It's going to be WWIII

[MichaeltheGreat]

Originally posted by laurentius


Ps. MtG its you whos the troller over Iraq with your crappy threads

*snif* *waah*


Damn, where's that "bite me" smiley when you need it?

[MichaeltheGreat]

Originally posted by Spiffor
A war where East Asia, South Asia, most of Africa and Sout America are not involved or scarcely involved can't be called a World War.

Did you guys speaking about 'the world war of terrorism against the West' knew that in the only territory or Congo, there has been millions casualties in the few past years (I think I remember more than 4,000,000 casualties) ?
That's much more than your 'world war' will ever produce until a nuclear power goes amok.

The "world war" thing is a bunch of bogus hype, of course, but what does Congo have to do with anything? Other than primarily being in a French / European sphere of interest? That is a primariliy tribally driven conflict, casualty numbers are dodgy (but still extreme) and the response to it so far was for a French Colonel to bureaucratically refuse the extraction request of two UN MILOBS who thus became unwilling dinner guests of the locals.

If the Europeans, collectively or as individual nations, want to demonstrate a morally superior interest in human rights and human suffering under oppression, why don't they start being more active in their former colonies?

[Spiffor]

I didn't use the Congo example to speak about the superiority of the French foreign policies. Especially because our policies in Africa manage to be more assholish than what the US has ever done out of South America (Ivory Coast is an exception, I hope we continue in this direction).

I used the Congo example, because it is a monstrous war that is still happening today with no one caring, and that is worse in terms of casualties than any conflict I'm aware of since WW2 (maybe Iran-Iraq was worse, I forgot the figures).
I used Congo's example to put things into perspective: our worldwide efort against terrorism is fortunately not coming close to the mindboggling slaughter that is happening in that small part of the world.

[MichaeltheGreat]

I wasn't slamming on the French, per se, either, because Congo is a mess beyond France's capability to handle. However, a unified European response (other than inaction) might set a moral tone for dealing with mass human rights violations and for dealing with stability issues in the third world.

[DinoDoc]

why don't they start being more active in their former colonies?

Why do you think they continually ***** about us?

[Tripledoc]

Originally posted by Ned
Tripledoc, your post regarding no correspondence between liberty (right to contract, own property, to travel, etc.) and prosperty is remarkable in its wilfull ignorance.

Prosperity as in wealth does not neccesarily equate an effective economy. Japan would be an example of that.

What I am talking about is economic development. That is creating the foundation for a strong nation which is capable of warding off encroachment by westen capitalism and militarism. Stalinist Russia would be a good example of how a backwards nation is capable of obtaining a strong economic base capable of guaranteeing national soverignty.

Of course 'liberal' economists know that, and hence they advice western politicians to push for 'reforms' in the middle east and eastern Europe, which weakens them and give international capitalism the opportunity to suck the lifeblood out of their economies.

Everyone agrees that the capitalist reforms have been an unmitigated distater in Russia. In fact the demographics would suggest that the population base has shrunk there to an even greater degree than it did during the civil war and the subsequent famines.

It would be silly to think that the Muslim countries would follow the same example. It is much more likely that they will follow the authoritarian economies of East Asia such as Korea a few decades ago, Taiwan and Singapore now. Liberty had no role to play in those economies. And democracy did certainly not. Neither does property rights equal liberty. The Roman Empire, which wrote property rights into law, was not characterized by liberty for example.

No liberty is as I said a phenomenon exclusively tied to the French and American revolution and is an exclusive western phnomenon which cannot be transplanted to other nations outside the cultural sphere of the west. It would be unfeasible since they have not yet to the same extent devleped the vast amount of control measures which paradoxically is neccesary for liberty to prosper. Many of these nations lack an effective prison system, proper survaillance of citizens. The educational system is not capable of molding the mindset of the young to the same degree as in the west. Psychiatric care is often minimal. Neither is media functioning effectively as propaganda for the masses. Neither has the familiy been rendered obsolete there. This is neccesary in a liberal soceity, otherwise loyalty to the system is hard to come by.

[Ned]

Tripledoc, your post is hopefully a joke. Right?

[Spiffor]

Tripledoc:
The Japanese are discovering individualism, and the ensuing liberty. The concept can and does export, however it is true many societies need some maturation before emphasizing on the individual rather than the collective.
Then, the concept of liberty in such countries can be different from what is known in the west. The French concept and the American concept are very different already (the Yanks emphasize more on being protected from the collective, the Frogs emphasize more on having the people leading the collective).

But except from that, I agree with you that a backward country can get huge economic benefits from a dictatorship. However, the disctatorship will have to grow out of it at one point, when the individual input becomes necessary to keep the economy growing.

[Tripledoc]

Originally posted by Spiffor
But except from that, I agree with you that a backward country can get huge economic benefits from a dictatorship. However, the disctatorship will have to grow out of it at one point, when the individual input becomes necessary to keep the economy growing.

Yes and the development has come from within. When the time is right the huddled masses will by their own accord topple the regime. Any external pressure from the West will only hinder this development because I believe most people are willing to give up personal liberty in exchange for pride in national sovereignty. After all it is better to have a dictator who speaks your language than being ruled by a foreign one.

[DinoDoc]

Originally posted by Ned
Tripledoc, your post is hopefully a joke. Right?

Except for the bit about distatorships being better able to develop the economies of underdeveloped states, I would agree with you that he was talking crap.

[Drake Tungsten]

Prosperity as in wealth does not neccesarily equate an effective economy. Japan would be an example of that.

Japan isn't an "effective economy"? What the **** are you talking about?

The Japanese are discovering individualism, and the ensuing liberty. The concept can and does export, however it is true many societies need some maturation before emphasizing on the individual rather than the collective.

How deliciously ethnocentric. Hate to break it to you, but East Asian collectivist cultures are superior to Western individualist cultures in many ways.

[Tripledoc]

Originally posted by DinoDoc
Except for the bit about distatorships being better able to develop the economies of underdeveloped states, I would agree with you that he was talking crap.

You don't think that control of the citizens is greater in the West than it is in the Muslim countries. For instance in order to get a drivers license in Egypt all you have to do is show that you are capable of driving a car backward between two trafic cones. Getting a speeding ticket in any mideast country is virtually impossible. Compare to Europe where photographic survalliance has been set up on checkpoints to check for speeding.

[Ned]

Originally posted by Drake Tungsten

Prosperity as in wealth does not neccesarily equate an effective economy. Japan would be an example of that.

Japan isn't an "effective economy"? What the **** are you talking about?

The Japanese are discovering individualism, and the ensuing liberty. The concept can and does export, however it is true many societies need some maturation before emphasizing on the individual rather than the collective.

How deliciously ethnocentric. Hate to break it to you, but East Asian collectivist cultures are superior to Western individualist cultures in many ways.

OK, name one.

I would like to provide an example: Invention. Committees do not invent. Individuals do.

There is a reason for the West and Westernized Asian nations being advanced in technology.

[Spiffor]

Originally posted by Drake Tungsten
How deliciously ethnocentric. Hate to break it to you, but East Asian collectivist cultures are superior to Western individualist cultures in many ways.

I actually think purely individualistic societies suck (and that's why I cannot imagine living in the US).
But there is a change happening in Japan since about a decade, as the youth and young adults are less and less prone to accept their place in society being dictated by their elders or their "betters".

I don't think there is anything ethnocentrist in saying Japan is experiencing a change. I haven't remembered saying it was good or bad.

[Drake Tungsten]

OK, name one.

A far lower rate of crime. People are less likely to **** over other people when they think of the group's interests before they think of their own.

Less selfishness in general, actually.