Nick Against the World (44 Viewers)
- Thread starter IncuboRossonero
- Start date
It's all about the boogeyman, Andy. Keep 'em scared, and you stay in power by selling both the disease and the cure.
George Bush Sr. based his platform on fear of crime, bantering about released prisoners and crack-addict black men who will rape your white daughters. George Bush Jr. is doing the same, but instead with Islamic extremist terrorists. In actuality, the bizarre thing is that your odds of being harmed through crime far and away exceed anything relative to terrorism, and yet crime has taken a back seat in the fear-mongering hierarchy.
It's that the visual spectacle of terrorism adds that sensational fear effect ... the same sort of exceptional thinking dispelling mathematical odds that makes winning the lottery seem so disproportionally possible -- i.e., relative to systematically losing your shorts every week on lottery tickets.
And without diminishing the loss of those affected by those who died in terrorist incidents, you're right about keeping a perspective on terrorism's perceived impact versus its real impact. According to the Centers for Disease Control in Atlanta, your chances of dying in a terrorist incident are as follows:
By comparison, some other odds from the CDC:
Seeing that, it makes you wonder whether so much of our civil liberties and national resources should be sacrificed to the greater threat of death by lightning strikes. Afterall, we are more likely to die from a bolt to the head.
And if you read the UK Mirror, taking into account all terrorist-caused deaths all over the world, you are three times as likely to die from a snake bite or food poisoning than terrorism:
http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/tm_obj...762&headline=odds-ways-to-die--name_page.html
Which underscores how very effective the terrorists are, and how successful we help make them. Because every incident they pull gets multiplied many, many times over by our government in how it impacts us.
George Bush Sr. based his platform on fear of crime, bantering about released prisoners and crack-addict black men who will rape your white daughters. George Bush Jr. is doing the same, but instead with Islamic extremist terrorists. In actuality, the bizarre thing is that your odds of being harmed through crime far and away exceed anything relative to terrorism, and yet crime has taken a back seat in the fear-mongering hierarchy.
It's that the visual spectacle of terrorism adds that sensational fear effect ... the same sort of exceptional thinking dispelling mathematical odds that makes winning the lottery seem so disproportionally possible -- i.e., relative to systematically losing your shorts every week on lottery tickets.
And without diminishing the loss of those affected by those who died in terrorist incidents, you're right about keeping a perspective on terrorism's perceived impact versus its real impact. According to the Centers for Disease Control in Atlanta, your chances of dying in a terrorist incident are as follows:
- 1 in 88,000 of a terrorist attack
- 1 in 1,500,000 of a terrorist-caused shopping mall disaster assuming one such incident a week and you shop two hours a week
- 1 in 55,000,000 in a terrorist-caused plane disaster assuming one such incident a month and you fly once a month
By comparison, some other odds from the CDC:
- 1 in 55,928 of death by lightning
- 1 in 20,605 in your clothes igniting
- 1 in 10,455 of dying in your bathtub
- 1 in 10,010 by falling from a ladder or scaffolding
- 1 in 7,972 in a drowning accident
- 1 in 6,842 in a railway accident
- 1 in 197 of dying in a homicide
- 1 in 299 of dying in an assault from a firearm
- 1 in 5,330 of dying in an assault by hanging or strangulation
Seeing that, it makes you wonder whether so much of our civil liberties and national resources should be sacrificed to the greater threat of death by lightning strikes. Afterall, we are more likely to die from a bolt to the head.
And if you read the UK Mirror, taking into account all terrorist-caused deaths all over the world, you are three times as likely to die from a snake bite or food poisoning than terrorism:
http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/tm_obj...762&headline=odds-ways-to-die--name_page.html
Which underscores how very effective the terrorists are, and how successful we help make them. Because every incident they pull gets multiplied many, many times over by our government in how it impacts us.
Sir Sebastian said:
If anyone here (most probably swag) knows anything about the Redwood Regional park, please PM me 
Pardon my recent absence. I've spent the past few days at a conference with horrible WiFi (oh, the indignity of it all) and dot-com wannabe wankers who think that having a blog puts you in the social strata above Nobel Laureate but modestly just below Shakespeare.
I'll like to officially apologize on behalf of all the ignorant Muslims that took to the streets this past weekend and 'protested' against the comments made by the Pope. Who the heck are they to speak out?? Regardless of what the Pope meant, they have no damn reason to be 'outraged'. People like Bin Laden have done 10x worse to bring down the name of Islam. Shame on every pathetic soul that has anything to protest against this.
