What? Looks perfectly reasonable to type that. What's wrong with you? *trollface*rsvp42 said:The fact is, we haven't had a whole lot to celebrate as a country recently. We've been looking for this guy for 10 years and we finally finished the job. Let us revel in it a little, get a little bit of closure for 9/11 and I promise we'll all go back to painting in the lines and feigning civility. Yes we're celebrating a death, but it's the death of the most infamous terrorist in recent history.
If this "scares" you, you're misinterpreting the situation.
also what the hell, captcha:
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Exactly how much of a threat was Bin Laden? I mean, really. Your country has designated him as the face of terror, convincing itself that this one man is singlehandedly controlling a huge, unified 'organisation of evil', when in reality he's just one more high ranking figure in a sprawling intangible network of various groups and like-minded fundamentalists. Given that he's been on the run for the last eight years, I highly doubt that the worlds terror network has entrusted their survival to him. He'd be a liability to any organisation. Nothing changes with his death. Israeli fundamentalism wasn't reliant on this one guy.spectrenihlus said:We took out Bin Laden because he was a threat and to make an example out of him. If that means going into a sovereign country to do so then we do it because we can, if another country had the ability to go into a country and kill someone they would do the exact same thing (eg: Israel's capture of Adolf Eichmann in Argentina). There is no good or evil in international politics only our guys and their guys and if our guys are under threat by their guys we take their guys out. This is how it has occured throughout history and it is just naive to think otherwise. International laws are only good if both sides abide by them the moment one sides doesn't they don't hold any meaning.
Smartarse.Father Time said:No he's been hiding in the building we killed him in for quite a while.Harrowdown said:Given that he's been on the run for the last eight years,
Harrowdown said:Killing Bin Laden was a major and I mean absolute major success and it really hurt Al Qaeda. Yes Al Qaeda isn't a homogeneous organization but Bin Laden was still their spiritual leader and a great inspiration to them by killing him we have broken their spirit and showed the world what happens if you do these types of things to us, you will die no matter how long it takes and no matter where you hide there is nowhere on this planet where you can run and no one you can turn to. And concerning international law it is broken constantly because it is pretty much held up by the honor system. Unlike if you stole or murdered someone their is no enforcer of international law. BTW the united states tried every legal option before resorting to this. The united states had two opportunities prior to the one where we got him and each time we told Pakistan that we were coming in and getting him. Guess what the leadership in Pakistan does IT FUCKING WARNS BIN LADEN. So this time we go in under cover of darkness without warning Pakistan and we finally get the son of a *****. By the way , the reason this works is because only a few nations can pull off what the United States pulled off in terms of disregarding a nation's border. If someone tried to do what we did to Pakistan to us they would be shot down within minutes. I also am pretty sure that if a terrorist blew up One Canada Square in London and your government knew that he was hiding is say Albania your country would do the exact same thing. So would France and so would any other country that has the capability to pull it off.spectrenihlus said:snip
spectrenihlus said:You're probably correct in your first point, although we have yet to see how things play out. Really though, fundamentalism is driven less by individuals and more by ideas and beliefs. You could kill the pope and have no real affect on organised catholicism in the long run. The rest of your argument is really just a retreading of points that you've already made, completely ignoring my own argument. As you've already said, other countries may well act in the same way as America, if placed in that situation, although the fact that you're 'pretty sure' of this isn't exactly an airtight argument. I say again that this fact doesn't justify anything. They can and might, but they shouldn't. If the only justification for your countries actions that you can provide is that they're powerful enough to get away with it, then your argument is on very shaky ground. I'd also appreciate some sources as regards to the supposed prior opportunities that America had before defying Pakistan's sovereignty. Also, just because international law does, as you say, rely on the honour system, it doesn't make it acceptable to break it. Logical, cooperative, constructive agents work together for mutual gain and general stability, not because they're afraid of getting caught. As a country, America is extremely bloody self obsessed.Harrowdown said:Killing Bin Laden was a major and I mean absolute major success and it really hurt Al Qaeda. Yes Al Qaeda isn't a homogeneous organization but Bin Laden was still their spiritual leader and a great inspiration to them by killing him we have broken their spirit and showed the world what happens if you do these types of things to us, you will die no matter how long it takes and no matter where you hide there is nowhere on this planet where you can run and no one you can turn to. And concerning international law it is broken constantly because it is pretty much held up by the honor system. Unlike if you stole or murdered someone their is no enforcer of international law. BTW the united states tried every legal option before resorting to this. The united states had two opportunities prior to the one where we got him and each time we told Pakistan that we were coming in and getting him. Guess what the leadership in Pakistan does IT FUCKING WARNS BIN LADEN. So this time we go in under cover of darkness without warning Pakistan and we finally get the son of a *****. By the way , the reason this works is because only a few nations can pull off what the United States pulled off in terms of disregarding a nation's border. If someone tried to do what we did to Pakistan to us they would be shot down within minutes. I also am pretty sure that if a terrorist blew up One Canada Square in London and your government knew that he was hiding is say Albania your country would do the exact same thing. So would France and so would any other country that has the capability to pull it off.spectrenihlus said:snip
On a final note, isn't 'showing the world what happens if you do these types of things to us' what terrorism is for? If Bin Laden was an example, aren't you using violence to intimidate your opponent, which is the very definition of a terrorist act? Huh...
