[TNT] Sonic Goo
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Posts posted by [TNT] Sonic Goo
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I see Sander stole my thunder already...
Though I might elaborate a bit when it comes to names. There is also the expression Lowlands, which includes both the Netherlands and Belgium (though I believe Les Pais Bas refers to the Netherlands only) and the Benelux is of course Belgium, The Netherlands and Luxemburg. The official name of The Netherlands, by the way, is The Kingdom of The Netherlands and Oversees Territories, since we still have a few colonies left.
Is it true that the Dutch have no sense of humor?I advise you learn the language and check out a thing we call Cabaret (which is a bit different than other uses of the word abroad). It's a bit like standup comedy, but these are longer shows which often have a story arc, songs and can even use a stage set to comedic effect. Whereas standup comedy tends to favour basic jokes or even oneliners purely for entertainment value, cabaret is often full of engagement, tackeling subjects socially relevant to society. 'Kicking over holy houses', we call it. This is often done by means of very harsh and black humour. Much of this humour, however, is language or cultural reference-based, so will be hard for foreigners to get, which might explain your misconception.
And, eh, we have a national dog? The Dutch heraldic animal is the lion:
Googling for national dogs yields a Kanaan Dog for Isreal and a naked national dog for Mexico, but not Dutch dogs... Am I missing something?
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I've seen this sort of topic elsewhere and thought it might be a good idea here. If there's anything you'd like to know about Dutch culture, politics, food or whatever else, just ask!
(I might be able to talk a bit about Irish stuff as well, until we can get Cel to make a similar topic, of course
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No. Just.... no.
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Now what to see??
Well, as for upcoming movies in 2008;
The Dark Night (or Batman 2)
Bond 22 (working title, of course)
Speed Racer (by those Wachowski brothers)
And in 2009;
The Power of the Dark Crystal (yes! they're making a sequel!)
And a bunch of stuff I'm not that much looking forward to, like the A-Team movie, Fast & Furious 4, Dallas, Jurassic Park 4, Seriously, dude, where's my car? and The Smurfs...
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RXS:
Not all laws are made (or changed) by congress. Segregation for example was not ended by referendum (otherwise it would still be there). It's not about passing a bill, it's about changing existing ones.
As for polygamy, it doesn't happen legally, but it does happen. It’s estimated that nearly 37,000 fundamentalist Mormons still practice polygamy today. See also http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/prem/200604...auch_2006-04-04
There have been plenty mentioned already. Kids that need adopting. It will lower hate crimes against gays (which you seem to condone). It will reduce sham marriages. It will reduce people living a sham life, being forced to be something they aren't. Something you seem to want to encourage.I haven't seen one written yet.Indy:
In Africa, HIV was first recognized in sexually active heterosexuals, and AIDS cases in Africa have occurred at least as frequently in women as in men. Overall, the worldwide distribution of HIV infection and AIDS between men and women is approximately 1 to 1.[59] In sub-Saharan Africa, 57% of adults with HIV are women, and young women aged 15 to 24 are more than three times as likely to be infected as young men.
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1) Rights issues should not be vote issues, they should be legal issues. Rights are not about popularity contests, on the contrary. They exists to protect the rights of a minority from the tyranny of the majority.
2) As pointed out by me above, your argument is silly. Not just that, it's irrelevant to the issue. Gay people will not suddenly stop having the children they're not having anyway when they're allowed to marry. In situation 1, not being allowed to marry, they have no children naturally. In situation 2, being allowed to marry, they don't either. Procreation doesn't effect the issue and the issue doesn't effect procreation. Your main argument is irrelevant.
3) As pointed out above and before as well, gay rights do not have adverse effects on society. Other situations you claim it sets a precedent for, do. Incestuous relationships lead to birth defects, polygamy would alter the structure of society negatively (see for example the issues this causes in the mormon community), etc. etc. These things you compare it with are not similar and will not be legalised as a result of gay marriage being legalised. The first examples you gave fall down for reasons of consent, the others for reasons of their own.
Then there are the countries that have already legalised gay marriage. There have been no cases of any of the other issues you mentioned being legalised citing gay marriage as a precedent. There have been no other ill effects on society either.
So both theory and practice assure you that no other atypical* behaviour will be legalised as a result of this.
In short, I'm still waiting for any valid reasons that this would be bad in some way.
*you know, just because something is not typical, average or normal, does not make it bad. I know it's natural for people to fear what they don't know/understand, but I was hoping we'd moved beyond that.
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*checks thread for actual arguments against gay rights, finds none*
*still waits for explanation on how something like gay marriage would be harmful or even immoral*
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The 'purpose' of humanity is not just procreation. And the purpose in life of a human being as part of that is not just to procreate. People can contribute many more things to humanity than just sperm and eggs. Humans are not animals. We have culture, science, philosophy. Many of the great contributors to which have been and will be gay.
Apart from that, according to your logic infertile straight people should be done away with as well. What you're basically advocating is eugenics, with the addition of homosexuality as a sort of disease. All because you cannot see any other values other than simple procreation.
