War: pros and cons

[Avelorn]

Originally posted by steelcult
What still amazes me is that in 3 years time we have lost 3,000 lives here and the press and the vocal Anti war movement are all over that - but in 05 there were 16000 Americans murdered without a blip coming up on the news - but hey, Americans killing Americans aint news, is it?

Nope, only new numbers count. Like with starvation or diseases. Only new epidemias count. Or when figures go up.. nobody mention that the number of homicides in U.S. is going down for example.

I\'ve read that many of you believe that war is something natural, inherent in the human behaviour. I don\'t believe that at all.. and I think I can prove it quite easily. Or more correctly, I can quite easily falsify your thesis. There hasn\'t been a war on Swedish ground for almost 200 years. We haven\'t attacked another country since 1814. There is a huge difference between conflicts and actual war. Seeing it as part of our behaviour will only feed the interests of war-mongerers. Just as Orientalism, prejudice against the west and Islamophobia will..

@Steelcult: Everyone picks and choses from the Bible.. anyone who says they don\'t either haven\'t read the Bible, are quite frankly liers or they lie to themselves. It\'s what you emphasize that is important. You have one interpretation that says that \"thou shall not kill\" is only ment for jews killing jews. But there are others... From my interpretation it is far more consistent with the Bible to mean that it applies to everyone. It\'s dangerous with dogmas in both religion, ideology, patriotism or nationalism. Things can and almost always will be twisted and re-interpretated to suit interests you know.. so is the case with Christianity, Islam, Communism or even the American constitution.

 

[Sand Rat]

Originally posted by Avelorn
@Steelcult: Everyone picks and choses from the Bible.. anyone who says they don\'t either haven\'t read the Bible, are quite frankly liers or they lie to themselves. It\'s what you emphasize that is important. You have one interpretation that says that \"thou shall not kill\" is only ment for jews killing jews. But there are others... From my interpretation it is far more consistent with the Bible to mean that it applies to everyone. It\'s dangerous with dogmas in both religion, ideology, patriotism or nationalism. Things can and almost always will be twisted and re-interpretated to suit interests you know.. so is the case with Christianity, Islam, Communism or even the American constitution.

No where did I say that I believed the prohibition was for Jew on Jew violence - if you go back and read what I said I said there was a belief amoung some scholars - not that I personally believed such.

I did however question the use of Old Testament Rules/Covenant when the New Testament/Christ is supposed to wipe the slate clean, and asked how the 10 Commandments still stand as acceptable behavior, while the prohibition agains eating pork is laughed off by Christians.

And I agree that everything is open to interpretation - this allows flexibility which will allow a great dogma to survive in the long run, while a rigid dogma will fall to the side.

Now is war a part of human nature? Well, our closest genetic relatives (chimps) have been recorded making war upon one another - marshalling forces, invading territory and killing other chimps, so yes on the one hand it could very well be in the human genectic code, and therefore inevitably linked to humanity.

As for Sweeden\'s unmatched record of freedom from the rigors of war since 1814, how many millions of kroner have been spend keeping the Sweedish military prepared for war over that time frame? Sweeden, along with Switzerland has done very well following the dictum of Cicero that to have peace one must understand and be prepared for war.

 

[Avelorn]

@Steelcult:

Sorry I didn\'t mean it as if it was you that had the opinion I understood that you didn\'t. A typo, \"there is\" is the correct phrasing

I know I\'m at risk being teared apart in a theological argument as I haven\'t done much research on the subject. I\'ve read the Bible and made an interpretation of it.. and basically it\'s derived from what I have been taught as well. I still have my childhood faith.. so be gentle to me..

The new testament doesn\'t wipe the slate clean, from what I\'ve understood. it basically means a new deal between God and humans. Jesus said \"Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to fulfil” (Matt.5:17) Now what Jesus gives to me is the direction to what is important or not in the old testament and what I set as culturebased.. etc. So I do pick and choose. My pick and choosing is also of course based on the \"canon\" of the Lutherian interpretation etc. But worse is.. I also do exactly that when it comes to the new testament! So when Paulus (Paul) is saying something I don\'t agree with.. I just check against what Jesus said.. and set it to cultural context.

Yes Chimps can wage war because they work together and help each others in conflicts as a collective. In other animal herds it can be the leaders that \"wage war\" upon each other instead. They share other traits with us also.. But just because people have traits that in specific circumstances can lead to war, doesn\'t mean it have to. By doing that people remove their own responsibility.