Harrowdown said:http://www.newscommando.com/WL-wikileaks-pakistan-exposed.htmlspectrenihlus said:You're probably correct in your first point, although we have yet to see how things play out. Really though, fundamentalism is driven less by individuals and more by ideas and beliefs. You could kill the pope and have no real affect on organised catholicism in the long run. The rest of your argument is really just a retreading of points that you've already made, completely ignoring my own argument. As you've already said, other countries may well act in the same way as America, if placed in that situation, although the fact that you're 'pretty sure' of this isn't exactly an airtight argument. I say again that this fact doesn't justify anything. They can and might, but they shouldn't. If the only justification for your countries actions that you can provide is that they're powerful enough to get away with it, then your argument is on very shaky ground. I'd also appreciate some sources as regards to the supposed prior opportunities that America had before defying Pakistan's sovereignty. Also, just because international law does, as you say, rely on the honour system, it doesn't make it acceptable to break it. Logical, cooperative, constructive agents work together for mutual gain and general stability, not because they're afraid of getting caught. As a country, America is extremely bloody self obsessed.Harrowdown said:Killing Bin Laden was a major and I mean absolute major success and it really hurt Al Qaeda. Yes Al Qaeda isn't a homogeneous organization but Bin Laden was still their spiritual leader and a great inspiration to them by killing him we have broken their spirit and showed the world what happens if you do these types of things to us, you will die no matter how long it takes and no matter where you hide there is nowhere on this planet where you can run and no one you can turn to. And concerning international law it is broken constantly because it is pretty much held up by the honor system. Unlike if you stole or murdered someone their is no enforcer of international law. BTW the united states tried every legal option before resorting to this. The united states had two opportunities prior to the one where we got him and each time we told Pakistan that we were coming in and getting him. Guess what the leadership in Pakistan does IT FUCKING WARNS BIN LADEN. So this time we go in under cover of darkness without warning Pakistan and we finally get the son of a *****. By the way , the reason this works is because only a few nations can pull off what the United States pulled off in terms of disregarding a nation's border. If someone tried to do what we did to Pakistan to us they would be shot down within minutes. I also am pretty sure that if a terrorist blew up One Canada Square in London and your government knew that he was hiding is say Albania your country would do the exact same thing. So would France and so would any other country that has the capability to pull it off.spectrenihlus said:snip
On a final note, isn't 'showing the world what happens if you do these types of things to us' what terrorism is for? If Bin Laden was an example, aren't you using violence to intimidate your opponent, which is the very definition of a terrorist act? Huh...
There is a saying do not argue with success. The United States was successful in doing what needed to be done. If that meant breaking international laws then that is what a country does to ensure the safety of it's citizens and guess what it worked. The United States will not do what it did to Pakistan to say Norway because Norway would do everything in it's power to assist the United States in getting a person within it's borders. If everyone wants to work together then international law is uphold the moment a country doesn't want to follow a specific rule to gain an advantage they don't and it's only unacceptable if the country can't accept the repercussions of breaking the laws and depending on which law is broken a lot of countries can accept the repercussions.
Concerning the violence against terrorism part. Violence, respect, and fear are the only things people like Bin Laden understand. If you get it into their heads that if they attack us it is certain that they will die if they try then the attacks will cease. This is why the US doesn't negotiate with terrorists and instead kills them. Either play ball with us or get trampled underfoot.
