Bhutto Assassinated

[Principessa21]

I watched Gandhi last night and saw how they 'created' Pakistan. Basically, they took the Indian empire and split it in two - all the muslims went one way and all the hindus went the other way. Gandhi wanted to keep it one big nation. In fact, he was assassinated by Hindu extremists who disagreed with his pro Muslim attitude. I wonder what the world would be like had Gandhi gotten his wish?

Blame the British. Muslims and Hindus lived side-by-side in peace until colonialism.

[TooLiveBrew]

Homer, I am of the belief that a lot of the strife in the middle-east is due to random arrangement of countries/borders. I've often wondered what Iraq would be like if it was just allowed to break up into smaller countries - basically, let the people there decide how they want it arranged. So much of these conflicts stem from people living next to one another that can't stand each other or each other's beliefs.

[homer]

Muslims and Hindus were peaceful during British rule as far as I know.

[sgtcluels]

The problem with redrawing the lines again is the economical impact of redistribution. Take Iraq, lots of oil in the south and the north. Curdes and Shia (I Believe) will be set, and the others will be left high and dry. So it would cause a bunch of tension above and beyond the current situation. Beyond that, imagine being told you can't live in Milwaukee anymore, you have to live in.. Reinlander because you are.. Lutheran. It's not so easy just make everyone move, if I was moved i'd be bitter. Home is home.

 

Alot of violence is due to poor education and horrible economy. If you have no hope, you turn to violence. Mass violence is one way to control (And unethical) population, education, and building a society that people are vested into will quell the violence. We are good at one, just not the other.

[TooLiveBrew]

Great points, sgt - thanks for the input on economics. Obviously it's not as easy as re-drawing lines, but it's relatively clear to me that drawing them the way they were in the first place is what has created much of the tension and struggles. How's that time machine we've been working on comin'?

 

http://forum.brewerfan.net/images/smilies/wink.gif

[Gopher74]

I have to toss what some may view as melodrama in here. Personally, I think this is a very dire day. This assassination will not be forgotten for a very long time. Bhutto was a key cog to stability in this region and even beyond....Globally, this assassination has an enormous impact.

No melodrama at all. This is a HUGE day in the world, and this really is one of the worst things that's happened in a long time...anywhere.

 

I feel sick for the people there. She was one of the few people who really cared about the people. She was gone, she was living comfortably, and she had nothing to gain by coming back, and she does, and right away they attack her because they fear her. And after they miss, and nothing is done, they go after her again. Really a dire day is an understatement.

 

 

[And That]

Of all the possible causes of death that are now coming out, along with denials of those causes, this is becoming more and more like the beginning of a 24 season. I fully expect Bhutto to pop up alive in 5 months.

[pogokat]

The probleem with the lines were that they were not drawn by the residents of the area...this is the same situation that ha splayed out many time sin africa...

 

the peop,e were divided arbitraril, giving no credence to thei own histories...

 

of course, going back and creating nations based on religion is flawed as well...but the truth tis that during colonialism, the people found their own way to nationalize themselves in some way other than paying attention to what "nationality" they were...they picked religion, tribes, culturs, etc...when these places started gainign independence form the olonizers in the 20th century, they wanted to redivide by the nations they were actually members of (religion, tribe, culture, etc) but were not always able to...

 

of course, even when these groups have the ability to nation form on thei own volition things an get hella ugly (rwanda, sudan, iraq, etc...) and the western states freak out...

 

sadly, the truth is that the western world did the same things that these countries do (genocide, assasinations,freky fundamentalist states) they just did it hundreds of years ago when it was politically correct to kill the natives or create our own church...

 

so now when nations try to form the way the developed nations formed, they get stopped by the UN and get told to bring on democracy...of course, bring in democracy tends to mean establishing a leader that the western states like...which causes problems...for example, venezuelans like chavez...but the 1st world (capitalist) powers in the west hate the guy...so they point to his successses as a blow against democracy...

