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Moderator comment: Racism will not be tolerated in the Great Debates forum. If you come across any racist posts of any kind, please don't hesitate to use the "report post" feature. Thank you.
Thanks but sadly it is in another forum and mods look the other way typically.
Inciting mobs to break the law and tear down historical statues divides the country. For some reason. You would think everyone would be in favor of law and order.
Hopelessly, you feel that treasonous and racist statues are unity symbols.
Last edited by Rastafellow; 06-27-2020 at 03:15 PM..
Reason: add text
It upsets me to read statements like this, parroting America hating lies.
This country was founded as a great experiment to see if people could govern themselves, free from the dictates of religion or aristocracy. They gave us the right to choose our own leaders and laws. Along the way, over a third of a million of our ancestors bled and died to end the slavery you champion, and many more bled and died to give the gift of that freedom to our cousins across the pond.
Along the way, we amended our laws to form A More Perfect Union. We extended citizenship to those who were property. We extended the right to vote to all citizens. We rejected those who would use fear and hatred to divide and control us.
The American Experiment is a work in progress, that will continue until attacks by the venal and cynical bring it to an end. The issue of our time is whether America should be a police state than is free to murder its citizens without consequence. Millions of citizens are taking to the streets in protest, saying that is not America. Those who would rule by bloodshed and fear are on the wrong side of this one.
Centuries of waiting! Only a white person could expect that kind of patience while indulging in Life, Liberty and Happiness. Someone once wrote: "Patience is what the powerful and comfortable always call for."
Inciting mobs to break the law and tear down historical statues divides the country. For some reason. You would think everyone would be in favor of law and order.
Age. We have a young country at the moment. Millennials don't care at the moment because they don't own anything and aren't responsible for anything. As they each find their way, the rings of their calls today will seem hollow and even a bit shrill, and proud of something they've accomplished they'll grow a bit upset when some youngster decides to wreck it over some cause that has nothing to do with them....then they'll know they've grown old and conservative.
Each century has its own society. America was a product of the 18th century, and built on the ideals of The Enlightenment, but if you are looking for perfection in the people who lived there, you will be sadly disappointed.
The 19th century did much to correct the evils of the 18th century, but practiced its own share of evils. A third of a million Americans died to put an end to the slavery you abhor, and uncounted others bore crippling and disfiguring wounds for the rest of their lives. Then the country abandoned Reconstruction and left the South at the mercy of carpetbagger profiteers, and ex-slaves as the object of hatred. America also conducted a horrifying genocide campaign against Native Americans, and invented the reservation system which became a model for the German death camps and Stalinist gulags of the 20th century.
The 20th century was a golden era for America, as it rose from a second place country to world dominance. The only threat to American hegemony was communism. The Russian Revolution at the beginning of the century was a shock, and the collapse of capitalism 12 years later was an even greater challenge. WWII left America the only untouched industrial power in the world, and put the rest of the world back to work rebuilding the bombed out rubble. Unfortunately, WWII did not end with WWII. The Korean War was a continuation of WWII, and the only reason the Vietnam War happened was that Eisenhower double crossed Ho Chi Minh and blocked free elections.
In the 21st centry, we are still fighting WWII, with a huge military-industrial complex we don't need, in wars we have no business fighting. Spain lost four centuries of development by squandering its national treasure to build an armada. Without learning from history, we jumped right in to repeat the mistake. A lot of Americans feel they got the shaft. They are right. The system is not designed to benefit the average citizen, and when something breaks they are the first to suffer. It's not a surprise that there is an undercurrent of anger, which is only controlled by convincing them to blame the other team.
Think about it. You are blaming a bunch of guys who lived in the 18th century. Do you really think that is productive? Who put that idea in your head? You are being played for a sucker.
I think your assessments of the 18th and 19th centuries are spot on! The genocide against Native Americans and enslavement of black people were indefensible.
I would only agree that about the last third of the 20th century was better. Remember that non white males were a disproportionate share of those drafted into the Vietnam War. We did not pass voting rights for people of color until 1964! If that had happened to whites you would never hear the end of it.
Remember all the complaining by many whites about so called 'reverse discrinination' after civil rights were passed. Those were the biggest players of the 'victim card' . The KKK continued to terrorize blacks in the south, burn down their churches, etc, well into the 1980's. Then white supremacists terrorized Charlottesville and killed a women just a few years ago.
I can imagine how painful it can be for most black people to do an ancestry search. Or having been looked at the entire time they are in any retail store too many times to count while it's probably happened to me at most 10 times in my life. I am certain if I used a counterfeit $20 bill, it would not mean a death sentence from a police officer (that should have been removed from the force much earlier after 17 prior violations). I am a 60 year old white male.
I think all reasonable people can at least agree on the above. If telling the truth gets me name called as a virtue signaler or SJW, so be it. That merely reveals that those people don't have a real argument and have to resort to insults.
Having said that, there are a lot of things I admire about our nation: our freedoms (speech, religion, press, etc), our holiday celebrations, respect by most of us for veterans and especially those that have made the ultimate sacrifice.
Patriotism is admiring the positives about our nation, while also critiquing its wrongs and improving it. The slogan "Love it or leave it" is antithetical to what the Founding Fathers believed in 1776 and therefore not patriotic imo.
Hope we can stay civil in the thread.
Last edited by chessgeek; 06-27-2020 at 05:04 PM..
Nationalists insist that leadership and country are intrinsically intertwined, and that to criticize the leader is to attack the nation. This is when they love the expression "Love it or leave it!". And they'll say this as long as one of their own is in power.
But once they lose power, they suddenly discover that it's perfectly acceptable to criticize leadership as distinct from state. And they'll hold fast to this notion... right up to the point that they gain power again. Then, it's back to flinging "Love it or leave it!" who dares to criticize the leadership of 'their' guy.
Those who do not remain civil on the Great Debates forum will be in violation of the specific rules for this forum. I advise all to acquaint themselves not only with the rules posted in a sticky on this forum, but also with the helpful guidelines for debate, also posted as a sticky on this forum.
If the rules are not to one's liking, one is always welcome to go and post in the Politics and Other Controversies forum.
Everyone should leave the “American” government and form their own communities/countries. The right to self govern is a fundamental principle. There are 100 million conservatives/libertarians. There are 100 million liberals. Another 100 million are somewhere in between. We want very different things and have irreconcilable differences. There is plenty of land for everyone to live among their own people and govern themselves how they see fit.
Centuries of waiting! Only a white person could expect that kind of patience while indulging in Life, Liberty and Happiness. Someone once wrote: "Patience is what the powerful and comfortable always call for."
I doubt very much that patience is a virtue of any one racial or cultural group, or there is any necessity to exercise it. Certainly in my lifetime there has been rapid social change, some for the better and some for the worse.
Police force executioners are on the political front burner right now. Perhaps as important, but getting less attention is liberty. The United States imprisons more of its citizens than any other developed nation by a large margin. Due to the pandemic, governors are releasing prisoners that meet the victimless crime criterion, which brings up the question of why they were in prison in the first place. The entire US criminal justice system needs to be restructured, which means 50 states and the federal government. That's not going to happen overnight.
I cannot comment for all people but for me, as much as I am disgusted by racists in the MAGA camp (I continue to be disgusted by the thinly veiled racism on here) they have the right to let their voices known (within term of use of their platform of choice.)
And hopefully you are also disgusted by all racism, no matter what "camp" you are a part of.
And when I say "you" I also mean all of us. There is no room for racism in this country or anywhere.
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