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Howard A Treesong wrote:The US government is the one desperate to shut down things like wikileaks, so I wouldn't get too excited about how free and wonderful you are compared to the oppressive nightmare that Europe apparently is.

Wikileaks is foreign. 'em with Matty's
You guys started it with your "ha we're superior to you Colonials" nonsense. I'm perfectly fine going back to the original topic.

dogma wrote:Sure, that's why you linked to Byrd's Wikipedia page, because you weren't mentioning party affiliation.

Sen. Byrd was a well-known liberal/progressive/leftist.

dogma wrote:So, you were indirectly conflating wings of the political spectrum with American political parties?

Mannahnin opened the door, not me. Like I said, your beef should be with him, not me. Pacific raised the issue of the DNC & RNC, so again, your beef is with him.

dogma wrote:You're really going to make this comment in light of your first statement in this post?

Yup. I think that any rational examination of political history in the United States will show that Democrats and Progressives are resposible for far more violence, death, and property damage than Republicans and Conservatives.

biccat wrote:
Yup. I think that any rational examination of political history in the United States will show that Democrats and Progressives are resposible for far more violence, death, and property damage than Republicans and Conservatives.

You think a lot of incorrect things.

Seaward wrote:

biccat wrote:
Yup. I think that any rational examination of political history in the United States will show that Democrats and Progressives are resposible for far more violence, death, and property damage than Republicans and Conservatives.

You think a lot of incorrect things.

Independents have spilled more blood than this world will ever know.

Leichenstein is reponsible for three world wars!

I have the bizarre opinion that "Marriage" as a religious ceremony should provide absolutely nothing by the law.

"Marriage" as a legal binding thing, aka Civil Unions, should be the only thing recognised by the state in giving benefits, visitation rights, insurance sharing or whatever wonderful things some cartoons will show in this area. These civil union "things" should be available for all consenting adults.

Just my opinion!

Seaward wrote:

biccat wrote:
Yup. I think that any rational examination of political history in the United States will show that Democrats and Progressives are resposible for far more violence, death, and property damage than Republicans and Conservatives.

You think a lot of incorrect things.

Ancient Budha says...ITS A TRAP!

Zyllos wrote:Ok, so maybe the problem here is that there is monetary value related to marriage?

If marriage was just a contract be the two individuals and nothing else, under US law they are just two individuals living together, homo individuals might not be pushing the issue as hard and hetro individuals might not marry as much?

Marriage is a contract between two individuals. The contract often involves various legal rights and privileges and is overseen by the law of the state. Religious states like Iran do things through their religion, but fundamentally the marriage is still a form of contract.

biccat wrote:
Sen. Byrd was a well-known Democrat.

Fixed that for you.

biccat wrote:
Mannahnin opened the door, not me. Like I said, your beef should be with him, not me. Pacific raised the issue of the DNC & RNC, so again, your beef is with him.

Whether or not someone else opened the door for X does not excuse you of doing X.

biccat wrote:
Yup. I think that any rational examination of political history in the United States will show that Democrats and Progressives are resposible for far more violence, death, and property damage than Republicans and Conservatives.

The Civil War, and slavery, may take issue with you.

Hrm. Although I don't necessarily agree with Biccat, I don't see how your post is factually correct. The North (assuming these are the 'progressives') were the aggressors/offensive force and there are those in the South who still style the Civil War as The War of Northern Aggression.

And Lincoln was a Whig who became a Republican and the first Republican president, so clearly you're not styling the Republicans as 'conservatives' but that's not really congruent with your rebuttal of Biccat's statement.

dogma wrote:Whether or not someone else opened the door for X does not excuse you of doing X.

Sure it does, that's what we here in civilized parts call "criticism."

But from what I gather from your comment, you're saying that the political spectrum is a thing which is sensible, and should be used?

dogma wrote:The Civil War, and slavery, may take issue with you.