Conflicts can grow to war but can also be solved. We will never live in a world without conflicts but we can work towards a world with less and smaller wars. When you look through history why wars were started there are explainable causes whether it\'s from a competition about resources, ethnical conflicts, abuse of power, to pull people together and divert the attention from internal politics.. or bureaucracy. War can\'t be simplified into a human urge... I don\'t think we collectively wake up one morning and just want to start a war.

The resources of the Swedish military has been cut and expanded during that entire time. Why we have managed to stay out of war for that long is a complex matter that many institutions and individual persons would like to take credit from. But that is besides the point, if we can do it.. it\'s possible. Denmark had peace from 1720\'s up to the Napoleonic wars just as an example from the top of my head. Many countries has enjoyed relative peace since the second world war.. But.. you see we still struggle with our history. There are so many conflicts founded in Imperialism, old ethnical conflicts etc.

I mean.. we\'re basically recovering from the unparalleled most bloody century known to man. What we must at least try to do is to solve conflicts and try to remove the causes to them. People don\'t start wars for the heck of it.. they have very real reasons. If one conflict can be solved peacefully, others can as well. We are a problemsolving (and creating) specie. I think we can come up with new ways of safeguarding peace, more effective institutions within or even instead of the UN.

 

[MarkusTay]

It\'s not so simple

You may say Sweden hasn\'t been in a war because you are a great bunch of people, and I\'m not saying you are not. The fact is no one has wanted what you have, and you have either not wanted or are in no position to \'take\' others property. I\'m not putting you down in any way Avelorn, just stating the facts.

If some new incredible super-resource were discovered in your backyard tomorrow, one that would end the world\'s energy problems for the next milenium, you could bet your sweet ass your country would be tripling its war budget, and the rest of the world would be eyeing you hungrily.

Area\'s where war breaks out is contested for economic, strategic, and/or religious reasons, none of which apply to your nation in any large-scale way. Political reasons, BTW, fall under the \'strategic\' category.

Secondly, war, in it\'s most basic incarnation \'conflict\', IS a part of the genetic code of EVERY predator. It\'s called territorialism, and in a much broader sense applies to ownership. In animals, they will fight over an area or kill they feel belongs to them, in humans it could apply to ANYTHING. Our intelligence is our own worst enemy, because with it we can rationalize beligerant behaviour.

I think my neighbor is blowing his leaves over on my lawn, BOY am I gonna have it out with him. That guy parked WAY too close to my car, just wait \'till he comes out of that store. The new guy is working really hard and staying late, I think he\'s after my job. I\'m going to have to sabotage him.

We are the only predator that operates in every climate and environment. We are VERY successful, because we have an over-stimulated sense of ownership. We \'covet\' that which our neighbor has, be it his wife, home, or country. Individuals feel this on a personal basis; countries have a national consciousness, a mob mentality if you will, and when they get their minds set on something they can convince themselves they are in the right. It\'s that evil \'reptilian brain\' that tickles the back of our subconscious, that drives us toward ever-more advanced ways of controlling those around us, because other people unfortunately also fall into the \'ownership\' category.

While the other wolves in the pack respect and abide by the Alpha male, they wait patiently for the day when they get their chance to rip out his jugular and take over. Are humans so different? How many of us have had a boss we wanted to slip-up so we could have HIS job?

Conflict, and on a greater scale war, IS part of the human pysche.

The ONLY thing we have to hold above animals is FAITH. Faith is food for the soul, and without it our soul withers and dies, and we become nothing more then the animals we have evolved from.

 

[Trevor]

The whole christian religion thing has me very confused, way I see it is very simple.

\"Love thy neighbour\"

There we go, perfect world in 3 words.

As Bill Hicks said, \"you\'re getting real baffled here\".

If we all did \"Love thy neighbour\", then there would be no war, no hunger, no murders.

But knowing humans, we\'d end up with hordes of people trying to have sex with each other.

\"I thought it meant \'make love to my neighbour...\' \"

 

[No Such Agency]

Sorry for a long, tangential post:

Originally posted by Dedwrekka
If the US goes in to Iraq and overthrows a brutal dictator -who was known to be a brutal dictator for so long that the UN was trying to force their way in to inspect for well over ten years- why are we now argueing about why it happened? They might have done it for oil, they might have done it for pride, but it happened and it\'s one brutal mass-killing dictator less in the world.

