| THIS IS A READ-ONLY ARCHIVE FROM THE SORABJI.COM MESSAGE BOARDS (1995-2016). |
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--- My daughter Aine and I were walking in the woods today playing a game. She was pretending that there were monsters in the forest and that they were coming to eat us. We had to be vigilant. We had to defend ourselves. I asked her "What is the plan? What are we going to do if we see one of the monsters?" She replied, "Feed them." "Feed them?" I said. "Yes," she said. "If we feed them they won't want to eat us." I think she has the answer there. Imagine if George Bush took that $40 billion that Congress gave him and used it to feed people. Heck, take $20 billion to fix up US security and clean up New York and use the other half to feed people. And not just feed them with food. What if we decided that people's spirits needing feeding too? What if we chose to take $1 billion and build the biggest, most beautiful mosque in the world, right in the heart of Kabul. And what if we gave it as a gift, no quid pro quo, as a place for people to feed their spirits? What would the reaction be? What do we want the reaction to be? We have choices: It seems we could bomb innocent people to death and celebrate, mirroring the images of this week, and thereby satisfy our thirst for vengeance. But what would that get us? A world that so admired the West that it wanted to emulate it in every way and celebrates its way of life? Or would a large part of the 5 billion people that don't live in the west see things differently? Would more people feel as if vengeance was the only possible response, and figure out more simple and effective ways to terrorize? We can have that kind of world if we choose it. Or we can take Aine's advice and feed people. And what would that get us? There is no better way to rob the world of it's anger and bitterness, jealousy and hate, than to feed people unconditionally...feed their bodies, minds and spirits. Build places of learning, places of spirit, places for healing and nourishment, places of community. Take that $40 billion dollars and spend it in every neighborhood in the world. Put the world to work growing food, healing people, restoring land and water, building communities, creating the thin fibres of connection between peoples, families, communities, cities, nations.... "If we feed them they won't want to eat us." Can you think of a better form of security? --- |
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Fortunately, my shorts are dry, but my eyes aren't. |
"Give a man a fish and he eats for a day. Teach a man to fish and he eats for life." To bad it doesn't make him a nicer person as well. |
I got a letter from Berkley this morning.It was written by a proff,who has been here 35 years,but is originally from Afganistan. It is very poinent.But I don't know how to post it here. Could I maybe forward it one of you,that knows how,and you could post it? Its worth the read. |
we've retaliated with bombs before, and we see where thats got us. the way i see it, we have nothing to loose. |
DaveNet essay, "Mir Tamim Ansary on Afghanistan", released on 9/14/2001; 4:28:07 PM Pacific. ***Mir Tamim Ansary on Afghanistan I've been hearing a lot of talk about "bombing Afghanistan back to the Stone Age." Ronn Owens [2], on KGO Talk Radio today, allowed that this would mean killing innocent people, people who had nothing to do with this atrocity, but "we're at war, we have to accept collateral damage. What else can we do?" Minutes later I heard some TV pundit discussing whether we "have the belly to do what must be done." And I thought about the issues being raised especially hard because I am from Afghanistan, and even though I've lived here for 35 years I've never lost track of what's going on there. So I want to tell anyone who will listen how it all looks from where I'm standing. I speak as one who hates the Taliban and Osama Bin Laden. There is no doubt in my mind that these people were responsible for the atrocity in New York. I agree that something must be done about those monsters. But the Taliban and Ben Laden are not Afghanistan. They're not even the government of Afghanistan. The Taliban are a cult of ignorant psychotics who took over Afghanistan in 1997. Bin Laden is a political criminal with a plan. When you think Taliban, think Nazis. When you think Bin Laden, think Hitler. And when you think "the people of Afghanistan" think "the Jews in the concentration camps." It's not only that the Afghan people had nothing to do with this atrocity. They were the first victims of the perpetrators. They would exult if someone would come in there, take out the Taliban and clear out the rats nest of international thugs holed up in their country. Some say, why don't the Afghans rise up and overthrow the Taliban? The answer is, they're starved, exhausted, hurt, incapacitated, suffering. A few years ago, the United Nations estimated that there are 500,000 disabled orphans in Afghanistan , a country with no economy, no food. There are millions of widows. And the Taliban has been burying these widows alive in mass graves. The soil is littered with land mines, the farms were all destroyed by the Soviets. These are a few of the reasons why the Afghan people have not overthrown the Taliban. We come now to the question of bombing Afghanistan back to the Stone Age. Trouble is, that's been done. The Soviets took care of it already. Make the Afghans suffer? They're already suffering. Level their houses? Done. Turn