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@RationalMadman
@Sum1hugme
Movie quotes are also okay, provided they are not from traditional, mainstream etc. blockbuster films.
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"The apparition of these faces in the crowd:
Petals on a wet, black bough."
- Ezra Pound, 'In a Station of the Metro'
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"If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you,
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,
But make allowance for their doubting too;
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or being lied about, don’t deal in lies,
Or being hated, don’t give way to hating,
And yet don’t look too good, nor talk too wise:
If you can dream—and not make dreams your master;
If you can think—and not make thoughts your aim;
If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster
And treat those two impostors just the same;
If you can bear to hear the truth you’ve spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,
And stoop and build ’em up with worn-out tools:
If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings
And never breathe a word about your loss;
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: ‘Hold on!’
If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with Kings—nor lose the common touch,
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you,
If all men count with you, but none too much;
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds’ worth of distance run,
Yours is the Earth and everything that’s in it,
And—which is more—you’ll be a Man, my son!"
- Rudyard Kipling, 'If'
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"And the days are not full enough
And the nights are not full enough
And life slips by like a field mouse
Not shaking the grass"
- Ezra Pound, 'And the days are not full enough'
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@RationalMadman
Awesome and, I feel, accurate. Thanks. And I can also see the parallels to Gus, which are pretty creative and are something I've never thought about even while watching the show.
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@RationalMadman
What's there to "admit"? That my previous username was armoredcat?
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@fauxlaw
Lol. You're going to critique me over a lack of a profile description? And it's absurd to think that just because of the fact that you say you're a writer means that everyone is supposed to second-guess whether what you're saying is fiction.
What's the use of advance notice if I want to achieve exactly what I have: honest response based on what is written, even if a ruse. This stuff is supposed to challenge comfort zones.
I don't understand. All this seems like is an expose of a misjudgment or double-standard that never took place. You're trying to mock people for saying that something you said (or I guess wrote in a piece of fiction) that you did (that was obviously wrong) is wrong.
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@fauxlaw
My impression is that you're taking advantage of the fact that people are taking you at your word and then saying "Shame on them" for doing so. Even if you're a writer, we all assume that when writers say things happened (that one can reasonably believe actually did happen), that those events happened unless there are other sufficiently significant extenuating circumstances.
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@Greyparrot
I was always under the impression that gun violence was more common in areas where people are more concentrated rather than where there are more Democrats.
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@fauxlaw
What if you were in a town, a bunch of people from Canada came to your house, said that America took their land from them 1.4k years ago, and are now going to buy out your landlord and then evict you in your own country?
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@fauxlaw
Once can logically be fine with 1.4k year old Arab settlements but oppose modern Israeli settlements, if that's what you're getting at here.
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@fauxlaw
By what Israeli policy is wiping put Palestine evident?
Settlements are not a policy.
Palestine can be somewhere else. Palestine is not recognized by the UN as a sovereign nation of a particular locale.
Palestine is a UN observer state. Even if that was not true, Israel and the West Bank were clearly culturally separate areas prior to the occupation.
If your go-to source on all things international is the UN, then you should be aware that Israeli settlements are illegal under UN international law.
Since the Arab world occupied the temple mount 1400 years ago, what's the difference?
That it happened 1400 YEARS AGO??????????
Don't you realize that every plot of land was owned by someone else thousands of years ago?????? For that matter, I don't even know if the Jews were the first people to inhabit Palestine. Maybe we should try to find who the descendant of the first man to step foot on the land was and kick everyone out so his kids can hang out in Palestine.
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@fauxlaw
Multiple things I should also note:
You can't justify what is going on in Israel and Palestine by citing the Bible.
Whether or not the Arab nations support Palestinian statehood is irrelevant to whether or not the Palestinians should be sovereign over the West Bank.
I am not implying that Israel did not have the right to defend itself in 1967. I stated:
I do not interpret Israel as the entirely faulty party when I say that they have initiated the war. But I am saying that for that reason it can hardly be constituted as a one-sided aggressive war to the 1948 War and for that reason cannot at all justify the current prolonged state of the occupation.
Israel has had no intention of wiping out the Arab nations, you're right. Though whether the Arabs are really the aggressing actors in the conflict is unclear, especially since it seems like Israel maintained the Jewish majority in the early 20th century by expelling them from their homes. But since 1967 Israel has shown that they do have the intention of wiping out Palestine.
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Now I am realizing that if this becomes a topic people might accidentally expose themselves to the film. Hm.
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Disclaimer: DO NOT LOOK UP THE ENDING TO WHIPLASH IF YOU HAVE NOT SEEN IT
Topic: The film "Whiplash" had a happy ending
Rule for topic: No using the testimony of the creators of the film as evidence
Once again, DO NOT LOOK UP THE ENDING TO WHIPLASH IF YOU DO NOT KNOW WHAT I AM TALKING ABOUT. Just see the movie if you're interested. It is one of the greatest works of art I have seen in my life
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@fauxlaw
I am not a Democrat partisan. I will not step up to defend Biden's actions every time he acts, and especially not when he hasn't even acted yet and ESPECIALLY not when the conversation was not about him.
