Cause and Detect
Bhaskar Dasgupta August 5, 2005
#27 Posted by BeeJay on August 12, 2005 3:36:20 am
#25 Hamidm2 sahib:
Ye kya mamla hai? You seem to have lost all hopes of solving the problems of the world! All those tens of thousands of interacts and THIS is the net sum that you (and your crew of Gabby (and not to mention the Big Honcho)) can come up with?! I recommend getting back to the drawing board and starting afresh (like I do, with EVERY interact of mine).
Sincerely,
Beej.
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#26 Posted by alamgirKabir on August 11, 2005 11:10:23 pm
“I do not feel your pain. I have to admit that I do not have any sympathy for you. I cannot feel anything for you, because you are a non-believer”.
A brilliant analysis Mr. Dasgupta. Take Islam out of this world, there will not be these suicide bombings. Indonesia occupied East Timor - a Christian Land. They killed 200,000 in conflicts there. We did not see any compassionate Muslim go and blow the Indodenesian army. Neither did we see any Christian from Europe or any other country go there and suicide bomb the Indonesian army. Nor did any Christian attack, the Indonesian capital.
A brilliant analysis Mr. Dasgupta. Take Islam out of this world, there will not be these suicide bombings. Indonesia occupied East Timor - a Christian Land. They killed 200,000 in conflicts there. We did not see any compassionate Muslim go and blow the Indodenesian army. Neither did we see any Christian from Europe or any other country go there and suicide bomb the Indonesian army. Nor did any Christian attack, the Indonesian capital.
#25 Posted by hamidm2 on August 8, 2005 9:32:36 am
just close your eyes ......
...... or stick your head in the sand if you live in the desert ........ there is absolutely no point in trying to analyze this sorry mess and striving to come up with reasons for why shit happens .......... it just happens !........... look, in the big scheme of things - which includes the humdrum business of living - a couple of bombings with a few thousand people killed is nothing to get excited about ......... so what if a few crazies killed some people on a bus - they did what crazy people do and trying to read their mind will drive you nuts and, god knows, we don`t need any more nuts ...........
.......... over sixty million people were killed in wwii and through it all people continued to do what people do - eat, drink, make merry and fornicate and legally conjugate to make more babies so that they could kill them later ........... and this is later ........
....... i am more worried about the two cichlids who mysteriously died over the weekend and am on my way to see the fish doctor with a water sample to find the root cause ......... man is pre-programmed to self destruct, cichlids ar not ............ besides, cichlids are prettier .........
...... or stick your head in the sand if you live in the desert ........ there is absolutely no point in trying to analyze this sorry mess and striving to come up with reasons for why shit happens .......... it just happens !........... look, in the big scheme of things - which includes the humdrum business of living - a couple of bombings with a few thousand people killed is nothing to get excited about ......... so what if a few crazies killed some people on a bus - they did what crazy people do and trying to read their mind will drive you nuts and, god knows, we don`t need any more nuts ...........
.......... over sixty million people were killed in wwii and through it all people continued to do what people do - eat, drink, make merry and fornicate and legally conjugate to make more babies so that they could kill them later ........... and this is later ........
....... i am more worried about the two cichlids who mysteriously died over the weekend and am on my way to see the fish doctor with a water sample to find the root cause ......... man is pre-programmed to self destruct, cichlids ar not ............ besides, cichlids are prettier .........
#24 Posted by BeeJay on August 6, 2005 7:37:29 pm
T-Bhai:
Aapkee khidmat mein pesh hai!
Top ten reasons to (de)bait a poet
10. They won`t know when a subject is much too vast.
9. They won`t know when the rival is slick and fast.
8. They won`t know a thing on how not to show.
7. They won`t know the places – never, never to go.
6. They won`t know the lots of Bush and Mush.
5. They won`t know the lot that is itching to push.
4. They won`t know a cat if it hit them on shin.
3. They won`t know a cat if it bit them on chin.
2. They won`t know a cat with nine hundred mice in “payte”.
1. They won`t know a cat if it made THEM a bait.
#23 Posted by tahmed32 on August 6, 2005 4:43:42 pm
OK, Mr t. While far be it for me to claim greater, or even equal, knowledge as you or other distinguished chowkies, I shall take up your invitation to go over your post.
