You will not find a very welcoming group of activists if you enter our community advocating aggression.
It's also very presumptive of you to believe the market cannot provide for defense. Besides that, what makes you think someone would launch an ICBM at Keene? People in other countries hate the American government, not the regular people. Since we would have no coercive state to attack, what would be the point?
Why does your fear of attack justify you hurting me any my family? Please stop supporting aggression.
[quote author=barwick11 link=topic=1044.msg10405#msg10405 date=1244602751]
The difference is, a fundamentalist Christian cannot go to the Bible and say "Look, God says to burn people at the stake for not being Christians". A Fundamentalist Muslim CAN go to the Koran and see ongoing commands from Allah to "slay the infidel, unless he converts, or is subject to you as a Dhimmi". The instances of these abuses in Christianity have no Biblical basis. Now, these sorts of things did happen (slaughtering entire towns) in the Old Testament, but they are one-time commands to the Jewish people (aka "go and utterly destroy this town, destroy every single thing in it, and leave nothing alive"). Nowhere will you find "Go into any town and slay everyone unless they convert".
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Certain passages of the Bible have been perverted to create religious wars. You totally ignored my comment about the Inquisition. 'If you believe anything other then God the Almighty, you are a pagan and the Bible commands us to burn witches.' Exodus 22:18 "Do not allow a sorceress to live." Leviticus 20:27 "'A man or woman who is a medium or spiritist among you must be put to death. You are to stone them; their blood will be on their own heads.'" Please don't come to me and tell me that the Bible says it does not speak to putting to death those who's personal beliefs against Christianity are not to be harmed.
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As I've said before, they've been fighting this war for over a millennium. They show no signs of ever stopping, and their holy book commands them to continue this war.
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It it interesting, in a world so large as ours that these people who have been fighting a way for over a millennium are still, for the most part, and until now, still regionized in the same location. I think we can assume that if there is a such a commandment to seek out those who are not Muslim and convert them or kill them, that they would have long ago converted the world. However evidence does not show this. In fact I haven't heard of a large scale war between any of the followers of Abrahamic Law going out and killing each other. Today in Iran and Iraq there are large populations of Christians, and while it is true that several thousand Christians continue to live and die there, there is no real movement that is religiously based(as apposed to government based) to exterminate people.
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It's got nothing to do with the holy land. This war has been happening for (see above)… Back when the Muslims controlled the holy land, they still fought the war, and spread Islam. The only way it has EVER spread in history to become a dominant force in a nation has been through the sword.
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That's interesting that you make such statements, since you have to rely on hearsay. With deeds done long ago, its hard to say that such actions have taken place in the past without evidence. In wars there is 'our side', 'their side', and the truth, I'll let you guess which one gets told.
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I'm not sure where you stand religiously, but from a Christian perspective, it is plain as day that human beings are imperfect and utterly incapable of perfection (or anywhere close to it). Christians go so far as to say that human beings in our fallen state (post the Garden of Eden) are naturally evil at the heart. That doesn't mean they're incapable of good tendencies and good things, but those things are not part of their nature in their fallen state. Heck, my 2 1/2 year old is a perfect example. He's the cutest friggin' kid, but he's got a mean streak a mile wide. His 5 year old sister used to be that way (I remember it well), but now has learned a few things and is "less" that way.
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I've been called a pantheist, however I like to celebrate the moon, sun, stars, trees, dirt, water and other things, so I generally call myself a pagan because it's so general. I don't know if judging the nature of a race based on it's children is such a good thing. Since you agree that in its natural state humans don't know they have a God who will punish them(not that I believe in a God who would punish people, since people seem to do a damn good job at punishing themselves for their actions).
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But even outside a Christian perspective, it is plain as day that humans are naturally inclined towards selfishness, greed, laziness, lust, unrighteous anger, lying, bitterness, envy, etc. Just watch any kids that haven't been taught otherwise. Adults are the same way, they're just better at hiding it.
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Would you say that a tadpole should indicate the behaviour of frogs in general? It's difficult to say that what children who haven't been taught is the nature of human beings since they are not fully developed. I mean, look at the differences in body chemistry between a child, a teenage, and an adult. To say that an undeveloped brain is what human beings are, is similar in to saying that your hand is the reason you have an arm. Given that the life expectancy of the human being is somewhere near 80 years, a human being spends more time as an adult then they do as a child, so that being true, you ought not base your 'nature' of human beings on based on what 'tadpoles' do.
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I'm not saying human nature has changed, I'm saying technology has changed. Centuries ago, if an army threatened a population, there was time to: Spread the word, raise funding, recruit soldiers, acquire equipment, train soldiers, develop a leadership hierarchy, march to battle, win.
With today's technology, you can instantly spread the word, but can't raise funding, can't acquire equipment (beyond basic arms in the hands of individuals, basically you can't acquire advanced equipment necessary to win a modern all-out war, and rifles don't stop nukes), etc…
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The process of commanding a tank to appear, such as funding and acquiring equipment is basically the same if it is private or public. It seems to me that the 'fundamentalist Islams' are doing a pretty good job at keeping your highly advance military at bay in Iraq, and they lack any advanced equipment. Further you assume that because pitting tank vs tank is the best way to wage war. If I were to wage war, I would rely less on matching my enemy and more at removing his ability to function. Such as killing the leaders of the state who wages war against me. That's all hypothetical of course.
