Scotty

Almost every time I see a smiley it's meant as a derisive insult to whomever is being addressed.

You people are being led down the garden path by bush cheney. The actual suggestion in another thread was this: You'll note it says nothing about the ancestors of present day African-Americans. So the question was are Black Americans lucky to be where they are now, in America, or would they be better off if their ancestors had never been enslaved and brought to America. I would suggest there's really no question the people living in the US today are, by and large, far better off than they would be if they were living in Africa. Nevertheless, modern day Black culture leaves much to be desired, as has been attested by numerous Black intellectuals, educators and journalists. It has resulted in a deterioration of the Black community in the US over the past couple of generations. Single parenthood, lack of education, lack of motivation, a nihilist attitude, and an admiration of 'gangsta' culture and its values have devastated Black communities in the US. And so I suppose you could make the case that in some cases individuals living in urban American slums, without hope, amidst massive crime and violence and family disintegration might well be better off in certain parts of Africa.

You are speaking from ignorance, August, for you have no actual idea what amount or manner of discipline takes place, and whether it might be ideologically motivated or not. How could you possibly? When a poster ceases posting for a while, do you recognize it immediately as a suspension? Do you know who has been warned and for what? Do you know what percentage of posters have been suspended from either end of the political spectrum? No. You actually don't know ANYTHING about it. Your posting manner is utterly unemotional. I don't know if that reflects your personality, but I suppose it must. I don't believe I've ever seen you even come close to insulting another poster. That's admirable, but not something most of us can hope to match. I don't know another poster here who is thus as insulated from moderation policies as you are. Why? Do you imagine there could be a lowering of the intellectual quality of posters? I would suggest that happened some time ago. The majority of posters here do not even understand it is possible to discuss controversial subjects without imputing motivation to the others discussing it, and then growing emotional and insulting. You are virtually unique in being a poster who does not insult others in word, manner or tone. And that does not speak well for this site.

I did not post any remarks which got me suspended. I posted a complaint about the moderation policies and that can't be adequately discussed without an example. Furthermore, I strenuously resist the suggestion that my quote was in any way racist or bigoted.

I made no such suggestion. Are you trolling or simply ignorant?

Your remark is massively ignorant. It appears based on a total lack of understanding of what constitutes racism, or even bigotry.

You don't seem to know what racism is. I don't think you know what an idea is either.

Then why did you make that inference? No one else did.

I did, and nothing happened. Which is par for the course. Then I sent a message to the mods asking for clarrification, and was ignored. Instead I get that indignant note accusing me of making a racist post. And by the way where does it say in the rules that expressing racist or bigoted sentiments are against the rules anyway? I think that's just another example of the political correctness of the moderator. That's especially true given how widely he interprets the terms. And btw I was suspended on an earlier occasion, and I freely admit I broke the rules in insulting another poster. Of course, the other poster started the flames, as he routinely does, and he too was suspended. but that's why I hate the way this site is moderated. I can be insulted, and can't insult back without risking suspension. All I can do is send notes to the moderator who never answers or even acknowledges them.

No. Your continued existence on this site is, like Guyser's, a prime example of them not following their own rules. You insult people on a daily basis, and delight in trolling for Canadian nationalists. If this site were following its own rules you'd have been banned years ago.

I've never been the one to slavishly kowtow to any kind of authority, especially when I think it's unfair. But if that's your thing, hey, go ahead and crawl. Maybe you'll get a pat on the head for being such a good little boy.

What I actually said was I will reserve further judgement till I see exactly what 'child porn' they accessed, but as I've pointed out, this law can put people in prison for looking at pictures of a naked 17 year old. This in a discussion which involved the different elements of child pornography, and whether the material was in fact, depicting the rape of children or whether it was teenagers in front of web cams. What I find frustrating is you can't hold any kind of reasonable discussions on politically or morally controversial subjects because hysterical fools or ideologues will inevitably start sneering, mocking and insulting you. But if you reply in kind you risk being suspended.

You were actually the only person in it until I put the shrill, hysterical woman who accused me of wanting to see child porn in there with you. Which in your estimation is about half the people here. And is there something in the rules which says you can be insulting and disrespectful as long as you only do it to "deserving posters"?