You write: ``…bush says and osama echoes… us or them…flip sides of the same coin ``
bush, whatever his shortcomings, is an elected leader of a nation of almost 300 million people. bin laden is not. There are no polls taken within al qaeda. And if ben laden ever came to power - well, the millions of afghans who fled the taliban will tell you what it is like to be ruled by these mullah nuts. So, please dont make such outrageous comparisons. You may or may not like Bush - but you must respect his position. If, as I think you do, you prefer democracy over dictatorship.
I agree with you that this is a vast subject. So, I will not try to cover the rest of your post, and leave it for later. First, I would appreciate your comment on what I am saying above. And on what I said earlier. Please dont say that you will simply read what I write. Give me an F if you like - but, like a good teacher, explain to me why what I have written above deserves an F.
You write: ``…bush says and osama echoes… us or them…flip sides of the same coin ``
bush, whatever his shortcomings, is an elected leader of a nation of almost 300 million people. bin laden is not. There are no polls taken within al qaeda. And if ben laden ever came to power - well, the millions of afghans who fled the taliban will tell you what it is like to be ruled by these mullah nuts. So, please dont make such outrageous comparisons. You may or may not like Bush - but you must respect his position. If, as I think you do, you prefer democracy over dictatorship.
I agree with you that this is a vast subject. So, I will not try to cover the rest of your post, and leave it for later. First, I would appreciate your comment on what I am saying above. And on what I said earlier. Please dont say that you will simply read what I write. Give me an F if you like - but, like a good teacher, explain to me why what I have written above deserves an F.
#22 Posted by Saj1981 on August 6, 2005 2:52:53 pm
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#21 Posted by temporal on August 6, 2005 11:49:56 am
tahmed32 # 16:
hey thanks for the F…been a while;)
frankly did not think you asked me anything…hence a question of refuting or conceding did not occur to me…
you observed So you think suicide bombing is a means to balance power internationally. …and then you elaborated on your observation
hum kya karaiN?…read your observation and thanked you for it
if you insist will reiterate again…while the subject is not simplistic my perch was bi-polar vs uni polar world we live in…and within that narrow parameter tried to express my views…within the longer post at #18 you will find further elaboration from the same vantage point...others like you who are more knowledgeable can express their contrarian views and we can all learn ...
rgds
t
hey thanks for the F…been a while;)
frankly did not think you asked me anything…hence a question of refuting or conceding did not occur to me…
you observed So you think suicide bombing is a means to balance power internationally. …and then you elaborated on your observation
hum kya karaiN?…read your observation and thanked you for it
if you insist will reiterate again…while the subject is not simplistic my perch was bi-polar vs uni polar world we live in…and within that narrow parameter tried to express my views…within the longer post at #18 you will find further elaboration from the same vantage point...others like you who are more knowledgeable can express their contrarian views and we can all learn ...
rgds
t
#20 Posted by tahmed32 on August 6, 2005 10:57:18 am
Mr. t: Please dont just avoid the question by saying ``thank you for your input, but this is a vast topic``. You are an honorable man and no ideologue, and so I would expect you to either refute or concede the specific point I made. But not to avoid it. Leave that for lesser individuals than you on chowk.
#19 Posted by arjun_m on August 6, 2005 10:00:41 am
#10 by beady on August 5, 2005 1:44pm PT
One associated fact for you to consider, east african refugees WERE involved.
East Africa is not in the middle east and eritreans aren`t arabs....
the reactions are different when Muslims are killing Muslims. Further calibration is when Shia are killing Sunni or vice versa. Unfortunately, no simple answers either, Arjun.
