recovery of the 1930’s and he was a remarkable military leader. For putting millions of Germans back to work, ending the misery imposed on Germany by its enemies and restoring Germany’s pride his people supported him to the bitter end. No matter the military setbacks or the mass murder of Germany’s civilians by enemy bombers he had the full support of all of Germany and Germany fought virtually the whole world until the bitter end. This documentary attempts to educate the viewer about the facts regarding Hitler, the war, the holocaust and many other things. Me too. But it is just one among many sad and stupid attempts to 'revise' the history of WWII. The racialists and revisionists eat this shit up, which is their wont. I know you are not touting this film, and not touting its message, and not touting its maker as an especially interesting addition to the field of Hitler Lovers. But you appear to be touting its 'quality' ... which I find a bit odd. Anyway, I went to look at episode 26, after reading a Reddit AMA with the dude wherein he said the episode contains the credits and sources. I was curious about which footage was 'borrowed,' who scored the music, where particular fact claims are warranted. The entire suite of episodes has been removed. "Adolf Hitler - The Greatest..." The YouTube account associated with this video has been terminated due to multiple third-party notifications of copyright infringement. My guess is that the film is full of 'borrowed' materials. If I get to another version of the 'sources' episode, I will make a note. -- click the image to go to the docco's page featuring Episode 26. The 'production values' are shit. I am interested in finding out if the footage of 'young Hitler' have been 'borrowed' or actually scripted and shot by Wise.
  6. Well, there's that. I guess you have hard and fast rules for mind-reading and ascribing opinions via telepathy. I don't believe Woody Allen was a pedophile. I don't necessarily believe all the claims of child-abuse or child-manipulation. I don't think Woody Allen's primary sexual fixation was on pre-pubescent child bodies. I found his taking a teen-age step-daughter as a bride repulsive, repulsive not just for the taint of incest and grooming, but that he hid it and must have understood how his actions would be seen as betrayal. He was unrepentant, implacable. The ensuing family drama was tragic and it was all his fault. He deserves all the scorn and responsibily for damaged relationships and Mia's going whack. The betrayal was unforgiveable. I thought it was a moral sickness of sorts, but not pedophilia. Is he still with his bride? Anyhow, thoughts about other than the contents of William's mind and The Bad Wind From Crotch? How's that Black South GOP Trump Winning piece coming along? That was your last substantive fact claim and a good one, and true enough. Sniping is fun, but not as productive. I'll go first to topic. I give. You give. We give again. Everyone gets presents. Approximately. Here's some zany gush from a writer at the looney-tunes Politico that should delight Michael for its blindness and inertia and sad spent memes. Fun stuff. I'd be happy to read your take on this, Adam, since your telepathy will have already told you what's mine. For all the bad feelings that Donald Trump’s naked religious bigotry and race baiting are conjuring up, they are also providing our nation with an opportunity. The ugly rhetoric just might force the country to finally contend with a problem many don’t even want to acknowledge exists: that we are fast becoming a nation in which minorities make up a majority of the population. As a result, tens of millions of white Americans, accustomed for so long to having all the benefits of being the majority, are scared out of their minds—and it is this fear that Trump is exploiting so effectively. These feelings are emerging not because whites are all racists, but because they don’t know what that might mean for them and their children. As long as angry, scared white Americans follow Trump and his rhetoric, the racial divide in America will only deepen, and it will become increasingly difficult to solve the nation’s most pressing problems. So the question becomes: Who can counter Donald Trump? This task can’t be left to pundits, academic experts or even preachers, rabbis and imams—particularly as long as Trump continues to tap into the darkest recesses of people’s souls. Destructive groupthink can overcome even the most sincere efforts of community leaders. It cannot be left up to other 2016 presidential candidates, either. They’re far too busy trying to win the White House to be healers. There is only one person who can unite the country again, and he works in the White House. Yes, President Barack Obama—ironically, the man who is the personification of the fear Trump is exploiting—is the one in the best position to quell the anger being stirred up. This is not something the president can do from the Oval Office, or from a stage. What he needs to do is use the power of the office in a different way, one that matches the ruthless effectiveness of a demagogue with a private jet. Obama needs to go on a listening tour of white America—to connect, in person, with Americans he has either been unable or unwilling to reach during his seven years in office. I know the difficulties of such outreach, and also its unique payoff. I‘m a black man who has spent the past decade listening to white Southern conservatives—people who many assume would hate me. Because of that, I’ve been able to get through to people others wouldn’t dare try to reach. I have the battle scars and rare friendships to prove it, including one with a member of the Sons of Confederate Veterans who may help me in a criminal-justice reform push. The conventional wisdom might say the current U.S. president should visit places like Chicago and Ferguson, where decades-long racial disparities are at the heart of recent bouts of unrest. Or that he should visit San Bernardino and offer condolences in person (which he did before going on vacation), as he’s done so many times after so many mass shootings. Or maybe Detroit, a city still struggling even after a massive bailout saved the domestic auto industry.
  7. I am long-winded in reply to Pekka here. Read in chunks, stretch, take breaks. Just kidding. I am probably arguing for a state of innocence about sexuality, to promote the notion that sex is good, all things considered, gay sex is good for those that like it, and that it is usually none of your business who fucks who in or out of marriage, be you king or neighbour, or mere passer-by voyeur. I've stretched Pekka's reasonable points to make a grander point here and there, and hope I don't come off as an insufferably sniffy old lady. Sometimes I just think as I type. The best part is Peikoff on video about the gay, at the very end. WSS fans will do the slog first. Peikoff takes the line that sexuality is 'set' early in life, by age five or so. But his other opinions, and the means and motive for the setting are not discussed. Neither are any notions of biochemical course of development, which makes it a Randian curiosity. For Peikoff there is a kind of mind-error taken early in life that is results in an imprinting that cannot be undone. He foresees a time when science would aid introspection enough that the cognitive formation of homosexuality could be revisited and reformed. I think that is bosh, but hey. An Objectivish, objectivist, even Objectivist person can easily see positive personal value in 'getting the state out of people's bedrooms,' in the sense of criminal sanction of private behaviour. An objectivist gay person can easily cast so-called "sex rights" within his own individual struggle to be let alone, to not be harried or oppressed by a state or community. A gay Objectivist seeks shelter, associations, education, employment, mobility and trade and will fight for his or her own right to individual flourishing without irrational fetter of law. Some might go farther and argue that any 'right to homosexual behaviour' without undue criminal sanction is a 'human right' won by fierce individual struggle against historical bigotry and bias in 'Law.' Consider your own home country's history with so-called gay rights. As I consult a brief Wikipedia entry on LGBT history in Finland, I see the same course and same controversies erupting on a timeline that ends with an almost identical regime of 'rights' as presently enjoyed in the USA and Canada. Nobody from outside the 'gay community' had to lift a finger to help, nor be anything but neutral. Each historical 'gain' of sexual rights ratcheted up the scope of freedom from the point of view of a gay individual. I see the same ratchet at work in most Nordic and other west European nations as in North America, with differing timelines, same destination. The gains made since 1900 are such now that you can bring your gay spouse to Canada or the USA on the same terms as any other spouse. Gay sexuality is a statistic, gay couplings another. It is not important to the state that you are gay. Most law that can fuck you up for being gay is gone. So all the "gay rights" have been built up by repeated challenges to earlier legal restrictions on individuals, restrictions imposed merely on the basis of sexuality and self-expression, challenged by folks who had a selfish interest in unlocking doors to liberty, each door opening to another door on the path to equal treatment. As in Finland, as in Canada, what was once a criminal offence has now become a 'colour' of an individual in law -- a colour, flavour, attribute that may not be used in law to 'cut from the human cloth' and devalue only by function of the colour. An objectivist/Objectivist may or may not support the full panoply of 'rights' (privileges) promoted by gay individuals. But they stand on bedrock that the state may not interfere with private adult homosexual