Massive Terract campaign in India

[onodera]

Could we ask one of the mods to split Asher's lively discussion into a separate thread?

[Asher]

Originally posted by onodera
Could we ask one of the mods to split Asher's lively discussion into a separate thread?

No need, it's lost my interest. We've looped 'round a couple times back to square one. Now Siro is starting to rant about how apparently only the Jews have culture and history, so I wouldn't understand. My favourite part was he kept talking about how I'm part of a "new" country, but the last time I checked Canada is far older than Israel.

(Plus, it's the weekend soon, and this is way too dull to talk about on the weekend)

[Dinner]

Originally posted by onodera
Could we ask one of the mods to split Asher's lively discussion into a separate thread?

[Wezil]

Originally posted by Asher

(Plus, it's the weekend soon, and this is way too dull to talk about on the weekend)

You can bump the David Frost thread now.

[Sirotnikov]

Originally posted by Asher
Keep telling yourself that. It isn't AS checkered, and you act like it's not. Are you saying no atrocities have been committed in the name of Judaism?

I would be hard pressed to find stuff after the BC area.

What else do you need to know? Studying stupidity in depth only makes you more stupid.

What ever your judgement of any religious belief is, being proudly ignorant about it hardly makes your statements about it worth-while.

The beliefs of primitive tribes in the colombian jungle is also nonsense, but unless you studied the actual beliefs and history of their tribe, none of your observations about them is worth the post it is written in.


This is very similar to Agathon bad-mouthing technologies he doesn't begin to understand, and saying that "I don't have to care for it, since it's all crap".

Because it's only important because you make it important. It's land, it doesn't matter. I've lived on the east coast, the west coast, Canada, US...it's all land. My family comes historically from the UK, so how is that any different than your cultural origins in the Israel area?

The fact that many Italians choose to live in Italy, and see it as their homeland, has nothing to do with the pope nor with Jupiter's will.

You have grievances with the concept of an ethnical-nation-state, and you mistakenly blame it on religion, without realizing the difference between concepts. I realize you find them both "stupid" but that does not allow you to ignore it.

To counter-prove your point - there are tons of much more religious Jews than me, that don't live in Israel, don't care about it, and even hate it. That does not live well with your claim that religion is the motive behind Israel's existence, and the motive behind its citizens existence in it.

Living in Israel, for most Israelis has to do with historical pathos, cultural heritage and, well, practical reasons.

Yes, there are some people, especially in the west bank, who are messianic and do stuff because they think God told them so. But they are an absolute minority, and their movement was only born in the late 70s - almost 100 years after Zionism, and 30 years after Israel was born.

You really should stop arguing about things you know nothing about.

You don't have to live there just because people did thousands of years ago, especially when living there causes countless people to die.

I don't have to, but I want to, and it is generally internationally accepted as a respectable reason. That's why the UN supports the right of people to self-determination in a territory of their historical heritage.

You decided ethnical/national ethos is meaningless to you - that's great for you and your parents. I see things in another way.

But you can't confuse my cultural-national motivation, with a religious one. That is absolutely false.

Most of my people's history revolves around England

...Most of my cultural heritage talks about England and Scotland.

And you've elected not to live there and you do not define your nationality to be English. Great for you.

To me, my national and cultural identity is Jewish and it is important to me enough to spend much of my life in Israel.

Not sure how that is all related to my logic. FWIW, that stereotype is sadly, more or less true, but that's neither here nor there...

Of course it isn't true.
Most people in the US today have little idea about indian history, and even less idea about Europe.

Yes, which are all from the OLD times. OLD. Not 1949 old. OLD OLD.

That makes absolutely no difference.

The shield of david is an old old emblem that bears no religious meaning. It has always referred to Jewish statehood and jewish "people" as opposed to jewish religion.

The stripes are indeed a simplified religious symbol, but it's unique enough to symbolize the common heritage that Jews, even non-religious ones, share.

There were plenty of other ideas for the flag, that were less religious, but this was chosen as it was the most inclusive.

The problem here is it's you that does not understand. Just because I live in a "new" country doesn't mean I don't have cultural history with a unique ethnicity.

Yes it does.
Your cultural history is not canadian, but english, as you've said yourself.
Your ehtnicity is (as you said) english.

But you do not define yourself as english, and you don't find English symbols and heritage interesting.

That's fine, but it has nothing to do with being secular or religious.

