Chill Princess, this is just a discussion. Nobody here is going to make a mad dash to save the inmates tonight.
haven, I made a mistake. To me, it made sense because I knew what I meant and what I was thinking. In fact, what I really think is not a contradiction, but what I wrote was. And just so you know, people have conflicting ideas about things all the time. It's normal. I have the ability to think on my own, thank you very much. I use what they say to back it up. I use what I read to back it up. I also use what I see and how people treat me and how they treat others, but none of it is good enough. And when I do have my own thoughts, you ask me to back that up. It's a cycle. Nothing will ever please you so I'm going to quit trying. If you have a problem with me, ignore me. I really don't care. I'm not trying to make friends. You're not looking for inconsistancies. I apologized for it earlier. And you could have asked it up front instead of beating around the bush about it. You purposely lead me around in circles so I end up looking like an ass. Congratulations, you can make little girls cry (more a statement that he was picking on me, not that I was crying). And who makes Kant right? Oh, you agree with it so that *must* make it correct. dylan, I do not think it is okay. I accept the fact that it happens but I still think it is wrong. However, I am not in any hurry to change it because these people are bad. This doesn't mean I think they deserve it. It just means I care less about their quality of life. I think protecting free and innocent people from rape and molestation is more important. It needs serious reform. I don't know how or when though. The prisoners do need to be seperated though, that's for sure. No they don't. AP courses are offered in high school. Nice try though.
I think princess really just meant rationalize instead of justify. Sometimes it helps me to think of what people are trying to get across, instead of attacking them on semantics.
Oh really princess, I guess I was unaware of that, seeing how I only took about 10 of them in high school and graduated with a 4.4 GPA. Like others before me have said, its one thing to make the grades, it's a whole different ballgame to apply the knowledge to real life situations. (I don't hate you, I just think you really must start thinking more before you post-because you are leaving yourself open to beng harassed pretty easily.)
How did you get a 4.4 GPA, DVauthrin? Just curious. As an aside, I think rimbaud might be disappointed. This thread stayed on topic only to devolve into an argument of the meaning of the word "justification"... And a 'Princess-bashing fest'. Pathetic.
High school or college? It's been so long since high school I don't even remember the grade scales... Can't be college, what am I thinking...
You know what? I suggested tis originally. I pointed out that perhaps she meant "rationalize." Guess what? She denied it. Wasn't much of an argument. Princess was incredibly, blatantly incorrect. All she had to do was admit it. But instead, she absurdly tried to prove that, somehow, she knew what she was talking about. She didn't. Everyone knew it. That's pathetic. Treeman: I find your pseudo-intellectualism to be pathetic. I find your defense of someone who consistently makes inconsistent and inaccurate statemetns to be pathetic. And I find your obsession with the middle east to be frightening. And I find your tendency to dismiss people who disagree with you on the issue without finding logical fallacies in their thinking to be highly suspect. And I find it remarkable that you're cynical in matters when such an outlook favors the US, while idealistic on issues when such a perspective would make the US look better. Odd conjunction, that. It seems strange to consistently interpret one side's actions in the most favorable light possible... while doing the reverse for the other side. And I find your whining in the "best poster tournament" to be pathetic. Other people lost, too. Deal with it. Hell, everyone will lose except one person... probably clutch or Major. Oh, and as for GPA's above 4.4... it's called "AP." Or it could be that dv's school has an odd scale. Some high schools go on a 5.0 or 6.0 scale. And finally... I've noticed that you've repeatedly stated that it doesn't matter what people here think, since our opinions are irrevelant to policy makers. Well, if you're right... perhaps it's time for you to stop posting on the issue? I think the rest of us might give a small cheer if a week went by without a "treeman's hawkish position on the Middle East" thread. Liberals don't feel compelled to post every article that represents their side. Why do you?