It's disgraceful to see people sit idly by as Muslims themselves defame the religion and no one speaks out. Islam needs to wake up and smell the roses because it is THEY who are defaming the Holy Propther Muhammad (saw) and his teachings, and not people like the Pope. It is themselves!
It's disgraceful to see people sit idly by as Muslims themselves defame the religion and no one speaks out. Islam needs to wake up and smell the roses because it is THEY who are defaming the Holy Propther Muhammad (saw) and his teachings, and not people like the Pope. It is themselves!
That's my whole point. It doesn't matter what he sayed. Muslims are in no position to protest against what he said, because there are Muslims out there who are doing, not just saying, but doing things worse to defame the Prophet and Islam. And it's not just one here one there, but powerful people; governments, "scholars", imams. The whole bunch. They are the few that ruining Islams image and they are the ones going against he teachings of God and the Holy Prophet. If you can't see that, then I can't help you.
That's a delicate line to walk through. I have a number of Muslim friends (Pakistani even ) who are like, "They call themselves Muslims? Those people are not Muslims. I am sorry."
There's a weird balance between disassociating yourself with extremist freaks who use religion as an excuse to kill innocents ... and also recognizing there's something inherently odd in how these freaks picked your own religious followings, among everything out there, as the foundation for justifying their own massacres of innocents.
Of course, the Pope doesn't exactly come from a mani puliti lineage himself either...
) who are like, "They call themselves Muslims? Those people are not Muslims. I am sorry."There's a weird balance between disassociating yourself with extremist freaks who use religion as an excuse to kill innocents ... and also recognizing there's something inherently odd in how these freaks picked your own religious followings, among everything out there, as the foundation for justifying their own massacres of innocents.
Of course, the Pope doesn't exactly come from a mani puliti lineage himself either...
Sir Sebastian said:
Just be grateful you're not in high school, everyone is like that, but twice as bad
My personal favorite of this week was "where is your dad from"
"czech republic"
"wtf thats not a country"
"...."
My personal favorite of this week was "where is your dad from"
"czech republic"
"wtf thats not a country"
"...."
i would like to officially apologise on behalf of catholics for the maddening ramblings of our pope. the only thing i see an a major obstacle is that if some continually protest at anything said we will become desensitized to it all and the western world will eventually stop reporting about it.
i see where you are coming from tahir but i feel its impossible in my eyes to tar the whole muslim world with the terrorist brush,as we catholics and also protestants have history here as well.
remember the irish "freedom fighters" of the IRA and the "british unionists" bombing each other to bits. the only problem we had was that for many years the american people pumped millions from fundraising and secret backing for "the irish cause" and it was seen as a "british problem". funny what a few dead americans can do to a countries perspective, these terrosist organisations knew tah game was up as soon as the twin towers atrocities happened. their friends in america took a dimmer view of teh romance of freedom fighting by bombing people.
i see where you are coming from tahir but i feel its impossible in my eyes to tar the whole muslim world with the terrorist brush,as we catholics and also protestants have history here as well.
remember the irish "freedom fighters" of the IRA and the "british unionists" bombing each other to bits. the only problem we had was that for many years the american people pumped millions from fundraising and secret backing for "the irish cause" and it was seen as a "british problem". funny what a few dead americans can do to a countries perspective, these terrosist organisations knew tah game was up as soon as the twin towers atrocities happened. their friends in america took a dimmer view of teh romance of freedom fighting by bombing people.
yes there r the bad crop, there always was and always will be.But thats a different case.
Ppl were protesting against the comments made by the pope cuz they were unfounded and very wrong.So muslims should sit there and say nothing? Only becuz there r some ignorant muslims who do the wrong things ? i think its a different matter.
Sure we have to look onto our own problems but we shouldnt let things like that get away.
Ppl r not happy abt muslims tarnishing the image of islam.And protested.They werent happy abt wat the pope said and they protested.
Ppl were protesting against the comments made by the pope cuz they were unfounded and very wrong.So muslims should sit there and say nothing? Only becuz there r some ignorant muslims who do the wrong things ? i think its a different matter.
Sure we have to look onto our own problems but we shouldnt let things like that get away.
Ppl r not happy abt muslims tarnishing the image of islam.And protested.They werent happy abt wat the pope said and they protested.
idiots