Just like I define myself as Jewish, and find Jewish symbols and heritage close to me. This has nothing to do with my actual religion, which is secular agnostic.

All ethnicities are unique, for christ sake.

Yes they are. But Canadians are not an ethnicity. Nor do they value ethnicity high as part of their self-determination.

And there are also plenty of Canadian Jews, who are more religious than me, but don't care for a national state like Israel.

Which is why your silly claim that Israel is a religious product is moot.

Some people like to have their own countries which symbolise their culture, while other people make a different choise. This has nothing to do with religion, no matter how you put it.

The stupidity of this conversation angers me. Just because Jewish people tend to be nationalistic doesn't mean it's okay, or other people don't understand. Maybe other people are just more enlightened and understand that nationalism is not the answer.

That fact is that YOU do not understand.

You continually ignore and misunderstand the difference between religion and nationalism.

The fact that I choose to live in Israel has nothing to do with religion.

Nationalism has nothing to do the original argument about the merits of Islam or Judaism, which is why your agument that Judaism is the cause of bloodshed in the middle east, is completely ludicrous.

Maybe other people realize that just because their "ethnic origins" begin in some other place, they don't need to live there.

Congratulations.

You have slowly, but surely, stopped blaming things on Judaism and started talking about Jewish nationalism, which is a different thing.

I guess that you concede that your original statement on Judaism being cause of tension in the middle east, or the driving force behind Zionism is absolutely false.

[Asher]

What the ****? You constantly make the assertion that ethnicity must be tied to a country (eg, "Canadians are not an ethnicity").

You're unreal. I'm adding you to my list between Ben Kenobi and Agathon.

This seems to be the root of your problem. You seem to think for the Jewish people to be ethnicity, they need to have their own country? I see no other reason why you keep bringing up Canadians in the context of ethnic groups. The fact that Canada's age has anything to do with the ethnic heritage of people who live in Canada is especially perplexing, but especially amusing.

I reject the notion that ethnic groups should be able to steal land from others just because they feel exploited. Learn to work together, don't exile yourselves on someone else's land then act all surprised when it pisses people off.

[Sirotnikov]

Now Siro is starting to rant about how apparently only the Jews have culture and history,

way to intentionally misrepresent my argument:

I realize that this is something incredibly difficult to understand for a person in such a young nation such as canada, which has no unique pathos nor an unique ethnical groups.

Europeans can better relate to my decision to live in Israel.

My favourite part was he kept talking about how I'm part of a "new" country, but the last time I checked Canada is far older than Israel.

Do you seriously claim that Canadian heritage is older than Jewish heritage?

That's funny, for a nation whose national flag was invented 18 years after my Israel declared independance.

It is also funny because until that time all the different committees trying to a invent a unique flag mostly included British emblems (lion, crown, union jack)

But the first time you even thought up you should have different flag from the UK, was around 1870 - at the same time as the birth of Zionism.

[Asher]

Originally posted by Sirotnikov

way to intentionally misrepresent my argument:




Do you seriously claim that Canadian heritage is older than Jewish heritage?

Holy ****, what the hell is wrong with you?

Canada is not an ethnic group. Apples and oranges.

Canada is a collection of many ethnic groups, a concept which is foreign to someone who lives in Israel no doubt.

Unlike Israel, Canada is enlightened -- we're a multi-cultural society with people from virtually every ethnic group around the world. Israel is still stuck in the past with old-fashioned ideologies...

[Sirotnikov]

This seems to be the root of your problem. You seem to think for the Jewish people to be ethnicity, they need to have their own country? I see no other reason why you keep bringing up Canadians in the context of ethnic groups. The fact that Canada's age has anything to do with the ethnic heritage of people who live in Canada is especially perplexing, but especially amusing.

I only bring it up so you can understand what ethnic heritage is, and why Zionism and Israel's flag are not religious concepts, but ethnical ones.

You have once again completely turned away from your original point, blaming Judaism for the middle east conflict.

If I ever said an ethnicity has to have its own country, you're welcome to quote.

Here's what I actually said:

I don't have to, but I want to, and it is generally internationally accepted as a respectable reason. That's why the UN supports the right of people to self-determination in a territory of their historical heritage.

You decided ethnical/national ethos is meaningless to you - that's great for you and your parents. I see things in another way.

But you can't confuse my cultural-national motivation, with a religious one. That is absolutely false.

I reject the notion that ethnic groups should be able to steal land from others just because they feel exploited.