their schools into piles of rubble? Done. Eradicate their hospitals? Done. Destroy their infrastructure? Cut them off from medicine and health care? Too late. Someone already did all that. New bombs would only stir the rubble of earlier bombs. Would they at least get the Taliban? Not likely. In today's Afghanistan, only the Taliban eat, only they have the means to move around. They'd slip away and hide. Maybe the bombs would get some of those disabled orphans, they don't move too fast, they don't even have wheelchairs. But flying over Kabul and dropping bombs wouldn't really be a strike against the criminals who did this horrific thing. Actually it would only be making common cause with the Taliban--by raping once again the people they've been raping all this time So what else is there? What can be done, then? Let me now speak with true fear and trembling. The only way to get Bin Laden is to go in there with ground troops. When people speak of "having the belly to do what needs to be done" they're thinking in terms of having the belly to kill as many as needed. Having the belly to overcome any moral qualms about killing innocent people. Let's pull our heads out of the sand. What's actually on the table is Americans dying. And not just because some Americans would die fighting their way through Afghanistan to Bin Laden's hideout. It's much bigger than that folks. Because to get any troops to Afghanistan, we'd have to go through Pakistan. Would they let us? Not likely. The conquest of Pakistan would have to be first. Will other Muslim nations just stand by? You see where I'm going. We're flirting with a world war between Islam and the West. And guess what: that's Bin Laden's program. That's exactly what he wants. That's why he did this. Read his speeches and statements. It's all right there. He really believes Islam would beat the west. It might seem ridiculous, but he figures if he can polarize the world into Islam and the West, he's got a billion soldiers. If the west wreaks a holocaust in those lands, that's a billion people with nothing left to lose, that's even better from Bin Laden's point of view. He's probably wrong, in the end the west would win, whatever that would mean, but the war would last for years and millions would die, not just theirs but ours. Who has the belly for that? Bin Laden does. Anyone else? Mir Tamim Ansary |
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Give a mouse a cookie, he'll want a glass of milk, give him a glass of milk and he'll want a straw and so on... |
But Patrick has a very valid point. More,moRE MORE! |
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It makes to much sence. |
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Children are so wise what happens in later life that makes us so stupid and ignorant? |
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wait is this serious? |
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not those cut, chiseled Athenian-sliced super hero types i see so much of here in gay media headquarters.com institute incorporated? Just normal guys.....and maybe a loin cloth or two. |
The Islamic Terrorists only want to kill the unbelievers. That is anyone who does not follow their brand of Islam. I saw this on MSNBC at 1:00AM this morning. In a program about life in Afganistan. It was a year old docementart originally titled "Abandon all Hope". The Arabic POW's in Northern Afganistan had no quams about doing anything to kill the non-believers. Men, women, children it just doesn't matter. |
*gay boys are not wrong, they just don't work in my fantasy life. |
they give me self image complexes. |
and maybe a turban. |
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Have any of you ever seen that tribe,that run around buck naked,except they wear 6 foot long sticks on their penis'? Strangest thing I ever saw. It showed them training their young male children,how to wear and be able to run with the stick-penis thingy's.The children had much shorter stick things.I guess so they don't poke out each others eyes,untill they get more proficient with them. |
i think you are making this entire story up. some weird and twisted fantasy about men, younger men, "training" and their relative "6ft stick penis's" Further, I think it interesting...not once did i say these mythical fellas be gay....i just didnt want them to look like the male imagery i see around here. Yet several interpreted that i wanted them gay. well maybe not interesting crackpot. |
But the documentary that I saw,all they had on were their dick-sticks.Not that cute little hoop skirt thing.It was weird,they were standing around talking,and their dick-sticks were pointing straight up,towards the sky.[maybe keeping them pointing upwards,while talking,is a rule,that had to be implemented,in relation to eyes getting poked out,when the conversation gets heated] They showed one guy,who was getting married,and he was adding all kinds of adornments to his stick. So maybe they have different dick-sticks,for different occasions.Like casual-wear,and dress wear,for those more formal occasions. The children were cute,running around with their little mini-dick-sticks. |
Patrick,maybe you could make yourself a penis-gourd,wear it around town,and see if you can run with it on.Then tell us if you had difficulty maneurving around with it on.[it might be wise for Nico to wear saftey goggles,untill you master it] |
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*blush* |
It's to dangerous around here. |