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State of emergency in France

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Re: State of emergency in France

#151
post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> France is sending its largest warship to join operations against Islamic State (IS) in Syria and Iraq. source: http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-34738177

Thanks. I was genuinely curious. To me "power projection" in itself is morally very questionable. Even without terrorist attacks. Unfortunately modern geopolitics is more Machiavellian than Machiavelli himself was.

Not stopping genocide is morally questionable too. And that's what Assad and IS have been doing.

Re: State of emergency in France

#152
post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I always wonder why I never see this one on lists of choices: 5. Stop killing large numbers of Muslim people in the Middle East every week and see if that doesn't make them less likely to kill comparatively small numbers of people in Western cities every couple of years.

The largest number of Muslimm people in the Middle Eeast every week are killed by other muslim people in the Middle Eeast.

Is there any place with a significant Mulsim population that is peaceful.....?

Re: State of emergency in France

#153
post #148

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It truly saddens me every time I write several paragraphs trying to get across the point about islam being used as a tool by people who couldn't give a shit about the religion. Neither on the attacker's side nor on the defending governments' sides. Am I just not getting my point across?

Of course you do. But I think we agree to disagree. I see religions as fundamentally harmful and you don't.

I have not stated what I think of religions anywhere in my posts, because it is not relevant - and I'd wager you would be surprised about my answer should you ask.

What you do see is this being a religious attack, when it is quite clearly a political one. I'm honestly not sure anymore how someone who thinks through the mentality these people have can come to the conclusion that the logic makes sense.

It's just so easy for people to just say "Pah, there's no logic, these people are irrational and crazy and they hate us". But that's bullshit. Everybody is driven by their own set of logic and in the majority of cases, they're easily manipulated by those that are more experienced or stand to gain more than them. This is a fact we have to face: There are horrors being done, and there are reasons behind the horrors being done.

So please, I won't try to convince you - instead, think this through yourself:

  1. Do these attacks serve a religious goal? If so, which?
  2. What are the social consequences on islam and muslims as a result of such attacks?
     Are they predictable? Are they known by the perpetrators?
  3. What happens as a result of those consequences? Who is affected?
     Who is most negatively affected?
  4. Based on your answers on 2 & 3, can you tell who stands to gain the most out of it?
  5. Does your answer to 1 still make sense in the context of your answers to 2, 3 & 4?
Have fun, I'm going to sleep.

Re: State of emergency in France

#154
post #140
post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you have an alternative? All I see is naïve suggestions. As I see it we have several options: 1. We accept the fact that we will have more terror attacks in major European cities as a given. We such it up and we continue to live in a free and liberal society. 2. We accept total surveillance of our society. As the technology becomes more honed, terror attacks might be easier to prevent before they start. 3. We acce…

Agree with #1 From my point of view we can't fight terrorism by war or massive surveillance. It's a matter of culture, if everyone knew about the beauty of life, and all good things that she provide, this would not happen. Your culture allows you to link your actions to different kind of emotions, and especially the one which make you unable to hurt anyone else. This is the way religions (all of them) were spreading…

You say like terrorists are some evil beings that just hate all the living people. But what if they are just ISIS soldiers whose objective is to force a country withdraw the army from their territory using all possible means? What if terrorists' friends or relatives died from US and european bombs? In their eyes you a just a liar bombing their cities while taking how you cannot hurt anyone else.

I cannot believe there are people who don't understand such a simple thing. You are probably brainwashed by western media.

Re: State of emergency in France

#155
post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you have an alternative? All I see is naïve suggestions. As I see it we have several options: 1. We accept the fact that we will have more terror attacks in major European cities as a given. We such it up and we continue to live in a free and liberal society. 2. We accept total surveillance of our society. As the technology becomes more honed, terror attacks might be easier to prevent before they start. 3. We acce…

Surveillance is not going to fix the issue. If we want to have fewer terrorist attacks, we have to prevent radicalisation by fixing the social issues that cause it. If we continue to do nothing, the problems will get worse, and surveillance will be futile. Fixing social issues is not easy. Masses of youths without education or perspective, racism, increasing segregation between the middle and lower classes can't be f…

I'm just wondering where the radical Hindu, Christian, Sikh, Buddhist, Jewish, Baha'ist Shinto, and Atheist terrorists have got to? Don't they have social issues as well? Or are the media hiding their activities?