 

it's a weird world we live in...everyone has two sets of rules: theoretical (yay democracy!) and practical (democracy! unless you want a religious dictator...)

 

back on track...the Bhutto thing is frightening becaus eit destabilizes a very powerful country...but the truth iss that musharef is sill relatively in control and he's liked enouggh that no one has killed him... edit: i'm not an idiot, i just have a wonky keyboard

[And That]

I really wish countries wouldn't get involved in the internal affairs of other countries, so I hope this doesn't evoke any sort of large or small international response. I think I put this lightly enough.

[danzig6767]

If you look at history, there were quite a few times where a religion got high jacked to a degree by scary fanatics and the result was plenty of totally unnecessary bloodshed. The big worry now is that when these things happened in the past, there weren't biological and nuclear weapons that could cause incredible destruction and/or harm to many people.

 

I wish i saw any signs that this fanaticism we see in that area of the world was waning or being strongly rejected by the more moderate masses, but i don't see it. If anything, it seems to be picking up steam to me. That's scary.

[sgtcluels]

Moderate masses do exist. Look at Iran... I know Adaginidad (I butchered his name) is a nut job, but there is a lot of western organic culture growing in Iran cities that could one day bring about a democratic "revolution" organically and internally. The worst thing we could do is attack Iran and radicalize the people who are slowly changing their country. Religion is very hijackable. It happens everywhere, since the concept of God doesn't have a natural "check" people can make super wild and crazy things. But even if we wiped religion off the face of the planet, we wouldn't solve a thing. People always point to the difference, and things like Nationalism would then be the source of violence. Society (And I'm guilty of this) needs to stop pointing out the differences of each other and more focus on the common. The less we fear and misunderstand people (aka. All Muslims are trying to kill Americans) the healthier society can get. At least that's my running theory, off course I'm an idiot. http://forum.brewerfan.net/images/smilies/smile.gif

 

I agree And That. Countries shouldn't have such an aggressive foreign policy where "What we say goes, and we'll punish you" but to completely disengage from the world scene could bring us right back to isolationism. Something "in the middle" where we work with other countries and threaten and use both force and economical force only when necessary. And these things become more transparent so there can be over site and balance.

[danzig6767]

Moderate masses do exist. Look at Iran... I know Adaginidad (I butchered his name) is a nut job, but there is a lot of western organic culture growing in Iran cities that could one day bring about a democratic "revolution" organically and internally. The worst thing we could do is attack Iran and radicalize the people who are slowly changing their country. Religion is very hijackable. It happens everywhere, since the concept of God doesn't have a natural "check" people can make super wild and crazy things. But even if we wiped religion off the face of the planet, we wouldn't solve a thing. People always point to the difference, and things like Nationalism would then be the source of violence. Society (And I'm guilty of this) needs to stop pointing out the differences of each other and more focus on the common. The less we fear and misunderstand people (aka. All Muslims are trying to kill Americans) the healthier society can get. At least that's my running theory, off course I'm an idiot. http://forum.brewerfan.net/images/smilies/smile.gif

 

Clearly all Muslims aren't trying to kill Americans or want to bring down Western forms of democratic governments, there are over a billion Muslims and i'm sure most just want to live a decent life for themselves and their children.

With that said, we can't bury our heads in the sand and pretend that there isn't a radical form of Islam that's been spread by religious leaders and being embraced by way to many Muslims. It's also true that the poverty and in general lower standards of living for many of these Muslims in the Middle East area makes it easier for people to buy into the radical teachings of some of these Islamic religious leaders. A big problem though in the poverty/lower standards of living is many of these radical Islamic teachers like to blame to US and/or Western countries for their economic problems and the people buy into it even though simple common sense shows that the backwards forms of government many these countries live under simply will struggle greatly to thrive in this global economy. Instead of the vast vast majority of these Muslim kids getting educated about things that would allow them to compete in the modern global economy, to many of the kids are either not educated at all or are spending huge chunks of their "schooling" in largely religious indoctrination schools instead of things they really need to learn. No big shocker then when these guys get older and they can't provide much for themselves or families, that they end up being very pissed off angry men that buy into the belief pounded into their heads that the US/The West is mainly responsible for most of the woes that tons of extremely poor Muslims live under. It's not like most Muslims live in countries with a free press and access to other sides of the story vs what is force fed them.