See, that\'s the argument that let Bush and his cronies get away with outright lying to the American people for years about this war. \"The end justifies the means\" does not cut it when it becomes patently clear that each explanation (putative \"means\") was either a lie, or evidence of incompetence, and the people in charge were either breaking the law by malicious intent, or by repeatedly fucking up.

Throwing Saddam out made Iraq WORSE for everyone - the Iraqi civilians who are now MORE likely to be killed than ever, and the soldiers who are in harm\'s way yet are accomplishing nothing. It also made things much better for power-hungry American politicans and money-hungry American corporations. Both groups made out like bandits.

To refer to my previous comment on conspiracies, a Bilderberg Group/Trilateral Commission/Masonic group meeting in darkened boardrooms to decide who wins the Superbowl and how best to suppress the electric car is NOT required. The \"conspiracies\" of our world meet in the open, right in front of our noses. Politicans, lobbyists and wealthy businesspeople are in constant contact, and we all know it. We mostly don\'t even think it\'s improper.

These \"co-conspirators\" do not always work together. They often work at cross-purposes. They have no formal command structure. They probably do not have captured flying saucers in a hangar in Nevada. But they nevertheless manage to start wars for profit, fleece ordinary taxpayers to line the pockets of the wealthy, and commit crimes which largely go unpublished. And you do not have to be Agent Mulder to uncover their activities - in fact you have to be willingly blind NOT to see what they are doing. The tinfoil hat crowd simultaneously give these power structures too much credit and too little. They don\'t meet centrally to control the world... but they don\'t NEED to. They just have the resources to make the most of unexpected events and to capitalize on each others\' manipulations.

 

[Sand Rat]

So lets go back to the original stated reason for the war - Weapons of Mass destruction -

The 500+ Chemical agent rounds that have been found here so far (which bliped up in the news when the report was shown to Congress last April then faded quickly) were and are a violation of the agreement brokered by the UN to end the Gulf War. Yet, they were downplayed by Democrats in the US Congress and the media as not being of \"recent manufacture\" - I\'ve looked over the UN resolution concerning Chemical Weapons and Sadam and no where does it state that he has to destroy the new ones but can keep the old ones.

 

[No Such Agency]

Originally posted by steelcult
The 500+ Chemical agent rounds that have been found here so far (which bliped up in the news when the report was shown to Congress last April then faded quickly) were and are a violation of the agreement brokered by the UN to end the Gulf War.

Yes, the powers that be latched on to those as proof of their justification for going to war. That still doesn\'t change the fact that until then, they changed their story about why they invaded Iraq more often than most people change their underpants.

If they actually did it for WMD\'s they clearly didn\'t have any confidence that those weapons would ever be found.

Rubbish like \"flypaper theory\" and tying the Iraq war to the \"war on terror\" (to the point of specifically connecting Saddam to the 9/11 hijackers, which is false) just reinforce the argument that the Bush administration started the war for some illicit secret reason, or simply to consolidate their own power via the wartime jingoism which has been suppressing legitimate dissent in the US for the last few years.

 

[Sand Rat]

Yup - Bush would have been better off saying he was doing it to get the bugger who tried to kill his daddy or to finish the job we started in 90.

Actually NSA, to my mind what has been killing the voice of dissent in the United States for the last 20 or so years is not any effort by the \"Man\" but rather the fact that the protest movement is so fractured that they cannot come together on any one topic -

Instead of a unified front what you get are 80 or 90 sub groups at any major protest, and they all feel that their message is just as important as the main message - be it stop the war or stop speeding.

Add to that a real inability to argue the opposition to their point of view, and when your arguement consists of \"Thats bad you shouldn\'t do it, and you then accuse someone who asks you to explain it of just lacking the capability to understand the emotions tied up in the issue and being an evil conservative who wants solely to rape the planet, and you really do loose the capability to effectively affect policy and people.

And before I\'m accused of painting one side to the picture, yes, the conservatives do the same thing - but they also tend to do it while wearing a suit and tie, which in the end gets their message out better than the other side.

 

[MarkusTay]

Not Always

Sometimes we listen to long-haired hippy freaks carrying peace signs.

\"Imagine there\'s no countries
It isn\'t hard to do
Nothing to kill or die for
And no religion too
Imagine all the people
Living life in peace...

 

[vincegamer]

Originally posted by steelcult
I . . . asked how the 10 Commandments still stand as acceptable behavior, while the prohibition agains eating pork is laughed off by Christians.