behaviour by criminalizing it. Another objectivist may feel personally-disgusted by homosexuality, but would never want law used to single out homosexual behaviour for legal censure or reduction of free-speech rights, at least not simply on emotional grounds. A libertarian has a laissez-faire attitude toward other folks using their rights of assembly, conscience, speech, protest to further their own individually-determined goals. A libertarian may have a loathing of homosexuals and of homosexual behaviour writ large, may wish there were no gay parades, no gay 'culture,' no in-your-face expressions of gaydom, but in the end, that libertarian accepts and tolerates individual and concerted efforts to expand freedom of action. The freedom range of the gays is what the libertarian expects of his own field of liberty. For me, the freedom range of a person whose opinions I abhor and whose behaviour and beliefs disgust or frighten me -- his freedom range is precious to my concept of rights. I don't want to shut up the Westboro Baptists, or the anti-Islam open-carry nutjobs protesting before mosques. I don't want to foreclose on maniacal gatherings of religious freaks and hatemongers. I don't want rights in general to be restricted on one class of human freak without sustained rational scrutiny. And so I don't want someone culled out of life because he or she is gay. That would injure my sense of decency, honour, and justice. So, all this to say I welcome hearing of the disquieting or incorrect actions of gays, rights-based or not, from Finland. I'd be interested in hearing which ratchet action was marked out as objectively wrong and unfair or felt to be unjust, dishonorable or indecent -- and of course which damages will have been done to whom, if any advance of so-called gay rights caused damage. I return to your first line. If I rewrite it via substitutions, it can exemplify a laissez-faire attitude, and can also imply a category error: As I am not black, I do not have a particular interest in supporting or opposing "black rights". As I am not atheist, I do not have a particular interest in supporting or opposing "atheist rights". As I am not Catholic, I do not have a particular interest in supporting or opposing "Catholic rights". As I am not Jewish, I do not have a particular interest in supporting or opposing "Jewish rights". As I am not Swedish, I do not have a particular interest in supporting or opposing "Swedish rights". As I am not a parent, I do not have a particular interest in supporting or opposing "parent rights". As I do not have capital, I do not have a particular interest in supporting or opposing "capital rights".First they came for the Communists, then they came for the Socialists ... then they came for the ... I'd say being neutral about so-called gay rights is a perfectly sound position to take, but at some point one will say, "of course I support the right of gay people to pursue their own happiness without the state getting in the way, criminalizing, punishing, imprisoning, putting to death." I mean, at some point, in some place, neutrality will be challenged. See for example Uganda or Saudi Arabia or Iran. I expect nobody here is neutral on gay rights in hateful places, as an objective thinker or humanist or whatever. At some point horror and disgust kick in. I don't think you are against promotion. You would not be bothered whatsoever to see a gay person promote himself, or get in a bigot's face to promote his own humanity. Glorification is in the eye of the beholder, I guess. What glorification has set you against it? Can you give some particulars? Would you like to be glorified in media and culture? I look at marriage historically, as a behaviour (pair-bonding) evolved into an institution -- with various religious and civil implications crusted on over time. I look more closely at how the institution -- in law -- evolved in the Anglo-Saxon and French/Roman world. I see the history of polygamy, chattel, betrothal, contract, divorce, and I see the history of ecclesiastical authority, courts, registers and ceremony. Today in North America there is a yuge industry devoted to the ceremonial aspect of marriage. The actual legal procedure of registering the ceremonial's legal weight -- that registration industry is not attached to courts of law except by custom. The act of civil marriage is simpler than registering ownership of an automobile. To a court's eyes, a fabulous ceremonial is in itself meaningless. It is the pair-bond that may come to its attention. Many marriages today are gay marriages by virtue of a marriage industry staffed by gays. The stereotype of a screamingly gay wedding director goes here. Just kidding. I am more or less with MSK. Let religiously-sanctioned partnerships and the attendant ceremonials be whatever the host and participants want it to be. Shop churches and synagogues and marriage halls the way you would for your funeral. If you want quiet, we got quiet, if you want to spend nine million dollars, we will help you. Then, if you want the state or its court or its fiendish, medieval Registry to know you have made a partnership with a spouse, observe the local civil statutes or absence of same. Is there a privatized 'registry' where you stand in line with someone seeking a birth or death certificate? Does that meet your needs? Take a number. Do you not care to do anything but 'marry' your partner in your heart's mind? Then move in together, blend your lives together, achieve unity of purpose, lay down plans for the rest of the union. Given enough time, the need to 'register' your partnership with a court or state goes by the way. You are married by custom and so by common law. If you are Israeli and cannot get a civil marriage recognized by the state, can't help you. Buy a plane ticket. If you want Gods to recognize your union, you are on your own, no matter what people tell you. As for my answer to the 'choice' question, I'd say homosexual behaviour is a choice. And that the element of choice is irrelevant to civil rights, registry rights, Book Of The Dead rights. I leave it to each individual to match his sexual object choice to his rational sexual behaviour. Here is a video I made to go along with Peikoff's podcast expostulations about De Gaey.
  8. All fever? Every time? No problematic fevers? -- I note we have had a full discussion of fever back in August this year. Remember? Yes. There is such a thing as a dangerous fever. We discussed this back in August. Fever phobia. Healing processes must be stopped at all cost, even by poison. [...] If I had a fever I would rejoice. Okay. In front of you are six vials. Five of them will give you a disease, a fever, if you are infected. Your choices are Hemorrhagic Fever (in three different viral forms!), Dengue Fever, Yellow Fever, and Lassa Fever. Which one will give you the most rejoicing, Jerry? Seriously, your larger point that most fevers do not require 'treatment' is understood within medicine. But what you have failed to note is, of course, that some fevers are part of a disease process that needs treatment. Doing 'nothing' the Shelton way, can mean death or disability. That's the sad truth that you are apparently blind to. It's something we discussed back in August, Brant. See in particular the references to Science-Based Medicine (https://www.sciencebasedmedicine.org). The 'phobia' of fevers is something that medical staff deal with, especially from parents of sick kids. It's a handy label for a sometimes irrational desire for MDs to 'do something.' It can lead pediatricians and other medicos to order needless tests and prescribe needless antibiotics, etc -- as discussed back in August -- and as noted in an SBM article I linked to then. See Fever Phobia. Interestingly, we are still waiting for a report back from Jerry. It's like he forgot we'd had a discussion in the first place. He was a little bit flummoxed by the idea of "science-based medicine," but hey. I was kind of flummoxed by his post in another thread that repeated Gerson, Gerson, Gerson about a dozen times. There we were trying to discuss fraudulent claims about 'curing cancers' ... or rather, I was trying to discuss it. That post is still in drydock. Gerson Gerson Gerson Gerson Gerson Gerson, etcetera ... Unfortunately prescriptions are necessary. [...] Neither doctors nor hairdressers should be licensed by the state. WTF is it the state's business? I am damn glad prospective doctors in my province are subject to objective standards of competence. In BC, the licensing is the responsibility of the College of Physicians and Surgeons. It's rigorous. I don't know the set-up in Arizona. Many pseudo-doctors (primarily naturopaths and chiropractors) seek to have their competence 'registered' by a government or professional body as equal in competence and knowledge to an MD. They fail, and I am glad. Their scope of practice is limited, by their own choice. If they wanted to practice with all the privileges and responsibilities of a medical doctor, then they can do the time. I am also damn glad that some sort of governance (in the larger sense) can distinguish between pretend-doctors and well-educated ones (and frauds and quacks and con-men). The governance is mostly done through a 'guild.' Despite all the downsides and negatives of a guild-controlled profession, aspects of competent care including accountability, transparency, bona fides -- are in the open. -- it is difficult to discuss with Jerry because of his bias and bigotry. He doesn't set himself any goals like increasing his knowledge -- and more importantly, testing his knowledge. He is done with education. He knows what he knows and that is not subject to revision. I'll return to the Gerson Gerson Gerson Gerson Gerson Gerson Gerson Gerson topic currently in drydock. Here's the remarks I am still puzzling over ...: Gerson Gerson Gerson Gerson Gerson Gerson Shelton Gerson Trall Gerson Gerson Gerson.
