Attacks in Paris

This is the sort of thing I didnt want about pacifism - any insults.

Can I ask, whitewave and Anniebach, why you havent to date, put more information about the subject on the thread I did start about the subject asking for just that? To properly inform the likes of myself, and those younger, who do not know all the information?

I am sure the pacifists who went onto the front line in the two world wars unarmed but carrying stretchers felt very smug and self righteous

Pity some don't bother to read in depth on pacifism but do a quick google instead

Was Ghandi self righteous and smug ?

Oh for goodness sake as I am going to reiterate yet again I am not a pacifist but none of you have read anything about pacifist history to talk the way you are.

That is what I think of pacifism as well, that a person can feel self righteous, virtuous ( smug?) in never condoning violence, knowing that the non pacifists will sort it out one way or the other, so that death never comes knocking at their own door.

It just seems a luxury in today's world - to be a pacifist. I suppose it's always been the same. Very sad.

Pacifists sell arms?

Ghandi caused more loss of life in India that the British army?

anya that is too simplistic a description of pacifism. To say that pacifism has caused more suffering is beyond reason.

When in my teens I liked to think I was a pacifist, but have discovered since pacifism is just an illusion.

The problem with pacifism is that it's an illusion indulged in by people whose own safety is protected by non-pacifists, and that non-violence has probably caused more loss of life and suffering than it has prevented, and the record of pacifists in supporting brutal, corrupt and repressive regimes throughout history.

I am not an a absolute pacifist, although I have flirted with it in the past, but I have never been able to get through the Nazi problem. What I am though is violence when absolutely all else has failed, and even then I would see it as failure.

Hello DJ was going to pm you today to see if you were OK!

Pilger and his historical perspective is someone I always turn to he is the absolute best.
So right about Pol Pot how could I have forgotten that!

I'll watch that with interest Wilma

It's good that a heavyweight like John Pilger is weighing in at the time the government is about to state its case for military action and I am surprised the John Prescott article hasn't had a higher profile.

Question Time could be interesting tonight -

Conservative Business Minister Anna Soubry, Shadow Home Secretary Andy Burnham, former editor of Le Monde Natalie Nougayrede, Daily Mail columnist Max Hastings and Al Jazeera broadcaster Mehdi Hasan join David Dimbleby for a debate in London.

Thanks durhamjen for the link to the Pilger article. I don't suppose those who complain about links will bother to read it, but I think they would find the historical perspective throws light on what is happening today.

POGS Gaddafi may well have been a very dangerous man to get on the wrong side of, but that surely applies to most of the rulers and dictators in the Middle East. Saudi Arabia also rules by fear, torture and brutal force -as has been witnessed in Yemen - and many experts also believe it is responsible for supporting ISIS. Yet our approach to their beheadings, floggings, stonings, etc., is to "continue to engage in dialogue".

An article in Global Research written by Garikai Chengu, a research scholar at Harvard University, made some points that we don't often hear about:

In 1967 when Colonel Gaddafi took power from King Idris, Libya was one of the poorest nations in Africa. By the time Gaddafi was assassinated, Libya was Africa's wealthiest nation. It had the highest GDP and life expectancy on the continent and fewer people lived below the poverty line than in the Netherlands.

Women in Gaddafi’s Libya had the right to education, hold jobs, divorce, hold property and have an income. The United Nations Human Rights Council praised Gaddafi for his promotion of women’s rights.

Libya is now a failed state and its economy is in a shambles. There are two opposing governments, one composed of Islamist-allied militias and the other of mostly anti-Islamist politicians.

I think the same points can be made about Saddam Hussein. 3 years after he became president, Iraq was awarded the UNESCO prize for eradicating illiteracy. He introduced free education for all and improved the infrastructure and healthcare.

It has been said on threads regarding the recent atrocities that there is no point raking this up because "that was then, this is now". But these attacks on Iraq, Libya and Afghanistan which are estimated to have cost 500,000 lives in Iraq alone must surely have caused hatred and anger and contributed to the rise of fundamentalism. France and the US are now reported to be bombing Raffaq which some commentators say has a population of around 500,000 people. I doubt they are all terrorists.

dj- I am so glad to have you back- and I totally understand why you felt it was best to stay away.

