US Election 2016

[GhostOfAmazon]

Originally Posted by Play

[B]
The point I am trying to make is don't paint everyone with the same brush.
If you're painting every Muslim as a terrorist, you may as well paint every American as a murderer, or every individual on the planet as a criminal - because a portion of it's population has purported such crime.

So why is there so much fear over terrorism and Muslims?
Put basically: "The fear of Islamic extremism currently sweeping the nation is objectively overblown."

Why would media portray a religion negatively?
It could be for an array of reasons. From a business minded individual like me, one of the first things that comes to mind is money. Believe it or not, lies sell a lot more than the truth.

Example: If I had written an article such as "Jennifer Lawrence to potentially get axed from the next hunger games after allegedly being affiliated with terrorism."
Sure it may be far from the truth, but are you telling me your not going to click that article? - which will then lead to me making some money.

Did you know Fox News was on track to earn more than $700,000,000 in 2010?.

We are not talking about small corporations here. These guys are big money machines! Lies sell well!

To end, this post is simply for informative purposes, and I hope it doesn't instigate a rant.

P.S. Mods - I know you don't like formatted text, I just thought with such a long post it would help break it down a little.

Yeah, I only need one retort for that:

Research Opinion Poll on Muslims.

Over and over and over and over again, firm after firm, shows that a LARGE percentage, NOT a tiny minority, "agree" or "sympathize" with terrorist individuals or terrorist organizations.

Muslim Opinion Polls

Don't need any more information than that. Thanks.

[dan_ebay]

Originally Posted by GhostOfAmazon

Yeah, I only need one retort for that:

Research Opinion Poll on Muslims.

Over and over and over and over again, firm after firm, shows that a LARGE percentage, NOT a tiny minority, "agree" or "sympathize" with terrorist individuals or terrorist organizations.

Muslim Opinion Polls

Don't need any more information than that. Thanks.

Is that the Muslim terrorists or the US ones? As I said I don't particularly like Islam or Christianity but they seem to of modernized slightly more and by modernized I mean they aren't actually following their fairytale book properly, quite clearly states being a homosexual is a bad sin in there and any non Christian goes to hell and is filled with violence but for some strange reason the 'modern' religious people seem think these books have been written in riddles and when it says you should kick your girlfriends head in they translate that to 'be nice my child' rather than you actually just reading it and taking it at face value so that they can justify their religion.

But I can kind of see where these left wing guys are coming from, if half of your family was blown up by a US drone what would you do? A ridiculous amount of civilians were killed as 'collateral damage' kind of debatable whether 'accidentally' killing 100s of thousands is worse than deliberately killing 100s when you know that the accident is going to happen

Invade Afghan because they want proof that Osama blew up the world trade centre? Hardly a unusual request is it?

Invade Iraq because of weapons of mass destruction that don't exist or because Sadam is a nasty guy? Plenty of just as nasty guys knocking about in Africa but they aren't on the news or being invaded as theres no $s there. Or the whole of places like Saudi Arabia or Quatar happy to all chop peoples heads off for being homosexual and treating women like second class citizens, they play ball though so the west just turns a blind eye.

Obviously don't agree with terrorists blowing innocent people up but these radical groups don't really have the option of starting their own army to fight a nice toe to toe fight in uniform with the US and half the world do they?
Similar to Pablo Escobars little terror campaign

As I said I don't actually like Islam myself and more playing devils advocate (being argumentative) but I dislike them more for their backwards sexist,homophobic, their attraction to little girls and bizarre views and their worshiping a imaginary self confessed pedophile in the sky.
I'm sure though that if you left them alone to play with their sticks and stones in the sand then there would be very little terrorism

[dealagreeproceed]

Originally Posted by GreenBean

JIhad is ensuring that Muslims maintain the Faith.

They have expanded that to becoming militant.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jihad

Wiki is a reasonable source to explain the meaning.

The concept tends to differ between the various sects of Muslims.

Too complex for here, imo.

should I go to wiki to get learn how to perform brain surgery as well?
you want to learn about islam OR the J-word then ask someone that's learned in the field who is actually muslim.
clearly not you or wiki...