  9. Tony, I will respond in detail to your comment immediately above at some later time -- I mean to get to work applying methodological skepticism to the claims made in the video, as that would better serve my argument that getting het up about this or that mistaken assumption about my opinions. So, thank you for goading me into providing a better analysis. (re: skepticism of the kind you do not like: 'nothing can be known,' it should be obvious by now that my mind does not work that way. On the contrary, I believe strongly that one can strive to come closer to truth by applied reason). At the moment my impression is that you are showing me bad faith, or at the very least willfully misinterpreting my comments in this thread. I especially find unfair the note "Your fancy that every European Muslim is good, humble, and plain misunderstood or prejudiced against" ... as I do not believe my multiple remarks on OL show this to be true. I hope you can cool out and re-read my responses to you above with fresh eyes and a goal of understanding. I may be entirely wrong, but I don't think you really believe that I show a non-objective rationality when I seek to apply a methodological-skeptical lens to fact-claims. If I am wrong, then I am baffled at your reaction. In the meantime, perhaps you would give a once-over to a Snopes.com article on this very video (which as I noted is essentially the same material with differing intros and outros as that put forward by Ed Hudgins). The article attempts to put many of the claims in perspective. It was originally published in 2009. Before you read or skim the Snopes article, please view the alarmist video again and try to understand my objections. Snopes: Muslim Demographics As for bigotry and ignorance, anyone can be bigoted in some small way -- me, you, Adam, Jerry, each of us. The seeking of reliable knowledge is a continuous effort in minds that I respect. Such application of reason aims to dispel innocent ignorance and find the best objective evidence about a given controversy.
  10. Who are you addressing, Adam? (and isn't this another way of saying "so you really don't understand that gay marriage is an abomination?") You quote no one, so it is not clear what your opinions are regarding the legal advice given to Kim Davis. With squinting and an angle to the sun, it almost seems you are praising Liberty Counsel for their latest knucklehead motion. But that would be interpreting your one-liner beyond its limits, perhaps. I find the Liberty Counsel to be a nasty outfit of gay-hating fuckheads, with their greatest triumph/shame agitating in Africa in favour of death penalties for homosexual acts. If you were addressing some other part of my opinions above, Adam, fair enough, but I don't know what you are arguing for. You may like me see bigotry and animus on the part of Kim Davis's attorneys, or you may find all but Kim and her deputies acting in good faith, What kinds of issues did I miss in my last analysis? Maybe you would like to give a Randian take on the conflict of authority and conscience between Clerk and deputies that may still be played out in Morehead.
  11. I don't think of myself as being an expert in any field. I am of middling intellect and probably a captive of cognitive biases, which captivity can tend to limit me in research and understanding -- unless I try very hard to interrogate what I think I know. In a small few areas of knowledge I might have on average a wider, deeper comprehension -- but in each area it depends on the pool one is being averaged in. Perhaps I know a bit more about the conflict in Syria than that 'average' OLer, but I hope I don't use that slight advantage in knowledge to parade myself as Expert William (my lack of Arabic alone puts me in the bottom percentiles; I must accept that I am but an amateur indeed). I hope I am up for challenging discussion and for further learning and analysis -- it is in my own interest to intelligently accept correction. What raises my ire sometimes is the sad inevitable effect of ignorance: bigotry. If one arrives at conclusions without establishing an argument, the conclusions may well be invalid. It seems to me of supreme importance that one examines critically all stages of reasoning -- so that one does not end up with an false conclusion (as with the wisdom of books like How We Know What Isn't So). This is sort of akin to so-called scientific reasoning: rigorous, protracted testing of each step and recursion of reasoning. What amazes me here about Peter's comparison of Scientology to Freemasonry is that he is seemingly so confident of his conclusions, so blithe. How did he get there (to his conclusions)? It seems he has assembled a few scraps of information but not put those scraps to any rational test -- resulting in an incoherent mass of prejudice and dogmatism -- riddled with incorrect notions and unsupported beliefs. Finally, of course, there is Peter's ironic elsewhere call for 'evidence,' 'proof.' It seems that the old adage what is sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander is not applicable: the baseline intellectual standards Peter demands of other folks' opinions are absent in relation to his own. That ignore function is so very tempting.
  12. "The Derb" is poorly informed -- which vitiates his conclusions. Check this paragraph from his column at the racialist site Vdare: Thus the crowds you’ve been seeing in news pictures the past few days, in Greece, Macedonia, and Hungary, almost all come via Turkey. And Turkey is a peaceful, stable, modern country, and has been accommodating to the refugees, settling two million of them in camps. Derbyshire does add a small smudge of nuance to that crashingly wrong depiction of Turkey: It’s true that he’s a Kurd, and that Turkey’s government does not celebrate Kurdishness in the full multicultural spirit, having their own long-running Kurdish problem; but if that was intolerable to Mr. Kurdi, he could have gone as a refugee to Iraqi Kurdistan, a de facto independent country that is hosting ten thousand Syrian Kurdish refugees. Whew! What a perfect ignorance of the geography of war and the actual means of egress to Kurdistan. But then he moves deeper into the dark waters of bigotry and ignorance: You can imagine cases of genuine refugees. The swarms heading for Europe likely include some genuine refugees among the economic migrants, criminals and terrorists. But as Ann Coulter writes in her splendid book ¡Adíos America!: The biggest scams in immigration law are the humanitarian cases. One hundred percent of refugee and asylum claims are either obvious frauds or frauds that haven’t been proved yet. The only result of our asylum policies is that we get good liars. Ugly, untrue, stupid, hateful. That's the kindest thing I can say about Coulter's vicious comment that Derbyshire contends is truth. What the fuck are we doing on an Objectivish forum when we cite approvingly tendentious racialists at a white supremacy site? Well, if you are keeping on topic -- Syria's refugees -- and in particular keeping to the topic of the one refugee family in the news ... you may need to educate yourself on the case of Mohammed Kurdi, the father. You will discover upon some research that Kurdi was once a guest of the Mukhabarat -- and that he and his family were rendered essentially stateless because of Syria's reluctance to offer Syrian citizenship to the Kurds of Hasaka. The compound problem of citizenship is only deepened by the special 'guest' status obtainable in Turkey -- which does not have a refugee system in place for any but Europeans! More cogently, Peter, you may need to educate yourself about the Catch-22 that faced the Kurdi family in Turkey. HInt: what is a Turkish exit visa, and how can a Kurdish-Syrian obtain one (without the all-important Syrian passport withheld by the Baathist dictatorship's sectarian policies)? It's interesting that your ignorance leads you to use a moralist cudgel, to tell a refugee what he should and shouldn't do. Without knowledge of the Syrian conflict and its ramifications, your suggestion will seem at best only naive. There you go. A dilemma. That is a good clue that the issues are more complex than a simple morality play. The Russians are allied with the mafia family that runs Syria. The family that runs rump Syria as its personal fief, whose slogan is "Assad or we burn the country." The family that has attempted to strangle any opposition at birth. Again ignorance of the real world constraints and agreements and European law as it pertains to refugees and asylum. Again a near-psychopathic inability to attend to human nature. It must be fun to sit in a chair and rule over reality.