The answer is simple...It`s the intpretation of Islam as accepted by a vast majority of muslims. An attack on muslims by non-muslims is a no-no and all muslims are required to do something about it. No such obligation when the perps are muslims.
consider: How many times have you heard people say that what Osama Bin Laden did is unislamic...I don`t doubt that a majority of muslims might actually disagree with the tactics - flying planes into buildings full of civilians...yet most muslims sympathize with the underlying cause...the islamic obligation to fight back against a non-muslim persecutor of muslims...
ask yourself: How come a majority of people in devoutly Islamic countries like Pakistan and Saudi arabia support Osama Bin Laden if what he did was so unislamic? Would there be so much support for a person who followed other non-Islamic practices like drinking and eating pork? just this week I saw a frontline rerun on saudi arabia..a saudi dude said people were slaughtering sheep and throwing parties to celebrate 9/11, inviting their friends and all...and this is saudi arabia, the land of mecca and medina...
The answer is simple...The bombers were motivated by the teachings of Islam..specifically the part that tells the ummah to stick together and obliges muslims to fight back when muslims are perceived to persecuted by non-muslims...the majority of muslims sympathize with the cause although the majority might profess their disgust over the tactics..
you can be PC and deny that this isn`t true..fine....Islam may very well be a religion of peace....but muslims sure as heck condone the terrorism everytime they try to link a terrorist attack with a ``root cause``....i doubt most britains question the ``root cause`` of the racist backlash against mosques in the UK after 9/11...nobody demands the government take actions that resolve what po`ed the racists, namely their hatred of muslims...how many brits asked their government to fix the root cause by deportting non-whites?
One associated fact for you to consider, east african refugees WERE involved.
East Africa is not in the middle east and eritreans aren`t arabs....
the reactions are different when Muslims are killing Muslims. Further calibration is when Shia are killing Sunni or vice versa. Unfortunately, no simple answers either, Arjun.
The answer is simple...It`s the intpretation of Islam as accepted by a vast majority of muslims. An attack on muslims by non-muslims is a no-no and all muslims are required to do something about it. No such obligation when the perps are muslims.
consider: How many times have you heard people say that what Osama Bin Laden did is unislamic...I don`t doubt that a majority of muslims might actually disagree with the tactics - flying planes into buildings full of civilians...yet most muslims sympathize with the underlying cause...the islamic obligation to fight back against a non-muslim persecutor of muslims...
ask yourself: How come a majority of people in devoutly Islamic countries like Pakistan and Saudi arabia support Osama Bin Laden if what he did was so unislamic? Would there be so much support for a person who followed other non-Islamic practices like drinking and eating pork? just this week I saw a frontline rerun on saudi arabia..a saudi dude said people were slaughtering sheep and throwing parties to celebrate 9/11, inviting their friends and all...and this is saudi arabia, the land of mecca and medina...
The answer is simple...The bombers were motivated by the teachings of Islam..specifically the part that tells the ummah to stick together and obliges muslims to fight back when muslims are perceived to persecuted by non-muslims...the majority of muslims sympathize with the cause although the majority might profess their disgust over the tactics..
you can be PC and deny that this isn`t true..fine....Islam may very well be a religion of peace....but muslims sure as heck condone the terrorism everytime they try to link a terrorist attack with a ``root cause``....i doubt most britains question the ``root cause`` of the racist backlash against mosques in the UK after 9/11...nobody demands the government take actions that resolve what po`ed the racists, namely their hatred of muslims...how many brits asked their government to fix the root cause by deportting non-whites?
#18 Posted by temporal on August 6, 2005 9:46:19 am
``like the naughty she-goat who used her hoof to dig up a knife from under the earth``.
(another long post:))
beady:
in # 13 I mentioned one perspective…from the perch of relations between nations…international relations…and as you agreed the issue is far more complex for one man to deal with…
allow me to deliberate some more from the same vantage point…bi-polar world allowed the rest of the world a little play on the chess board…a little…uni-polar world has shorn that fig leaf off the ROW….rest of the world…bush says and osama echoes… us or them…flip sides of the same coin
to illustrate my point I will take quotes from the transcripts available on the net for obl’s letter to american people sent to aljazeera and authenticated by cia prior to the US elections...