[dealagreeproceed]

Originally Posted by GhostOfAmazon

Yeah, I only need one retort for that:

Research Opinion Poll on Muslims.

Over and over and over and over again, firm after firm, shows that a LARGE percentage, NOT a tiny minority, "agree" or "sympathize" with terrorist individuals or terrorist organizations.

Muslim Opinion Polls

Don't need any more information than that. Thanks.

one mans terrorist is another mans freedom fighter bud... what do you think the average Iraqi or afghani thinks when they see our soldiers? does the word "terrorist" come to mind. yup most likely...

[GreenBean]

Originally Posted by dealagreeproceed

should I go to wiki to get learn how to perform brain surgery as well?
you want to learn about islam OR the J-word then ask someone that's learned in the field who is actually muslim.
clearly not you or wiki...

Stop assuming you have the only right to discuss your Faith.

I was replying as a non-Muslim and endeavoring to show some respect.

A discussion on Jihad is not what this forum is about.

[GhostOfAmazon]

Originally Posted by dealagreeproceed

one mans terrorist is another mans freedom fighter bud... what do you think the average Iraqi or afghani thinks when they see our soldiers? does the word "terrorist" come to mind. yup most likely...

If they attack armed military soldiers, that's one thing. But they never do. They always attack "soft" targets. Unarmed civilians. Not military bases or even military personal. Not really a valid analogy.

If they were bombing bases, you'd have a point. But they aren't, and you don't.

[Haidukken]

This whole thing is pretty interesting and both sides have valid points: As with everything.

You can debate all you want...

Pro-gun people have very valid points: protect themselves, protect their family, "freedom of speech" kind of mentality of "who the hell are you to tell me I can't have a gun- I don't kill anybody" and all the other noble and rightful reasons.

The anti-gun people have exact valid reasons to support their argument: danger, terrorism, mass shootings, accidents, "why do you even need a gun" and all the other noble and rightful reasons.

I don't live in Murica and I'm not part of that culture but its very clear that every little American wants to be a cowboy or a policeman and as a society the whole gun issue is more about freedom and less about actual topic itself- Why would anybody let someone else tell them what they can or can't do with their lives? It boils down to freedom of choice, freedom of speech- America is all about that.

Murica seems to be a perfect little ****storm for the men in charge- You only need couple of incidents and few hot words in media and suddenly you get the attention of many, many different groups of people... Because in Muricaland, everybody wants freedom!



I don't think its a gun problem issue and I don't think its a gun control issue as such. I think its more about mental illness and some sick ****s who somehow slip through the system and cause massive problems.
In a country of 320m+ people, where you actually have MORE guns than people, its surprising that you don't have such incidents every week!
Statistics will tell you that America is the safest that it has ever been, but every now and again you get a serious ****o who goes off the rails and it becomes a big thing... Nobody reports hood shootings and drive-by incidents because its not dramatic enough!


Instead of gun control, you should be talking about mental illness and how a person who has been flagged up before can still go out there and get himself some GTA type of firepower and how there are people working in shops who sell these death-tools to people who clearly are not going deer hunting with them.

In my opinion, people should do what ever the **** they want with their lives- Smoke weed, do heroin, own guns and pay for sex. I 100% agree with personal freedom as long as you don't harm anybody else.
But that applies ONLY for people who are mentally "there" and thats a minority!
If you are really just smoking weed and paying for handjobs then there is nothing wrong with it. But if you daterape some poor girl behind a dumpster and then call it a good night... you should be locked away for life!

Same goes to guns and everything else!
In 2016 where information is the new currency, I'm surprised they have not put together a database that combines all the data that they have, to get a full profile on a citizen.
IF a person is taking medication daily and needs SSRIs to stay balanced and somehow manage through life... THEY SHOULD NOT BE ALLOWED TO WALK INTO A STORE AND GET THEMSELVES A GUN!