  13. I think you might be on to something. Contempt is sometimes rational and sometimes not, sometimes deserved and sometimes wholly wrong and misdirected. Contempt can be expressed in strong terms -- as many folks do here on myriad subjects -- or in a minor key of mockery or ridicule. Contempt can be well-warranted, and contempt can be a result of prejudice or bigotry -- or just old-fashioned revulsion, which can have various emotional inputs or instigations. Political topics certainly invite contempt. Who does not have contempt for the grotesqueries of an American political system that will spit up in the end -- after a billion and more dollars are expended -- two hoary old dynastic operators like Clinton and Bush? (that is my ballot prediction for 2016) Clinton deserves harsh scrutiny and certainly invokes contempt from Republicans and Independents, and most certainly from the Objectivish-oriented here. She is everything politically repulsive and disgusting to an Objectivist or Randian. That contempt can be expressed by calling her ugly, a ratty vagina, a hag, a lesbian, a Marxist, a liar, a criminal, and so on. If I had to reduce my own genesis of contempt to a single factor, I think I would identify bullshit as the primary instigator. And the principal component of the bullshit for me would be sloppy and irrational thinking and arguments. For some of the folks here (excepting incorrigible people such as Greg), the single point of contact or adhesion I have is Reason. Difficult, sustained and protracted reasoning is attractive to me, because it is in my eyes the best tool for gaining proper and valid understanding of the world and what is in it. I expect everyone here (excepting the nitwits and the bigoted) to be able to think critically, to examine their own arguments, to do the diligent work necessary to arrive at reliable knowledge. If the only take-home received from recent comments of mine is contempt, then I have probably failed to communicate my points and the basis for my questions, and let emotion rule my expression. I do want straight-thinking, warranted arguments and claims based on something other than vague nostrums and puerile slogans. I want the highest and best efforts from folks I engage with. I don't want slop and prevarication and wishful thinking and other irrational nonsense. As to the subject of your comment, I will interpret it as me having unfairly taken issue with Adam's statements and lazy habits. It seems contemptuous to question his bases of knowledge. It seems contemptuous to ask him to answer the old question "How do you know?" So be it. This is not a girl's club. Folks have strong opinions. I would rather everyone expressed those opinions in the strongest terms, based on critical assessments. I would rather an argument be conducted at full heat rather than no argument at all.
  14. Greg, where did you get this graphic? It isn't found at the webpage you linked to -- so nobody can check the figures or discover from whence they were derived. One problem with confirmation bias and motivated reasoning is that only partial 'evidence' is forked up, only evidence that fits the pre-conceived conclusion or prejudice. This is known as cherry-picking (seeking only warrants that serve to confirm a notion, avoiding any warrants that disconfirm). The biggest problem with copy-pasta lists of supposed truths as you have forked here, Greg -- the underlying statistics are unexaminable. The list from the page you cited has zero references. The offsite link that purports to be the source of the statistics is 404. If you had climbed a little higher into the cherry tree, you might have come across the same list -- but with references included. In other words, the list of statistics in your copy-pasta is worthless -- since the underlying sources are unexaminable. Adding to the cognitive whoopee of the pasta list is the prepended 'source' notation -- which you excised in your excerpt: According to Getting Men Involved: The Newsletter of the Bay Area Male Involvement Network, Spring 1997: Begin quote: So, the statistics might as well have been discharged from somebody's asshole for the truth-value contained. Since you can't bother to back up your contentions with examinable warrants nor with the underlying sources of information, your entire post above is worthless for a reasonable mind. Better you cite your own female intuitive leftist religio-manic garble and epigrams -- or your bible -- because this is not how reason works. (I won't bother tracking the pre-1997 sources in the excerpt any further, since it couldn't possibly have an effect on your bigoted conclusions about The Blakks. Your contribution here appears to be the same bogus cherry-picking and moral retardation you show in all other attempts at rigorous objective thinking. Have a nice gay day, Greg, and may your female intuition lead you to better fruits.) -- I will quote the stupidest line in your hasty pasty: "72% of black babies have no father" ... (for those equipped with a fully-functioning brain, I will add just one more thought: if a woman gives birth to a child without being married to the father, does this mean the child is fatherless -- or that the child is/was raised in a single-parent household? Hint: check the statistics for 'illegitimate' children in the Nordic countries, particularly Iceland and Sweden ... and you will be faced with the overwhelming Blakkness of the Norse culture ...) Derek, you are making Peter angry. This is the first sign of a crack in an irrational body of thought. It is a sign of cognitive dissonance. If you press harder, Peter might absorb and understand a glimmer of your objections to bigotry and narrowness of mind. Here's hoping. There are lots and lots of cherries. In a perfect world, he would examine more than a subset of them ... and conclude he has been hasty and unfair in his comments. My request for a bike+Go cam would be a ride-by an inner-city Baltimore high school during lunch break. It would be interesting to see how many stabbed, shot and strangled folks are left on the concrete once the bell rings. Maybe Francis M Wood high school.
  15. If I was, I'd very likely be a militant leftist homosexual activist today... ...but I wasn't, and so I'm not. It is pretty obvious that you were sexually molested as a child, Greg. Your unseemly interest in other people's genitals is the evidence, as is your fixation on gay issues. Why not just admit it, and then explain how you were not angry about it, and you thus escaped becoming gay? Right. Sure. Which, if correct, means that your molestation did not make you angry enough to hate your abuser (probably your mother). And if, like with you, the molestation was simply an interesting experience, and did not engender anger and hate, then the answer to homosexuality is to help kids understand that molestation is just fine, that they got what they deserved, and then they will turn out straight and Republican. This is empathetic and wise, to my eyes. You are right, I don't understand. Your empathy and wisdom seems in opposition to your rock-ribbed philosophical position. Well, 'vibrancy of society' -- what can that possibly mean in context? That gays have become clannish and inward-turning? It is more likely that widespread acceptance will tend to de- clan the individuals, don't you think? ...and now you are a bigot for not celebrating homosexuality. Basically, so what? We have all been called worse, and lived. All that should affect any of us - is: Is there even a little validity to the label ? If so, why, and should it be amended for one's own sake? You're big on self-awareness, so only you can answer. What he said. Why whine about being called names? Your opinions on homosexuality are either bigoted or not. I suggest that you haven't done any thinking or considering the factual basis of your dreams of causality. I suggest that it is this blindness and animus that makes your opinions bigoted. If you don't like it, then try to appear less prejudiced and stupid on this topic. What he said. Both Stephen and I have detailed the protections under law that legal marriage confers. Please review what we have written -- it is very much to the point you raise. So, when your daughter comes out of the closet as a lesbian, she can count on you rejecting her and her 'choices,' and you will be sitting out her gay marriage in a funk of bigotry. Good to know that the Moral Queen will be consistent. Your lesbian daughter will deserve what she gets. Image courtesy of Jon Shriver's blog.