high school-in that "AP" courses are given 5 point credit while all others are 4 college uses a 4.0 scale
I know the college scale, didn't know the high school scale... Thanks. BTW, didn't anyone ever tell you that nothing you did in high school matters, except where it helps you to get accepted into college? haven: I find your elitist attitude to be pathetic. "I'm so smart, I can attend an Ivy League school - what do you have to say about it?"... Know what? I really don't give a f* how smart you think you are - you are not as smart as you think you are, and that's your main problem. I was about where you are right now when I was your age and about to graduate - I thought I knew everything. I was, of course, dead wrong. After 4 years of indoctrination into the liberal arts , I thought I knew everything about everything, and what I didn't know I could deduce from my well-honed logical and critical thinking skills that I had acquired... Of course, I was dead wrong. I had learned how to be a pompous ass, and how to believe that I was a good critical thinker, when in fact all that I had earned was a degree in liberalism. It took me years to unlearn much of what I learned there, and how to actually engage in critical and strategic thinking, not just claim I could do it. Hopefully you will go through the same 'unlearning' (deprogramming) process. Otherwise you are destined to be a pompous ass who thinks he knows more than he actually does. As for my seeming obsession with the ME - I have suspected for years that it would be a major point of conflict that the US would get dragged into. I mentioned earlier that when I was in grad school I got into a tiff with a prof there who wanted me to stop worrying about ME terrorism and conflict, and start worrying about global warming. That actually happened. He didn't want to read my papers on WMD terrorism or the international anti-US terrorism movement. He didn't want me to write about how one day a major terrorism strike would draw the US into a conflict in the ME. Guess what? I was right! Goddamnit, it is people like him - and you, apparently - who have for years ignored warnings from people like me that got us into this sorry state in the first place. After 9/11, you still don't see the need to focus our attention on these areas? How many f*ing Americans need to die before people like you will listen??? As for my support for Israel - they are scumbags. But they are certainly the lesser scumbags in my mind, as their intention is not to commit genocide. Why do you (and others) continually just gloss over the suicide attacks and the gun attacks committed by the Palestinians? It is not acceptable to intentionally attack civilians! You've continually tried to paint me as biased in that situation, when you're the ones who are biased against Israel. For whatever reason, you absolutely refuse to see their side of things... I have looked at both sides, and I choose to side with the side that doesn't intentionally kill civilians. Sue me. You learned nothing from 9/11. "Whining in the best poster tournament"? Jesus, man, I never expected to win. I knew ahead of time that I had no chance - I'm not exactly a popular guy here, in case you haven't noticed. I made one friggen statement, and I'm "whining"? Please. If I actually cared, I'd have followed up on it. You need to come down off your high horse. You're getting full of yourself. As for our opinions being relevant on policy matters... Who here sets US foreign policy? It is irrelevant. That said, however, I will continue to post articles that I think are relevant to the issues, because I do think that the "hawkish" side (which is apparently in line with national opinion, like it or not Mr. Liberal) is underrepresented here. If you can't respond to them logically, that's your problem. BTW, nice attempt to scare me off the boards, Mr. Free Speech Defender. Go screw yourself, I'm staying until the admins kick me out. Or at least until April, when I ship out. To defend your right to try to bully me off an Internet BBS, I might add.
<b>Jeff</b>: Making a simple mistake is not indicative of impaired powers of observation or hearing. It's just a simple mistake. Believing him was not the operative point. His reporting of what she said was contradictory to her well-known position on matters such as this. Working backward, I concluded that he simply must have mis-heard and yet you and he turn it into an issue of character assasination. My comments about his never listening to her show were in the context of being compared to MY being a daily listener for several years at that point in time when he made the post-- thus my conviction that he was mis-reporting her position. It's a casual over-statement about relative amounts of listening not a case for perjury. Reporting a mis-understanding is not lying. We don't know how intently he was listening. He had a friend in the car. He is naturally opposed to most of her positions. All of those conditions would tend to make for a casual rather than intent listener and thus error-prone. All I know is that what he reported her to have said is 180 degrees opposite of what she has consistently said in the 6 years that I've been aware of Dr. Laura. If he were a regular listener, he would have recognized that or he would have been aware of some special circumstance which would lead her to offer counsel that flies in the face of her standard position. He has never offered such a special circumstance. I never made the assertion that RM95 has a persistent problem grasping what is said. In this one instance, it appears to be the case. You and I and everyone on this board have had the occasion or multiple occasions to do the same. It's not an indictment of our intelligence or character. That is why I object to your portrayal. You've taken my criticism of a single event and made it out to be a condemnation of the guy. If you just wanted to have fun, that's okay. Just put in the smilies so we all know what's going on. BTW, can you post the link to the original thread. I searched for it but got no result.