Simple. The 10 commandments are supposed to be the direct word of God, in His own hand.
The dietary rules are set out by the jews as part of their culture, not at the direction of God, but by jewish scholars and theologians trying to figure out how to make life better.
Non-jews who became Christians because of Paul didn\'t adopt judaeism so they didn\'t adopt the cultural rules, but they still acknowledge the direct word of God written in His own hand.

 

[vincegamer]

Originally posted by MarkusTay
If some new incredible super-resource were discovered in your backyard tomorrow, one that would end the world\'s energy problems for the next milenium, you could bet your sweet ass your country would be tripling its war budget, and the rest of the world would be eyeing you hungrily.

Possible, but not necessarily so. I would argue that nothing would change except Swedes would become richer.
Sweden has a stable government, friendly to the western world. They play ball with us.
Countries who won\'t play ball are much more likely to become targets, particularly if their governments are unstable.

 

[MarkusTay]

In the above scenario Vince, said resource could make Sweden the most powerful country in the world. In as much as I would like to believe in the \'good\' side of human nature, I still can\'t help but think that the US would somehow manage to either control said resource, or block its use altogther. By control, I mean \'regulate\' it somehow, and not \'give\' it to undeserving countries (nations the US doesn\'t like); and by block I mean if they can\'t control it somehow they would have our top scientists issue reports about it\'s instability and how unsafe it would be to use world wide. Further testing, of course, would be needed, and the US would need enormous amounts of the materials to better understand it and perhaps figure out a safe way of handling it. Remember Nuclear Energy? It\'s very easy to convince a sceptical public to continue to rely on depleted resources.

It\'s just my opinion, but I don\'t think Sweden would be safe from us for a minute. It just wouldn\'t be a war anyone would notice...

 

[vincegamer]

as in it wouldn\'t involve troops killing each other?
I don\'t buy the \"economic war\" or other arguments. War, as far as I care, involves armed people trying to kill each other quickly.

Now, I actually think in your scenario that we (americans) would find it in our best interest to exploit such a resource economically. We\'d find a good way to make money off of it that would not involve sending troops to Sweden.

 

[Sand Rat]

@MarkusTay - yeah, but that long haired hippy has been dead for more than 20 years - I did say the last 20 years or so, did I not?

@Vince - now, I will admit to it being a while since I read that portion of the Bible, (or any Bible for that matter - its easier to get a copy of the Koran here for some reason) but I remember the dietary laws also as coming from the mouth of God, not the Rabbinical Council - yes the Rabbi\'s can and do interpret what is and is not Kosher, but the basic rules that they follow are from God himself, not the Rabbis.

 

[airhead]

No unclean Animals :

Acts Chapter 10:
9About noon the following day as they were on their journey and approaching the city, Peter went up on the roof to pray. 10He became hungry and wanted something to eat, and while the meal was being prepared, he fell into a trance. 11He saw heaven opened and something like a large sheet being let down to earth by its four corners. 12It contained all kinds of four-footed animals, as well as reptiles of the earth and birds of the air. 13Then a voice told him, \"Get up, Peter. Kill and eat.\"
14\"Surely not, Lord!\" Peter replied. \"I have never eaten anything impure or unclean.\"

15The voice spoke to him a second time, \"Do not call anything impure that God has made clean.\"

 

[Avelorn]

Sweden does have 15% of all the uranium assets in the world. We don\'t use them either right now because of environmental concerns.. So.. we\'ll see how your theory works Marcus! One Swedish author actually thought that we might be invaded because of it.. especially because there is a group of people living near those areas who might be interested in their own land. Namely the Samis.. and U.S. might want to help that freedom struggle! Well as I\'ve said.. we\'ll see.

A quick note. Just because we have tribal urges (like the chimps) doesn\'t mean we have other instincts as well. I f have trait A, B, C they might under the right circumstance lead to war, but on the other hand they might not because of trait D, E, F. It depends on how we order our society, who can make the decision to go to war etc. Actually we humans have a clear territorial instinct which also mean we hesistate to intrude. But it depends on what we consider our tribe. I my village some decades ago they never knocked before they entered a house. Some never do it still.. We don\'t lock our houses either if we\'re not going away far... oh. wait I didn\'t say that lol. The human tribal instict is mutated beyond recognition.. we are far too many really.

The most problematic instict imo right now is how we generally tend to obey authorities (from socialisation and evolution, not directly fear of punishment) without questioning ourselves properly illustrated by Milgram\'s experiment on obedience. Another is group pressure and the isolation and alienation we do of \"other tribes\" that can lead to massmurder and and atrocities. Hopefully we will one day all be a part of the worldtribe...