  16. How will the Supremes will actually rule on Obergefell v. Hodges? Few dare opine. That is what I wrote above, Adam -- the two questions before the court. We are on the same page. Thanks for linking to the other recent thread, it is interesting how American public opinion has shifted from the first entry back in 2010. In that thread and here in your quote above, you pasted excerpts from a gentleman named Edwin Chemerinsky, from an ABA Journal article which I found of note on review. You had no comment on the excerpts then. From his article, further down from your quote of the basics: Predictions are free and worth what they cost, and we’ll all know by the end of June how the court will decide these cases. That said, my prediction is that Tuesday, June 30, at about 10 a.m. Eastern Time, the court will hold 6-3 that laws prohibiting marriage equality deny equal protection. Either Chief Justice John G. Roberts or Justice Kennedy will write the opinion for the court and it will be joined by Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Stephen G. Breyer, Sonia Sotomayor, and Elena Kagan. [...] Ultimately, for Chief Justice Roberts, and for Justices Kennedy, Ginsburg, Breyer, Sotomayor and Kagan, the question is whether they want to be part of the next Plessy v. Ferguson, a decision regarded by history as based on bigotry and being terribly misguided, or the next Brown v. Board of Education, a ruling seen as expanding equality and the court playing its most important role for society. Looked at this way, it is easy to see why most expect that the court will find a constitutional right to marriage equality. Which, wow, is just what my guess is. I must have retained Chemerinsky's argument somehow. Regarding the amicus brief you mention, is it this one from Eagle Forum, mentioned in Joseph's Symposium article? I add an attribution to that article suggested by SCOTUSblog: Recommended Citation: Larry Joseph, Symposium: Supreme Court should address the domestic-relations exception to federal jurisdiction in its marriage-case decision, SCOTUSblog (Jan. 17, 2015, 12:55 PM), http://www.scotusblog.com/2015/01/symposium-supreme-court-should-address-the-domestic-relations-exception-to-federal-jurisdiction-in-its-marriage-case-decision/ I will leave off pining for an answer to my questions. I suppose you don't care to venture a guess on the SCOTUS decision, nor an opinion on the Irish vote. Oh well. These are hard times. and very hard questions. Save your strength.
  17. This puzzled me, then I realized you were speaking historically. One adjunct to this is that the Religion is not over there, it is here, in North America. The Religion, of course, is not quite as singular a historical actor as it once may have been. We have so many different kinds of Muslims here, that it is dangerous to see a monolith, a single Religion of Islam. On the whole, Canadian muslims of all stripes are peaceful and law-abiding and fully participating in society. As I wrote in the aftermath of the Ottawa attack, muslims were as revolted as any other aggregate. I am troubled by the 'hero' status accorded here to simple-minded reductionists, who purvey at times bigotry and irrational alarmism in the face of Islam, as with Geller and Wilders. Wilders wants the Koran banned. This is a hero of freedom? It is interesting how many folks Geller throws under the bus as either bad muslims, fake muslims, taqqiya muslims, irrelevant muslims -- are folks she once praised. Example, Zhudi Jaffer. Here's a guy that should get more face-time than hate-preacher Anjem Choudary, in my opinion. From Fox news. Now, you would think that Geller and her organization would be at least friendly to Jaffer. But no. See his depressing American Thinker article in response to a hatchet job she did on him back in 2011: American Islamists Find Common Cause with Pamela Geller, Here's just a teaser from Jaffer in the American Thinker back when. Please have a read of Jaffer's article. I think he deserves support from an Objectivish, rational angle -- support in this case against Geller's misinformation and fabrication. It answers the question: why would Pamela Geller attack the moderate reform-minded Jaffer? Because she irrationally lumps all muslims as a suspect group. Because she can be unscrupulous in her 'intellectual war.' I am really glad that security was tight at the Garland event, that the would-be murderers were inept, and that no innocent cartoonist or attendant was harmed. I am not so glad that Geller gains a halo. I don't know how many OLers venture onto the Daily Beast site, but there is a wide-ranging article there that showcases Geller's disdain for fact-checking her own claims. Here's some pertinent bits from the lengthy Beast article:
  18. Francisco, Greg has determined you are not a Real American. He has also determined that you are a complete and utter failure as a human being. He has determined that if you 'complain' about something, you deserved that something. You 'complain' about taxes because, well, Greg doesn't. Greg pays all his taxes without complaint. He submits to the state, passive and cheerful about the tax load squeezed out of him, because otherwise he would be complaining, and he doesn't complain about things other than what torments him -- sex and females. I think he may vote now and again, and might even support a candidate that complains about what you complain about ... but he takes rather a weak path of concern, complaining foremost about people. So here at OL, he complains about me, you, Jonathan, Brant, Michael, whomever he disagrees with. He makes the complaint personal because, I guess, he doesn't mind appearing as a bitchy, claws-out nitwit. I find Greg's complaints about other people to be psychologically underdetermined. He does not let ignorance of the details of other peoples' lives stand in the way of personally-insulting rhetoric. It has long been my contention that this is the good stuff for Greg, the mean-girl insult, that this is the orgasmic pay-off for him. He takes pleasure in insulting and trolling people he does not care to know. He like to get low and dirty. It could be that Greg's appearence on an Objectivist-friendly site is the result of no thought. He didn't sign up at any other site among the sisters. He didn't advance a question about Objectivism or Rand, or speak to issues that concerned her in her life and work. The ignorant contempt he visits on OL regulars is likely the same contempt he feels for any intellectual -- the contempt is a function of ignorance rather than knowledge. I think he harbours contempt for the Randian project in a way that I do not. It wouldn't surprise me if he gossips nastily about her. Other than that, I think Greg is a fraudster, not what he presents here -- he would never speak to a person in real life the way he has done so here above -- unless he wanted a physical altercation. The demeaning tone of the purely personal attacks -- here on Francisco by way of example -- tell us what we need to know about good faith. He says here what he would not dare elsewhere. That is what makes me sad he has achieved a favoured-nitwit status here at OL. His style weakens, cheapens and degrades debate. He drags down the general level of intellect on display. He rejects rational process not because his intuition is superior, but because he is too stupid or uninterested to follow a challenging or complex topic. He cares nothing for anyone here, ultimately, nor for ideas, nor for rational discussion. The insults propagated in this thread could easily be turned to any person other than his target here. He is out of his depth on every significant issue he attaches to, and brings nothing but bigotry when challenged. I don't know Francisco. I don't know if he runs a company, provides a service, leases fleets, administrates a business, raises orphan elephants, sells coconuts on the beach, or lives off the earnings of canny investments. I know nothing about this. But I do know that Greg pretends to know something, something intuited, not learned by matter of fact. Greg pretends to know things and has utter disdain for the necessary epistemological work of finding out what is and isn't so. He finds himself attacking the personal qualities of a discussant that he can't possibly know. It's telling that Greg comes off not as a fan of unfettered capitalism, a la Rand or FF, but as a fan of things as they are -- he has no personal or political problem with expanding or intrusive government, he is entirely passive about these things. He is, as they say, supine and uncomplaining, taking it up the metaphorical ass and apparently liking it enough to utter no protest. Where's Rand and Objectivism and her philosophical work in Greg's happy world of fettered capitalism? In the complaint box. Even if she would find such a passive anti-intellectualism to be repugnant, Greg does not give a damn. His contempt for the life of the mind is large enough to cover Rand herself and all her complaints. To wrap it up, I think Greg is pissing in the pool and laughing at every one of us. He is poisoning the well and quite enraptured at the stink. By having Greg on ignore I only have to write this post every few months or so. At this rate I will never catch up with Greg's posting numbers, but hey, life is short, the sun is shining, and my mark is made.