As far as i'm concerned, the ends do not justify the means here. You say that America was ensuring the safety of its citizens, but as I think I pointed out a few posts ago, Bin Laden himself doesn't represent any real danger. His death does very little in the grand scheme of things. America seems to have a habit of scaring its people into accepting its own irredeemable crookedness. The patriot act, for example. Exactly how did killing Bin Laden 'work', anyway? That statement makes no sense. I say again, Bin Ladens death is going to change nothing in the long run. There's still terrorists, and there's still fundamentalists, and there's still decades of bitterness directed at the western world.spectrenihlus said:http://www.newscommando.com/WL-wikileaks-pakistan-exposed.html
There is a saying do not argue with success. The United States was successful in doing what needed to be done. If that meant breaking international laws then that is what a country does to ensure the safety of it's citizens and guess what it worked. The United States will not do what it did to Pakistan to say Norway because Norway would do everything in it's power to assist the United States in getting a person within it's borders. If everyone wants to work together then international law is uphold the moment a country doesn't want to follow a specific rule to gain an advantage they don't and it's only unacceptable if the country can't accept the repercussions of breaking the laws and depending on which law is broken a lot of countries can accept the repercussions.
Concerning the violence against terrorism part. Violence, respect, and fear are the only things people like Bin Laden understand. If you get it into their heads that if they attack us it is certain that they will die if they try then the attacks will cease. This is why the US doesn't negotiate with terrorists and instead kills them. Either play ball with us or get trampled underfoot.
Ok so what should have been done with Osama? Should the US just sat their and took what they got on 9/11 and let Osama get away with it?Harrowdown said:As far as i'm concerned, the ends do not justify the means here. You say that America was ensuring the safety of its citizens, but as I think I pointed out a few posts ago, Bin Laden himself doesn't represent any real danger. His death does very little in the grand scheme of things. America seems to have a habit of scaring its people into accepting its own irredeemable crookedness. The patriot act, for example. Exactly how did killing Bin Laden 'work', anyway? That statement makes no sense. I say again, Bin Ladens death is going to change nothing in the long run. There's still terrorists, and there's still fundamentalists, and there's still decades of bitterness directed at the western world.spectrenihlus said:http://www.newscommando.com/WL-wikileaks-pakistan-exposed.html
There is a saying do not argue with success. The United States was successful in doing what needed to be done. If that meant breaking international laws then that is what a country does to ensure the safety of it's citizens and guess what it worked. The United States will not do what it did to Pakistan to say Norway because Norway would do everything in it's power to assist the United States in getting a person within it's borders. If everyone wants to work together then international law is uphold the moment a country doesn't want to follow a specific rule to gain an advantage they don't and it's only unacceptable if the country can't accept the repercussions of breaking the laws and depending on which law is broken a lot of countries can accept the repercussions.
Concerning the violence against terrorism part. Violence, respect, and fear are the only things people like Bin Laden understand. If you get it into their heads that if they attack us it is certain that they will die if they try then the attacks will cease. This is why the US doesn't negotiate with terrorists and instead kills them. Either play ball with us or get trampled underfoot.
Norway is a weird example, but I see what you're trying to say. Regardless of your opinion of their actions, Pakistan was well within their rights to hinder American military activity on their soil, and America can't just break laws because they don't get their way. I don't think you fully appreciate exactly what is meant by sovereignty. It is, as wikipedia defines it, "the quality of having supreme, independent authority over a geographic area, such as a territory." A good comparison would be to property rights in the developed world. I have the right to refuse to let you into my house, and you have no right whatsoever to enter my house without my express permission. You can't simply decide that you're entitled to trespass on my property because there's something you want on it.
I'm afraid I can't really understand the next point of your post, as the grammar gets a little weird.
As for the final part of your argument, i'm afraid it's nonsense. You fail to understand the mindset of an islamist fundamentalist. They're not just barbaric animals without reason. You underestimate them if you think a couple smacks with a rolled up newspaper will stop them. To think so is to underestimate your enemy. Obviously the fundamentalist doesn't care if you kill him. If they did, then why don't they just plant the bombs, instead of martyring themselves? Their violence isn't aimless, and it isn't vulnerable to a stern hand. They have a clear ideological goal and a cause to uphold. If you're still not convinced, just read up on the viet nam war and see just how easily /they/ gave in. Like the Islamists, the viet cong were motivated by ideology and a passionate belief in a cause. They held onto their cause for twenty years against the Americans. Al Queda and company aren't going to be perturbed by one lousy death.
i recently did a term paper on the subject of human nature and as it turns out, humans really aren't violent by nature. The enjoying of violence is a learned trait we developed. We observed people enjoying violence when we were younger and thus we learned to enjoy it as well.believer258 said:I heard that he hid behind one of his wives as he was shot. It's hard not to hate such a man, a coward who would ask others to commit suicide for his cause. Is it right to celebrate his death? No. But neither were the bastard's actions in life. This man got what was coming to him, and the celebrating afterward is more humiliation of a man that deserves it, whether it was right of us to dish it out or not.