Your ignorance is showing in equating my casual mention of a longstanding argument among social policy advocates in the US. Many prominent Black Americans have decried the gangsta culture, the anti-intellectualism, the sexual promiscuity and lackadaisical work ethic among Blacks. mentioning it isn't racism. first page of google search

I will reply to you on this thread, though you are on my ignore list. One of only two people on it. You are consistently insulting, disrespectful, mocking and derisive in your posts. If this site were moderated according to its stated rules you would have been banned years ago. So your continued presence actually supports my contention that the site has different rules for different posters.

I've come to suspect the moderation of this site is based largely on the ideological and political beliefs of the posters. Ie, if you're right of center and step so much as a toe across the line the moderator will be on you, but if you're left of center you almost have to threaten to kill someone before he'll stir himself. For example, during the thread I have a question on Countries governed by Black governments I posted, among other things, this with regard to another poster speaking of Blacks being lucky to have gotten out of Africa and made it to the US. For that I got the following from one Charles Anthony. Please avoid posting racism and bigotry. Comments like this are outrageous and unacceptable in this forum. I put it to you that my comments, especially in context, were not the least bit bigoted or racist. They were observations many have made on the problems with American black culture. On the other hand, comments like this: And the CHILD porn viewers. And apparently you, you sick f***. But maybe the cops have your IP number now. and this I bet you want to see the child porn. Are apparently perfectly acceptable because the people who made them are left of centre. Of course, there's no way of telling how many left of the center people are suspended or banned or warned vs right of center people, because the moderator won't tell you. I'll probably wind up being banned, but I'm coming to like this place less and less anyway entirely due to the moderation. I note whenever I look at old threads I see all kinds of intelligent frequent posters who are gone. I wonder why they left. There don't seem to be many people still here who are capable of having an intelligent conversation without insulting and ridiculing other posters. That in itself is a strong commentary on the moderation.

If this web site was properly moderated you'd have already been suspended. Since the moderator doesn't know how to do his job or isn't interested in doing his job I'll have to put you into my ignore file. I certainly don't intend to engage in any further dialogue with a rancid mind like yours.

Canadian troops in Bosnia had not been bombing anyone, nor had other UN troops, when they were taken hostage and chained to bridges. Dutch troops in Rwanda had not attacked anyone when they were slaughtered. UN troops in the middle east in several locations had not attacked anyone when they were themselves attacked. I think you have your cause confused with your reaction. Today's conflicts involve too many non-national players now, people who can't guarantee the behavior of their own combatants, even assuming you can trust what the leaders say. It's not like the old days when conflicts involved nation-states who could pretty much be held to their word when they accepted UN intervention.

They have their own issues with a dumbass cultural belief system which admires gangsters and sees the government as the enemy, welfare as a right, and education as unimportant.

You mean like when locals respected the blue helmets ... before they started shooting them, or chaining them to bridges? Been outside much the last few decades?

I've often wondered how much help all this 'help' actually is. I'm sure that in individual cases it's very useful, but overall, I don't see it's had much result, and it might be too much 'help' dissuades local initiative in many cases. I don't think you can count countries like Rhodesia, established by a more technologically sophisticated people with the aid and support of the colonizing nation for some centuries (not to mention they imported horses and cattle). Of course, once it got taken over by the locals it fell to crap. But what kind of experience and education did they have before the place was handed to them? And what kind of democratic instincts for compromise and economic development did the likes of Robert Mugabe have? Different story again. The people in Haiti are largely the descendants of the slaves brought over to do the rough labour. The people of DM are largely the descendents of the colonizers. Haiti never had an existence as a black country. It's residents had no culture or values of unity or history. They were completely uneducated and inexperienced, and wound up establishing (surprise surprise) a craphole. One strong man took over from another, and you had corruption, violence and incompetence for decades, and still do. And of course, the culture is ... undesirable, to say the least. I think they usually are. But so much of the aid is overseen without any real organization by scores of separate aid and governmental organizations which often don't coordinate very well. And of course, over time, the local urban cultures have not given rise to the kind of work ethic we see in the West or Asia.

