I now feel the army deserve what they get...

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I've already had been told that single mums are the scab of the UK by some damn Tory recently and now this army guy tells me lots of (made up) stories about ethnic people making £20,000 within 4 months of living here due to tax refunds and getting instant housing etc

He then went on about how we needed to go to Iraq to stop Saddam carrying out another Sept 11th (I told him why this sentence is wrong) and to make sure women could once again not have to cover up in the country. A quick history of Iraq followed from myself (including that Saddam operated a secular, albeit violent and right-wing, society and women never had to cover up) and the guy told me I was lying about America funding Saddam in the Iran/ Iraq war. Yup, no one gave Saddam chemical nerve agents or tracking equiptment or helicopters so he could try and wipe out the Ayatollah. Nice. The guy then said a draft should be in operation so everyone can experience military service and be proud of what the union jack should stand for (i.e. wogs out)

So the question is - if we must have stupid people in the army shouldn't we atleast educate them? After hearing this guy my only thought was that if they are using these people for target practice over in Fallujah then my sympathies are with the resistance!

― C.Taylor, Monday, 15 November 2004 10:37 (twenty-one years ago)

Well, people in the army do have access to educational resources. But there are clever people in the army too. It's an obvious point, but what you're saying is like me claiming that because I once met a stupid policeman, policemen deserve what they get in the line of duty. (ignoring arguments about police violence - I could have used any profession really).

― Kevin Gilchrist (Mr Fusion), Monday, 15 November 2004 10:42 (twenty-one years ago)

i'm sure the resistance have some stupid/ignorant people among their ranks too. from a practical point of view the Allies probably prefer to maintain a proportion of 'drones' so that their obtuse (or is it abstruse? i just don't know anymore) methods and justifications for the war are not questioned by potentially disillusioned troops. violence and logic are theoretically polar opposites after all.

― Freelance Hiveminder (blueski), Monday, 15 November 2004 10:47 (twenty-one years ago)

That's an interesting suggestion Steve - that violence and logic are theoretical polar opposites, that is. But I'm too tired to discuss it, so I'll think about it while I feel sorry for myself. I will say, however, that sometimes there is nothing illogical about violence.

― Kevin Gilchrist (Mr Fusion), Monday, 15 November 2004 10:51 (twenty-one years ago)

http://www.startreksite.com/crews/tuvok.jpg
"i'm trained in the martial arts of many alpha quadrant cultures and i have just counted up ninety four ways of killing a person"

― ken c (ken c), Monday, 15 November 2004 10:57 (twenty-one years ago)

sometimes there is nothing illogical about violence

look forward to your reasoning! of course i'm aware there are several situations where violence may be useful as a means of self defence and protection, but by doing so you'd still almost certainly be risking more damage being done to yourself, so logic is effectively compromised - in that the solution becomes a 'lesser of two illogical approaches' (argument in this case boils down to being 'it's illogical to allow potential threats to persist' vs 'it's illogical to neutralise what is believed to be a potential threat without sufficient evidence and reasoning').

― Freelance Hiveminder (blueski), Monday, 15 November 2004 11:46 (twenty-one years ago)

your reasoning assumes that you're less likely to win in a fight. In school, for example, threatening and doing physical violence to skinny (but rich) kids can sometimes earn you bags of chips.

― ken c (ken c), Monday, 15 November 2004 11:52 (twenty-one years ago)

Well, I would say that violence can be logical in a temporary, short-sighted way. Given certain sets of premises, especially the ideas you tend to find in the west, violence can be entirely logical, if not actually inevitable as a result of those premises. Often it is emotion that stays our hand, rather than logic. I think it is rational, for example, to torture a young woman to find out where a nuclear bomb is, for example (uh, I will chime in now to say that I'm a pacifist, and wouldn't torture anyone). It's simple meat mathmatics, in that case - one body vs a hundred thousand. The final solution was the logical conclusion of the Nazi's beliefs.

Now, in these cases I believe there are faulty premises, but probably not faulty reasoning - and I suspect you probably include correct premises as part of your argument. A strict, cold logic can be dangerous; so many of the more human qualities are natural and illogical. It's admittedly a charicature of 'the logical man' to be cold, calculating, ruthless, but I don't know that it is a charicature without basis - I find it hard to imagine a logic that can have room for emotions, except perhaps in some vague utilitarian idea of the greater good.