Medieval? Yes, a bit. But it appears we haven't evolved our base instincts much over time, especially the one that controls our thirst for vengeance. I can't say I blame the Americans that did this, and frankly that's one less evil bastard in the world to deal with.
Well to start with, they shouldn't be carrying out illegal military operations in other countries. Failing that, it would've been ideal to capture Osama and put him on trial. Given the recent details of the operation, which state that Bin Laden was in fact unarmed, that probably shouldn't have been too hard. As when Saddam Hussein was captured, a trial would erase any suspicions that America was bypassing the justice system, and would probably act as a far better message to the enemy than just killing people. I think perhaps you're looking at this whole thing the wrong way. You seem to think that America needed to prove a point by killing Osama, that it was a matter of petty revenge rather than an act of combat. Yes, Osama did undoubtedly need to be dealt with, but not like this, and not for such silly reasons. All of the anger and contempt is out of place in any war. It simply impedes progress towards a solution, which is always the indisputable goal during any conflict. Holding up peace to settle old debts and prove points is irrational and foolhardy.spectrenihlus said:Ok so what should have been done with Osama? Should the US just sat their and took what they got on 9/11 and let Osama get away with it?
I'm not sure where you thought you saw outrage. Probably best not to assume anything about people's emotions when your only data consists of text. It was an observation that I've made many times before, and am quite accustomed to at this point. I am sure that somewhere on the net there is a person who is as rabid as you imagine I am. I'm just curious why you've decided to pick a fight with me. "Cavemen" is hardly something that I think of as an insult that requires you to defend the honor of the people I applied it to. There are much worse things that I'm sure others have said, likely on this very thread.Father Time said:It was an artificial sense of outrage to match yours.McMullen said:Then I imagine you must be disturbed often.Father Time said:I'm disturbed how quick you are to label people caveman. Because of course having closure is nothing to celebrate.McMullen said:This is quite normal for us. My fellow classmates erupted in cheers when OJ was declared not guilty. They talked through the national moment of silence for the Oklahoma City bombing victims. They were more interested in who Clinton was fucking than what he was doing as president, good or bad. This kind of thing more or less continued into adulthood.ShakyFiend said:And this is happening all over the US, people are actively celebrating killing a guy? Does that not seem a bit medieval to anyone else? When people turn out in their thousands to celebrate something like this it justs worries me like hell.
People describe the hellish culture of Xbox Live as if it is some new phenomenon. It existed here well before the Internet became a Big Thing.
Don't be disturbed by the fact that many of us are insane misguided cavemen. Be disturbed that we are insane misguided cavemen with a permanent seat on the UN Security council and a nuclear arsenal.
Have a nice day!
There's nothing barbaric about celebrating this man's death.
True, but not the entirety of it. In the long run, he's just a single person. It's like dancing in the middle of a warzone because you just pegged off an enemy. It's liable to get you killed, and accomplishes little.Father Time said:And that single man was a threat.rmb1983 said:See, this is exactly the issue with having some sort of grandiose celebration for this. This is NOT the death of a threat, only the death of a single man.SenseOfTumour said:How do you respond:
A) You say "Ok, cool" and go about your life. Your friends are still dead.
B) You celebrate the death of a threat NOT the death of a human being. Your friends stay dead.
C) You say "They should have let more people die (cops) and tried to arrest the bastard. He could have blown himself up and killed more cops but oh well, everybody deserves a trial!"
You're mis-contextualizing my posts. I'm all for being thrilled the man is dead, and "celebrating" the smallest of victories (such as my "Victory Dances"; a cigarette when I've accomplished something particularly trying). I did, however, imply it's barbaric to use it as an excuse to act like it's gorramed Spring Break.Father Time said:Barbaric my ass. Celebrating hurts no one and doesn't accomplish anything. We celebrate things far less significant than the death of a man who murdered thousands and has been trying to murder thousands more.rmb1983 said:The point is that anyone celebrating the death of a single person (no matter who they are) like it's just another excuse for an all-out bender, especially when said death really accomplishes nothing? Taking joy in a victory, no matter how small, is just fine. Celebrating in the streets when a war has ended is understandable. Partying over this...a little on the barbaric side of the spectrum.
I highly doubt that'd be the case, considering their attacks involve sacrificing their lives, to begin with. They're not afraid of death. They welcome it in service to their deity.spectrenihlus said:Concerning the violence against terrorism part. Violence, respect, and fear are the only things people like Bin Laden understand. If you get it into their heads that if they attack us it is certain that they will die if they try then the attacks will cease. This is why the US doesn't negotiate with terrorists and instead kills them. Either play ball with us or get trampled underfoot.