I don't think race has anything to do with the failure of Black countries, despite the fact that Blacks, in general, have failed countries. If you want the reason, you can look to history. First, as to why Blacks didn't develop in the same way Whites did, you can look to the fact that Africa, as lush as it was, was not friendly to the idea of large scale human development. Why wasn't it? What did Europe have that Africa lacked? Africa, and this is going back a ways so my memory might be a bit foggy, lacked one thing for sure, and possibly the second. It lacked animal power. Now you might think there are lots of animals in Africa, sure. But what it lacked was an animal they could domesticate to use for power in the way oxen and cattle and horses and camels were domesticated in other areas. Without that domestic animal, which other parts of the world also lacked, notably the Americas, they could rely only on their own muscles, and only their own feet. Areas of the world without these animals didn't develop very far. A second thing needed, which I think most of Africa also lacked, was a type of food which could be easily grown and could feed a lot of people. I don't believe the kinds of crops which sustained early Europeans and Asians were available to them, ie wheat, rice, corn, etc. Without that you couldn't build a nation very large because there wouldn't be enough food in a given area to sustain them, and without animal power you couldn't move food from outlying areas. I think they also lacked a food beast, an animal which could be domesticated and held on farms in the way cows, pigs, chickens, sheep, etc. were held, grown and butchered for food. Not entirely sure of that. So, then came colonialism. The big problem colonialism caused was not that it destroyed their self-esteem or anything. The big problem was that the Europeans drew borders which had little or nothing to do with the actual tribes and nations which lived there. As long as the Europeans were in charge that didn't matter. When they left, you found 'nations' which were artificial creations, that were shared by several tribes (nations) which were historic enemies. Civil war was the norm, not the exception, and there was little in the way of compromise and accommodation. And, of course, there was little in the way of education either. There was no one left who had any experience in how to run a nation. So of course, everything fell to pieces. Why is Africa still a crap hole? Because they never developed the cultural idea of democracy there, still have mutually hostile populations within the same borders, and still (no money) lack the infrastructure for a modern economy. Plus, of course, the shaky governmental structures are invariably corrupt, which means multinational corporations or foreign governments (notably France and China) can buy them off so they let their resources be raped away.

This is politically correct nonsense. The fact is that every powerful nation or culture in the history of the world up until the present era has used that wealth and power to expand and conquer all around them. The Europeans were no worse, and in many instances, a hell of a lot better than those who came before them. Have a look at some of the eastern empires from Asia, India or the Mid-east, and how they treated their weaker neighbors, sometime. They weren't exactly kind. For that matter, within Africa, nations which were more powerful preyed on their neighbors, conquering them, slaughtering them, taking their land for themselves. And no, the Europeans didn't invent the concept of slavery. It was in wide use long before their ascendance. And they, at least, were the first ones to develop a social conscience to the extent they eliminated slavery and then freed the subjugated nations. The rest of your odious, self righteous nonsense I'll leave to others.

I think it generally is jealousy and resentment. $30hr is about $60,000 a year. That's a decent living but not exactly rich. City bus drivers make a lot more than that. But you've got a whole lot of people who resent not making much, and instead of wishing they had more skills or had a better job they resent the workers who are better compensated. We see this all the time in the campaigning corporate America is doing on behalf of 'right to work' which is such a hypocritical term. Corporate America bribes politicians (mostly Republicans) to bring up these bills, and campaigns for them by trying to tell everyone that those making more are 'greedy' and somehow responsible in some way for those other people getting less. Those 'greedy' unionsts are responsible for there not being more jobs too! It's all their fault! Nothing to do with corporate America shifting work overseas, of course. Such is the poor nature of education and the poor nature of the news 'infotainment' business that their message seems to be working, especially in the south and midwest, where you've got a lot of hicks, a lot of ignorant, gullible people. Still, it's not like we don't see the same attitude here, especially towards public service workers.

I did not say it was entirely victimless. I said it depends on the material. And the police call them 'victims' but they are teenagers, so I'm not sure how victimized they really are. The police like to scare people. As for your apology, you can stick it sideways.