Gay people have been around for anyone as anyone can remember and yet humanity has managed to grow and grow and grow as far as even stretching the resources of the planet. Giving gay people more rights will not increase the number of gay people (though it might decrease the number of loveless sham marriages). In fact, allowing them to adopt will give more children a better start in life.
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I'm saying the way he presents it could make him look that way and he might want to clarify that. Stop acting all prosecuted and come up with something other than *hyperbole* and other forms of comparisons. Give some actual reasons. What bad effects will giving gay people equal rights have? What is actually wrong with gay people? Explain. Substantiate.Hmm, you saying RXS is a racist and a sexist is not lowering "the tone of the discussion"? Again, liberals can get away with anything, but conservatives must be attacked as bigots. Thanks for proving my point, goo.Also, for those saying gay behaviour cannot be natural; homosexual behaviour has been observed in a number of different species in nature.
Plus, people are not just either 100% straight or 100% gay. There are bisexual people, asexual people, transgendered people, etc. etc. etc. Gay people are not a different species - they're part of the same spectrum we all are part of.
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That's exactly what I'm asking for. Explain yourselves and provide the insight for us poor people unable to see what's so wrong about it.
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I would still like to keep the nature/nurture thing out of the discussion, like I've said before, since that shouldn't be a matter of opinion but a matter of fact.
What I'm still missing is what's so objectionable about gay people? About gay people marrying, about them adopting children, etc. What exactly do they do what's so bad about it? What influence does a gay marriage have on other people? What exactly is the effect gay parents have on children that's so bad? I still haven't seen any of those mechanisms explained.
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There are many children growing up wondering why they have only one mommy or only one daddy or none at all. Are they healthy?is it healthy for a child to grow up wondering, why i have 2 mommys or 2 daddys while my friend has a daddy and a mommy?
It's not a justification for gay being ok. It was a comment on Indy's complaint about political correctness preventing him from posting his opinion.I don't necessarily buy the times are a changin' argument you presented as justification for gay being OK.
As this directly follows the previous quote, can I assume this is about rest of my comment? Are you saying that things like women being allowed to vote or black people getting equal right constitute a downward spiral?morales and values, almost always, spiral downward to the lowest common denominator in the name of progress.In the not too distant future, could our values degrade to such a point where we are discussing acceptance of something as vile as pedophiliaThis is the same sort of slippery slope argument as Indy's goatrapers and falls down for the same reason; consent.
Me too. I wish society would stop disapproving, shunning them, forcing them to deny what they are.I have empathy for some of those who struggle with being gay
Please explain what's so morally objectionable about it.I can tell you with absolute resolution that I loathe those who try to force me to moraly accept their gay lifestyle -
There's a gay mafia? 'I'll make you an offer you can't refuse... these fabulous shoes are now half price!'
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Indy: times change and society's values with them. There was a time when it was ok to call black people animals, to publicly humiliate them. There was a time when it was ok to say that women should obey their husband, know their place (in the kitchen) and not get any uppity ideas about work or voting. Right now the people most accepting of gay rights are young people and as time goes by this will become the majority opinion. However, many people consider freedom of speech an absolute. And since these forums are hosted in the US, you probably won't even have to fear hate speech laws (which are being eroded in Europe as well, through that's a whole different subject).
As for the reaction of other people to your opinions, that's what they call personal responsibility. They have as much freedom of speech as you do. Though this is in part your responsibility. If you lower the tone of the discussion with talk of goatrapers and such, there will be people who take the low road with you (though hopefully also a few pointing out that little detail of consent and such).
Knix: what particular 'major behavioral difference' would that be? And how does it effect the society around them? Plus, how would gay rights change that? That particular cause and effect relation seems to be missing from most of the anti-gay rights arguments I've seen.
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I have. I think* the data you're supposed to fill in there come from where you want to host it. Do you have a host?
*doing this from memory
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I believe its unnatural therefore predetermined not chosen.
THIS ISN'T LOGIC!!!
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I believe the word you're looking for is 'frames'. Like this: http://www.w3.org/TR/html4/present/frames.html (popups not working on work pc?)
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I don't think the nature vs nurture discussion is something for these boards. It's something for science to find out.
Though I would like to add one note to that first part. When people say 'We're just like everyone else.', they don't mean they dress, act, etc. like everyone else, they mean they're morally worth the same as everyone else. It's a variation on 'If you prick us, do we not bleed?', or, as Mick Jagger said about foreign women, 'They're all pink on the inside'.
Are you born this way? If so should science work on available options to offer a person the ability to become hetersexual?
In the transhumanist future, it will be probably be possible to choose gender, skin colour, enhanced muscles, lungs, grow horns, tails, or whatever you can think of else. Though I'd say there are more urgent problems to solve.
Should homosexuals be allowed to openly fight in the US Military?
There is a large number of militaries in the world where homosexuals are allowed to fight openly. It's not a problem there, so why should it be in the US?