Ethnic groups should be able to form countries, should the wish so. That is a principle accepted by the UN, and that's how most modern countries came to be.

The most logical place for an ethnical group to set up a country, is the area that is most tied to their heritage, where they are a majority, esp. if it previously had self rule.

Israel is unique in that for a time, and due to foreign influence, Jews were a minority and not a majority.

I remind people again, that this his has absolutley nothing to do with your claim tying Israel and Zionism to Judaism.

I'm glad you conceded that silly argument.

Learn to work together, don't exile yourselves on someone else's land then act all surprised when it pisses people off.

That is completely and utterly irrelevant in a discussion on the merits of Judaism vs. Islam.

[TCO]

So split it and let it die then.

[Asher]

I remind people again, that this his has absolutley nothing to do with your claim tying Israel and Zionism to Judaism.

I'm glad you conceded that silly argument.

Only an idiot would claim that Zionism, Israel, and Judaism are not linked.

[TCO]

Asher: I think you are just coming upon a new worldview that you have not really tried on before, or considered non-dismissively.

Like you, I am from the polyglot NA. And the whole idea of a nation being defined by an ethnicity or a langauge seems bizarre. Yet this is the way of the world...and Europeans and Jews and such are more likely to think this way.

Heck, maybe they actually have a point. Look at how screwed up Yugoslavia is. Similarly think about the USA as Mexican immigrants come in, especially if they do not assimilate our language or the whole mythos of the REvolutionary War and such.

[Asher]

Originally posted by TCO
Asher: I think you are just coming upon a new worldview that you have not really tried on before, or considered non-dismissively.

Like you, I am from the polyglot NA. And the whole idea of a nation being defined by an ethnicity or a langauge seems bizarre. Yet this is the way of the world...and Europeans and Jews and such are more likely to think this way.

Heck, maybe they actually have a point. Look at how screwed up Yugoslavia is. Similarly think about the USA as Mexican immigrants come in, especially if they do not assimilate our language or the whole mythos of the REvolutionary War and such.

You're right, I'm used to living out here in the developed world. Israel is a throwback, and I don't think that's a good thing. People need to learn to work together and live together, and you don't do that with ethnic segregation. It's more understandable for me if the people are religious -- it's an irrational basis that has no hope for resolution anyway. But to me, it's almost reprehensible that secular people still ally themselves in an "us versus them" battle where they wall themselves off from the world, invite conflict by placing their country where they did, then constantly play the victim card even though you cannot make a serious argument that jews in North America or Western Europe are seriously victimized.

Yeah yeah, the holocaust really ****ing sucked but Hitler was an evil man who did evil things to many people, not exclusively Jews. Time to move on, it's not an excuse anymore.

[Sirotnikov]

Originally posted by Asher
Canada is not an ethnic group. Apples and oranges.

Canada is a collection of many ethnic groups, a concept which is foreign to someone who lives in Israel no doubt.

*sigh*

Sadly you fail to understand that non-ethnic countries are
a) a new concept
b) only possible where previous indigenous populations were destroyed
b) and where colonial countries accepted lots of immigrants who willingly forefeited their previous national identity (like your family did when it immigrated).

This concept is practically irrelevant to Europe or the Middle EAst, or Asia. A multi-ethnic, multi-cultural concept couldn't possibly work for a long term.

The Balkans is an excellent example of this.

All countries that have more than one ethnicity have tensions based on this. That includes spain, the uk, the balkans, slavic countries etc.

An enlightened country, as you call it, is a wonderful thing. But it does not work for everyone, and it can't exist in places where there is already a strong cultural heritage present.



And this has absolutely nothing to do with what started the discussion:

Judaism, and Christianity. They're engines for conflict.

The fact that your entire country exists has caused countless peoples' deaths, and your religion is the reason your country exists.

You have successfully moved away from this failed argument.

[Sirotnikov]

Originally posted by Asher


Only an idiot would claim that Zionism, Israel, and Judaism are not linked.

Of course they are linked. Like Zevico said - everything is somehow linked.

England's official church used to be the Anglican church -> That is a type of Christianity -> Christianity was born out of Judiasm.

Great, now we've proved that England is linked to Judaism. That does not mean Judaism is the reason behind England's existance.


But you have made a very specific claim on the nature of link between Judaism and Israel.
You said that Judaism caused Zionism and caused Israel to exist. I've successfully disproved that.

Now you're trying to play with semantics.

There was a time where I had a higher opinion of your arguing abilities