You know... When you see a couple of the street fighting, you don't go and offer one of them a deadly weapon! How come people who are having those same arguments with themselves every wake moment can just have access to guns.


Also, when you talk about Muslim people then thats a whole 'nother thread! Whats happening at the moment is not a surprise- Murica has had a blast for few decades now, bombing up countries and "fighting for freedom" and now you see a direct result of this- You have the kids of those parents who were shot to bits growing up in hate and all they want to do is get back at the system.
Do you think that they would be so hostile if America would have dropped toys over their houses for 20 years? **** no!
The problem is that you have few generations now where men grow up with hate because they have seen their brothers and sisters die, their parents killed in front of them and their villages, towns and even sheep get blown up.
They have not been raised by their parents, they have been raised by hate.

This is not Islamic movement, this is hate and revenge movement that is taking place.

(The same thing is happening in poor neighbourhoods all over America where people are being thrown to jail for non-violent drug offences and kids grow up without parents and generations of families are broken up. No wonder they are "lost" in the system)

[Haidukken]

Originally Posted by GhostOfAmazon

If they attack armed military soldiers, that's one thing. But they never do. They always attack "soft" targets. Unarmed civilians. Not military bases or even military personal. Not really a valid analogy.

If they were bombing bases, you'd have a point. But they aren't, and you don't.

Heh, this is pretty funny.

American forces have only targeted military bases and killed only the bad guys?

I did a quick Google on "drone stats" and literally picked first link without much research- Its scary how ****ed up the whole thing is.

41 men targeted but 1,147 people killed: US drone strikes – the facts on the ground

41 men targeted but 1,147 people killed: US drone strikes – the facts on the ground | US news | The Guardian

Also, Obama has sanctioned more drone stikes than Bush and all the other presidents combined. Freedom! Hope and change, n all that jazz.

America has harassed Middle-East for decades now and they were fighting the same dictators that they put in charge back in 70s. This whole "war on terror" is so easy to do because there are no real targets anymore- Its a generic term that gets used, to justify war.
War on terror? Heh. Good marketing and branding, thats all.

[JamesNorth101]

Originally Posted by GhostOfAmazon

If they attack armed military soldiers, that's one thing. But they never do. They always attack "soft" targets. Unarmed civilians. Not military bases or even military personal. Not really a valid analogy.

If they were bombing bases, you'd have a point. But they aren't, and you don't.

I think that is a bit disingenuous and seems slightly naïve to be honest.

A lot of non combatants get killed in US (as well as other counties, its not just the US that do this) attacks. A lot of the time this is done knowing full well that there will be a high non combatant casualty count

While I would never agree with terrorism I do understand the reasons and motivation for it in some cases. If all my friends and family had been killed or severely marred in a drone attack I would be pretty p!ssed off.

If you put yourself in their position. You see your daughter, mother, father and 2 childhood friends killed by a drone that was targeting someone totally unrelated to you, you just happened to be in the same area as the targeted person X at the time. The person controlling the drone that targeted person X knew that chances are while taking out person X he would also be killing your family. Would you not want vengeance? I know I would. That does not make it right, but its very easy to understand that sort of motivation.

Originally Posted by GhostOfAmazon

You forget WHY we have guns.

A little over 200 years ago, you Brits tried to take over the country.

Hence the 2nd amendment.

That's all water under the bridge, but the reason we have the right to bare arms is to keep overreaching government in check. That includes our own.

If I remember my history correctly Britain at the time basically owed most of America. It was one of the colonies.

The Americans then had an uprising to overthrow the British. Ironically (and I am being deliberately facetious here I know!) the Americans that rose up against the British could have been described as terrorist. The line between an uprising of freedom fights and terrorists is a very very thin one sometimes and a lot of the time is only really decided after one side gains victory.

.....

Just on another totally unrelated point that goes back to gun ownership. One thing that really perplexes me is that you have a lot of gun owners in the US, and you also get quite a lot of mass shootings (this is a general statement and not relating to any one mass shooting in recent time).