We knew we were at war with Germany, one country, but with Syria we could be talking of war with the middle east

However, I can't help wondering if the underlying plan to this awful event might have been a mistaken belief that France would duplicate Spain's reaction in the days after the Madrid bombings and withdraw from military participation against IS.

I disagree, absent. I don't believe the IS organisation is that naive.

I do agree that comparisons with Nazi Germany aren't helpful or realistic though.

Talk of World War III and a global caliphate, whether here or in the knee-jerk media, seems disproportionate. Of course beheadings, bombs and mayhem are atrocious, horrifying and even frightening. However, I can't help wondering if the underlying plan to this awful event might have been a mistaken belief that France would duplicate Spain's reaction in the days after the Madrid bombings and withdraw from military participation against IS.

I think too that we should remember that IS is not a state, whatever it wants to call itself. It is a well-funded terrorist organisation, but does not have the resources to become a state or caliphate. Hence comparions with Nazi Germany really don't wash. It also has a habit of claiming responsibility for every act of lunatic violence across the globe, whether committed by freelance Islamist extremists sympathetic to the cause or by others with absolutely no connection to Islamic extremism thus "enhancing" estimates of its membership and reach.

"I’ve been called a lot of things in the past few days, many of them deserved. “Leftie wanker”. “Islam apologist”. “Unfunny **.” I’ve also been called a “traitor” and even worse, “un-Australian.”

Here’s why I don’t think those last two apply.

Earlier this year I was invited to an Australia Day drinks function at the Australian High Commission in London. As the beer flowed and the lamingtons were passed around I found myself in deep conversation with a variety of governmental experts on The Middle East and in particular, Syria.

As this was a few weeks after the Charlie Hebdo attacks I took the opportunity to find out all I could about this so-called Islamic State group.

I learned a lot of things that night, but the one that stood out was this: Islamic State need recruits and they have two steps to get them.

1) Create an uprising against Muslims in the West by carrying out attacks in the name of Allah.
2) Then when young Muslims feel rejected by Western society, make ISIS look like a cool alternative.

Please remember, this was all expressed to me by officials of both the Australian and British Governments.

It seemed to me that a good way of combatting this would be 1) be nice to non-ISIS related Muslims (ie the vast majority of Muslims) and 2) make ISIS look like idiots.

I ran this past my friends at the High Commission, who agreed that this was indeed a good thing to do."

This is by Adam Hills, on The Last Leg.
It's not the humour that is important, but what he was told by high ranking officials in both the UK and Australian government.

Neither, thanks for asking, Alea. Just thought I ought to get to bed earlier for a while.
Being a pacifist, I did not see any point in joining in some conversations. I see no point in arguing about the best way to kill people.

Durhamjen!!! You're back!!
Have you been away or just offline?

"the greater the hostility toward Muslims in Europe and the deeper the West becomes involved in military action in the Middle East, the closer ISIS comes to its goal of creating and managing chaos." Paris: The War ISIS Wants
"What many in the international community regard as acts of senseless, horrific violence are to ISIS’s followers part of an exalted campaign of purification through sacrificial killing and self-immolation. This is the purposeful violence that Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, the Islamic State’s self-anointed Caliph, has called “the volcanoes of Jihad”—creating an international jihadi archipelago that will eventually unite to destroy the present world to create a new-old world of universal justice and peace under the Prophet’s banner. "

On the same website, John Prescott talks about how we never learn from history. Pilger shows the parallels. He is not just talking about US invasions of foreign countries. Isn't it that it only seems different because it is closer to us?

For those who really have missed my links.

stopwar.org.uk/index.php/news/don-t-attack-syria-says-tony-blair-s-deputy-prime-minister-john-prescott

I think this is a bit different, though.
That was blatant interference in a foreign country, whereas this is becoming more widespread than just Syria and Iraq.
Who can blame the French, the Russians, for not wanting to sit idly on their hands?

Hello Jen, nice to see you back, I have missed your links but I forgive you - John Pilger