reddit is usually my primary internet time-wasting place, this is my second. I gotta say though, I can't say I regret time-wasting on the internet, there's always time to be wasted-in class, at work. preferably, you waste time wasted, but hey, they have a no-drinking policy for some stupid reason in schools and workplaces.
This kind of thread only plays to ATW's ego. He posts all those articles to get attention and glynch is giving him tons o tons of it!
ATW, your timeline leaves out the Srebrenica Massacre 0f 1995, which saw upwards of 9,000 Muslim men and teenagers murdered by Christian Serbian terrorists. That entire conflict brought immense suffering to the Muslims in the Balkans, with "rape camps" established by the religiously insane Christian Serbs, and holding over 35,000 Muslim women and children, who were systematically raped in order to get them pregnant by "Christian" Serbs. A quote: During the Bosnian War, so-called "rape camps", aimed at the birth of a new generation of Serb children, were reportedly used. The purpose of these camps was to impregnate the Bosnian and Croatian women. Because of the patrilineal make-up of their society, in which children inherit their father's ethnicity, this was used a method of ethnic cleansing. In the camps, women were kept in confinement until the late stages of their pregnancies. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yugoslav_Wars That last wasn't murder, but I would bet that many of the women and children that were victims wished they were dead at the time. Certainly, those responsible deserve death.
Deckard, good point about this terrible massacre and genocide. The victims were mainly Muslims, and the perpetrators were Christians. The Srebrenica massacre was in 1995, though, and I don't think the perpetrators cited religious reasons - it was an ethnically motivated genocide. Terrible nonetheless, and good point to remind us that clearly not all murders and terrorist attacks are traced to Islamists, on the contrary, sometimes Muslims are only on the victim side of these atrocities (very often, they are on both sides, like in Pakistan or Iraq).
I knew it was 1995 and have no idea why I typed that. Oh well! I disagree about the motivation behind it, though. In my opinion, the religions of those on all sides, as well as their ethnicity, played a big role in what happened (as well as countless other terrible things that happened during that conflict that didn't get the press these two incidents did). In fact, most of the Muslims in that region are simply of "European" origin, IMO. As I'm sure you know, they became Muslim in order to placate the Ottoman Empire after they were conquered. The alternative to changing their religion was often a change of address, or worse, so they changed their religion. I don't think there is really much difference between their various ethnicities. When I traveled to Yugoslavia during Tito's rule, the Yugoslavs I saw on the streets appeared to be "Europeans" to me. Those who stood out were Gypsies walking barefoot in the snow on the sidewalks of Belgrade. The locals showed their prejudice then, as well, as I saw several cross a street, rather than pass Gypsies on the same sidewalk. I couldn't decide which was crazier to witness... Serbs crossing the street to avoid Gypsies, or the Gypsies walking barefoot in the snow. Very freaky! Almost as crazy was going to a disco in Belgrade with some Yugolavs to dance, and having to suffer through the music (not a disco fan). Saturday Night Fever writ small, in the capital of a Communist country.
Deckard, its good that you brought the genocide of the Bosnians to the discussion. About 10 years ago when I took a course at college on genocide and read several assigned books, I was absolutely shocked. The narratives by some of the award winning authors was very disturbing to say the least. The most shameful thing about the atrocities the Serbs committed, was that it happened in Europe. Not some remote region of Africa but right in the developed countries' backyard. This wasn't 50 or 100 years ago! This was less than 20 years ago and is a genocide that is often conveniently ignored or overlooked.
If you guys spent as much time on building an internet business or a secondary stream of income as you do on silly sites like reddit, then you'd all be millionaires by now.
I consider diversity and striving to understand, respect, or tolerate diversity of choice a worthy progressive ideal. Bar question shrouded in pseudoethics: If you could kill Hitler before his rise to power, would you do it? lol "We have the data to support such," thanks Professor Dawkins. I wouldn't pick on that if whence you had the source of which to support such... Eastern mystics what? What kind? From where? Or do they all eat rice and know the same voodoo? I could phrase it better if that's the sense of what I'm offering. I think it's a starting point. What causes our collective self loathing and the need to act it out through destruction? Insufficient resources? Living with social inequality all around us? Our genetic history....cultural history...societal history? The need for meaning and justifying it to others? Prestige? Religion is sometimes used to bridge that gap, but even fine thinkers like Jesus or Buddha realized that religion itself can be used as a shroud to ignore answering the question rather than dealing with our uncomfortable collective truths. And without religion, it's still a question we'd still have to come to grips with. I don't like presuming frames that jumps to conclusions such as the "either you are this...or otherwise you are that". I think of them frequently, but am frequently wrong or ignorant of more possibilities/explainations. I also don't like opening my cynical mind to others on the possibilities of a ****ty world steeped in game theory and efficient players (since it doesn't happen unless the people who play make it happen). I mean, I think Wall Street bankers are the most soulless, immoral and socially destructive vermin surpassing mass murders in their negative influence on our collective quality of life. They don't thank their .001% status on God (they may even think of themselves as Gods or its direct servants). They thank themselves, and they're not necessarily crazy or mentally impaired either. Just read this today that people of higher standing are more likely to be dishonest or commit evil acts than the poor. Why? One guess is because they feel more entitled and feel like they have more to lose (and therefore must risk more to maintain or gain). Here's a glimpse on the relative scale we work with. Maybe in a further time, with more at our disposal, eating meat can be the most selfish and perverse thing one living being can do to another. Most of us can survive without meat by choice, but if we had the means and the preference for it, then what harm does it really impact? Many of us perform or commit unjust deeds, like steal, cheat, lie, destroy another's life and/or reputation, without the "crutch" of an illness, or in your opinion, a religion. If any of that is common sense, then I must've misread your claim. As a sidenote, check out neuroscience studies, specifically its focus on prestige. Predeterminism, what? Ironically, our way of life is a direct cultural descendant of those horrible religions. Even Humanist ideals arose from the notion of God coming down and embodying a man. I don't think it's a waste of time to read those horrible fairy tales many people consider Holy. At the very least, it's know thy enemy Sun Tzu ish. Plus, you can move outside parroting The Professor and complimenting your own opinions. These religions are changing. Much different than the kind people lived under 1k years ago. They're evolving to peoples needs. Sometimes it helps facilitate change, such as preservation of knowledge during Medieval times, sparking the Renaissance, the Enlightenment, and Abolitionary movements... and sometimes it stands against it. The rate of evolution is slow and ponderous because of its history and organization, but it's still becoming better if only because it'll shrivel off and die if it doesn't meet our collective needs. PS. Your indirect advocation of "better religions" sounds weird. Did I get that right? PSS. The original argument was that people will always misunderstand words due to language, personal experience, mental capacity or the plain fact that we can't read minds. Forming better religions won't solve any of that, and over time, it'll fall in the same loop as the others. While interested, hope you don't mind me passing searching it down. I am and am not?
The problem is that corporate slavery-like jobs don't give you a steady stream of time to work on something else constructively. You just get fragmented periods of rest, and a couple of weeks off to take care of other stuff you have to do in order to keep your job. Sites like reddit are designed for the most simple minded human. Made to use as easily as possible and makes you feel like you significantly contribute to something other than your personal profile with your government.
