From: MaxPlumm@aol.com
Date: Sun Jun 08 2003 - 21:58:37 MDT
Mr. Newstrom continues in his defense of Damien:
"This is still misleading. The fact that Damien has not commented on these
other regimes does not imply that he supports them. This is unreasonable
binary thinking. You can't accuse everybody of every sin that they haven't
publically denied."
I did not say that Damien supports a Castro or Mengistu, I said he supports a moral and world view that would allow them to continue unimpeded in their policies of mass murder so long as he is unaffected by them. So, ultimately, it doesn't make any difference whether or not he hangs a portrait of Le Duan in his den.
"As I have explained before, you are over-simplifying. You are classifying
dissimilar enemies into a single group called "them." Combining communists,
socialist, Nazis, terrorists and radical Muslims into a single group makes
it very difficult to discuss motives, methods, goals, and possible future
actions of this "group." It would be much more accurate to describe each
group separately and only attribute motives to the groups to which they
belong. This is a classical logical fallacy."
Your critique would be appropriate were this a thread involving strategic geopolitical thinking and the implementation of our conclusions. It is not. I have never remotely suggested that a world of Soviet hegemony would be the same as a world of Islamist hegemony or one of Nazi hegemony, except for the fact that each would be one of oppression and mass suffering, especially when compared to world system dominated by the United States. Nor have I ever remotely suggested that the tactics and motivations that would be utilized by each of these totalitarian alternatives to the United States to acheive their ends would be the same. The only binary thinking I am guilty of in that regard is that I prefer a world dominated by United States hegemony to each of "them."
Damien entered this particular thread by criticizing and blaming the Coalition for civilian casualties in Iraq. He has subsequently acknowleged that in his view it is more morally imperative to speak out for and "liberate" Americans imprisoned for marijuana use then it is to liberate those imprisoned in the gulags of Baghdad, Hanoi, Havana, Pyongyang, or Beijing. It is then legitimate to raise these other regimes in this discussion for the sake of pointing out the absurdity of Damien's moral position, as each has deliberately destroyed far more innocent lives than those Coalition forces active in "Operation Iraqi Freedom" inadvertently did. Damien himself lumps each into a dreaded "them" category, as each falls outside Damien's "sphere of influence", thus making their motivations, methods, goals, and future plans of actions irrelevant so long as they do not represent him or impede his well-being, or that of the U.S. pot smoking community.
Saddam and the Communists still equal bad,
Max Plumm
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.5 : Sun Jun 08 2003 - 22:11:44 MDT