Once again, French surrender monkeys saved by brave USians

[grumbler]

God you're a tedious *******. Go bore someone else.

And you're a sore loser, to boot. Ah, well, let's move on.

[kentonio]

And you're a sore loser, to boot. Ah, well, let's move on.

Yes, you definitely won the contest to see who had the lowest level of reading comprehension and the highest ability to impersonate Ben Kenobi.

Well done, have a cookie and STFU already.

[Dinner]

Does this mean that the UK basically has the best firefighters in the world? I'm too lazy to know for certain, but they certainly seem to be massively better than American firefighters.

Also, I remember that this was in the news from last week: Three Firefighters Killed in Washington Blaze Identified


Virtually every time there's major fires in the US you hear of US firefighters dying - it has occurred to me in the past that it seems like a curiously American thing...

I remember this story too: Loss of 19 firefighters in Arizona blaze 'unbearable,' governor says

As well as being incredibly sad, it does seem unbelievably careless...

Wildfires Have Killed 1,086 Firefighters in U.S. Since 1911

That's averaging 10 a year - for a century!

And that's only 'Wildfires'!

Something is definitely wrong and something should be done to help protect the lives of American firefighters better?

The lesson I get from this that wild fires in dry mountainous terrain is a very dangerous business. The other big problem is everyone wants their dream house surrounded by nature so the build right up next to the parkland and sometimes even have lots surrounded by it. In Canada public wild lands and private lands aren't so intermixed so they can just let it burn and only interview if it is heading towards a town. With the development patterns and the larger population here there is almost always structures in danger so they have to deploy firefighters to defend those structures.

Add in geography and the dry climate because it is further south and suddenly you have a much deadlier mix.

[notyoueither]

Not stupidly risking your life isnt cowardice. Stupidly risking your life is just stupid.

Unless you've gone through the training and combat you have less than zero clue what you're talking about when it comes to soldiering.

Most people freeze and flinch when weapons are being fired or other dire threats to life are at hand. That includes when they are doing the firing.

Give me a combat vet vs a wanna be jihadist any day of the week. ****, I'd take Oerdin over that **** whad.

Others tried to tell you. Not doing anything was more dangerous than doing something.

I'll finish with you have no idea what you are talking about because you simply lack the life experience. You should pause and take that into account once in a while.

[notyoueither]

Have you ever thought about how stupid a captain going down with his ship really is? It made kind of sense a long time ago because it was an attempt to ensure a captain would do anything possible to AVOID his ship sinking, but as a moral guide its ****ing appalling.

Are you familiar with a concept called personal responsibility?

I suggest you, and a lot of others, get acquainted with it.

[notyoueither]

The lesson I get from this that wild fires in dry mountainous terrain is a very dangerous business. The other big problem is everyone wants their dream house surrounded by nature so the build right up next to the parkland and sometimes even have lots surrounded by it. In Canada public wild lands and private lands aren't so intermixed so they can just let it burn and only interview if it is heading towards a town. With the development patterns and the larger population here there is almost always structures in danger so they have to deploy firefighters to defend those structures.

Add in geography and the dry climate because it is further south and suddenly you have a much deadlier mix.

Umm, not really. Towns burn down.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2011_Slave_Lake_wildfire

From past discussions elsewhere Euros and many Americans have little concept of the scale of things. Most of the boreal forest they are trying to save from development burns down every generation or two due to dry conditions and lightning strikes, but they get upset we cut weed like trees down and don't recycle toilet paper.

[Bereta_Eder]

california seems to always be up in flames (when it doesn't go bankrupt).
Maybe the firefighters die there?

[kentonio]

Unless you've gone through the training and combat you have less than zero clue what you're talking about when it comes to soldiering.

Most people freeze and flinch when weapons are being fired or other dire threats to life are at hand. That includes when they are doing the firing.

Give me a combat vet vs a wanna be jihadist any day of the week. ****, I'd take Oerdin over that **** whad.

Others tried to tell you. Not doing anything was more dangerous than doing something.

I'll finish with you have no idea what you are talking about because you simply lack the life experience. You should pause and take that into account once in a while.

Wow, way to completely miss the point. One of the soldiers themselves pointed out that had the gun not have jammed, that they would probably have been killed. In their position though they had basically nothing to lose, and made the logical choice. If you thought I was insulting them for what they did, then you completely misunderstood what I was trying to say (or I made a crappy job of saying it, which is also perfectly possible).

My point was that this idea that unless people try and overpower an armed attacker, that they are 'cowards' is a terrible message for people to put out there. Most of the time it will lead to nothing more than people dying when they could otherwise have survived because they believe they have to try and be a hero. That is what I'm angry about.

[dannubis]

Yeah, obviously 2 women serving coffee needed to overpower and armed man. Personal repsonsibility and all that ****.

[kentonio]

Are you familiar with a concept called personal responsibility?

I suggest you, and a lot of others, get acquainted with it.

The captain thing is nothing to do with any modern concept of personal responsibility, its a throwback to a much older day when honour was something considered (amongst the higher classes) to be more important than life. This manifested itself in things like people basically committing suicide in one way or another because they were perceived to have failed in a task they held responsibility for. The same system basically that led to the kind of attitude we saw from Imperial Japan during WW2, something that seems so shocking and brutal to us today. Personally I'd like to see that kind of thinking consigned to the dustbin of history.

[kentonio]

Anyway I came into this thread to apologize to grumbler. You were being dismissive yesterday but I was in a ****ty mood and was unnecessarily dickish, so sorry about that.

[Bereta_Eder]

Apologies are "happy"

[NICE MOBIUS]

Yes, we are being nice to each other again. The circle of positivity has been restored.

[Dinner]

california seems to always be up in flames (when it doesn't go bankrupt).
Maybe the firefighters die there?

The state has never been bankrupt, it did, once, have to issue I.O.U.s because Republican **** bags refused to do what the state constitution required them to do, namely, pass a stare budget by such and such date, but voters responded by absolutely gutting the state Republican Party. Rightly so too because the ****stains deserved it.

As a result, the Republican obstructionist were removed so even the state's ridiculous 2/3rds rule was not an issue and the budget was quickly balanced with about 2/3rds spending cuts and 1/3rd tax increases (mostly on the wealthy but also with a 1.5% sales tax increase). In short common sense prevalied and the state Republican Party finally figured at that tea bagger extemism is a death sentence in this state.

As for wild fires, yes, of course, we are in our fifth year of drought. In the best of times fire is part of the local ecology but in drought it is especially so.

[Egbert]

I don't think Galileo was actually burned at the stake... oops, I think I just cited a fact

True. Galileo recanted.

Giordano Bruno was burnt at the stake, by the Roman Inquisition.