  19. The key here is that the freedom to practice your religion is a primary individual right Constitutionally. You cannot assume that a person is discriminating against another individual by practicing their religion. And as Bob pointed out, you have a right to refuse service based on rational, or irrational selections. You can assume that a person has an absolute right to be free. How do you explain the clarification that the Indiana pols published? It now explicitly protects gays and lesbians in the inserted language. I mean, we might, from a purely Randian stance, disagree vehemently with any legislative act that curbs the ability of a person (or corporation or religious entity) to discriminate on the basis of race, religion, national origin, etc. We would be against the Civil Rights Act and each and every act that has led to "protection" from discrimination -- the ability to sue for damages or contracted services. From a Randian perspective, all of it is the wrong business of government. If a business or entity refuses entry, accommodations, services and so on, we might find some discriminations odious and morally obnoxious, but yet would extend to that entity full freedom to be morally squalid. Put up a sign that says We do not Serve Negros, Fags or Dykes, the Objectivist will defend your right to refuse service, while decrying your bigotry. This is Tony and Bob's view of rights. Who suffers from discrimination can move along. The rights adhere to the discriminator (at least in the pure noumenal realm of shoulda-oughta). In the Indiana case, there is then a Randian rationale for complete freedom to discriminate, but that is not what happened, and that is what interests me -- the jumble of news, freakouts, rebounds, swerves and drama accompanying this law's signing. The revision or clarification's explicit mention of sexual orientation and gender identity strips the bill of its intended effect -- to shield discriminatory acts from legal consequence. Now, agree or disagree with the play of this issue in Indiana (or Arkansas where the governor signalled a veto for a similar act). Agree or disagree that it is proper to discriminate (as a florist, wedding photographer or cake maker or wedding registry or whatever) against gays and lesbians. Reject any act that would serve to bind someone in service to someone else against their will. What remains are the ethical and moral issues separate to government's improper laws and courts' improper interpretations. What the reality seems to be is that notions of fairness and morality that Rand champions are behind the reaction to the bill. Philosophically far from her starkly simple government mandate, people who criticized the bill did not admit Randian niceties. Up to and including the Supreme Court, opinion has shifted. Gay marriage is in many states a right. The national debate over the Indiana law seized on this reality. Opposition was swiftly marshalled up to the point of boycott. Thus, the motive power behind the re-jigging of the bill in Indiana was political reaction, not philosophical, not ethical. The boycottage may have had serious knock-on effects to Indiana's economy. The notion of discrimination against gays and lesbians is increasingly seen as morally repugnant under the conditions of America's constitution (as interpreted by USA courts), and aside from the religious groups that lobbied for the Indiana law, the issue has been solved (dangerous economical impacts avoided). I am a spectator to the ongoing gay marriage issue in America. Up here the whole schmozzle is behind us. As for rights, religious bodies have the right to not offer gay marriage as a sacrament of their beliefs. They have a right not to employ gays in their institutions. Is there some suffering Canadian cake-maker who is forced to sell a cake to a couple that fills her with religious loathing? Probably, but we don't hear much from her. Adam, I can entertain a Randian read of the whole schmozzle, but my observations were uncoupled from Objectivish notions. I am more interested in the contours of the Indiana ruckus, and what it says about what Americans tend to believe are bedrock issues -- as they change. The ruckus is likely to effect other states' considerations of similar laws. Which state would want to face boycott or the wrath of the business class? If I sympathize with a Randian in face of the Indiana drama, I'd still challenge that Randian to offer a positive argument in favour of the initial 'unclarified' legislation. Why is it necessary, on Obectivist grounds? Separately, how might this Objectivish argument in favour of an Indiana law have effect on the actors in the legal and social dramas that are still to come (ie, what would an Objectivist offer to the Supreme Court considering its gay marriage decisions in June?). Reality is a government never sated with its power to legislate. Is there any reason for an Objectivist or Objectivish person to champion such Religious Liberty Restoration acts? Is there any effect an Objectivish person can make on the larger issue (I like Ed Hudgins arguments for the GOP to get out of the way of social reality)? Meanwhile, in deepest Iowa: In Iowa, Ted Cruz denounces gay marriage, lauds Indiana religious liberty bill
  20. William should have a restraining order keeping him away from children. Greg dreams of using the force of government to punish creators of art that he doesn't like. Not at all surprising. Greg's oddball notions of homosexuality are what lead him to suggest a 'restraining order,' I think. In an earlier comment, he made his notion clear and simple: -- and expanded the notion: What is left implied is that a new generation of gays requires 'initiation' by abuse, and that gays and lesbians are most likely to revisit this abuse upon new victims. Thus a gay man like myself is ipso facto a putative criminal in waiting ... I can't see any other reason to suggest the law be called in. It cannot be the blue painting. So, I guess Greg believes I must be 'restrained' by legal order to keep away from children, lest I molest them or otherwise abuse them. He may believe that I am an acute danger to most children. I don't take this noxious nonsense personally, nor am I offended by Greg's opinion that it's time for someone to apply legal force. The notion and suggested remedy are too unwarranted to provoke anything but laughter. However, should Greg wish to proceed on his suggestion, he can either contact someone in British Columbia who also feels 'the children' are at acute risk -- or he can attempt to obtain an order himself from the Surrey RCMP: Obtaining a Peace Bond or Restraining Order. I'd advise Greg to have his homosexuality-via-child-sexual-abuse explanation ready for his order application, since the untitled blue painting might not be the best evidence to convince the RCMP that my freedoms need curtailing. All in all, my impression has only deepened that Greg is no friend of reason or objectivity. -- to those who have suggested offstage that Greg has defamed me, I disagree strongly. Greg's notions and opinions here deserve only ridicule. I would, however, relish what reasoning Greg might supply to ensure that my freedom be legally restricted. He can release those reasons here and we can all learn a lot. Not about art, not about sexual abuse, not about me or my danger to children, but about Greg's bigotry. I would actually advise him to say no more about why William needs to be put under an order. What reasons he will pull up will only make his arguments look more stupid and nasty. All rise. Court is in session.
  21. How did Kyrel arrive at this estimate ... that 'almost all Muslims' sympathize or support the murders in Paris? -- if Kyrel were to investigate further, asking himself "what have Muslims said in rejection of the murders," what would result? I think it's necessary to investigate further.** As for the notion that Salafism, fundamentalist Islam, Islamo-Nazism, Islam are distinctions that need not (or should not) be made, this is not a useful rational heuristic. It allows a faulty generalization and faulty conclusion. In addition, a make-no-distinctions-among Muslims heuristic allows a great amount of non-rational hatred and bigotry free play: I think Kyrel is a bigoted maniac on the subject of Islam, incapable of rational argument. I think the rhetoric above is nothing but hateful expostulations. I can imagine Kyrel meeting a Muslim of some stripe -- and letting loose the farrago of insult. What would follow, I have no idea. It seems a pointless exercise to direct a stream of ugly fighting words to a non-Muslim audience. Why not engage the perfidious freak monsters directly? Abusing OL's forum to pollute discourse with such key words of prejudice and reaction: it's doubly disgusting. (Google "site:objectivistliving.com goat-fucking towelhead monkey") ___________________________ ** one way of evaluating goat-fucking vermin towelhead monkey freak monsters is to divvy up the ground. Look for media reports (not only in English) of reaction to the Paris massacre in the following countries with a Muslim-majority: TunisiaEgyptAlgeriaMoroccoJordanTurkeyIndonesiaMalaysiaSaudi ArabiaUnited Arab Emirates (including Dubai)QatarKuwaitPakistanUzbekistanKazakhstanBosniaKosovo- one could also include the Muslim voices parlayed by media in Western countries: GermanyUKFranceNetherlandsUSACanadaWhat did/do "most Muslims" have to say about the French massacre, ISIS, violent jihad, religiously-invoked terror? I think he would be surprised. I invite Kyrel to do some work at finding out a more realistic state of affairs.