 

[No Such Agency]

Originally posted by steelcult
Actually NSA, to my mind what has been killing the voice of dissent in the United States for the last 20 or so years is not any effort by the \"Man\" but rather the fact that the protest movement is so fractured that they cannot come together on any one topic - Instead of a unified front what you get are 80 or 90 sub groups at any major protest, and they all feel that their message is just as important as the main message - be it stop the war or stop speeding.

Well that\'s kind of intrinsic to the movement. There IS no unified movement, just many movements. Sometimes these groups CAN work together very effectively. Look at the anti-globalization protests and meetings of the 90\'s, at those many groups DID present a unified front - but the only people who got any media attention were the brick-throwing anarchists and other violent or disrespectful types.

As for being unable to argue a point of view, sadly this is true of most people Most people of ANY persuasion have only a motley understanding of the issues, because so many issues are mindbogglingly complex. \"GMO\'s rape the planet!!!\" is a useless argument, and it pisses me off when those are the loudest voices heard, often voiced by the most inflexible ideologues. That said, I don\'t see why anyone should accept ANY argument, no matter how logical, for why social inequality, or oppression, or war must exist, just because an argument is logical doesn\'t mean it is right.

And before I\'m accused of painting one side to the picture, yes, the conservatives do the same thing - but they also tend to do it while wearing a suit and tie, which in the end gets their message out better than the other side.

Sadly, so so true. You can talk illogical crap all day in the street, and all you are is a street wacko. If you put on a shirt and tie and $400 shoes and say it on television in a calm voice, people will drink that bullshit up like it was Fanta.

 

[philologus]

Originally posted by vincegamer

Originally posted by steelcult
I . . . asked how the 10 Commandments still stand as acceptable behavior, while the prohibition agains eating pork is laughed off by Christians.

Simple. The 10 commandments are supposed to be the direct word of God, in His own hand.
The dietary rules are set out by the jews as part of their culture, not at the direction of God, but by jewish scholars and theologians trying to figure out how to make life better.
Non-jews who became Christians because of Paul didn\'t adopt judaeism so they didn\'t adopt the cultural rules, but they still acknowledge the direct word of God written in His own hand.

Kind of, The Law was not done away with, some conveniently say so. The difference is that Christ brought the opportunity for salvation through Grace, because men had become incapable of obeying the Law unto righteousness.


John 14:21 Those who obey my commandments are the ones who love me. And because they love me, my Father will love them, and I will love them. And I will reveal myself to each one of them.\"


Matthew 5:17 \"Do not think that I came to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I did not come to abolish but to fulfill.\"
Matthew 5:18 \"For truly I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not the smallest letter or stroke shall pass from the Law until all is accomplished.\"


Not all Christians sneer at the food ordinances. I obey the proscriptions against unclean foods. I just don\'t believe that eating pork will keep someone else out of heaven. I observe the ordinances because they are good (beneficial) for me not because I think they will give me extra credit. The passage that Airhead quoted is used by many to say that God made unclean food clean. A reading of the entire chapter (Acts 10) shows that Peter\'s vision was in regard to the three servants of Cornelius (gentiles and therefore unclean in rabbinical tradition) who sought out Peter in Joppa. Peter saw the vision 3 times; Cornelius sent 3 gentile servants to visit Peter to enquire of the Gospel. The angel was instructing Peter to have converse with these men in spite of the fact that they were \"unclean\" See Below:

Acts 10:17 Now while Peter doubted in himself what this vision which he had seen should mean, behold, the men which were sent from Cornelius had made enquiry for Simon\'s house, and stood before the gate,
10:19 While Peter thought on the vision, the Spirit said unto him, Behold, three men seek thee.
10:20 Arise therefore, and get thee down, and go with them, doubting nothing: for I have sent them.

 

[airhead]

Made me go back and re-read Acts. Thanks.

But:
Matthew 15:11

11What goes into a man\'s mouth does not make him \'unclean,\' but what comes out of his mouth, that is what makes him \'unclean.\' \"

and like much of Christ\'s teachings, it has several meanings.

and
1Timothy 4:3-5

3They forbid people to marry and order them to abstain from certain foods, which God created to be received with thanksgiving by those who believe and who know the truth. 4For everything God created is good, and nothing is to be rejected if it is received with thanksgiving, 5because it is consecrated by the word of God and prayer.