No doubt the US isn't without fault in any of this mess. IMO we spend to much effort trying to force our way of life and government on places of the world that very well may not even want it or are prepared for it right now. This causes more anger towards the US in people that already have anger built after being indoctranated for years by their religion and leaders that the US/The West is basically the devil that keeps them in poverty. My biggest fear though is that while the vast majority of Muslims want no part of committing terrorist acts, i just don't sense enough outrage from everyday Muslims around the world for all the chaos the radical sects of Islam are causing and for how frighteningly dangerous they are to the whole world.

 

Those are the people that have to stand up and say to the radical elements of Islam, this isn't acceptable and this isn't what Islam stands for. The radical crazies certainly aren't going to listen to any non-Muslims, they already view non-Muslims as parasites on earth for not believing in Allah. Right now in time, we rarely ever see big rallies in the streets of Muslim countries condemning all these violent terrorist acts that keep giving Islam a bad name, threaten the stability of their countries, and help keep their countries way behind the more developed ones. But god forbid a teacher names a stuffed animal Allah or a Danish cartoonist makes a cartoon Muslims find offensive, the streets are full of angry protesters demanding death for retribution.

I don't hate Muslims or think Islam is solely to blame for all the danger in the world, but the fact is, at this point in time around the world, most places out there with scary danger and death have radical elements of Islam involved. Hopefully sometime sooner than later, all the good and more moderate followers of Islam will stand up and strongly reject all the powerful radicals that give their religion a bad name, helps keep their countries in poverty, and fill their children's minds full of propaganda and hate instead of knowledge.

[DuWayne Steurer]

Hopefully sometime sooner than later, all the good and more moderate followers of Islam will stand up and strongly reject all the powerful radicals that give their religion a bad name, helps keep their countries in poverty, and fill their children's minds full of propaganda and hate instead of knowledge

 

Unfortunately, what you're describing is exactly the type of action that *Terrorism* is designed to stop. There's never enough people who aren't afraid to make enough of a difference. Sad to say, they're very good at what they do. The people that lead any radical groups are, by and large, extremely charismatic individuals. They make impressionable people believe what they want to hear, and make them believe that things are the way they are because of non-action and peaceable solutions. These people aren't stupid. They know as long as there's poverty, they have a rallying point to sell to any would-be suicide bomber who dreams of a better way for themselves, their families, their people.

[sbrylski]

If I weren't an American, I'd hate us too. We are the most dangerous country in the world, I would say.[/i] We can't keep these guys down forever.

[DuWayne Steurer]

If I weren't an American, I'd hate us too. We are the most dangerous country in the world, I would say.[/i] We can't keep these guys down forever.

I think that's a pretty strong statement. I think a lot of people hate America for the same reason everyone hates the Yankees, or rejoices when a guy like Michael Vick goes to prison, or when a celeb like Mel Gibson makes a complete ass of himself. We're the Big Dog, and it doesn't matter who you are, everyone likes hating whoever is on top. You want what you can't have, you want what your neighbor has that you don't.

 

I'm certainly not going to say America is blameless in all this, but the religio-terrorism has been going on over there for centuries, long before America became the global policeman, and it's never going to stop.

 

Blaming AMERICA is a convenient whipping post for terrorist leaders to stir dissent among people who have a less than enjoyable life, when in fact it's terrorists themselves who help propogate the cycle of poverty and violence that creates enough dissidence (sp!?) to keep people angry enough to want to strap dynamite to themselves and get on a bus and kill women and children in the name of religion.

[homer]

At the risk of getting political (probably too late for this thread) there is one candidate who has espoused a foreign policy that pulls us out of ALL foreign nations (not just the middle east). I'll let you research who it is on your own.