  22. MSK did hit it on the head, I thought, especially by highlighting "the freak-villain persuasion technique." He also noted as he does: "If you identify something incorrectly, it doesn't matter how you judge it. Your judgment will not be based in reality." Now, on the subject of Japan and its Muslims, the separation between state and religion and the liberty to practice religion are much like Canada and the USA -- constitutionally protected. Your points then seem not rational or informed: "They (Japan) did the SMART thing seeing as it is hard to separate the good from the bad apples they said to hell with all of them.Japan did not and does not do what was claimed in the preposterous article you cited. By NOT allowing them to take root in the FIRST place they unlike us do not have to deal with it from a "oh shit how are we ever going to clean up THIS mess."Japan has Muslims. Their religious practice is constitutionally-protected, just like here in Canada They avoided the mess all together.Japan as a whole has a tiny Muslim minority, of native Japanese and of resident aliens. It has a robust free press and a very active, even militant brand of pressure groups. Do you SEE Islamic anyone crying and complaining about the Japanese valuing their OWN culture over anyone else's? No.The biggest beef of Japanese Muslims are things like vandalizing and destroying symbols of Islam and its Japanese mosques and madrasas. See this report on such events back in 2001. If I as a westerner want to go to Japan and want to be treated with respect I bloody well learn Japanese and at the very least if I do not practice their culture I respect it and do my best to make an attempt to fit in.You are, I expect, an atheist. In Japan you are free to choose your religion or lack of religion. I certainly do not go brandishing a Quran and try and shove Islam down the Japanese throats.That's nice. Here's a two parter video on Muslims in Japan, some twenty minutes in total. The report is happily free of viral baloney. Maybe you will reconsider your opinions. Maybe you would offer better information about Muslims -- how about an angry post about Canada and its Muslim communities? If you are working in the Patch, no doubt you have worked alongside Muslims. It would be interesting to have your point of view on something you have personally experienced. Maybe one day somebody 'brandished' a Bible at your doorstep, and wanted to harangue you about Jehovah ... maybe somebody tried to shove the Book of Mormon down your throat. On the subject of Islam in Japan, I think some more homework may be necessary. Here's a precis of Muslim Japan, with some excellent references: Here are the references: Islamic Center of Japan: History of Islam in Japan Islam: Beliefs and Observances; Caesar E. Farah, Ph.D. The Pew Forum: The Future of the Global Muslim Population Islamic Center of Japan: Life in Japan Japan Focus: Local Mosques and the Lives of Muslims in Japan The Constitution of Japan The Pew Forum: Mapping the Global Muslim Population Asia-Pacific Human Rights Information Center: The Everyday Life of Muslims in Japan Yes, perhaps we should say that the principle of freedom to distribute books cannot have been seriously violated if there is only one instance of it not being upheld. ... The logic is simple, elegant and relentless. 1. You cannot buy certain books in the U.S. without attracting the attention of the NSA. 2. The U.S. is a free country, right? 3. Therefore Quran-banning Japan must be a free country too! There is no ban on the Koran in Japan -- so, the logical entailments are tainted by irrational assumptions in the first place. Oddly, Jules seems not to see the internal illogic of his stance. On the one hand, Japan holds strongly to separation of religion and state (thus, there is no state religion, and no religious test for office, and no official statistics collected on religion of immigrants and guest-workers). Jules is strongly for this kind of deliberate constitutional protection of its citizens' human rights -- it is the same protection Canadians and Americans enjoy. On the other hand, Jules mistakenly believes that Japan as a state interferes with the free expression of religion -- by banning or controlling imports of Islamic 'holy' texts. And despite his errors, he thinks that a state interfering with free expression, conscience, association and so on is just fine, apparently. I might have it wrong, but. It doesn't make sense to me to hold these two notions as compatible. Why shouldn't Canada ban the Koran, inhibit mosque building, reject Muslim immigrants on the basis of religion? This is where Jules lives, and this is where the Muslim population is building. If the (falsely claimed) restrictions on religious behaviour are great for Japan, why not Canada and the USA (and the UK, and France, and etcetera)? I don't understand Ed Hudgins' fact-free borrowing from an anonymous Youtube video, nor his flouncing off from the scene refusing to discuss his sources. I do not understand Jules' fact-free assumptions regarding Japan. I don't understand how Objectivists and Rand-admirers or small-O objectivists fail to use rational means to check 'facts' against reality. Reality is what we want to discuss, right? And we are right to toss out bullshit and preposterous nonsense no matter from where it was spawned, no? Frankly, some of us are starting to ape the ugly prejudices proffered by Richard the Infidel, implacable in the face of contradiction, full of general malice toward the generic Muslim, and informed by the worst bigotry.
  23. The online forum belongs to Joshua Landis, a professor in Oklahoma. His forum pre-dates the 'Arab Spring' and the terrible war in Syria. That forum is called Syria Comment. Landis is not a Muslim, but is married to a woman from Syria who is of the Alawi community. The discussions there that I participated in are too many to reasonably describe. I became a moderator when I complained to Dr Landis that some commentary was seething with hatred and sectarian bigotry -- counter to the site's rules. He gave me the opportunity to moderate, and I did to the best of my ability until I was "outed" by a partisan and former writer/editor for the Syria Comment blog. Michael, I think you give me too much credit for understanding The Muslims, but by participating at Syria Comment (and via Twitter) in debate and discussion, I learned about history in Syria (and to a lesser degree Egypt, Yemen, Bahrain, Tunisia and Libya. It might be fairer to say that I have been exposed to and participated in debate, discussion, dispute with a wide variety of Middle East and North African discussants, Muslims of many stripes. I am also exposed to a wide variety of media and particular people making/reporting news and comment (I could probably give a three-hour 'talk' on Syria and its religious/political history). I search out and digest a lot of 'data points' that purport to illuminate The Muslims -- from surveys to opinion pieces, from historical essays to intelligence dossiers. It's an ongoing project. It's challenging, frustrating at times. I haven't reached conclusions about The Muslims except to understand that "The Muslims" are about as varied as "The Christians." I like Tony a lot. I appreciate his perspective. I think we are both committed to Reason, sweet Reason. And I think that a face-to-face discussion between the two of us would probably bear much good fruit -- would lead to mutually-satisfactory agreements on facts. Sometimes we know so well the detailed warrants for our own claims that we forget that the other discussants have little access to these warrants, experiences, and other building blocks of an opinion. Sometimes, with Tony (but of course with other OLers), I know or suspect or assume he has a lot of personal experiences that inform his present opinions -- but the details are not always apparent, they sometimes need to be teased out. It is a feature/bug of online discussion that questions can be left hanging. In face-to-face discussion neither discussant can simply roll on over questions. Neither discussant can entirely evade the other's questions in conversation ("But let me ask you again, what evidence do you have that ...?"). If I were to have a real-life discussion with Tony on "The Muslims," I have no doubt that we could find agreement in many subject areas. We could get down to specifics, details, and better understand each other's conclusions by becoming much more familiar with each other's bases for particular opinions. With regard to "The Muslims," my arguments often focus on generalizations that are poorly supported. These are epistemological issues for me -- how we 'know'(believe) such and so, how we best approach fraught questions, how to best assemble and challenge 'data points,' how we can best avoid the operation of bias and other cognitive errors.