* he began: People of America this talk of mine is for you and concerns the ideal way to prevent another Manhattan, and deals with the war and its causes and results.
then went on to say: Before I begin, I say to you that security is an indispensable pillar of human life and that free men do not forfeit their security, contrary to Bush`s claim that we hate freedom. this message has rubbed on to bush and his bunch of neoconzix sympathisers and aides…in his speeches as well as those by rice and rumsfeld and other appartchik they maintain that they are bringing freedom to afghansitan, iraq…they tire not of mentioning freedom…i will leave the mention of other countries and states not afforded this kid consideration to your imagination!
* …why we don`t strike for example - Sweden? since not all americans are bright like bush … in simple english…perhaps because the country named by obl has not committed it personnel or resources to fight US’s proxy war?
* No, we fight because we are free men who don`t sleep under oppression. We want to restore freedom to our nation, just as you lay waste to our nation. So shall we lay waste to yours. simple quid pro quo … a message the neconzix inc. USA tries it best to cover up
* No one except a dumb thief plays with the security of others and then makes himself believe he will be secure. Whereas thinking people, when disaster strikes, make it their priority to look for its causes, in order to prevent it happening again. this was a low below by mr obl…points would have beed deducted if this was a boxing match…also point to note beady re: thief…could this be an mischivious aljazeera typo? A c in the original downplayed to a t?
* But I am amazed at you. Even though we are in the fourth year after the events of September 11th, Bush is still engaged in distortion, deception and hiding from you the real causes. And thus, the reasons are still there for a repeat of what occurred. I think this is another low blow…directed at the americans as well as their supporters across the pond!
* And that day,(referring to 1982 invasion of lebanon) it was confirmed to me that oppression and the intentional killing of innocent women and children is a deliberate American policy. Destruction is freedom and democracy, while resistance is terrorism and intolerance.…beady sahib… for crying out loud…pity the media ‘experts’ who still argue and speculate about obl’s root causes
* Is defending oneself and punishing the aggressor in kind, objectionable terrorism? If it is such, then it is unavoidable for us. …This is the message which I sought to communicate to you in word and deed, repeatedly, for years before September 11th. (And you can read this, if you wish, in my interview with Scott in Time Magazine in 1996, or with Peter Arnett on CNN in 1997, or my meeting with John Weiner in 1998. You can observe it practically, if you wish, in Kenya and Tanzania and in Aden. And you can read it in my interview with Abdul Bari Atwan, as well as my interviews with Robert Fisk.) …my parenthesis…also what is interesting to note here is he is not invoking Allah or qur’an…this was also confirmed by the last journalist to interview him, hamid mir, in his paper read on the hill some months back…
* All that we have to do is to send two mujahidin to the furthest point east to raise a piece of cloth on which is written al-Qaida, in order to make the generals race there to cause America to suffer human, economic, and political losses without their achieving for it anything of note other than some benefits for their private companies… This is in addition to our having experience in using guerrilla warfare and the war of attrition to fight tyrannical superpowers, as we, alongside the mujahidin, bled Russia for 10 years, until it went bankrupt and was forced to withdraw in defeat….So we are continuing this policy in bleeding America to the point of bankruptcy. this observation was followed by this:
* And it was to these sorts of notions and their like that the British diplomat and others were referring in their lectures at the Royal Institute of International Affairs. [When they pointed out that] for example, al-Qaida spent $500,000 on the event, while America, in the incident and its aftermath, lost - according to the lowest estimate - more than $500 billion.
Meaning that every dollar of al-Qaida defeated a million dollars…. As for the size of the economic deficit, it has reached record astronomical numbers estimated to total more than a trillion dollars.…check out the dire warnings posted by sohali rabbani at FOMC.
* And so it has appeared to some analysts and diplomats that the White House and us are playing as one team towards the economic goals of the United States, even if the intentions differ. …beady sahib, I call him and bush the two sides of the same coin…it is interesting to note that he is aware and trying to down play it!
* And the same goes for your allies in Palestine. They terrorise the women and children, and kill and capture the men as they lie sleeping with their families on the mattresses, that you may recall that for every action, there is a reaction.…this is aimed at the think tank jehadis too who try to spin away from his cause-effect message/thinking
* and this is how he ended:As has been said: ``An ounce of prevention is better than a pound of cure.``…And know that: ``It is better to return to the truth than persist in error.`` And that the wise man doesn`t squander his security, wealth and children for the sake of the liar in the White House.…. Your security is in your own hands. And every state that doesn`t play with our security has automatically guaranteed its own security. go back to the sweden reference earlier…al-qaeda strikes ONLY at those who attack it…why is that lesson not taken…with or without a grain of salt?