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@fauxlaw
WHY ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT BIDEN?!!?!?!?!??!
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@Benjamin
What is important about the Six-Day War is this: Nowhere within it did Palestinians consent to their land being settled in and wiped out. And, for that reason, how can you cast doubt the legitimacy of every organization currently within the PA but not do the same for the Israelis, who have settled in and wiped out the Palestinian presence in the West Bank since '67?
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@Benjamin
Israeli intel knew that Egypt did not plan to go to war. The Israeli military knew they were not going to be annihilated.
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@zedvictor4
It's still a significant thing to point out.
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@Benjamin
If you're going to accept purely testimonial evidence, then maybe look at this :https://www.reddit.com/r/Palestine/comments/ndo3yu/how_palestines_live_under_israel_an_account_of_an/?sort=controversial
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@Theweakeredge
Benjamin supports the Israeli annexation of the West Bank. I oppose it.
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@Benjamin
Did the Egyptians know that closing the Suez canal for specifically Israelian ships would be interpreted as an act of war? If not, did they expect to destroy the innocent lives of peaceful Israelian shippers by taking away their jobs?
Do you mean the Straits of Tiran? Egypt blockaded the straits because the Soviets told them that Israel was mobilizing on Syria.
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@Benjamin
WW2 is clear. Germany violated the orders of the Allies to stop invading other nations.
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@Benjamin
Perhaps I have not spoken clearly enough. I do not interpret Israel as the entirely faulty party when I say that they have initiated the war. But I am saying that for that reason it can hardly be constituted as a one-sided aggressive war to the 1948 War and for that reason cannot at all justify the current prolonged state of the occupation.
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@Benjamin
Allow me to bring all of this back: Syrian initiated skirmishes with Israel caused Israel to fight Egypt because Egypt took defensive movements to protect Syria and Jordan was allied to Egypt... And so therefore... Israel gets to permanently occupy the homes of people who want nothing to do with them?
Answer my question.
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@Benjamin
Allow me to bring all of this back: Syrian initiated skirmishes with Israel caused Israel to fight Egypt because Egypt took defensive movements to protect Syria and Jordan was allied to Egypt... And so therefore... Israel gets to permanently occupy the homes of people who want nothing to do with them?
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@Benjamin
Did Israeli officials not know that Egyptian actions were defensive in case Israel invaded Syria?
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@Benjamin
Finally: Do you realize that Israel officially initiated the Six-Day War? Which is the whole pretense for this occupation? So the Palestinians cannot be constituted in any way to have forfeited their right to national self-determination to Israel?
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@Benjamin
Also: Why don't Israel's West Bank settlements delegitimize them when the PLO's terrorist acts do delegitimize them?
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@Benjamin
I can't seem to get through to you here so I will give you an analogy:
Should European states have collectively annexed Germany after WW2?
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@Benjamin
So, "Just have some respect and live under our country. We know what's best for yours."? Really? Do you not see how authoritarian that is?
A. The land of Israel is the historical homeland of the Jewish people, in which the State of Israel was established.
B. The State of Israel is the national home of the Jewish people, in which it fulfills its natural, cultural, religious, and historical right to self-determination.
C. The right to exercise national self-determination in the State of Israel is unique to the Jewish people.
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@Benjamin
If the Palestinians do not want to live under a nation of people who are religiously separate from them, the long term effects are not relevant (or are outweighed).
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@Benjamin
We agree about that, but we don't agree about whether Israel should annex the West Bank.
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@Benjamin
I agree with you that living under a free democracy is better than living under an authoritarian government.
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@Benjamin
I don't believe that Palestine is a free democracy.
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@Benjamin
Obviously because you worded the second one as favorably as possible to your side. But I'm aware that you meant under a Jewish state.
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@Benjamin
Do you claim that a minority (religious and political activists; self-appointed leaders who don't care about human rights) should rule Palestine?OrDo you agree that they should be able to rule themselves by living in a free democracy wherein their voices are heard and their votes counted?
I oppose both.
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@Benjamin
The difference between the population's opinion in this case and the North Korea case (which I don't even know to be true) is that there is the potential for an alternative action. In that case you afford more credence to the opinion of the populace in case you end up ruling over a group of people who oppose being ruled over. In addition, it is highly unlikely that Palestinians would support an Israeli annexation of Palestine even without PLO propaganda. None of these are variables in the NK case.
Finally, I should point out that if you're the one who supports the Israeli annexation of Palestine, you would need to establish that Palestinians do support it. Even if I did concede that Palestinians may or may not support an annexation (which is ridiculous), you'd have to establish that they do.