Why is it that the gun owners never seem to shoot the perpetrator of the mass shooting? It always seems to end up in either suicide or a shoot out with the police. I understand that the logic is that everyone being able to have guns means that everyone can protect themselves, so why is it that no one seems to do it when there is someone going around shooting in the street? Its one of those questions that I have been thinking about over the last few days and I cannot really get my head around. It seems to make the argument for protecting yourself by owning a gun void.

This is not meant as a dig just for the record but a question that I don't understand the answer to.

[GhostOfAmazon]

Originally Posted by dan_ebay

Is that the Muslim terrorists or the US ones? As I said I don't particularly like Islam or Christianity but they seem to of modernized slightly more and by modernized I mean they aren't actually following their fairytale book properly, quite clearly states being a homosexual is a bad sin in there and any non Christian goes to hell and is filled with violence but for some strange reason the 'modern' religious people seem think these books have been written in riddles and when it says you should kick your girlfriends head in they translate that to 'be nice my child' rather than you actually just reading it and taking it at face value so that they can justify their religion.

I can tell you're completely unfamiliar with Christianity.

The examples you're talking about are in the Old Testament, and the Bible clearly states that once Jesus died on the cross, the Old Testament is over and no longer valid. Now Christians follow the new Testament. There are no examples of murder or beating women, or any other violence committed by Christians in the New Testament.

But I can kind of see where these left wing guys are coming from, if half of your family was blown up by a US drone what would you do? A ridiculous amount of civilians were killed as 'collateral damage' kind of debatable whether 'accidentally' killing 100s of thousands is worse than deliberately killing 100s when you know that the accident is going to happen

Would be a valid point.....if they ever attacked military targets.

[JamesNorth101]

Originally Posted by GhostOfAmazon

Would be a valid point.....if they ever attacked military targets.

So as long as someone kills 10 non combatants but also gets 1 combatant then its OK? I don't really see it that way to be honest.

[GreenBean]

Originally Posted by JamesNorth101

So as long as someone kills 10 non combatants but also gets 1 combatant then its OK? I don't really see it that way to be honest.

The warlords do, however.

[GhostOfAmazon]

Originally Posted by JamesNorth101

If you put yourself in their position. You see your daughter, mother, father and 2 childhood friends killed by a drone that was targeting someone totally unrelated to you, you just happened to be in the same area as the targeted person X at the time. The person controlling the drone that targeted person X knew that chances are while taking out person X he would also be killing your family. Would you not want vengeance? I know I would. That does not make it right, but its very easy to understand that sort of motivation.

Again, the problem with this argument is that, in all cases, the US military is targeting a threat, an armed combatant of some sort (if you believe what they tell you, anyways...but let's save that for another day). The point is, it's incomparable. Civilian causalities in a military strike and targeting ONLY civilians...not even close to comparable. This guy shot up the club because he hates gays and he hates Americans. There's no question about his motives in this case.

If I remember my history correctly Britain at the time basically owed most of America. It was one of the colonies.

The Americans then had an uprising to overthrow the British. Ironically (and I am being deliberately facetious here I know!) the Americans that rose up against the British could have been described as terrorist. The line between an uprising of freedom fights and terrorists is a very very thin one sometimes and a lot of the time is only really decided after one side gains victory.

This I can agree with. I'd love to see a British History textbook...just to see what the other side says about the events.
.....

Why is it that the gun owners never seem to shoot the perpetrator of the mass shooting? It always seems to end up in either suicide or a shoot out with the police. I understand that the logic is that everyone being able to have guns means that everyone can protect themselves, so why is it that no one seems to do it when there is someone going around shooting in the street? Its one of those questions that I have been thinking about over the last few days and I cannot really get my head around. It seems to make the argument for protecting yourself by owning a gun void.

This is not meant as a dig just for the record but a question that I don't understand the answer to.

Very simple answer: The shootings happen almost exclusively in "gun free zones". A club. Several schools. A movie theater. Regular people will obey the law. Criminals will not. Who cares if you get 5 years in prison for unlawfully carrying a firearm when you're about to commit murder?