Even assuming that you can lay all of the deaths of the Civil War on Republicans (and can somehow argue with a straight face that the Republican party was "conservative" on the issue of slavery), I will raise you Roe v. Wade.

I win: 50 million+ vs. 700,000.

I told you it was a trap. No one listens to Zathrass, er, Frazzled.

Frazzled wrote:
Ancient Budha says...ITS A TRAP!

Admiral Ackbar concurs...

biccat wrote:
Sure it does, that's what we here in civilized parts call "criticism."

Engaging in a fool's errand because someone else engaged in a fool's errand is not criticism.

biccat wrote:
But from what I gather from your comment, you're saying that the political spectrum is a thing which is sensible, and should be used?

In satire? Absolutely.

biccat wrote:
Even assuming that you can lay all of the deaths of the Civil War on Republicans (and can somehow argue with a straight face that the Republican party was "conservative" on the issue of slavery), I will raise you Roe v. Wade.

I win: 50 million+ vs. 700,000.

I wasn't referring to Republicans, but conservatives.

Of course, I don't really think death toll is a reasonable way of considering political philosophy, so it doesn't really matter.

dogma wrote:Engaging in a fool's errand because someone else engaged in a fool's errand is not criticism.

I think we've covered this before. Simply because you don't understand an argument doesn't make it a bad, nor fallacious (lets head that one off right away) argument.0

dogma wrote:I wasn't referring to Republicans, but conservatives.

Even so, to blame "conservatives" for the death toll in the Civil War is to ignore history. Fun fact: it takes two to start a war. Unlike a love life, it's tough to have a war all by yourself.

dogma wrote:Of course, I don't really think death toll is a reasonable way of considering political philosophy, so it doesn't really matter.

Not as an absolute measure, but it certainly bears consideration.

biccat wrote:Simply because you don't understand an argument doesn't make it a bad, nor fallacious (lets head that one off right away) argument.

That's not really true. If your target audience doesn't understand your argument, then its a bad argument. Not that I'm your target audience, as I think you're smart enough to know that there are few things political that you could bring to my attention in order to convince me (10-12 hours of political analysis per day will do that), but still.

Also, it isn't that I don't understand your argument, its that I think it isn't very good.

biccat wrote:
Even so, to blame "conservatives" for the death toll in the Civil War is to ignore history. Fun fact: it takes two to start a war. Unlike a love life, it's tough to have a war all by yourself.

There is always self mutilation.

That aside, its difficult to blame any vague political group for anything, welcome to RAA.

biccat wrote:
Not as an absolute measure, but it certainly bears consideration.

Assuming you can establish causation.

dogma wrote:

biccat wrote:
Not as an absolute measure, but it certainly bears consideration.

Assuming you can establish causation.

Res ipsa loquitur.

biccat wrote:
Res ipsa loquitur.

No thing speaks for itself, least of all in politics.

Frazzled wrote:

Melissia wrote:

Frazzled wrote:Thats not the actual reasons cited.

Yes it is, or it is the root cause of the reasons at any rate, and none of the ones are actually logically consistent anyway.

I defy you to prove otherwise.

Just three:
1. My etheral sky god's teachings say otherwise.
2. A fundamental reason for marriage is the making of little demon seeds known as children. Until recently, that wasn't possible.
3. Little demon seeds benefit from the nurturing perspectives of both male and female viewpoints.

1: Not everyone beleives in the same god, Like i said before, As a country that says we have religious freedom, we sure do force our freedoms on another
2: I will fix that for you "A fundamental reason for sex is the making of little demon seeds" You don't need marriage to sstart a family. But marriages makes it a whole lot easier.
3: I was raised by a single mother. I am as normal as yuo can get for someone who plays 40k.
By that logic lets outlaw being a single parent, If you arent married you get your kids taken away.

There you go. Arguments without calling anyone an "ist." Excellent.

I agree with your points FYI.