haven, Nice try on trying to come off as a nice guy. You laid into me the second you could. You didn't merely suggest rationalization. Here's what you said. Maybe if you would have said it up front instead of insulting me, it would have been different. And for the record, I never denied it (if you read what I wrote). I didn't even comment on that part because it was somewhat irrelevent. You think you're doing some huge favor to the world for correcting me? Everyone else read my posts and either ignored it or figured I misspoke. Major pointed it out nicely and you could have done the same. I guess when you think you're better than everyone, that clouds your judgement a little. People are allowed to have conflicting ideas. That's part of what makes an intelligent person. At least I'm actually thinking about how I feel on such matters as prison security and abortion. I'd rather have conflicting ideas than being spoon fed beliefs and never actually thinking about them. I guess I should thank you for this huge service you provided for the world.
I find this to be funny for a few reasons: 1. That someone actually remembered it to bring up 2 pages later. 2. That treeman was the one to do it (not a jab or anything, I will explain further if it is taken the wrong way). 3. That I will now disappoint myself and continue to derail this thread of hostility 101. There is an old academic saying along the lines of "it is silly to think that 4 years of college can teach you anything, all it can (ideally) do is teach you how to begin to think." tree, You have shown hostility/regret of your college years in the past. If I may ask, what was your major? I know you have some training in clinical psychology, but was that undergrad as well as grad? I am sorry for your negative experience, my only problem with your comments is that you make it out to seem like all academia is a waste and similarly minded about teaching all sorts of bad things. Obviously, investing many thousands of dollars into a possible future in academia I am going to be sensitive, but I also went to a pretty conservative (faculty and students) undergrad university and am at a fairly neutral grad. Anyway, I think that - no matter what - one can still get something out of the whole thing and not end up so anti-academic as you and others on this bbs seem to be. In regards to the ME and your predictions/problems in the past, I do not think your experience was that unique. It has been known for some time that the ME was a problem area in general, a powderkeg waiting to explode. It further had been screamed out that there were serious terrorist threats - in books, reports, hell, there were government reports that basically were ignored or glazed over. I do not think it was any kind of bias or whatever, just an overestimation of the US, false sense of security kind of thing. Everyone now knows the problems with such thinking. Finally, calm down people and please quit throwing around insults, they make me sad. If haven and treeman can't get along, then I will have to pull the car over and both of you will get a whoopin'. Seriously, I am one to talk, eh?
I was wondering myself how much longer this "you said this...yes you did, yes you did" argument would continue. Jeebus.... Haven: are you planning on returning to the debate now, or do you really only enjoy beating others into the ground over irrelevant points for your amusement? I noticed you chose to completely ignore/overlook several posters' arguments in order to concentrate on Princess. Princess: It seems like although you find yourself on the same side of issues as others (including myself), you are more often targeted as wrong or personally attacked than probably anyone else on this board. I know you are kind of known around here for making contradictory statements, but keep posting. Effectively expressing onceself in logical written argument is not something that comes easy to most; the best way to become a good writer is to write. That's the reason I decided to start posting after several years of lurking: to improve in an area in which I feel needs work. Don't let those who would jump at the first oppourtunity to personally attack you in order to discredit your opinion discourage you. Believe me, these people exist outside of the BBS, too. Treeman: Good points made in your posts (especially with regards to critical thinking: I once thought I had it all figured out too). In addtion, I agree that that side is underrepresented on this board: besides, your pretty much the only thing on at 3AM ) BTW, where are you shipping out to? x34