..btw just to reinforce and reiterate so that we are on the same page …in all humility this writer considers obl and gwb to be the flip sides of the same coin!
rgds
ps: tahmed and BeeJay: thank you for input... this is a vast topic and hopefully you will note my narrow perch...
(another long post:))
beady:
in # 13 I mentioned one perspective…from the perch of relations between nations…international relations…and as you agreed the issue is far more complex for one man to deal with…
allow me to deliberate some more from the same vantage point…bi-polar world allowed the rest of the world a little play on the chess board…a little…uni-polar world has shorn that fig leaf off the ROW….rest of the world…bush says and osama echoes… us or them…flip sides of the same coin
to illustrate my point I will take quotes from the transcripts available on the net for obl’s letter to american people sent to aljazeera and authenticated by cia prior to the US elections...
* he began: People of America this talk of mine is for you and concerns the ideal way to prevent another Manhattan, and deals with the war and its causes and results.
then went on to say: Before I begin, I say to you that security is an indispensable pillar of human life and that free men do not forfeit their security, contrary to Bush`s claim that we hate freedom. this message has rubbed on to bush and his bunch of neoconzix sympathisers and aides…in his speeches as well as those by rice and rumsfeld and other appartchik they maintain that they are bringing freedom to afghansitan, iraq…they tire not of mentioning freedom…i will leave the mention of other countries and states not afforded this kid consideration to your imagination!
* …why we don`t strike for example - Sweden? since not all americans are bright like bush … in simple english…perhaps because the country named by obl has not committed it personnel or resources to fight US’s proxy war?
* No, we fight because we are free men who don`t sleep under oppression. We want to restore freedom to our nation, just as you lay waste to our nation. So shall we lay waste to yours. simple quid pro quo … a message the neconzix inc. USA tries it best to cover up
* No one except a dumb thief plays with the security of others and then makes himself believe he will be secure. Whereas thinking people, when disaster strikes, make it their priority to look for its causes, in order to prevent it happening again. this was a low below by mr obl…points would have beed deducted if this was a boxing match…also point to note beady re: thief…could this be an mischivious aljazeera typo? A c in the original downplayed to a t?
* But I am amazed at you. Even though we are in the fourth year after the events of September 11th, Bush is still engaged in distortion, deception and hiding from you the real causes. And thus, the reasons are still there for a repeat of what occurred. I think this is another low blow…directed at the americans as well as their supporters across the pond!
* And that day,(referring to 1982 invasion of lebanon) it was confirmed to me that oppression and the intentional killing of innocent women and children is a deliberate American policy. Destruction is freedom and democracy, while resistance is terrorism and intolerance.…beady sahib… for crying out loud…pity the media ‘experts’ who still argue and speculate about obl’s root causes
* Is defending oneself and punishing the aggressor in kind, objectionable terrorism? If it is such, then it is unavoidable for us. …This is the message which I sought to communicate to you in word and deed, repeatedly, for years before September 11th. (And you can read this, if you wish, in my interview with Scott in Time Magazine in 1996, or with Peter Arnett on CNN in 1997, or my meeting with John Weiner in 1998. You can observe it practically, if you wish, in Kenya and Tanzania and in Aden. And you can read it in my interview with Abdul Bari Atwan, as well as my interviews with Robert Fisk.) …my parenthesis…also what is interesting to note here is he is not invoking Allah or qur’an…this was also confirmed by the last journalist to interview him, hamid mir, in his paper read on the hill some months back…
* All that we have to do is to send two mujahidin to the furthest point east to raise a piece of cloth on which is written al-Qaida, in order to make the generals race there to cause America to suffer human, economic, and political losses without their achieving for it anything of note other than some benefits for their private companies… This is in addition to our having experience in using guerrilla warfare and the war of attrition to fight tyrannical superpowers, as we, alongside the mujahidin, bled Russia for 10 years, until it went bankrupt and was forced to withdraw in defeat….So we are continuing this policy in bleeding America to the point of bankruptcy. this observation was followed by this:
* And it was to these sorts of notions and their like that the British diplomat and others were referring in their lectures at the Royal Institute of International Affairs. [When they pointed out that] for example, al-Qaida spent $500,000 on the event, while America, in the incident and its aftermath, lost - according to the lowest estimate - more than $500 billion.