Frazzled wrote:There you go. Arguments without calling anyone an "ist." Excellent.

I agree with your points FYI.

I noticed that you did not respond to my post. You msut be conceding the points I made. Good for you.

Frazzled wrote:There you go. Arguments without calling anyone an "ist." Excellent.

I agree with your points FYI.

Hmm, Well you re a breedist Frazzled. You seek to create a master weiner dog race that either seekss to enslave or destroy all other breeds.

What do you mean SEEKS to? They've already won. Only the noble felines have remained aloof and independent.

Pacific wrote:Do you live in some kind of weird, parallel universe biccat?

Biccat lives in a world where calling someone a bigot for being a bigot is oppressive. It's a very strange place to live, but biccat seems to enjoy himself in there.


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Frazzled wrote:Republicans ended slavery
Republicans managed to get eneacted the seminal Amendments to the Constitution [prohibiting slavery, all incidents and badges thereof, and insuring the right to vote.
Republicans were the Congress members that brought you the Civil Rights Act.

You've made the grade school error of assuming Republicans are an ever constant political force. Instead, try doing some reading on the issue. Try, for instance, to to read up on Wilson Bachelor, a contemporary of Lincoln, and a leader of the Republican Party in Arkansas. Bachelor argued for the equality of women, stated the freeing of slaves was an act of the highest society, claimed science was the record of the expanding human intellect not to be opposed by embraced by the forces of compassion and tradition, argued that there was not a Christian government and that laws based on Christian traditions had no right to exist, and he loathed the idea of political purity or litmus tests.

He was, in short, very similar to a modern liberal, and the kind of person the Republican party could not tolerate among it's ranks today. But he was a prominent and respected member of the Republican Party in his time. Because the Republican Party has changed a great deal over the course of its history.


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biccat wrote:I'll juse leave this here.

It's Europe, so it's liberal. feth me that's lazy. I'll accept that you had no idea about the strength of conservative Catholicism in Poland, maybe you'd never heard the factoid about Poland having more nuns per capita than any other country in the world, but did you not think it even slightly necessary to look up if Poland was a bastion of leftie ideology before posting that?

This, biccat, is why your politics are as goofy today as when you joined this forum. Because you don't care about learning about the world, instead you just keep looking for anything that'll justify your politics.


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Frazzled wrote:You missed the one about the Civil Rights Act, and how the only known US Senator who was a KKK Grand Dragon was a Democrat.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Byrd

You also missed the Southern Strategy, the effort by Republicans to draw disaffected Democratic voters in Southern states to the Republican party in the wake of the Civil Rights act.

If you were to claim in the 1950s the party chock full of racists was the Democrats, you'd be absolutely, 100% correct. That just isn't the case today. Years of focussed, Republican campaigning to appeal to bigots have successfully drawn them to their party.


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Frazzled wrote:Duh. Neither are the Democrats. neither is the Greens Party, nor the American Communist Party, nor the Libertarians. Ok, maybe the Libertarians still are.

Then why in hell did you mention emancipation as a defence of the modern Republican party?

sebster wrote:Biccat lives in a world where calling someone a bigot for being a bigot is oppressive. It's a very strange place to live, but biccat seems to enjoy himself in there.

Actually, it's called "Dakka." Which apparently has a "zero tolerance policy" for calling someone a bigot.

The jury seems to be out on who, precisely, this rule applies to.

biccat wrote:Yup. I think that any rational examination of political history in the United States will show that Democrats and Progressives are resposible for far more violence, death, and property damage than Republicans and Conservatives.

That you think such an examination even possible, let alone one that could demonstrate one side as being more evil than the other just goes to show how far you've disappeared down the rabbit hole of 'yay my political team, boo your political team'.

There is no greater political force of good against some greater political force for evil. There's just the issues of the day, and a largely chaotic process decides which ones end up grouping with each other.


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biccat wrote:I win: 50 million+ vs. 700,000.

