Racism as All-Purpose Smear, Courtesy of _53
As you may have noticed, it has in the last couple of decades become popular to claim that anyone who criticizes anything involving persons from a foreign culture, or that culture itself, is a "racist." Someone thus accused of "racism" is supposed to simply accept it and apologize.
I received a rather amusing, and cost-free, reminder of this fact in an exchange of posts.
_53 made a post entitled The worst accidents in aviation history, by death toll" (at http://users.livejournal.com/_53/561499.html), which I found rather interesting, but I took technical exception to the following entry:
Iran Air Flight 655 was a civilian passenger airliner that was shot down by a missile launched from a US Navy cruiser, the USS Vincennes, in Iranian waters while the flight was in Iranian airspace. All 290 passengers and crew perished, making it the seventh deadliest aviation accident of all time.
Needless to say the cause is up for much debate. According to the US government, the Vincennes mistakenly identified the Iranian airliner as an attacking military fighter. According to the Iranian government, the shooting down of IR 655 by the Vincennes was an intentionally performed and unlawful act.
In August 1988, Newsweek quoted the Vice President as saying; "I'll never apologize for the United States of America. Ever, I don't care what the facts are." in regard to the shoot down or any other mistakes. Bush Sr. used the phrase frequently during the 1988 campaign. The United States has never formally apologized or admitted any wrongdoing, although as part of a settlement at the International Court of Justice they paid $61.8 million in compensation for those killed on the flight.
Now, the problem with this is that it is cast in such a way as to make this look like an atrocity, committed intentionally by the United States of America. American and Iranain assertions are taken as equivalent in terms of plausibility, and the rather important framing information that the shoot-down occurred in the middle of Operation Preying Mantis, an air-sea battle is omitted. This makes it look as if the captain of the Vincennes just randomly decided that it would be fun to shoot down a civilian airliner; in the actual incident, the cruiser had recently been under attack and her crew had good reason to believe that more were forthcoming. In combat, of course, one has limited time to decide, on the basis of limited information, whether a radar contact is a harmless passenger jet, or an enemy warplane launching an attack run.
I pointed out:
You're assuming that the assertions of the US and Iranian governments are equivalent in weight. They're not -- the US is civilized and sane, the Iranians a bunch of barbaric loonies. Furthermore, the US account accords better with known military-technological realities.
and received the following by way of reply:
You're assuming that I'm assuming anything. I merely stated that both sides claim opposing viewpoints.
But I agree, surely shooting down a passenger airliner with a missile isn't barbaric or loony at all.
Again, taking the incident out of context, and making it look as if the captain of the Vincennes was insane.
But seriously, your racism and ignorant hatred is kind of cute in a morbid curiosity, "let's see what he'll say next" kind of entertainment, but it's really gotten old by now and it sickens me. I think you've confused patriotism with hatred and you clearly see only that which you want to see. Justifying your racism with pseudointellectualism and html links isn't somehow oh-so-intelligent, it's just hatred with pie charts. But that's just my opinion, as I said sure I could be wrong.
But tl;dr if you're going to comment on my livejournal at all, please save your e-breath and take your racist bullshit and your burning crosses somewhere else, ...
Now, this is the part where I was supposed to feel ashamed and apologize.
Problem is, I hadn't said anything "racist" about anyone. The Iranians aren't a "race," and the reason I called them "barbaric" and "loonies" (ok, I should have specified the Iranian regime, but I assumed that was understood) was because of their repeatedly manifest political culture. What's even funnier is that the Iranians are, of course, "white" -- they are of essentially the same "race" as Europeans! And he calls me "ignorant," when he's unaware both of the realities of a naval battle and of the ethnic heritage of the Iranian people?
Sorry, _53. I don't cut and run because someone uses the r-word at me. Especially when they're dead wrong about it.
I received a rather amusing, and cost-free, reminder of this fact in an exchange of posts.
_53 made a post entitled The worst accidents in aviation history, by death toll" (at http://users.livejournal.com/_53/561499.html), which I found rather interesting, but I took technical exception to the following entry:
Iran Air Flight 655 was a civilian passenger airliner that was shot down by a missile launched from a US Navy cruiser, the USS Vincennes, in Iranian waters while the flight was in Iranian airspace. All 290 passengers and crew perished, making it the seventh deadliest aviation accident of all time.
Needless to say the cause is up for much debate. According to the US government, the Vincennes mistakenly identified the Iranian airliner as an attacking military fighter. According to the Iranian government, the shooting down of IR 655 by the Vincennes was an intentionally performed and unlawful act.
In August 1988, Newsweek quoted the Vice President as saying; "I'll never apologize for the United States of America. Ever, I don't care what the facts are." in regard to the shoot down or any other mistakes. Bush Sr. used the phrase frequently during the 1988 campaign. The United States has never formally apologized or admitted any wrongdoing, although as part of a settlement at the International Court of Justice they paid $61.8 million in compensation for those killed on the flight.
Now, the problem with this is that it is cast in such a way as to make this look like an atrocity, committed intentionally by the United States of America. American and Iranain assertions are taken as equivalent in terms of plausibility, and the rather important framing information that the shoot-down occurred in the middle of Operation Preying Mantis, an air-sea battle is omitted. This makes it look as if the captain of the Vincennes just randomly decided that it would be fun to shoot down a civilian airliner; in the actual incident, the cruiser had recently been under attack and her crew had good reason to believe that more were forthcoming. In combat, of course, one has limited time to decide, on the basis of limited information, whether a radar contact is a harmless passenger jet, or an enemy warplane launching an attack run.
I pointed out:
You're assuming that the assertions of the US and Iranian governments are equivalent in weight. They're not -- the US is civilized and sane, the Iranians a bunch of barbaric loonies. Furthermore, the US account accords better with known military-technological realities.
and received the following by way of reply:
You're assuming that I'm assuming anything. I merely stated that both sides claim opposing viewpoints.
But I agree, surely shooting down a passenger airliner with a missile isn't barbaric or loony at all.
Again, taking the incident out of context, and making it look as if the captain of the Vincennes was insane.
But seriously, your racism and ignorant hatred is kind of cute in a morbid curiosity, "let's see what he'll say next" kind of entertainment, but it's really gotten old by now and it sickens me. I think you've confused patriotism with hatred and you clearly see only that which you want to see. Justifying your racism with pseudointellectualism and html links isn't somehow oh-so-intelligent, it's just hatred with pie charts. But that's just my opinion, as I said sure I could be wrong.
But tl;dr if you're going to comment on my livejournal at all, please save your e-breath and take your racist bullshit and your burning crosses somewhere else, ...
Now, this is the part where I was supposed to feel ashamed and apologize.
Problem is, I hadn't said anything "racist" about anyone. The Iranians aren't a "race," and the reason I called them "barbaric" and "loonies" (ok, I should have specified the Iranian regime, but I assumed that was understood) was because of their repeatedly manifest political culture. What's even funnier is that the Iranians are, of course, "white" -- they are of essentially the same "race" as Europeans! And he calls me "ignorant," when he's unaware both of the realities of a naval battle and of the ethnic heritage of the Iranian people?
Sorry, _53. I don't cut and run because someone uses the r-word at me. Especially when they're dead wrong about it.