Meaning that every dollar of al-Qaida defeated a million dollars…. As for the size of the economic deficit, it has reached record astronomical numbers estimated to total more than a trillion dollars.…check out the dire warnings posted by sohali rabbani at FOMC.
* And so it has appeared to some analysts and diplomats that the White House and us are playing as one team towards the economic goals of the United States, even if the intentions differ. …beady sahib, I call him and bush the two sides of the same coin…it is interesting to note that he is aware and trying to down play it!
* And the same goes for your allies in Palestine. They terrorise the women and children, and kill and capture the men as they lie sleeping with their families on the mattresses, that you may recall that for every action, there is a reaction.…this is aimed at the think tank jehadis too who try to spin away from his cause-effect message/thinking
* and this is how he ended:As has been said: ``An ounce of prevention is better than a pound of cure.``…And know that: ``It is better to return to the truth than persist in error.`` And that the wise man doesn`t squander his security, wealth and children for the sake of the liar in the White House.…. Your security is in your own hands. And every state that doesn`t play with our security has automatically guaranteed its own security. go back to the sweden reference earlier…al-qaeda strikes ONLY at those who attack it…why is that lesson not taken…with or without a grain of salt?
..btw just to reinforce and reiterate so that we are on the same page …in all humility this writer considers obl and gwb to be the flip sides of the same coin!
rgds
ps: tahmed and BeeJay: thank you for input... this is a vast topic and hopefully you will note my narrow perch...
#17 Posted by bbabu on August 6, 2005 8:01:15 am
I think it is more a case of British ABCDs going off the cliff
#16 Posted by tahmed32 on August 6, 2005 3:41:35 am
temporal #13 So you think suicide bombing is a means to balance power internationally. Wrong answer. You get an F, sorry to say. This is why:
Suicide bombers, while they destroy lives of those unfortunate enough to be travelling in the same bus or plane with them, do not put a dent on society. More people are killed every day in traffic accidents daily than suicide bombers kill in an year. You would be more accurate if you claimed that drunk drivers are a means to balance power internationally.
Suicide bombers, while they destroy lives of those unfortunate enough to be travelling in the same bus or plane with them, do not put a dent on society. More people are killed every day in traffic accidents daily than suicide bombers kill in an year. You would be more accurate if you claimed that drunk drivers are a means to balance power internationally.
#14 Posted by BeeJay on August 5, 2005 7:51:32 pm
#13 T-Bhai Saab:
Please don’t get too nostalgic about the “good old days” of the cold war – what you euphemistically called the days of “checks and balances”. The Soviet bear from the seventies and eighties knew no balance – thank God the Americans were able to check, then checkmate him! The present “unipolar” world is a vast, vast improvement – at least we don’t go to bed dreading if there will still be a tomorrow for the world – remember, the time for those nuclear ICBM’s to cross the globe was less than an hour! I will take a few (or more) suicide bombers any day! (Interesting discussion about cults – but it’s not a smart idea to lump all of them together – especially the ones which are inward-looking with those which are not!)
#4 Mitra Sahib
Let’s cut out that crap about how heartbroken the parents get and how it is all the fault of those narrow-minded uneducated Mullahs. That model has long been discarded. Children learn what they learn from the following sources and in the following decreasing order of importance (1) parents, (2) school, (3) society, (4) media. Mullahs are just one weak element of the third source – the parents are (and have forever been) numero uno!