If we assume that a fertilised egg is a person. Which lots of people believe, but remains an odious, cheap thing to simply assume.


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biccat wrote:Actually, it's called "Dakka." Which apparently has a "zero tolerance policy" for calling someone a bigot.

The jury seems to be out on who, precisely, this rule applies to.

A person who hates homosexuals is a bigot. That seems pretty much straight up according to the definition.

The trick is that in your world, if someone gives a homophobic reason for disapproval of gay marriage*, and another person calls them on it by calling them a bigot, that counts as oppression on apparently a far more grievous level than denying someone the right to marry the person they love.


*This is not something I can remember you doing. I certainly am not implying your opposition to gay marriage is based in bigotry. In fact, I don't even know what your opinion of gay marriage is, you may well be fine with it for all I know. All I've seen you comment on is a desire to have it resolved through legislation rather than courts (which is sensible), and to complain about how people keep being mean to conservatives (which is ridiculous).

sebster wrote:... maybe you'd never heard the factoid about Poland having more nuns per capita than any other country in the world...

Now I know who to blame.

I know biccat called me a bigot twice and was not banned as far as a I know, as posts continued unabated. Maybe he is talking about himself.

I've never seen an argument against homosexual marriage that's not simply pure dislike for homosexuals cloaked in sophistry.

Seaward wrote:I've never seen an argument against homosexual marriage that's not simply pure dislike for homosexuals cloaked in sophistry.

I’ve seen reasons other than straight up bigotry. I’ve seen people get caught up in the fantasy of declining Christian morals, who think the only way to stop that slow decline is to fight people looking to increase rights. It isn’t that they hate the gays, but the gays are just one part of this whole narrative they’ve been led to believe. Some people have been given a very narrow reading of the Bible, and been taught to believe that condoning gay relationships with marriage cannot be accepted if we are to think of ourselves as Christian, so it isn’t that they hate homosexuals, just that they can’t condone what they do. Some folk just reflexively deny benefits to anyone that isn’t them, on some kind of stunted understanding that rights are a zero sum game, so anything you gain may cost them. And I’ve seen people who just reflexively oppose anything suggested by the other side, so if the progressives think gay marriage is a bad idea, they assume their place is to argue against it.

They’re all pretty stupid reasons, but they’re not bigoted reasons. The last one, reflexively taking up the other side, you see a whole lot on Dakka. I’d think it’s probably more common than bigotry here.


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Ahtman wrote:I know biccat called me a bigot twice and was not banned as far as a I know, as posts continued unabated. Maybe he is talking about himself.

I find it really odd that so many posters can be so outraged that opposing equal rights for marriage could lead to them being called bigot, but the very same people will be so quick to call you anti-semitic if you oppose elements of Israel's foreign policy.

hotsauceman1 wrote:

Frazzled wrote:There you go. Arguments without calling anyone an "ist." Excellent.

I agree with your points FYI.

Hmm, Well you re a breedist Frazzled. You seek to create a master weiner dog race that either seekss to enslave or destroy all other breeds.

Yep.


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Melissia wrote:

Frazzled wrote:There you go. Arguments without calling anyone an "ist." Excellent.

I agree with your points FYI.

I noticed that you did not respond to my post. You msut be conceding the points I made. Good for you.

I did. My argument was only that there are logical reasons besides "ism" to opposition. I didn't care to defend those reasons as I don't give a flying feth about the issue frankly. I just want the democratic process to occur and not the usual rule by judges.


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dogma wrote:

sebster wrote:... maybe you'd never heard the factoid about Poland having more nuns per capita than any other country in the world...

Now I know who to blame.

"We're on a mission from Gahd."


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Seaward wrote:I've never seen an argument against homosexual marriage that's not simply pure dislike for homosexuals cloaked in sophistry.

Dude / dudet/whatever you are, we just freaking had this conversation. Hello! McFly!