The minimum wage disproportionately affects low-income minority populations. So if that's your goal, go for it! Employers understandably cream off the top (as they see it) applicants and the rest can go spend their lives unemployed. To really hurt them, why not increase the minimum wage yet again.

Re: State of emergency in France

#156
post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Blaming the violence of the Middle East on Israel is naive.

I didn't try to do that. I just think that conflict fueling unrest more than anything else. And it's lot easier to imagine Israel to disappear than to imagine half of Islamic world to disappear.

> I just think that conflict fueling unrest more than anything else.

Despite the attention it receives, Israel is actually a pretty localized issue. It has very little to do with the biggest conflicts in the Middle East.

If Israel weren't around, Syria would still be destabilized and we would still have ISIS.

Also, your rhetoric around wiping Israel off the map kind of gives your agenda away.

Re: State of emergency in France

#157
post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You understand how bayesian reasoning works, right? There are probably between three and six million muslims in France alone. Whatever monitoring you're doing, you're proposing to find on the order of a few hundred people, if that. False positives (which, remember: we cannot distinguish from actual positives) would end up targeting orders of magnitude more innocent people than guilty. Worse, by breaking the compact o…

Not to disagree with your point about Bayesian reasoning but would you care to cite some source for your assertion about the relative dangers of white-supremacy groups and their ilk versus Islamic terror groups? 9/11 alone killed 2996 people [1] including hijackers and there's little question Al Qaeda/ISIS adherents would have killed many more if they could have. It was certainly not for lack of trying. [1] https://e…

Not the parent, but I suspect his statement was drawn from coverage of this report:

http://www.globalresearch.ca/non-muslims-carried-out-more-th...

Re: State of emergency in France

#158
post #54
post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you have an alternative? All I see is naïve suggestions. As I see it we have several options: 1. We accept the fact that we will have more terror attacks in major European cities as a given. We such it up and we continue to live in a free and liberal society. 2. We accept total surveillance of our society. As the technology becomes more honed, terror attacks might be easier to prevent before they start. 3. We acce…

I always wonder why I never see this one on lists of choices: 5. Stop killing large numbers of Muslim people in the Middle East every week and see if that doesn't make them less likely to kill comparatively small numbers of people in Western cities every couple of years.

I agree completely, but you can't put this genie back in the bottle. What is your solution given the current status quo?

Say that we leave them to themselves. The USA abandons all of its based on "Muslim lands". They decide to leave us in peace after we apologise profusely and offer reparations for the damage we've done?

They aren't doing this for retribution for our acts in the middle East. You've missed the point of ISIS.

They want all non-Muslims who don't want Sharia Law dead. Attacking us is designed to provoke us to alienate the "grey zone" Muslims who have integrated in the west and are moderate, sensible and peaceful. If those moderates don't join IS then they are going to also get killed.

These guys are following an "actual" prophesy. They are trying to make it come true.

Check out the wikileaks article via my tweet earlier and you'll realise that we have very little chance of preventing further terrorist attacks assuming we continue our current course.

Leaving the Muslim lands and making reparations is not going to help the situation at all. It may help or children's children, but it won't solve the "now" problem.

Re: State of emergency in France

#159
post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Surveillance is not going to fix the issue. If we want to have fewer terrorist attacks, we have to prevent radicalisation by fixing the social issues that cause it. If we continue to do nothing, the problems will get worse, and surveillance will be futile. Fixing social issues is not easy. Masses of youths without education or perspective, racism, increasing segregation between the middle and lower classes can't be f…

> I'd suggest starting with schools. Make sure that kids go to school. We already try to do this, they already fight this with violence (on us and on their own children).

You mean so that they go to engineering school? Terrorist organizations have long recognized that engineering departments are fertile ground for recruitment and have concentrated their efforts there. A 2005 report from British intelligence noted that Islamic extremists were frequenting college campuses, looking for 'inquisitive' students who might be susceptible to their message. In particular, the report noted, they targeted engineers."

Re: State of emergency in France

#160
post #107
post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was quoting the relevant part. Or rather, the irrelevant part. I don't see why only Muslims that have the potential to be radicalized should be monitored.

Because so far it's primarily been radicalized muslims that have been involved in acts of terrorism?

That's not even close to true. I understand how you might come to believe that based on how they are covered though.
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