#13 Posted by temporal on August 5, 2005 2:18:42 pm
(long post)
beady:
there is no one reason that can be precisely pin pointed for this spread for suicide bombers…you have touched and explored some of them…and there must be more…
i briefly mentioned somewhere that (from the international relations perspective the proliferation of suicide bomber) this is an equalizer…replacing the check and balance of the old world order in the new unipolar world…the rich world has their economy backed with destructive push button annihilation capabilities to sustain their growth and colonization…the third world has neither the economic depth nor do they have a power deterrent at their behest…
result? proliferation of suicide bomber to restore a primitive check and balance in international relations
(of course several questions come to mind: you have some of them yourself..chiefly among them why does this afflict muslims mostly!)
…another interesting perspective on suicide bombers is their utter brainwashing…as a muslim they believe ( as recorded in the past and reported by themselves and by journalists who have spent time with them) ..they would go to heaven!
..and as a muslim…i sincerely believed they are misguided and would end in a hell!
in another column perhaps you should explore thought reform or brainwashing
rgds
t
digression: In reaching out for some reason why a young adult would radically reject the way which parents had prepared for them to fine a successful (and by their standards, normal) life, parents tended to place the blame upon the group that s/he had joined, and increasingly upon the leader of that group. The several organizations founded in the early 1970s drew upon the literature developed primarily by American Evangelical Christian writers that referred to the new religions as ``cults.`` (1) Through the early 1970s, they began to seek the assistance of law enforcement agencies and various professionals, primarily mental health professionals, to intervene in the life of the new believers. Police and courts were generally unable to assist parents whose child had joined a cult, a ``cult`` being defined as it was in Evangelical literature merely by its espousal of a radically different set of beliefs. The situation changed in the late 1970s largely as a result of (a) the discovery of involuntary deprogramming as a technique that had some positive results in persuading members to drop their affiliations to new religions, (b) the emergence of the concept of brainwashing in the trial of millionaire heiress Patty Hearst, and (c) the death of some 900 people at Jonestown.
First, the original parental groups found a major ally in the person of Theodore ``Ted`` Patrick who stumbled upon the process of deprogramming after being alerted to the dangers of cults when one of his relatives became briefly associated with the Children of God. In 1976 he authored a popular volume, Let Our Children Go,(2) describing his kidnapping of several people and the application of various forms of physical and emotional stress in an attempt to force them to sever their relationship to the group, be it the Unification Church, the Hare Krishna, The Divine Light Mission of Guru Maharaj Ji, or one of the several new Evangelical Christian groups.
rest here Brainwashing and the Cults: Te Rise and Fall of a Theory by J. Gordon Melton
#15 Posted by beady on August 5, 2005 11:12:37 pm
#13 by temporal
You raise important issues. This topic of suicide bombing is such a strange animal and has simply far too many facets for one person to really put their arms around. I have been flirting with this topic from many angles which you can check on my blog. That said, my specific points (long post here as well :))
1. This was a slightly satrical piece aimed at the root causers so to say. It was aimed at trying to show the impact of terrorist from the victim`s perspective. I urge all to read the book which I referred to. It was not oriented towards trying to explain the reasons behind why suicide bombers come up.
2. I am afraid I have to disagree with your statement that this is assymetrical warfare. Yes, I understand the logic and argument which you are making, but I am afraid I have a different take on it. Soldiers dying for their comrades or going to blow up a tank with a satchel full of grenades are not considered to be suicide terrorism. Its when civilians are targeted with expressedly political or religious ideological basis that we call it suicide terrorism. Its ideology, tamil tigers or hizbollah or the saudi volunteers are not really going up against the BIG weapons, they go after the easy meat/victims. Their objective isn`t to go up against the military but to go after the infidel/civilian/other/you name it. The tamil tigers who went up against the sri lankans were roughly equal in parity but still used it. It’s a remarkably effective weapon, and if your ideology (marxism, separatism, islamism) is powerful enough, you will get the useful idiots to carry this out for you. It is just another communication means (excluding the military benefits), a potent and shocking one, but just communication at end of the day. They are sending a message, temporal. But yes, this needs good treatment and have stored this for another column another day :), thank you for the idea.