Anyway, I think it's fairly easy to imagine a logical set of beliefs (marxism, for example, is not illogical, or Mutually Assured Destruction) whose outcome is, or could be violence on a horrific scale. Logic is a means of tracking assumptions to their conclusions, not a way of choosing assumptions themselves, I believe. A lot of violence is committed by irrational, passionate people. But a lot of violence is also committed by calm men and women, who have thought about what they are about to do and decided it is the right thing to do,

― Kevin Gilchrist (Mr Fusion), Monday, 15 November 2004 12:07 (twenty-one years ago)

Pah, all the same among the ones I’ve spoken to. Ill-informed dipshits going into a country they know nothing about. Fecking, Iraq was not funded by the Americans etc – wot an idiot. I say such morons should be buried with the stupid Union Jack they love so much stuffed in their butts. I have such little time for army idiots.

― C.Taylor, Monday, 15 November 2004 12:17 (twenty-one years ago)

but you haev an awful lot of time writing about them.

― :| (....), Monday, 15 November 2004 12:19 (twenty-one years ago)

Are you Cecil Taylor?

― Kevin Gilchrist (Mr Fusion), Monday, 15 November 2004 12:20 (twenty-one years ago)

my girlfriend's brother is a military policeman, and he's none of those things, and while he's never explicitly said so, i'd say he's ideologically against this war. have a peek at some of the letters michael moore has received, too, and you'll find the military forces aren't entirely squadded by bigots making uninformed, prejudiced sweeping generalisations that are ultimately just hot air. like those you've just made.

― stevie (stevie), Monday, 15 November 2004 12:28 (twenty-one years ago)

you don't have to be a bigot making uninformed, prejudiced sweeping generalisations that are ultimately just hot air round here, but it helps!!!!

― debden, Monday, 15 November 2004 12:41 (twenty-one years ago)

Are you Cecil Taylor?

try Chantel...something beginning with a C anyway

― Freelance Hiveminder (blueski), Monday, 15 November 2004 13:11 (twenty-one years ago)

you don't have to be a bigot making uninformed, prejudiced sweeping generalisations that are ultimately just hot air round here, but it helps!!!!

that's what it says on the sign on my desk

― stevie (stevie), Monday, 15 November 2004 13:14 (twenty-one years ago)

Cha~~nte~~l um...er... something like that, anyway.

― Pashmina (Pashmina), Monday, 15 November 2004 13:14 (twenty-one years ago)

if this *is* Calum... how does it feel to be so utterly predictable that we can guess yr shenanigans without even checking ISPs, etc? i mean, i instantly thought, 'This is Calum', and only my disbelief that someone would invest so much time in failing to rile a message board full of strangers who call you on your shit prevented me from believing that from the start.

― stevie (stevie), Monday, 15 November 2004 13:18 (twenty-one years ago)

Anyway, I know a couple of people who are in the forces, neither of whom are exactly pro-gulf war 2, and both of whom are very thoughtful and interesting when in conversation about this.

― Pashmina (Pashmina), Monday, 15 November 2004 13:21 (twenty-one years ago)

and i should point out i don't believe any military organsation (our violence vs their violence being their primary ethos) is really without logic of course, or that the people employed within are uneducated morons. obv. this is nonsense, but it doesn't mean you couldn't argue the 'logic' of what has happened (tho it's funny that there are pro and anti arguments concerning 'the bigger picture' and it's hard to tell whose on the higher pedestal because of the distance between the two)

― Freelance Hiveminder (blueski), Monday, 15 November 2004 13:38 (twenty-one years ago)

Sigh. No I'm not. I take the point that they are not all like that but - well - I've yet to meet a half intelligent army person. They should at least inform them of the place they are about to wreak havoc in. But all these stupid fools who want wrap themselves in the Union Jack deserve to be target practice for renegade militia in the Middle East anyway. Don't you think? It might teach them something like, hey, WAR IS BAD.

― C.Taylor, Monday, 15 November 2004 13:41 (twenty-one years ago)

some of those who were in the forces are the same that bore crosses, you know.

― ken c (ken c), Monday, 15 November 2004 13:42 (twenty-one years ago)

But all these stupid fools who want wrap themselves in the Union Jack

http://home.att.ne.jp/delta/insighter/pict/morrissey.gif

― Freelance Hiveminder (blueski), Monday, 15 November 2004 13:44 (twenty-one years ago)

given half a chance i'd give her some target practice of my own phwwooare

ihttp://news.bbc.co.uk/olmedia/150000/images/_150855_geri_in_union_jack_150.jpg

― cman taylor (ken c), Monday, 15 November 2004 13:53 (twenty-one years ago)

You join the army, you run the risk of getting shot in the knackers. Whining twats.

― noodle vague (noodle vague), Tuesday, 16 November 2004 02:19 (twenty-one years ago)

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