Linkage

[erudito]

A Venn-diagram that helpfully distinguishes between nerds, dweebs, dorks and geeks.

A very useful term: squick.

About Oscar the hospice cat.

Do the Libertarian Purity Test. I scored 47 “your libertarian credentials are obvious”.

Making a statement: not entirely sure which one.

Nice story about being patient with people who may have an entire

Comments

[jordan179]

I wonder why anyone from the West ever voluntarily goes to the Arabian peninsula, save as part of a military unit? This sort of thing happens all the time there, and the victimization isn't even limited to women, or amorous men. There have been cases where men have been homosexually raped and then thrown into prison for "sodomy."

The Arabs are utter barbarians, who postively enjoy seeing evil triumph. Why is this so difficult for us to grasp?

[jordan179]

I said nothing about Arab maliciousness being biological in origin. Do you even understand the meaning of the term "racist" that you throw about with such abandon?

[jordan179]

as to the rest of your second statement: why do you assume that our way of life is better and that westerners must be allowed to behave as they would at home wherever they go?

Because I believe in the concept of natural right -- that humans have certain rights by nature, and among them is life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness: and that from this derives the right to do something harmless (like peck a woman on the cheek in public) without interference from some tyranny jokingly calling itself "the law."

I also believe that those coming from Western cultures are superior, because of their cultural background, to those coming from Muslim cultures, and that when Islam and the West conflict, Islam should be forced to walk mighty small. Clear?

[catsidhe]

Perfectly clear: you are a bigot.

And, for the record, you impugned biological origin when you said "The Arabs". Not "Arabian culture". Not "Islam", even. That was a racist statement, and, in my experience, completely in line with your usual bigotry.

[jordan179]

I am certainly convinced that people other than hetrosexual male Muslims should have full civil rights; consequently I have a higher opinion of Western culture than I do of Muslim cultures. My gripe with the Arabs is purely in regards to Arab culture: I have nothing against the Arabs as a biological "race" (whatever the heck that means anyway, since self-defined "Arabs" come in almost every shade and physical appearance save for extreme East Asian or extreme African Negro). I regard discrimination against people on "racial" grounds both ignorant (of human biology) and silly. Does that make it clear?

[catsidhe]

Yes, quite. You are an ignorant bigot.

Arabs are of a specific ancestry. Your statement on ‘Arabs’, unqualified and absolute, said nothing about their culture, it was a slander on everyone of Arabic descent. Including Christians and Pagans.

If you had said ‘Islam’, you might have a stronger case, but even then I don't know where to find the Hadith which says “And it's alright with Allah if you frame Anwar Ibrahim on charges of Sodomy to protect the feelings of the (ex-)president of Malaysia.”

And if you have a problem with ‘Arabic’ culture, then I assume you are fine with Iran? They're not ‘Arabs’, after all, and never have been, but are Persians.

Definitions

[erudito]

Arabs share a culture rather more than they share a biological ancestry. (A lot of people now classed as 'Arabs' are of rather diverse ethnic ancestry.)

Barbarism is also usually regarded as a cultural state, rather than a biological one.

Now, the comment was stupid: the behaviour in question flows from monotheist erotophobia and one can find analogous behaviour in European history, some quite recently, from the same source. But jordan179's comment is one of those borderline cases, since ethnicity is both a cultural and a biological construct.

After all, it would not be too hard to find some pretty negative comments about Americans from folk not normally regarded as racist or being racist.

[jordan179]

Unfortunately for the western they ARE demographically younger and they will simply out-live us.

I wouldn't count on that ... especially where the Americas are concerned. I wouldn't even count on that where Europe is concerned -- I think that the Europeans will wake up and pull out of their demographic and cultural tailspin before they hit the ground.

Monotheist erotophobia

[erudito]

Actually, the behaviour is pretty standard for places where monotheist erotophobia sets the patterns. Alan Turing for example, when he went to the police to complain about being robbed by a young man, was charged with committing homosexual acts instead. In earlier periods in Latin Christendom, it was not unknown for the victims of homosexual rape to be flogged for having committed an "unnatural" sexual act: the fact that it was forced on them was mitigation (they were flogged instead of being burnt alive or otherwise killed) but still meant they were held to be guilty.

So it is the system of belief, not something intrinsic to Arabs.

Re: Monotheist erotophobia

[jordan179]

*sigh*

You're right, of course -- the present-day tolerance is a relatively recent development. Though I will point out that it's been a century or more since Western countries, especially since the Anglosphere, routinely enforced a death penalty for homosexuality, as happens today in the Muslim world.

Re: Monotheist erotophobia

[erudito]

Ah, but in the Islamic calendar, it is still the C15th.

As far as I can tell, Iran executes homosexuals roughly as often as Napoleonic War Britain did (or C18th Netherlands during one its "moral panics" on the issue) and they were the most liberal European polities at the time: though the Code Napoleon did drop it as a crime. The Enlightenment process of secularisation was only really just beginning (and is still working its way through on gay issues).