Should they be allowed to enter Marriage, Unions, with the same legal benefits but no title, or neither?
Having lived in a country that allows gay marriages, I can report that I have not witnessed any bad results.
Should they be allowed to adopt?
The main argument I've seen against this is that the kids would be ridiculed. Which seems like a circular argument: we shouldn't normalise gay families because they're not considered normal. Again, I do not know of any bad influences on kids adopted by gay parents. Wouldn't it be a good thing if there were more families adopting children? There are still more orphans than families willing to adopt.
Should they be allowed to user doner eggs, sperm, carriers to have children?
Straight couples are allowed to, so why not gay couples? For the arguments for/against them having children, see above.
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(Btw - that was an Aliens quote
)Just tell us what it was about, and I'm sure someone here will know.
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Deal, and I get to pick where in Iraq.......
I was thinking more of a trip around the country. I do Slovenia, Kroatia, Bosnia, Macedonia, Serbia and you do Basra, Baghdad, Ramadi, Kirkuk. Hiding in a hotel in the Green Zone wouldn't give you a good idea of what's going on, now would it? That's like McCain acting all surprised he can walk around Baghdad safely - with 10,000 soldiers around him and Apaches overhead.
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Do you *honestly* not understand that the sole purpose of the UN is to oppose the USA at all costs?
So at what point has the UN needlessly opposed the US? Looks more like the other way around. If you mean the Iraq issue - turned out they were quite right, didn't it?
what sane American wouldSo what's wrong with the ICC? And what's so good about self-regulation?
This pretty much sums up our feelings on the UNFrom the article in question:
If you think—as the media and the left do in this country—that Iraq is a God-awful mess (which it’s not), then try being the Balkans or Sudan or even Cyprus or anywhere where the problem’s been left to the United Nations.ROFL Hey, I've got an idea! I go on holiday in Yugoslavia or Cyprus and you go on holiday in Iraq. The survivor gets the dead guy's money. Deal?
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After the situation in (former) Yugoslavia, I got the feeling that a pattern was starting to emerge for those kinds of interventions. The US doing the asskicking and the rest of NATO (Europe) doing the peacekeeping stuff.
This idea, now, seems further away than ever. And the reasons for this were only touched upon in the presentation I linked to, even though they are more important and controversial than the rest of what he says. He favours pre-emptive warfare, but he doesn't say what factors these decisions should be based upon. He also suggests the G20 as a platform for this, but never says why. Why not the G8? NATO? The UN? Or even the Bilderberg group? If you're going to let the ghost of pre-emptive warfare out of the bottle, then accountability should be the number one concern. Otherwise you're simply talking about empire, and then there's no need for his sysadmin force at all. There's also his dismissal of the ICC for the traditional forces, suggesting he's perfectly fine with them committing crimes. He may have separated the two forces, but he should realise that the acts of the first can make things much harder for the second.
Barnett also supports unilateralism. He thinks the US can and should do it all, which is makes the same mistakes they're currently making all over again. Many of the economists behind the rebuilding of Iraq, are the same who advised Boris Yeltsin in privatising the Russian economy. When that failed, their conclusion was not that their ideas were wrong, but that they simply hadn't been drastic enough. Then Iraq came and they did it more drastically. And failed again. Barnett is making that mistake again; thinking it's not the ideas that are wrong, it's simply the execution. Which brings me to values.
When Barnett talks about 'pops' army' and 'mom's army', he's basically talking about masculine and feminine values. And of this, the US has the first, but lacks the latter. Americans are good at the first thing, not just because they have the money, but also the culture and willingness to do it. The American language has the phrase 'kicking 'donkey'' - other languages don't. This mindset also hinders them in doing the sysadmin thing. That's where you need a different mindset. A mindset that is prevalent in Europe.
When talking about a future European army, nobody talks about an army in the American sense of the word. Europe realises all too well that the age of empires is over and that the battlefields are ruled by the guerilla handbook. When Europe talks about a future army, you see phrases like this:
"The primacy of law
Above all, Europe should speak up for the notion that relations between states and individuals
should be governed by law. The war of "all against all" that once governed domestic politics still
exists in many parts of the international arena. But just as violence has been tamed by law
domestically, and now also regionally through the EU, so it can also be tamed internationally."(Javier Solana)
A future European army will be more like a peacekeeping, humanitarian force than a traditional army. They will seek a legal framework through international institutions, like the UN, before any action is taken. It will be much more suited to become (at least the basis of) Barnett's 'mom's army' than a reorganised US army.
The framework for that is already in place - NATO. But there's a number of obstacles that need to be taken if the US and EU are to ever come together again after the rifts of the recent years. And those are the ones I mentioned at the start that Barnett hastily seemed to skip over - unilateralism, pre-emptiveness, accountability. It will take at least until the next American president for that to change.
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So why in the heck do they go in with pop guns?
I say we take off and nuke the entire site from orbit. It's the only way to be sure.
KG, maybe seperate art from the artist?
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