Also of note: The murder capital of the world, Chicago, has some of the strictest gun laws in all of America. Criminals know their victims will not be armed, so they target them. If you were going to break and enter, and you knew that, statistically, there was a 25% chance the owner of the house had a gun, would you think twice about breaking in? What if there was only a 1% chance? I think you understand my point.

[rsot]

Originally Posted by GhostOfAmazon

Also of note: The murder capital of the world, Chicago,

Just a minor correction - murder capital of the world would be Caracas just based on stats - had to do something with the info recently so it stuck in my head



Right on about the gun-free zones - that club shooting...pretty disgusting how he got in with the weapon

[JamesNorth101]

Just as a hypothetical (mainly for my own curiosity) do people feel, putting aside all other arguments, that if it was possible to get rid of all guns in the US tomorrow using the magic anti gun wand that the US would become a safer place?

Originally Posted by GhostOfAmazon

This I can agree with. I'd love to see a British History textbook...just to see what the other side says about the events

Its not really something that is all that prevalent in UK textbooks. Its just what I have read over the years from different sources including US texts. We don't really learn much about the US independence to be honest in UK schools. There may well be some knocking about though but I would think we much less volume of text devoted to the matter

[Haidukken]

Heh, if you get rid of guns then people will do ****ed up things with the next best thing: knives, baseball bats, DIY explosives.
You start banning things based on what damage they can do then soon we'll have no knives and forks left in the world.

Just because there are some deeply disturbed individuals out there who want to express their anger by killing other people, doesn't mean we need to nerf the world.
You know... Its pretty amazing that some people don't just drive their cars off the road and kill people on the sidewalks like you can in GTA. Its super simple and nobody will suspect a thing- We all have cars!

Its not about banning things, its about looking beyond the drama and traumatic events- Its easy to focus on dead people, blood, guns, laws and other aspects of mass shootings that are very easy to talk about.
The real issue is "whats happening behind the scene" and believe it or not- In every mass shooting, the thing that pulled the trigger was a human finger.
The problem is inside of that human, not in the tool that the person used.

Mental illness and how the society treats its weak minded people, thats where its at. Its not video games, its not movies, its not 50 shades of grey... Its bad parenting, broken brains and mentally unstable people.
Take away humans, names, sexual orientation and religious beliefs and it'll all boil down to numbers/statistics.

If you take 7 BILLION apples. How many of those apples are still raw? How many of them are bad? How many of those apples are REALLY ****ing bad apples?
When it comes to apples and oranges we can all agree that its impossible to have 7B perfect apples. Thats just apples.
When it comes to people, we assume that everybody wants the same things- Peace and harmony.
Nope, some people are just broken. Some people are really bad apples. Like, really bad apples.

Then you take those bad apples and insert them into a life that is horrible- Bad parenting, poor upbringing and struggle. Perhaps add a bit of hate and boredom, take away love and care and what you end up is a person that doesn't value his own life.
If you don't value your own life and you have nothing to live for, its impossible to see value in other people.

What we should do is focus on how to build a more loving and caring society. We should not care about religious beliefs, colour of someones skin or who they like to bang. Who cares?

We are just apes, living on a piece of rock that is flying through space.

[GreenBean]

Originally Posted by JamesNorth101

Just as a hypothetical (mainly for my own curiosity) do people feel, putting aside all other arguments, that if it was possible to get rid of all guns in the US tomorrow using the magic anti gun wand that the US would become a safer place?

No. Once steps are started to be taken to remove firearms, they will go underground.

There is no such thing as a magic anti-gun wand.

[JamesNorth101]

I do think its a lot easier to kill someone with a gun than to stab them to death with a knife though.

I know both have the same result, one mentally one seems much easier to do than the other. Pulling a trigger is a lot easier to do mentally with that stabbing someone over and over IMO at least. It would also be a lot harder to on a mass murder rampage with a knife than an automatic assault rile.

I am not really making an argument against guns, but I do think any country that has a lot less guns will naturally have a lot less mass murders and homicides.