3. This doesn’t sound good either but brainwashing can easily be termed as faith. Take for example the tantrics or aghori`s of Hinduism, the naked monks in jainism, the bloody Christian pilgrims in christianity who wear crowns of thorns, the ma`atm of Shia`s, these are expressions of piety which, when looked at from a certain perspective, does resemble brainwashing. Putting it in another way, if I did this type of behaviour and wanted to explain to say a rational, secular and dare I say westernised chap, I would not be able to explain more than just say its my way to god and that`s my faith. And you will be fully justified in saying that I am brainwashed. Is that wrong? Is that right? Difficult question, my friend. Misguided? Only for a person who is on another path. This is why it is notoriously difficult to deal with issues around faith. As for a column on this, I am hesitant to even broach this topic, very difficult to do justice to it without sounding like a hysterical carpet muncher, difficult to see this topic from both sides.
You raise important issues. This topic of suicide bombing is such a strange animal and has simply far too many facets for one person to really put their arms around. I have been flirting with this topic from many angles which you can check on my blog. That said, my specific points (long post here as well :))
1. This was a slightly satrical piece aimed at the root causers so to say. It was aimed at trying to show the impact of terrorist from the victim`s perspective. I urge all to read the book which I referred to. It was not oriented towards trying to explain the reasons behind why suicide bombers come up.
2. I am afraid I have to disagree with your statement that this is assymetrical warfare. Yes, I understand the logic and argument which you are making, but I am afraid I have a different take on it. Soldiers dying for their comrades or going to blow up a tank with a satchel full of grenades are not considered to be suicide terrorism. Its when civilians are targeted with expressedly political or religious ideological basis that we call it suicide terrorism. Its ideology, tamil tigers or hizbollah or the saudi volunteers are not really going up against the BIG weapons, they go after the easy meat/victims. Their objective isn`t to go up against the military but to go after the infidel/civilian/other/you name it. The tamil tigers who went up against the sri lankans were roughly equal in parity but still used it. It’s a remarkably effective weapon, and if your ideology (marxism, separatism, islamism) is powerful enough, you will get the useful idiots to carry this out for you. It is just another communication means (excluding the military benefits), a potent and shocking one, but just communication at end of the day. They are sending a message, temporal. But yes, this needs good treatment and have stored this for another column another day :), thank you for the idea.
3. This doesn’t sound good either but brainwashing can easily be termed as faith. Take for example the tantrics or aghori`s of Hinduism, the naked monks in jainism, the bloody Christian pilgrims in christianity who wear crowns of thorns, the ma`atm of Shia`s, these are expressions of piety which, when looked at from a certain perspective, does resemble brainwashing. Putting it in another way, if I did this type of behaviour and wanted to explain to say a rational, secular and dare I say westernised chap, I would not be able to explain more than just say its my way to god and that`s my faith. And you will be fully justified in saying that I am brainwashed. Is that wrong? Is that right? Difficult question, my friend. Misguided? Only for a person who is on another path. This is why it is notoriously difficult to deal with issues around faith. As for a column on this, I am hesitant to even broach this topic, very difficult to do justice to it without sounding like a hysterical carpet muncher, difficult to see this topic from both sides.
#11 Posted by mohar11 on August 5, 2005 1:46:47 pm
It`s kind of insensitive to the brits who are fellow-victims of jihad - but I have to say this - as you sow, so you reap. Brit mofos have been feeding these jihadi snakes for a long time - pontificating towards people who have been fighting the menace all the while they have been molly-coddling the jihadis .
``Just`` 52 people dead and brits are already executing suspects in public. When chips down - these people have shown their true colors...... Which is fine - you have to what you have to do to protect yourself from jihad ..... But where was that sensitivity when indians where hit by the same evil day in and day out for 15 years? Why were the brits sheltering the jihadi mothaf**ers?
Reap what you have sown. The price of ingoring extermism - brits have to pay the price.
``Just`` 52 people dead and brits are already executing suspects in public. When chips down - these people have shown their true colors...... Which is fine - you have to what you have to do to protect yourself from jihad ..... But where was that sensitivity when indians where hit by the same evil day in and day out for 15 years? Why were the brits sheltering the jihadi mothaf**ers?
Reap what you have sown. The price of ingoring extermism - brits have to pay the price.
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