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@Benjamin
Whatever the average Palestinian says is determined by religious fundamentalism and political propaganda by groups who breach the basic human rights of both Jews and Arabs. One cannot hear their real voices clearly, and thus backing one's claims on "Palestinian opinion" is a fallacy.
1. You have no way to determine that this is true; it's not a reasonable assumption. Palestinians in the West Bank are subject to military law, have their homes repeatedly settled in by outsiders, cannot vote in the elections of their occupiers, and have no free movement within their own country.
2. This is irrelevant because the Israeli annexation of the West Bank gives Palestinians no choice. By the time they are liberated from whatever authoritarian government they live under they'll no longer have a say in their statehood.
Do you support the regime of North Korea? The population does, and you would be a hypocrite if you do not accept the fact that a populations opinion is irrelevant unless it is free of outside control --- as is the case with North Korea and the west bank.
I do not support North Korea, but if America permanently annexed North Korea against the will of the North Koreans I would oppose that as well.
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@zedvictor4
"May" being the operative word.
Right. But if that is a possibility then the claim that you cannot disprove the existence of God is still true.
Though one would suggest that logic is always logical, at any level.
I'm not sure of that. If God has always existed, he would, by necessity of him being all powerful, be able to break the rules of logic.
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@Benjamin
I did study the history of the conflict. I have heard every claim you have made before. I'm going to be collapsing to the things that are actually important.
The main problem with your argument about the status of Palestine is that regardless of the history of Palestine, people whose culture is radically different than Israel's have a legitimate interest in separating from Israel. You cannot be perpetually controlled and erased (and yes erased, because Palestine is de jure a state) by another nation. A nation of people have the right to choose who governs them. If they want to be governed by another group, that is fine. If they do not, then there's a problem if the governing continues to happen.
I can't believe you believe that the slow erasure of a sovereign nation is just fine but targeting civilians in attacks (which is something that Israel is not exactly innocent of either) makes you a party that cannot negotiate for peace. Whoever becomes the representatives of the Palestinian people are going to oppose the occupation of the West Bank, because people in the West Bank do, too. I would oppose the occupation as well if I was increasingly unable to move within my own nation. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palestinian_freedom_of_movement#:~:text=Checkpoints%20between%20Israel%20and%20West%20Bank,-There%20are%2039&text=There%20are%2063%20gates%20in,a%20few%20hours%20each%20day.)
Just substantiate the claims about national security with a source. Please. You can't just theorize about things as complex as this without actually citing someone who knows what they're talking about.
I agree that human rights are important. Tell that to the Arab nations
I almost always oppose human rights abuses done by any nation.
The major takeaway point is that Arabs living inside Israel live better, freer lives with more democracy and human rights than Arabs in any Arabian nation.
And?
Unless one agrees with those Arabs who are motivated by irrational religious or nationalistic extremism, then one should agree that Israel annexation is a valid possibility.
Let me know when the Palestinians consent to that.
*Side note: It is not clear that the 1967 War was initiated by Arab nations. To be clear: (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Controversies_relating_to_the_Six-Day_War#Preemptive_strike_v._unjustified_attack)
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I do not see how it is possible to disprove the existence of God given that human logic may not apply to a God. An all-powerful being may operate on a higher realm of logic than we can possibly comprehend.
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@triangle.128k
Can you substantiate your claim that Israel's existence is illegitimate?
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@Benjamin
The Israelian occupation of the west bank started in 1967 and has been in effect for more than half a century. Before 1967, the piece of land was occupied by the Transjordanian kingdom - also illegally I might add. Before that, the piece was a part of the British mandate "Palestine", which included Israel, Gaza, Jordan and the west bank. Before that, it was controlled by the Ottomans. It would be dubious to claim that the current occupation is more a legal problem than any of the previous ones.
Good thing I never claimed that. Do you think I support British imperialism? Israel is occupying a de jure sovereign state and wiping it off of the map. Representatives of Palestine do not and never did consent to that, so Israel is just conquering and destroying something that is not theirs to take. A nation, its culture, and its people do not waive the right to self-determination because dead people started a war in '67.
Additionally, the territory is important for Israel's security, an all-important thing for the Israelian state due to the 6+ wars and conflicts with the Arabs.
What about Palestine's security? Do you not think that building settlements and military checkpoints within, eliminating the voting rights of the members of, and annexing portions inside, Palestine constitutes an existential threat to the nation?
And I am not unwilling to believe this, but please substantiate your national security concerns.
If we are talking about issues in terms of importance, aka priority and feasibility of solving, the occupation of the west bank isn't high on the list.
Issues of human and national rights are always important. It is not as if we can only deal with one issue at a time.
Even if you could instantly remove this occupation, who is to say that Arabs won't invade Israel in an attempt to eradicate the state as they did in 1948 and later in 1973?
Will the sovereignty of Palestine somehow enable an invasion?
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