  24. Okay, fair enough. I thought this was the money quote from WHO ... I realize that I haven't commented on the original post in this thread. I found it just disheartening enough in its title to not read what I imagined were the arguments. "We shoulda kept a race-based drawbridge up in 1964. Negroes from Africa shoulda been kept out, and every bad disease we have faced since woulda been kept where it belonged, on the Dark Continent." In reality the low tide was still to come, with Vegas's 'pesthole.' The kind of generalization that sets my teeth on edge. And Wolf's careful rendering of African failure as a whole to live up to the mark (in statistics). That was of no purpose but to dehumanize, to my eye ... How little empathy and 'emergency thinking' has been on display here? How much rational, practical discussion, and how much unalloyed bigotry? Maybe Jerry's head-in-sand attitude is better. It avoids fear and loathing of Dark Ebola Blood Coming to Your Town Now, and it avoids demonizing a continent and counselling a cruel disconnection from a broad humanity. But Jerry's head in the sand is no better than panic quarantine cull. It fails to engage with reality as she really is. On a personal, gut level, I feel that the West should do its best to help. In my thoughts picked clean of emotion, I don't think ignoring/quarantining/disengaging is smart for America or smart for Europe or smart for Canada (or India). At this point in the outbreak, abandoning Africa and international aid efforts will pay no good dividends. I believe it is separately in our own national interests to institute real emergency response -- including Western military. I hope our government does more. Pestilential thoughts though these may be, it's what I come up with on balance. Derek, I am with you on the Whiskey Tango Foxtrot about 'pesthole.' I don't like it.
  25. Not me, not yet at any rate. All I can know so far is that Jerry believes something about Ebola is a hoax. His general POV about government dishonesty is not a useful heuristic in re Ebola -- it doesn't allow differentiation between truth or untruth in particulars. A useful heuristic would help us to informally classify particulars. It would give criteria for accepting or rejecting a particular. It would show the steps necessary to carry out a reasoned analysis. So, for me, the POV is cognitively crippled -- it is restricted to a narrow view, and it is darkened by bias and bigotry. This is an epistemological puzzle for me. "The information" market writ large will be a combination of reasoned/logical/tested informaton ... and extrapolations, distortions, misapprehensions, rumour, and cant. "The Information" would also include truth ... though you have left that out of the mix(!). If I can reduce the focus to Ebola, of course "The information" we get (and how we get it) is prone to the very same mix of truth, rumour and bullshit. For me, the information generally available about viruses ranges wide. On one side we have the most rigorous applications of science -- the side that 'discovered' viruses and how they operate and how they differentiate and how they replicate and how they mutate -- and the mechanisms of a given virus's virulence and vectors of infection. At the other pole, we have outright denial of the reality of viruses. At this pole collect the nonsense accrued. Here we find those opinions that combine ignorance and error and false statements (eg, Bill Maher's nonsense on the subject). Here I find a welter of "the information" that is not credible, not the result of hard slogging rational inquiry. For me, advances in biology have opened the amazing macroscopic world of our bodies -- opened to our understanding the world of the immune system, its parts, its mechanisms, its failures, its amazing complex structures. There really is compelling detailed knowledge of Ebola -- discernible under the crust of cant and blather and news/entertainment simplifications. It is so sad to me that Jerry does not understand that the only thing that stands between us and crushing ignorance is reason. That he cavalierly disposes of reason ... and shows no insight into his cognitive errors -- this suggests to me that he actually rejects reason, rejects the very idea of well-warranted knowledge (in this instance the operation of the Ebola virus in primates, humans). So, in this sense, I feel Jerry insults all our intelligence, assigns us to the column Rubes and Fools. Because he knows better. Because we are all fooled by the FDA and the CDC, fooled by the 'hoax.' You may find, Mike, that passing insults based on Jerry's peculiar modes of thinking are the most significant. I disagree strongly -- I hold that Jerry insults the spirit of reason. I hold that his specious claims are deeply insulting in the abstract (fools who believe that Ebola is a dangerous virus) and in the particular (William, you are a fool and a dupe of the CDC/Government/FDA). I find it more generally insulting that pernicious nonsense is peddled here. I will agree that Jerry doesn't know (accept as true) the underlying facts. And I would argue Jerry doesn't care about the underlying facts. I would argue, moreover, that Jerry doesn't actually believe facts can reliably be had -- he mistrusts or anathematizes the very 'fact'-based regimes of knowledge accrual that expose facts to our view ... So a bland and general statement that "mostly" we are ignorant of the facts -- this rubs me entirely the wrong way. I infer that attempts on grasping 'underlying facts' are so prone to error or bias or deception that they are without value ... I will state that I do mostly know the underlying facts, and that you also have a reasonable approximation of the facts that are in play. I would say you accept (or believe or understand or know) that the reality of hemorrhagic virus is such and so, that such and so can be and has been empirically validated. That the virus and its genetic material has been accurately typed. That the means of transmission are understood. That prophylactic measures can be successful. That the virulence of the virus is accurately described and understood. That the Ebola virus can be reliably differentiated from the other hemorrhagic viruses in the world. That the epidemiology of Ebola is understood with reasonable certainty. I believe you accept all these things as relatively 'factual' -- within the constraints and uncertainties of scientific reasoning. So, reading words of approbation for Jerry's loosey-goosey epistemology is surprising. It strikes me as passive, incurious, evidence of a kind of 'relativity of truth.' It places doubt not as a tool of inquiry, but a tool of obfuscation. It elevates a curious kind of skepticism (Oh, we can never know, can we?) in which knowledge is not just conditional (on truth) but is unapproachable. In the context of Ebola, this is far too skeptical for me. An over-broad skeptical "we cannot know" seems to me a kind of "I give up on attempting to know." It devalues reason, and suggests we should be comfortable in our ignorance. No doubt I have read too much into your interjection, Mike. But I believe there is such a thing as reliable knowledge, validated by experiment and empirical observations (of the Ebola virus and its current epidemic in Africa). So, I use your interjection to make a case for reason, not to denigrate you or Jerry as a human being. I can't leave Jerry's lack of reason unchallenged. My motivation in challenging Jerry (and in similar context, Dean) is to put beliefs to a rational test. It is significant to me that Jerry cannot mount a defense of his original Ebola claims. He can't or won't lay out his reasoning on Ebola. It disturbs me that Jerry cannot establish a common cause with the other Realist Reasoners here. The microbiology of Ebola (and other hemorrhagic viruses) is a work in progress, but at present "the information" from that work is the best available (by the measure of reason). -- If one is only concerned with the United States or Canada, our main tasks in medical response will be containment. Canada and the United States will be vigilant to accurately identify those who bear the virus, to medically quarantine the infected, and latterly to treat the infected with what means we have. If one thinks of Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea ... well the "hoax" speaks for itself. This is the most serious outbreak since Ebola was identified back in the seventies. It is a scourge, a menace, a killing disease above all ... If we (US/Canada/Europe) in the West want to ignore Ebola in Africa, hoping that by ignoring it it will go away ... I would suggest this is myopic and extremely dangerous. Of course, the public health bodies of the USA/Europe/Canada are helping the African nations to contain the spread. In the scenario suggested by Jerry's 'I don't care' -- where there are no facts, no worries since it is all hoaxed -- I can see the dangerous implications of that shrug. Luckily, Jerry's head in the sand approach is opposite to the actual measures taken. His arguments are irrelevant and have no impact to the actual measures being taken and being contemplated. I don't understand this. I cannot know Jerry's motivations, only speculate on the reason he posts nonsense. If I am in the group who has insulted Jerry in this thread, I do not consider my mission accomplished. My missions are related to reason, how we know what we know, how knowledge claims are examined ... how dangerous is Ebola. "Not pleasant but won't kill ..." Hmmm. This doesn't leave much room to discuss the actual measures taken, whether you support them or understand them or not.