I do understand your argument though Haidukken and agree with it. The problem is its all good and well knowing what should be done, but then getting it actually done is another matter. One major stumbling block is who would pay for it all. Most people in most countries around the world do not like taxes being increase. In the US they really really don't like taxes being increased.

Finding, diagnosing and then curing (or restricting if it is needed) with mental illness is a very expensive job

[GhostOfAmazon]

Originally Posted by JamesNorth101

Just as a hypothetical (mainly for my own curiosity) do people feel, putting aside all other arguments, that if it was possible to get rid of all guns in the US tomorrow using the magic anti gun wand that the US would become a safer place?

Hell no. People have ALWAYS killed people. Look at the history of any nation----there have always been murderers, wars, etc.

In fact, in the past 100 years, murders have dropped DRAMATICALLY compared to the past! Is it all due to firearms being prevalent? No, a large part is that it's very hard to get away with murder today, due to technology. But the fact of the matter is, there are thousands of ways to commit murder. Many are more deadly than any AR-15 a civilian could purchase. Take car bombs, for instance. Personally, I'd rather take my chances with a bullet.

This guy knew he wasn't going to get out alive. He didn't want to. If he did, he would have tried to negotiate, or take hostages and attempt to flee. Instead, he had a shootout with the police. Even shot one in the head. (Kevlar helmet saved his life!) I don't doubt he would have used explosives had guns been unavailable.

[JamesNorth101]

Originally Posted by GreenBean

No. Once steps are started to be taken to remove firearms, they will go underground.

There is no such thing as a magic anti-gun wand.

Ha I know that. It was a theoretical

Originally Posted by GhostOfAmazon

Hell no. People have ALWAYS killed people. Look at the history of any nation----there have always been murderers, wars, etc.

In fact, in the past 100 years, murders have dropped DRAMATICALLY compared to the past! Is it all due to firearms being prevalent? No, a large part is that it's very hard to get away with murder today, due to technology. But the fact of the matter is, there are thousands of ways to commit murder. Many are more deadly than any AR-15 a civilian could purchase. Take car bombs, for instance. Personally, I'd rather take my chances with a bullet.

This guy knew he wasn't going to get out alive. He didn't want to. If he did, he would have tried to negotiate, or take hostages and attempt to flee. Instead, he had a shootout with the police. Even shot one in the head. (Kevlar helmet saved his life!) I don't doubt he would have used explosives had guns been unavailable.

Sure people have always killed people. But the US does have a much higher murder rate (between 300% and 800%, this does also take into account population level) when compared with like for like countries around the rest of the world. That is mainly down to the easy access to guns.

Again I am not really arguing for or against guns in the US, but I do think if all guns were removed with the click of a finger tomorrow from the US then the murder rate would drop significantly.

[Haidukken]

I say, for the next 100 years every country should invest their military/defense budget to their own people. Build school, upgrade hospitals, create jobs and introduce basic income nationwide.
See how it works out- I'm pretty sure world would be a better place.


I mean... Thats ****ing intense:


We are talking BILLIONS here, just to kill eachother and cause as much damage as possible.
Murica going strong for that #1 spot! USA! USA!

[GhostOfAmazon]

James,

A big part of the problem in comparing the US to other countries is that we are not like other countries. For example, take the ethnic population of the US: We have one of the largest mixes of different ethnicity in the world. Now, it isn't racist to state the simple fact that people from different cultures often find there are things they don't have in common. This can lead to tension, and sometimes an "us vs them" mentality can develop among the populace. Maybe America is just racist. Or maybe different cultures don't get along. Doesn't matter. The point is, when you have a largely homogeneous population, there are some issues that are less prevalent.

For example, what would the murder rate look like if you removed every crime committed by an immigrant? It would be far lower....

That's not to say we don't have Americans killing each other. Happens everyday. In fact, African Americans murder one another more than any other group. That's not racist---it's an observable fact. An unfortunate one.

That's not to say that other cultures are wrong or evil. I'm only pointing out that tensions and a perceived difference can cause some people to react violently. It does not excuse the behavior itself.