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I won't disagree on the Missile Defense Systems proposed, in private hands (if allowed to be made or a profit, heck, put a bounty on it, and agree to pay the private company $1B per year for the first 10 years of operation if they successfully produce the system, and $100M per year to keep the system operational after that. (These are all arbitrary numbers pulled out of thin air by the way).
But with the "other states" idea, you're relying on other states' possession of ICBM's for your security. That is not under your control, and shouldn't weigh in on your long term position. Short term yeah, we're pretty sure Britain, France, India, and (though they'll never admit it) Israel would come to our defense if someone launched at us, and we had nothing to shoot back with. But long term, who knows. Iran used to be our staunch friend and ally till we let the Ayatollah Khomeini oust the Shah of Iran, then all hell broke loose in short order.
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I again ask you to please look at Switzerland, a nation who has no ICBM's and has not succumbed to any other nation's will. They are proof that having neighbors who have nukes keep you safe. In fact not having nukes is more protection then you need, since I highly doubt a country with nukes will nuke a country that doesn't. It all of history it just doesn't make sense to make the land you want to take inhabitable, regardless of how crazy a leader may be.
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Don't let this come across the wrong way, but I feel sorry for your family, that you would not use pre-emptive force to defend them if someone threatened them. You can go right ahead and condemn me, because if someone says "I am going to kill you and your family" and I know they mean it, I am going to pre-emptively use force to stop them as soon as possible. I will first call in the local sheriff, if that fails, then I will personally use force (deadly if necessary) to stop them myself.
In the same way, if the leader of Iran is saying "We are going to wipe Israel off the face of the planet", means every word of it, and is actively working to acquire a nuclear bomb, I have no problem with Israel doing whatever they can, using force, to stop them. Obviously they shouldn't just pop off a nuke in the center of Iran, but if that was the ONLY way, and it was them getting nuked, or nuking Iran themselves, I would not condemn Israel for stopping them first.
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It's interesting that you will claim to be a Christian but are more then willing to violate those laws handed down by your God. In fact, I have a hard time trying to find a passage in the Bible that says its okay to kill people in defense of anything(show me if I'm wrong). In fact I see more pacifism expressed by Jesus then anything really. It would appear to me that as a follower of Jesus, you let God punish those who violate his laws.
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Ah, but it's harming someone else's rights. If someones on a pacemaker let's say, and any reasonable microwave transmission wouldn't interfere with it, but Fred down the street wants to set a world record for the most powerful microwave generation by an amateur, and cooks the dude's pacemaker, and he dies. Fred is obviously guilty of causing harm to that individual, since his actions were outside the scope of what could reasonably be expected to be transmitted on that frequency under any normal circumstances.
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Sounds like to me that this is a faulty device issue, not a rights issue. Since the designer of the pacemaker didn't take in to account the possibility of microwaves being bounced all around, and because the government regulates such things, he didn't design it to operate outside of what was going on a the time. Do you think a near lightening strike, which emits a high amount of energy was taken into account when the pace maker was developed? I don't think so either.
The thing about reasonability is that what is reasonable to one person, such as killing anyone who doesn't believe in Islam, might not be reasonable to another, such as a Christian who knows that violence begets valences and as such, should refrain from using violence.
Arbitrary rules and regulations are not made with reason. It was 'reasonable' at one time that if your slave escaped or you encountered an escaped slave you were obligated to kill him.
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The thing is, on the internet, everyone by definition stays out of everyone else's way. Private, physically bounded lines are used to transmit data, and bandwidth across them is paid for on a use basis. If there becomes more demand, we can create more lines. With radio transmission, we can't just create more bands, there is an upper limit on the amount of data that can be transmitted in any given frequency range (known as Shannon's Law). At some point, in any given region of space, the absolute maximum limit could be reached, and no more data could be transmitted at that particular time. In this case, potentially the best method for handling the frequency spectrum is not to license it, but for private individuals to own a portion of it in a particular region, with the ability to sell it, break it up into smaller regions, merge it into larger regions, etc…
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Okay, now you are pressing my 'you're being ridiculous' button. We can always create new bands. We can't create new frequencies, we can only use the existing frequencies. This is like saying, 'we can't create new land' but we can always figure out how to re-use that land. You only need look at the current state of 'limited frequencies' we have in WI-FI area. We have how many 802.11 protocols right now? You don't think that if we should get to the point that we max out all the frequencies that someone won't come along with a new protocol to address this? What no one talks about anymore is what a difference that digital tuning made to radio. We would continue to refine the tuning ability, and this is one way to 'get more out of what is already there'.
I'm afraid I have to agree with Ian on this. Anyone who believes that a product or service should be provided by the barrel of a gun is a total non starter for me. There is no room for movement in my book. If its a 'maybe' then we can talk, however if 'defense' can only be done by turning everyone else into a slave, then we have nothing more to speak about. If someone believe that someone should be forced against their will, becoming a defacto slave, then they aren't welcomed around me in my book.
I would just like to point out that Americans gave $306.39 billion to charity in 2008. Now, what were we saying about human nature prohibiting effective joint fundraising? Do continue. 