Snipeout: “Did you miss that terrorism and terrorists is the central point of this thread?”
I am able to follow the thread…although the posts applying Eric Byrne’s Tranactional Analysis took me in an odd direction. The thread is about detention without trial. Snipeout, you are working from the premise of guilty until proven otherwise…sounds pretty un-American to me.
The BBC reported yesterday that a report investigating the London Bombings found foreign policy to be a huge alienating factor in Muslim comunities. Its time for the Right wing to stop throwing their hands up and saying ‘we don’t know why they hate us’. Whether Britain and America’s policy is at its core motivated by racism is neither here nor there becaue that is how it is being percieved. We are creating terrorists and the ‘all guns blazing’ approach has not worked.
Here on T-mag we all learnt that to do the same diet and nutrition approach and expect different results is idiotic. Well foreign policy is the same. The West needs to re-think. It needs to check the IMF and World Bank whom install free trade in poor countries with no venture capital of their own, allowing Western corporations to move in like vultures. The West needs to stop viewing the world as ‘potential markets’ and start seeing ‘people’. The West, however, doesn’t need to halt Globalisation, it needs to humanise it, and make sure the cultural and economic traffic flows more evenly. Then people will not resent the West. Then people will not blow the West up.
On the 90 day thing: The reason I have issues with it is that here you are innocent until proven otherwise. Yes the police’s view needs to be taken into account, but this is not a police state- they do not call the shots. 3 months is a long time and lives would be ruined from that length of detention. Maybe the police need more time than 14 days, or maybe they need better funding to do the same job more quickly with less distrubance to the populace. Either way all sides lost because Tony Blair would not take the 28 day recomendation from the state legislature. He’s an egomaniac and needs to resign.
[quote]JohnGullick wrote:
The BBC reported yesterday that a report investigating the London Bombings found foreign policy to be a huge alienating factor in Muslim comunities. Its time for the Right wing to stop throwing their hands up and saying ‘we don’t know why they hate us’. Whether Britain and America’s policy is at its core motivated by racism is neither here nor there becaue that is how it is being percieved. We are creating terrorists and the ‘all guns blazing’ approach has not worked.
Here on T-mag we all learnt that to do the same diet and nutrition approach and expect different results is idiotic. Well foreign policy is the same. The West needs to re-think. It needs to check the IMF and World Bank whom install free trade in poor countries with no venture capital of their own, allowing Western corporations to move in like vultures. The West needs to stop viewing the world as ‘potential markets’ and start seeing ‘people’. The West, however, doesn’t need to halt Globalisation, it needs to humanise it, and make sure the cultural and economic traffic flows more evenly. Then people will not resent the West. Then people will not blow the West up.[/quote]
“Then people will not resent the West. Then people will not blow the West up.” One group of people are trying to blow the West up, Islamic fundamentalists. The rest of the people are not. If Western economic policy is the great evil here, why are no other groups of people responding to it with violence? Why does one small group of people get to speak for the rest of the non-Western world? Why can’t they just be a bunch of nutty fundamentalists?
The thing is, the world is going to continue to move in the same direction, with the IMF and the World Bank and global trade and all that it entails. That ship has sailed. Islamists don’t want any of the things you mentioned; no globalization, no cultural and economic flows. They want a world that is long gone and is not coming back. That’s why they can’t win.
As for the rest of the world, they see the U.S. as the potential market. We have a rather large trade deficit that proves that point.
I don’t think many starving African nations view America as a market that they can take advantage of.
Anyhow, you can’t suggest on one hand that only a small number of fanatics hate us, and that the rest don’t, and then on the other hand question why the general populace allows the fanatics to reside within their society and act unhindered.
Well, I guess you can, but nobody believes you don’t see the blatant hypocrisy.
vroom wrote:
“I don’t think many starving African nations view America as a market that they can take advantage of.”
Most of Africa is not starving. In those non-starving countries exports provide most of their national income, and over time their exports will grow. If you want to highlight those areas where despotic rulers have precipitated human disasters then go ahead, but global trade is certainly not the cause of their problems.
"Anyhow, you can’t suggest on one hand that only a small number of fanatics hate us, and that the rest don’t, and then on the other hand question why the general populace allows the fanatics to reside within their society and act unhindered.
Well, I guess you can, but nobody believes you don’t see the blatant hypocrisy."
I think I was pointing out that only a small number of fanatics are trying to blow us up. It is surely the case that many people around the world do not like aspects of Western economic or foreign policy. Many of them when asked might even say they hate us. But they’re not trying to blow us up. That is my principle concern here, what groups of people are actively trying to blow things up.
JohnGullick seems to be saying that if we humanize our economic policies we can achieve world peace. That might be a noble goal but I do not believe it will satisfy the demands of Al Qaeda.
opt,
I don’t think there is anything that will satisfy Al Queda. I really don’t. However, there is another issue, the ease with which they can recruit people into their ranks.
I suspect this latter issue can be affected by long term policy issues. Others may not.
Really, it depends on what the “man on the street” over in Arabic countries hears about the US. Right now, I think all they hear is very biased propaganda which makes them distrust the US or worse.
Honestly, small shifts in policy are unlikely to fix that either. It would probably take some concerted efforts in various areas to make a dent.
I’m not going to say I have the answer to the problem, but ignoring Arabic perception of policy won’t fix it. At the same time, no, the US shouldn’t base it’s decisions on foreign public perception. It may however be appropriate to temper some policies somewhat.
It’s stuff that is worth discussing and thinking about, no matter what the hotheads around here like to throw around in the forums.